A gender related question

[Fether]

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

[The Nehor]

19 minutes ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

Doubt it. If God did not take steps to make sure everyone’s sexuality was in conformity with His plan I see little reason to believe He was strict on avoiding all gender mistakes.

Edited August 7, 2022 by The Nehor

[LoudmouthMormon]

1 hour ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

For almost everyone?  For the typical human?  Sure.   For 100% of all humans?  Naw.   Factors that determine sex include chromosomes and genes (set at conception), hormones (in utero), internal and external sex organs, and secondary sex characteristics that appear with puberty.  If you printed out every abnormality known to medicine and put them all in a big stack, you could pull out a couple dozen sheets of paper detailing something that doesn't make all of humanity a simple binary.  Just the vast, vast, vast, VAST, overwhelmingly vast number of humans fit into a simple binary.  

But you can find stuff like turner syndrome, or ambiguous genitals (as in born with both sets of biological parts), or someone born with both a wiener and fallopian tubes, or 5-alpha reductase deficiency, or chromosomal abnormalities, or, I mean, take a look:

 

Keep in mind I haven't even mentioned the "I don't match with the body I was born with" stuff that's so popular these days.  Looking at neurology/mental/behavioral issues, there are dysmorphias and dysphorias, maybe add another dozen or two sheets of paper. 

Again, and this point often gets lost in the discussion, just about everyone everywhere, just about every human everywhere, are either male or female.  There's a tiny, tiny, miniscule percentage where the answer ain't that easy.  And given current winds of changing culture, you can find more and more percentages of humans (largely teen girls and young women) going the feelings/dysphoria route.  Is it a cultural contagion?  Is it harmful old cultural structures falling away and humans are finally free to do what they've always wanted to?  Get back to me after another dozen years and we'll see.

Anyway, the phrase "essential characteristic" I think is a good one.  Some folks might come into this world to miss an essential or two during their mortal probation.  Although I've never had any sort of issue with my gender not matching my sex, or my biological sex not being normal, I can have empathy with folks who don't fit.  And I can love my neighbor if they're here somewhere.

Edited August 7, 2022 by LoudmouthMormon

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

Unlikely as that would imply to me all genetics were a reflection of a person’s true physical form and that would include genetic deformities or disorders.  I think best to assume our genetics are an approximation of our eternal physical form.

[CV75]

1 hour ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

This is a statement of doctrinal truth. I think the prefect way for those having the need to figure our their gender is the Restored gospel, and the Perfect Figure-outer will help them deal with this need or with this figuring just as He does with every eternally significant need and question.

[The Nehor]

1 hour ago, CV75 said:

This is a statement of doctrinal truth. I think the prefect way for those having the need to figure our their gender is the Restored gospel, and the Perfect Figure-outer will help them deal with this need or with this figuring just as He does with every eternally significant need and question.

The LGBT community would like a word.

[DT_]

3 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Doubt it. If God did not take steps to make sure everyone’s sexuality was in conformity with His plan I see little reason to believe He was strict on avoiding all gender mistakes.

Can a person with complete androgen insensitivity who identifies as a man/male receive the priesthood? 

[Calm]

7 minutes ago, DT_ said:

Can a person with complete androgen insensitivity who identifies as a man/male receive the priesthood? 

My guess is it is taken on a case by case basis and under certain circumstances they would (if they had been raised as male for example) and others they might not (if they had been thought to be female and raised female, perhaps even gotten married to a man because it was expected, perhaps not).

[DT_]

Just now, Calm said:

My guess is it is taken on a case by case basis and under certain circumstances they would (if they had been raised as male for example) and others they might not (if they had been thought to be female and raised female, perhaps even gotten married to a man because it was expected, perhaps not).

Good answer. I like it.

[rpn]

No.  One in 1666 births are not chromosomely either male or female.  (The term is intersex.)   (And I think it was in the last press conference about lgbtq issues  4-5 years ago that the answer to a question like this was that the leadership was still working on how to handle such cases.) Understandable that this isn't the same LBGT+ issue because it isn't possible in science yet to know what gender that person's spirit might be, presumably. 

