Gender pronouns and you
 

Well, recently I had a run in with a friend of mine. We were talkin' about stuff and she ended up trying to hook me up with a friend of hers. I turned her offer down, because said person is a transgendered woman and quite frankly that's basically dating a man to me.

Now, during this conversation, I referred to her friend as a he. She took offense to that, telling me that it's what they believe themselves to be that matters. I responded that I viewed that person as a man, since the only real difference to me between that person and a man is cosmetic surgery.

Now, is it more important that someone's gender determined by genetics, or by their state of mind?

State of mind. We had a section about this in psychology/philosophy class (I say slash cuz it was really neither of either, but a writing class on both).

The reasoning behind this: Not all men are necessarily "manly" and not all women are necessarily "girly". It's not uncommon to see a tomboy, or a ridiculously effeminate gay man. Thus, using genetically born genders to describe someone may not necessarily describe their personality. It sounds like a strange concept, I know, but I still call all my gay friends girls, and they're perfectly okay with that!

Of course, I'm not really saying if a girl is manly, start calling her a guy. I'm saying, "gender" is really becoming a more and more skewed term as time goes on due to our ... "evolving" pop culture. That's really the only way I can put it.

Also, I had a similar problem with your situation...Although mine's a tad bit stranger. The guy was perfectly happy, rather small and petite, but VERY aggressive/into heavy metal etc. etc. Had a long-term girlfriend, was very happy with her, and then 2 weeks later I found out he got a sex change and was now a girl. My parents never saw her after that....And truth be told, neither did I, really. She was really creepin' me out.

They like to be referred to as their trans-gender, in any case.

We've had a similar discussion in this forum before and it really did not end up well. This is a big mess in definition where everybody is right and wrong because the definition of 'gender' is such a messed up thing.

However, your friend who took offense needs to understand your point of view as well, and it's very presumptuous of her to even try to set you up with a transgender without knowing your feelings on it. You have a right to be attracted to whatever gender you want, if you want good old fashioned females, thats your business and she should respect that.

If she doesn't, she's not much of a friend.

I think we generally need to work out three or a dozen or however many new pronouns and then this sort of thing will be a lot easier for everybody.

No... FtM = Man, MtF = Woman. I can’t understand it being any different.

That doesn't mean that you have to go out with her. :sweatdrop

...Yes.

Gender neutral pronouns? I favour:

Ve (He/She)
Ver (Him/Her)
Vis (His/Hers)

...not that I ever have an opportunity to use them.

I'd go ahead and call someone by whichever pronoun they preferred for cases like this.

This isn't because I think that the biological sex of a person isn't an objective thing or that it can truly biologically change. It's simply that if someone decides they really don't feel like a guy and they don't wanna look like a guy or act (gender role typically) like a guy, then their whole identity doesn't match with 'male' - they wanna disassociate themselves from that label. While the label is strictly arbitrary, I don't know any good reasons for not being fine with that wish and calling them what they want. Perhaps the best case would be 'So other people can know the person is not a biological <gender here>', but couldn't that be pretty easily established by stuff other than pronouns?

Not 100% sure I agree with more pronouns either for this kinda thing. It'd almost be like trying to create a new identity or group for transgendered folks that they don't need if the regular pronouns actually mostly work. It's kinda like, you could more quickly identify people via pronouns if we made subdivisions for race, hair colour, sexual orientation or other stuff, it's just that these things can be established without making possibly unnecessary words.

Though I could easily stand corrected if I'm wrong on the necessity here, I'm just making what I can out of it.

Now, see, I've got no problem with you wanting to associate with another gender. However I do have an issue with you telling me how to refer to you. To me it's the same thing as calling a white person a black person, or vice versa.

@Tyrfing, that's your definition. My definition of man, for example, is that you have a certain ration of testosterone to estrogen, having a prostrate, produces sperm, and has XY chromosomes. To me you can not change the fact of being male or female more than can change your blood type or eye color naturally. So far what you and pict said is that some people identify themselves with stuff considering feminine or girly. Whatever floats their boat.

...Which raises the question, what are people who only meet some of those criteria or their biological characteristics are split (i.e. intersex)?

Really speaking, if you've gone the whole mile, 1) you no longer have the main organs involved in maintaining your natural male/female hormonal rhythm, and 2) you've introduced hormones in levels that correspond to whichever you feel yourself to be. So mostly what you have left is just the fact that you were given a certain set of genes. Incidentally, it's possible for fetuses to possess XX or XY chromosomes and still form the opposite body type.

I'm going to avoid the whole argument regarding distinctions between male/female and man/woman and just say there's one to be made between being/feeling masculine or feminine and feeling like a man or a woman. There are a lot of girls who act like guys in certain ways, or vice versa, but still identify as their birth sex. Alternately, there are, say, MtFs who aren't particularly feminine but still conclude, for whatever reason, that they're women inside.

The majorly messed up part is expecting Odjn to be okay with it. There is no way in hell I'd be able to get past the mental block associated with anything more than a strictly friends relationship with that person. To me it would be the same thing as a friend setting me up with a gay guy. I have no problems with people being gay, I am not though, and don't welcome same sex advances.

While I am sure to catch flack for this, I'm just being honest about my feelings on the matter of intimate relationships with trans-gender guys-who-were-chicks. It's great that they feel better and how they should be, just don't expect me to want to have an intimate relationship with it. I wouldn't be able to get over the idea that they were a guy.

I would've been honest with the setting up friend and lay that down, it wouldn't be fair to do to the trans-gender party.

Me neither. I like my women to be... well... women.

Ya know, come to think of it I'm not sure how transgenders find normal relationships. Seems like the whole transgender thing would mess up a lot of possibilities, making it quite difficult. Lets take a man changed to a woman example, MOST straight guys (not just you) wouldn't be able to get past that so thats out. Most gay guys want other gay guys, not transgenders, so a good proportion of homosexuals are out. Most straight woman actually want a man man, not a transgender who considers themselves female so there no go there. And most lesbians want a lack of male genitalia, so thats kind of rough there too.

Man... even finding someone who would want to date would be insanely difficult, wouldn't it?