OT: how to deal with gender

Rails
1

On 2 August 2010 17:29, Marnen Laibow-Koser [email protected]
wrote:

probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.
As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are
sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the
difference between physiological sex. But that’s the point - it’s the
physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

It might be an interesting experiment to store both sex and
gender-identity of the subject of the DB, but probably outside the
OP’s requirement.

For genders, there are more than two categories

I did say that… ‘“Masculine”, “feminine”, “neutral”, etc’

but for the vast, overwhelming majority there are only
two choices; either being male or female, and that’s your sex (whether
it changes over the duration of your life is a different debate :slight_smile:

No. Your sex doesn’t change over the duration of your life if you’re a
human (at least, not without surgery, but that’s a different debate).

That (the potential surgical change) was my point.
But it’s interesting that you say “Sex is biological” (whereas I used
“physiological”), as can “biology” be changed with surgery - does
having my genitals removed change my biological sex as well as my
physiologically identifiable sex? If not… does that mean my DB needs
three fields?! arrgh!

God gave them.

right… time for me to stop there :slight_smile:

2

Michael P. wrote:

On 2 August 2010 17:29, Marnen Laibow-Koser [email protected]
wrote:

probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.
As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are
sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the
difference between physiological sex. But that’s the point - it’s the
physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

I think this is an open question, and the OP needs to decide this for
himself. Baby names would seem to have more to do with gender than sex.
This is actually something of a data analysis issue.

It might be an interesting experiment to store both sex and
gender-identity of the subject of the DB, but probably outside the
OP’s requirement.

Probably so.

�For genders, there are more than two categories

I did say that… ‘“Masculine”, “feminine”, “neutral”, etc’

I wasn’t sure whether you were talking about grammatical gender or
sociological gender.

but for the vast, overwhelming majority there are only
two choices; either being male or female, and that’s your sex (whether
it changes over the duration of your life is a different debate :slight_smile:

No. �Your sex doesn’t change over the duration of your life if you’re a
human (at least, not without surgery, but that’s a different debate).

That (the potential surgical change) was my point.

OK.

But it’s interesting that you say “Sex is biological” (whereas I used
“physiological”), as can “biology” be changed with surgery - does
having my genitals removed change my biological sex as well as my
physiologically identifiable sex?

That, I think, depends on how you define biological sex. If you
interpret “biologically male” to mean “has a Y chromosome”, then no. If
you interpret “biologically male” as “possesses a penis”, then yes.

If not… does that mean my DB needs
three fields?! arrgh!

I suppose that depends on whether you care about all three pieces of
data. I could imagine medical applications where you would need all
three.

God gave them.

right… time for me to stop there :slight_smile:

? I’m using “God” as convenient shorthand for “God/whatever combination
of natural forces came into play here”. If that’s a discussion-stopper
for you, then I’m not sure how to respond to that. :slight_smile:

Best,

Marnen Laibow-Koser
http://www.marnen.org
[email protected]

3

Marnen Laibow-Koser wrote:

Michael P. wrote:

On 2 August 2010 17:29, Marnen Laibow-Koser [email protected]
wrote:

probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.
As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are
sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the
difference between physiological sex. But that’s the point - it’s the
physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

I think this is an open question, and the OP needs to decide this for
himself. Baby names would seem to have more to do with gender than sex.
This is actually something of a data analysis issue.

Well, this discussion certainly has “gone down the rabbit hole” so to
speak.

I mean let’s face it. When people think about baby names. and creating
lists of them for a boy or a girl this discussion of sex vs. gender, and
attempts to define either, completely misses the point.

What about “the boy named Sue?” It really only matters to the individual
picking the name whether they consider it suitable as a boy’s name, a
girl’s name or both. All that’s required is that the name can be
categorized by the person creating the lists.