For most of the earth's existence (before we knew about chromosomes), the child was raised how the external genitalia most closely presented.  (If you had anything that remotely looked like a penis, you were a boy.)

 

Edited August 8, 2022 by rpn

[the narrator]

17 hours ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

No, because the notion of a premortal, unembodied, non-biological spirit being sexed or gendered is nonsensical--meaning it lacks sense.

[LoudmouthMormon]

1 hour ago, the narrator said:

No, because the notion of a premortal, unembodied, non-biological spirit being sexed or gendered is nonsensical--meaning it lacks sense.

Has someone suggested you take a look at the website you’re posting on? I don’t want to like keep bugging you about it.

[Fether]

2 hours ago, the narrator said:

No, because the notion of a premortal, unembodied, non-biological spirit being sexed or gendered is nonsensical--meaning it lacks sense.

Go back and play with your legos. The adults are talking right now.

Edited August 8, 2022 by Fether

[mfbukowski]

22 hours ago, Fether said:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

Are chromosomes a perfect way of figuring out what a person’s true and intended physical gender is?

No more than being born with cancer is God's curse. Stuff happens 

[rodheadlee]

22 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Doubt it. If God did not take steps to make sure everyone’s sexuality was in conformity with His plan I see little reason to believe He was strict on avoiding all gender mistakes.

Yeah or they were caused by things men did to the Earth or to each other. 

[katherine the great]

18 hours ago, DT_ said:

Can a person with complete androgen insensitivity who identifies as a man/male receive the priesthood? 

I doubt a person with complete androgen insensitivity would ever identify as a male. Women have testosterone in varying levels but an AIS woman with complete insensitivity would almost be a super female since she couldn’t respond to any androgens at all. 

[pogi]

2 hours ago, katherine the great said:

I doubt a person with complete androgen insensitivity would ever identify as a male. 

I got curious:

Quote

The findings support the assumption made by Meyer-Bahlburg ( 2010 ) that gender outcome in people with CAIS is more variable than generally stated. Parents and professionals should thus be open to courses of gender development other than typically female in individuals with CAIS.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26133743/

Here is a case report:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/42807732_Male_Gender_Identity_in_Complete_Androgen_Insensitivity_Syndrome

It just goes to show just how ambiguous the roles of genotype, phenotype, and personal identification really are in gender ID.  They all can play a role in legitimate ways.  

No one (hopefully, but probably not realistically) would fault a CAIS individual for identifying as a woman, despite being genetically male with XY chromosomes.   We have been told by some that gender is objectively determined by genes and that gender based priesthood ordination should not be determined by how one subjectively identifies.  If that is true, than all CAIS individuals who have XY chromosomes should be eligible for the priesthood.  Feelings don't matter.  They shouldn't have a choice in their gender, right?  They are genetically of the male sex and feelings shouldn't matter with gender.    Until someone can demonstrate exactly what gender is and how it can be determined objectively, why shouldn't subjective experience matter?  What percentage should genes play a role?  Phenotype?  Feelings?  This is all objective after all, right?

These are questions not necessarily directed at you katherine.  Just throwing out some thoughts for anyone to comment on.   

 

 

Edited August 8, 2022 by pogi

[the narrator]

2 hours ago, Fether said:

Go back and play with your legos. The adults are talking right now.

Please enlighten me on what it means--what sense it has--for an unembodied, non-biological spirit to be sexed or gendered.

[Stormin' Mormon]

38 minutes ago, the narrator said:

Please enlighten me on what it means--what sense it has--for an unembodied, non-biological spirit to be sexed or gendered.

So very little has been revealed about our unembodied existence, one can only speculate about what gender meant in that context.  But it's really not that hard to imagine that spirits exist in some kind of binary fashion.  Think of them as the positive and negative forces from a magnet, or the positive and negative charges of subatomic particles. 

