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Terrible2s's picture

Black and White or Shades of Grey?

So I'm a little confused about the Gender Binary.

In Grobstein's lecture we learned that there cannot exists any (T)ruths or facts, because science is constantly disproving and finding new observations and creating new stories. So I guess her statistics could lead to many different stories/summaries of observation/hypotheses.  It seems that Roughgarden reflects this idea of science in other areas of her book, too. When she speaks of the Gender Binary she brings up the idea that there is not and should not be only two defined genders.  This makes sense. The way I see it it's a spectrum just like anything else; there is no black and white. But what I am confused by is how we bring that into practice. I guess I'm not really wondering to disprove and/or question her work, but instead to help my own understanding. Is it wrong to categorize people into two genders? Is it that she's "against" the gender binary, or that she thinks it is limiting? What changes would she propose? Is Bryn Mawr's all-womens aspect wrong? Should we go "gender neutral"? Should we not use words like "male" and "female"? What should we use? Is calling someone "masculine" or "feminine" wrong?

(This is more of a side issue that has been bothering me about her writing... She seems to be basing her facts on narratives and many psychologists reports. She gladly uses her research to prove points she deems important but then will justify the lack of evidence for one of her points by saying things like the subjects of the topic of conversation might "not regularly consult with therapists, and so don't figure in the narratives compiled by therapists" and "often live in 'stealth' " (269, Roughgarden). So does she want us to believe her proof or not? Obviously it is partially flawed, so how much of her statistics and resulting "facts" can we believe?)

 

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