there's your sex, there's your gender,there's your sexuality

[Deleted]

Quoting something Ativan said to me privately.

There is your sex, there is your gender, and there is your sexuality. They can line up, but one is never more than the other, they are separate things....


I totally never understood or heard thissbefore.

It's huge. It changes how I see everything right now.

Thoughts my dears, as it applies to you?

I believe it by the way, completely, and I see where imbalance and misunderstanding this has caused many problems.

I hope Ativan does not mind going public on a private email quoted out of context. But it's bound to help many.

Trinity

[Deleted]

I agree. I think conflating them has caused a lot of people a lot of trouble when trying to work out their identities.

[Edge]

Personally, I still find it weird that "sex" usually means "these sexually dimorphic organs and chromosomes" and "gender" usually means "this sexually dimorphic organ." Then again, I'm in the odd position of my sex being labelled female, being very uncomfortable with that, and thinking my gender is both regardless of my brain being male. All in all, I think it's more complicated than most people think and I don't know how to define either of those two terms in a concrete way.
I don't know why there are still people who conflated sexuality with gender. It's frustrating.

[Ativan Prescribed]

They can overlap, just like a Venn diagram. But even overlapped from a top view, they are separate from a side view.
And those circles don't necessarily have to be uniform in any way.
Often, Cis perspective and expectation are of sex and gender overlapping exactly.
But just because they might, they are still separate things.
Not a perfect view, how does intersex work into that simplistic view?
That circle gets to be its own color(s)?
Same with gender and NB, same with sexuality and all it's variations.
You can make it as complicated as necessary, but mostly, the bottom line is they are still, separate things.

[Edge]

Well, the sex of the various sexually dimorphic organs and chromosomes that fall under the usual definition of "sex" don't always overlap exactly either. How come those organs are considered part of "sex," but the brain isn't?

[Ativan Prescribed]

I did call it a simplistic view, and that's a good question.
Probably goes back to the times that people didn't know any better.
Pretty much like thousands of years ago, I assume.
It's the very first thing people do, to their children and back when most people owned animals, when they were born as well.
Around here, there are lots of factory chicken farms.
You can get a starting job, no education needed, you pick up new chicks and you sex them.
Turn them over and take a peek at what they got.
Chicken sexer's.
Nobody asks them if they are trans or otherwise, pretty much like most people in the world still do for their children and animals.
But keep on pushing those questions Edge, it's people like you who ask the hard ones that need to be answered, correctly.
And not just assumed like a chicken sexer. What they see is considered the sex.
What the brain thinks, is considered the gender. They're starting to figure out how that works.
Sex is still important when it comes to procreation. Someday we just might be able to do without that as a consideration.
When questions are important enough, when they are asked enough, we look for the answers. Research Scientist's do that a lot.
When you figure out the answers and they are peer approved, you get to use that title.

[Deleted]

Here is where I am on it.

Sex, is what you have physically, once corrected to your needs. Your correct body, the body you want, the endgame of transition, physically.

Sexuality, is how you feel sexually, your attractions, what you do in bed, how your body is hardwired for pleasure or to please.

Gender, is who you are, as you relate to the world, who you are in your core, its not limited to sex, Its like, well, not a guy, not one of those folks, not a girl, not one of those either, a me, a unique gender made of me, and presenting as me, in terms of what I need to look like, wear, be, me. You. Us. Nonbinaries.

Mine dont line up all the way. Doesnt matter. But if my sex is dominating my gender, if my sexuality is overpowering my gender, is that good....

And I havent figured any of this out yet, for myself, for you, for others. But I know what they are in themselves, what they want to be, for me, and I think I know about others here, based on what they have said, bits and pieces.

But my gender I dont think is my sex, or I'd be a girl. Or an mtf girl. Or Mtf noop, shemale.labels fail. That may line up with my gender, now that I het two years of hrt, almost.

My sexuality would make me a girl, all the way. And I'm not.

My gender would make me a nothing. Or an mtf androgyne which I am. Or a girl then a guy then andro then a shemale then queer then .... forget it ... fluid...But it falls far short of describing the whole me.

So, it takes three to see the diamond. Three dimensional diamond.

Just thinking. Just describing how it is with me personally.

And I need them balanced.



So it's all part of a three legged stool, which represents the whole of us, right?

What happens when the legs aren't right?

Confusion? Frustration?

In Mtf trans, is it winner takes all?

Just thinking, playing with it.

