Gilda,
First I'd like to say that I've really enjoyed this discussion. I know you have some unique insight and a different viewpoint on many of these issues than I do. Thanks for sharing your point(s) of view on these things.
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Originally Posted by Gilda
Because, to use your word again, for a woman, male genitals are superfluous. As in, "serving no useful purpose, having no reason for being" [dictionary.com]. Something that is superfluous is something that can be easily disposed of without harm.
I can say this because genitals determine one's physical sex, but do not always indicate whether a person's gender itentity is male or female. They didn't in Gwen's case; they were, to use your word (which I love, by the way, as it describes the situation perfectly) superfluous.
Also, the interactions were primarily social, and Gwen was socially female. The sexual interactions didn't involve her genitals, so for those interactions, her genitals were irrelevant.
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I think this is a point of divergence for us that I find interesting. I think that someone whose gender identity and physical sex, to adopt your terms, are the same is exactly that: male of female, depending. I think that others, while being perfectly fine, unique individuals are not the same gender, or at least not in the same way, as the first category. I guess I believe that you can't call two objecs the exact same, if they have some striking differences - without expanding the definition of said thing. Thus, it could be that we are arguing over a question of semantics, wherein I am not particularly interested in donating equivalence to related set of items, and you are?
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Originally Posted by Gilda
I don't think I have been inconsistent.
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Neither do I, now that I more fully understand what I perceive to be your position. I just disagree with it, but I suppose such are the vagaries of life
So you would say that a person who was fully, 100% of the physical sex typically considered male, would be a female in your mind if he/she wanted to be designated as such? I am anticipated so - but to me this destroys the meaning of the words male and female. I don't say this to condemn the people who are somwhere in between the "traditional" definitions, only to say that I don't see any reason to expand these words so that they become, in my mind, less descriptive - but rather I would think it more accurate to add new words to more exactly describe reality. I'm not going to answer the next several points that followed, because I think that they essentially are mutations of this one.
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Originally Posted by Gilda...from previously + additional pigglet point (because he forgot to not respond to the wrong post :)
They were interacting with Gwen through talking to her, flirting with her, kissing, and eventually oral and anal sex. In all those activities, they related to each other in a male-female fashion and none of those activities, though often sexual, involve her genitals. Because they believed at the time the interaction took place that Gwen was female, this makes them heterosexual. They were attracted to her because they saw her as a pretty, sexy young woman, and that's likely what she got out of the relationship, a confirmation that she was an attractive young woman.
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Disagree here as well. I think that these events, at the time were perceived to be heterosexual, but in actually involved some level of homosexual activity. Which does not make the act itself heterosexual, but only the appearance heterosexual. Which I think begs the metaphysical question of whether or not perceptions of the truth and the truth are the exact same. I claim they are not in this case, because the participants are not limited by vocabulary to more adequate describe their situations; you might claim that, at least in this case, that truth and perception are identical?
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Originally Posted by Gilda
Understandable, maybe. Natural, no. Male homosexuality was considered as "natural" in Greek and Roman society as it is considered "unnatural" by many in our culture. Hatred for and violence against, or tolerance of those who are different from us is a learned response.
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From what I know, it wasn't really as rampant as we are sometimes led to believe, but was fairly common among the educated elite. Neato factoid: Did you know that the common way of intercourse among men was have one guy bend over at the calf, and the other to essentially calf fuck him? Actual anal sex was considered extremely taboo. (I had a roommate who studied Greek classics in graduate school)
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Originally Posted by Gilda
I'm not an absolute pacifist. I believe that violence is justified in defense of one's physical being, but not in response to having been offended or insulted, or in this case, in response to having one's sexuality questioned, particularly when the only one questioning their sexuality was the killers themselves.
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I agree that their involvement did not make them homosexual, and thus I think this is a big problem of any reaction they would have had, because they would feel, with some justification I think, that they had just participated in a sexual act that involved some level of homosexuality.