This report on a psychological study indicates that speakers of non-gendered languages tend to assign gender to even the most abstract concepts; odd numbers tend to be thought of as male and even numbers are thought of as female.  (https://www.vice.com/en/article/gvv8vy/the-gender-binaries-new-study-says-people-assign-gender-to-numbers)

Unembodied gender need to be anything more than a type of binary polarity. 

Edited August 8, 2022 by Stormin' Mormon

[Fether]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

No more than being born with cancer is God's curse. Stuff happens 

My question is about how one figures out their real gender if there is confusion due to a mixup of chromosomes or genitalia

[Fether]

1 hour ago, the narrator said:

Please enlighten me on what it means--what sense it has--for an unembodied, non-biological spirit to be sexed or gendered.

I don’t know that I have a good answer, but I Believe it.

I’m not asking if gender is eternal, I’m curious about the implications of it.

Please don’t derail the thread because you reject the premise. Go start your own.

[the narrator]

28 minutes ago, Stormin' Mormon said:

So very little has been revealed about our unembodied existence, one can only speculate about what gender meant in that context.  But it's really not that hard to imagine that spirits exist in some kind of binary fashion.  Think of them as the positive and negative forces from a magnet, or the positive and negative charges of subatomic particles. 

This report on a psychological study indicates that speakers of non-gendered languages tend to assign gender to even the most abstract concepts; odd numbers tend to be thought of as male and even numbers are thought of as female.  (https://www.vice.com/en/article/gvv8vy/the-gender-binaries-new-study-says-people-assign-gender-to-numbers)

Unembodied gender need to be anything more than a type of binary polarity. 

So, then, I guess you agree with me that premortal "gender" lacks sense in that it is completely different from how "gender" is used in relation to biological bodies and lacks any identifiable definition beyond a binary polarity that would then make polar directions, left & right, up & down, light & dark, on & off, etc equivalent to gender.

Would you then say that computers run on gender?

[the narrator]

5 minutes ago, Fether said:

I don’t know that I have a good answer, but I Believe it.

And I am asking you to provide some sense to what it is you believe. If you don't care to, that's cool.

[katherine the great]

40 minutes ago, Stormin' Mormon said:

odd numbers tend to be thought of as male and even numbers are thought of as female. 

I always thought males were odd. 🤷‍♀️

[Calm]

1 hour ago, pogi said:

I got curious:

Here is a case report:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/42807732_Male_Gender_Identity_in_Complete_Androgen_Insensitivity_Syndrome

It just goes to show just how ambiguous the roles of genotype, phenotype, and personal identification really are in gender ID.  They all can play a role in legitimate ways.  

No one (hopefully, but probably not realistically) would fault a CAIS individual for identifying as a woman, despite being genetically male with XY chromosomes.   We have been told by some that gender is objectively determined by genes and that gender based priesthood ordination should not be determined by how one subjectively identifies.  If that is true, than all CAIS individuals who have XY chromosomes should be eligible for the priesthood.  Feelings don't matter.  They shouldn't have a choice in their gender, right?  They are genetically of the male sex and feelings shouldn't matter with gender.    Until someone can demonstrate exactly what gender is and how it can be determined objectively, why shouldn't subjective experience matter?  What percentage should genes play a role?  Phenotype?  Feelings?  This is all objective after all, right?

These are questions not necessarily directed at you katherine.  Just throwing out some thoughts for anyone to comment on.   

 

 

Priesthood is optional, isn’t it?  Would refusing it because one identified as a woman and had always been treated as a woman keep one out of the temple?  I would hope not.  I can see an issue if doing proxy work though. In a case where they had always lived their life as a woman and only because of modern science are we aware that they have XY chromosomes while other biological factors influence them identifying as women, I would hope we embrace them as women and allow temple access including serving proxy for other women. If this is in error, it can be resolved with all the other millions of likely errors that have or will be done in proxy work if our records ultimately are meant to be perfect reflections of partakers of eternal life. 

Edited August 8, 2022 by Calm