[Ativan Prescribed]

They are as you described them, for you. It can be a little more complicated, but essentially...
That they are different things, sure, the level of importance at any given time can change and it does.
Depending on how you perceive them is how changing one might affect the others, it's subjective.
Sex is easily defined, relatively.
Gender is a part of your thought process as well as sexuality, but they are two different things for the most part.
But very easily connected for each individual. They are separate when talking about people in general, a way to define things.
It's very easy to blend them in ways that one affects another, it's that way most of the time for most people.
But just knowing that it doesn't have to be, that you can make a conscious decision, one doesn't have power over another.
You are who you are, don't get me wrong, you don't have a choice about each one, but you can in how they interact.
You see someone who turns you on, your sexuality comes to the front, you get dressed and your gender might be more to the front.
But you can also dress according to gender, and to be sexually provocative as well, they both come to the front.

I see myself as some combination of 'she', 'he', and self.
They are very interconnected, I'm not that aware of she or he unless I stop to think about it, most of the time.
But my sex, gender and sexuality are separate, and of course they are all connected, but those connections can be changed and do change.
Sometimes we don't have the ability to control those connections, sometimes we do.
But knowing the structure can be empowering. Anywhere from awareness to complete control.
There's really not as much rigidity in any of this like it's being written, just sounds that way for lack of a better way to describe it.
It's not the end all of how it works, just a way of perceiving things, but that's how we see most everything, as perceptions.
Two people can stand on the edge of the Grand Canyon, one see's a lot of breathtaking beauty, the other see's a big fricken hole in the ground.
Perceptions. Not trying to change the way people see any of this, it's just a perception.
But I think it's one that as it was told to me, as I read about this and that, what others have said, it seems like one that can be mutual for a lot of us.
But even then, no two people are going to see it the same, even if a definitive answer to it could be made.

[Sisyphus]

I think of these three categories, but I like to think of them as constellations. Sex = physical, but is that your external gender organs, your internal gender organs, your hormonal balance, your genetics, etc? Gender equals perception of self, but that could be informed and defined by external social pressures, internalization of socialization, brain derived, soul derived, behavior and self perception. Sexual orientation can be physical connection based, emotional connection based, romantic connection based, combination or none of those. It strikes me that the brain seems to cross all three, even when the net sum of a constellation, as interpreted through the current time/space/geography/social coordinates lens, do not appear to be in sync.

[Deleted]

Math.

You= target or perceived sex + sexuality + socially interactive gender+ your core or center + spiritual connection + life experience + emotions/heart + self expression/style

Variables...social interaction, spiritual connection, memory and conditioning of life experience, style, modified based on perception.mindfulness.vision.understanding.hormonal influence and subject to our will, paradigms, understanding, creativity.

Variables and constants. Some adjustable, some static.

Each added together and put in a blender becomes you as a whole.

Yes? No?

Fascinating...

[Deleted]

Sexuality is not same as orientation or attraction I think.

[Deleted]

What is gender?

If gender is not sex or sexuality...definitely not orientation...then what is it?

I self express as an androgyne now. It's my current real..
I think you could say that since I think that way, it's a gender. Thinking unboxed fluid, that is, quite variable. Is that a gender? Is the physical mtf androgyne a gender? Is the wild she sexuality a gender?

Or is gender how you perceive yourself in comparison to others?

[megan]

I have heard this phrase before (or something similar too it) I find it helpful in terms of figuring out my own identity and less helpful in me explaining to others.

My sex is female which I am fine with but if I suddenly woke up male or something in between I feel like I would be fine with it once past the disorienting feeling of having ones body change suddenly. My gender is non-binary and fluid. My sexuality is pansexual and I am poly-amorous which I am still trying to figure out if that is part of ones sexuality or a separate thing mono vs poly which is further confused by the fact that I'm in a poly-fidelity relationship, I digress. Anyways, for me it feels like all these things do happen to align, they just don't align in a binary structure. My gender is non-binary, my sexuality - pansexuality is pretty much like a non-binary sexuality. And I suppose my sex/body is just what it is and I don't have strong feelings about it. I like it and don't want to change it because I'm use to it but if it did change it would probably not bother me all that much.

On a side note, isn't it funny how in tv shows there are sometimes episodes where people body swap through some random event and it's always sort of just a joke, like the binary male gets swapped with a female and it's funny because 'hey I can touch my own boobs' lol. And no one is horribly disturbed that they have suddenly switched sexes? I wonder what would happen in real life if someone who feels strongly male was switched in to a female body (or vice versa). How would they really react? Would they feel disturbed or be mostly okay with it? Would they want to switch back or stay the same? Of course when you factor in sexism and all that it's even more complicated but it is interesting to think about.

[Sisyphus]

Sexuality as not orientation. I will have to roll that one around and around to get an understanding. For me, though gender is complex its much more clear to me than the idea of sexuality versus orientation. Hmmm.

[Ativan Prescribed]

Orientation is another word used for sexuality.
Orientation is an aspect of your sexuality.
Google it for a bazillion definitions, but in general, that's about it.
You can use your sexuality in the way it is oriented.
There is more than one social construct built into that.