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Only if you assume that one's gender identity is determined by one's physical sex. It isn't. I know that's hard to grasp, because the correlation between being male and having a penis is so high, because our culture uses that as its primary method of identifying a person's sex, because it just seems right intuitively to say "I'm male because I have a penis and testicles".
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I think you are taking an opinion, which may or may not be strongly held in certain circles, and presenting it as fact.
edit Or more accurately - I think you are confusing "gender identity" and just straight up gender. I don't think they are the same. As a smartass example, I might psychologically think I'm Mickely Mouse, but that doesn't make it so - no matter how much I really believe it.
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Originally Posted by Gilda
It's sorta the same question as what is it that makes you you. Is it your body, or your brain, or your spirit, or some combination of those things? I tend to come down on the it's a combination side of the argument.
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I agree, but we disagree on what happens to the nomenclature within the mixture cases.
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Originally Posted by Gilda
Agreed, though there's a shorter way of saying MTF transsexual: girl.
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See above for my viewpoint on this.
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Originally Posted by Gilda
But they stopped and thought about it before the acted. It wasn't a sponteous reaction, they stopped, and discussed, and made plans to find out, then discussed it some more after they confirmed their suspicions. They put a lot of thought into it, and missed what seems to me to be some pretty blatantly obvious stuff.
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You really have no need to keep reiterating that any deep seated emotional reaction these guys (or a theoretical guy / group of guys) might have to this situation does not defend the extent of their reactions. I don't see that as a part of the argument. Thus, I will also quit stating that I don't mean to condone their actions - I think we can all agree there. This discussion, as I envision it, is something that is almost becoming a "Coming Together" Thread in the sense that I think that Forum was created.
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I get that they didn't read it that way, that their interpretation was something along the lines of penis=male, sex with another male makes you gay, I don't want to be gay. I understand that in much the way I understand racism, in that I understand that that kind of thinking exists, but I'll never be able to connect to it emotionally, and what's more, it doesn't even make sense that one's sexuality is in some way determined by another person's body parts.
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Or that I participated in homosexual sex, even if I don't think it makes me gay, although it might understandably make me question my sexual orientation. Maybe questioning one's orientation is a good thing, but I don't think that's the point here. Another interesting point concerning connections to racism, and what if I found out my girlfriend actually had some x in her blood. Well, for me it wouldn't be a problem because I don't have a problem with interracial sexual contact. I don't equate the two - racial "orientaton" and sexual "orientation." Although I suppose that I could understand someone being upset if they explicitly or implicitly made it known, or there was a reasonable expectation that it was important to them, that they only wanted to have sex with members of certain race, and another person intentionally withheld that information from them for their own self gratification. I think that if Gwen had felt that there was no problem with how her condition would be perceived, she would have told them at some point during the months, or the little baron would flown his biplane out of the hanger at some point. The fact is she held it away from them, precisely because I think she knew that the reasonably would feel that she wasn't a woman.
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Originally Posted by Gilda
In any case, at no point was any violence justified. She was no physical threat to them, and harming her didn't change anything about what had happened. If having sex with her made them gay, then they'd still be gay after she was dead, or after they slapped her or beat her up. Nothing they did at this point would have changed any part of that equation that led them to question their sexuality.
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I think we handled this above.
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Bad analogy. Gwen wasn't a stranger to her killers at the time they had sex with her; the sex was consensual for all parties involved.
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I only threw the Trojan horse plan in to explain how it might happen, like Uther Pendragon slipping into Tintagel at night. The important part if you perceive a violation if you found out after the fact that a person you slept with, while under the impression they were female, turned out to in fact be male. I'm guessing you would say yes, but in this case it wouldn't be a (theoretical) problem because you would feel the person was a female, despite the presence of male genetalia?
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Originally Posted by Gilda
In any case, that they felt violated does not justify group violence against a helpless victim.
Gilda
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Agreed and agreed. Have a nice weekend. I'm a hitting the hay. Once again, thanks to both you and
martin and ye olde
martian and even
ustwo (even though I usually disagree with him quite hardily
) - thanks for the discussion. I find this quite interesting.