Defining Sex and Gender
I've been writing about London so much lately (probably at least like 10 London references in every post!!), I thought I'd completely change the topic in this post for a change! I will try my best not to use the word "London" more than the times I've already used it above.
Ok, so I encountered a really interesting article on BBC's website the other day that I thought brought up really interesting points regarding the definition of sex. The article shed light on a lot of different aspects of sex and gender that I had no previously given much thought to. Medically, there are 4 types of sex. 1) your phenotype (what you look like), 2) your psychological (what you feel like, which is usually the same as your phenotype), 3) your gonadal sex (ovaries or testicles) and 4) chromosomal sex (your combination of X and Y chromosomes).
There are a bunch of intersex conditions, like androgen insensitivity syndrome (the feotus has male chromosomes but doesn't respond to testosterone) or chromosomal disorders like Turner's Syndrome, where individuals have one X chromosome and no Y chromosome, or Klinefelter's syndrome where males have two or more (!) X chromosomes in addition to one Y.
In our society, our social construction of sex has two categories based solely on a person's phenotypical sex. I suppose the majority of people on earth would have no problem fitting into one of those categories. But what about the minority? What if they are penotypically/psychologically/gonadally/chromosomally not solely female or male? And what if your child has multiple sex organs from birth, how do you decide what sex to assign the baby? I thought those were really interesting points raised in the article.
Maybe we should eliminate the concept of gender completely? Hmm.
P.S. I am off to the city that begins with L in a week! And no, I didn't break the rule, I didn't actually use the L-word ;)
