You do not need microscopes, telescopes, or even eyeglasses to determine sex differences. The existence of chromosomal abnormalities does not mean we need to change the meaning of words.

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froh 8 months ago | parent | next [-]

and you can tell with the naked eye that an intersex baby is intersex, and neither "properly" male or female. except when the baby looks very female but is genetically male due to androgen insensitivity syndrome. then you need that microscope again...

kindergarten level logic fails at physiological sex ambiguity.

and it fails even more so at gender identity issues.

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remarkEon 8 months ago | parent [-]

Not following your point, unless it's merely to say that parsing observable reality isn't good enough to determine the precise levels of hormones flowing through someone's body, which, fine. That's certainly true. However ... physiological characteristics are in fact dictated to a large extent by hormones, and as a result one can realistically make a good inference about e.g. who has more testosterone.

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froh 8 months ago | parent [-]

my point is: biological sex follows a bimodal distribution with some in-between data points that are not trivially assignable to one or the other pole, called "intersex" humans. they are a biological, medical reality, and they themselves ask to leave children alone and allow them to decide when and if at all they want medical interventions.

	▲	remarkEon 8 months ago \| parent [-]
		Even calling it bimodal obscures the truth, though. When people read "bimodal" they think of the two-humped-camel plot, when reality is like two 60-story skyscrapers a mile apart with an apartment building or two in between.

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sapphicsnail 8 months ago | parent | prev [-]

People routinely can't tell I'm trans. The differences are a lot more subtle than people realize.