Sexuality and Gender Discussion
A PUBLIC CONSULTATION
DRAFT Position Statement
GEORGE HEWSON
The New Enlightenment Project offers the following analysis and points for discussion based on our respect for science and the free exchange of ideas. We believe that policies derived from these ideas would promote justice and human dignity.
There are two sexes as determined by biology: male and female.
There are basically two genders, based on sex; but other gender expressions exist.
CANADIAN GOVERNMENT POSITION
• ‘Sex’ and ‘gender’ are often used interchangeably, despite having different meanings:
• Sex refers to a set of biological attributes in humans and animals. It is primarily associated with physical and physiological features including chromosomes, gene expression, hormone levels and function, and reproductive/sexual anatomy. Sex is usually categorized as female or male but there is variation in the biological attributes that comprise sex and how those attributes are expressed.
• Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, expressions and identities of girls, women, boys, men, and gender diverse people. It influences how people perceive themselves and each other, how they act and interact, and the distribution of power and resources in society. Gender identity is not confined to a binary (girl/woman, boy/man) nor is it static; it exists along a continuum and can change over time. There is considerable diversity in how individuals and groups understand, experience and express gender through the roles they take on, the expectations placed on them, relations with others and the complex ways that gender is institutionalized in society. [source: Government of Canada: Canadian Institutes of Health Research, used by permission]
MORE DETAILED NEP STATEMENT
Analysis based on scientific research:
• From a strictly scientific point of view, biological sex refers to the type of reproductive strategy that an individual has. Species such as humans are characterized by the fusion of heterogamous gametes that usually differ chiefly in size. A gamete is a mature male or female germ cell which is able to unite with another of the opposite sex in sexual reproduction to form a zygote (fertilized egg cell). The individual that produces the larger-sized gamete or ovum is called the female. The one who produces the smaller gamete or sperm is called the male. This is fundamentally what biological sex means. It refers to these reproductive strategies rooted in the type of gamete that they have the function to produce.
• Biological sex is binary because there are only two gamete types. There is sperm and there is ovum. There are only two options for an individual to have with respect to sex, and that is either male or female. There’s no third sex. There’s no third type of gamete, which would be the requirement for there to be a third sex or more.
FURTHER OBSERVATIONS
• Almost all babies are born with exclusively male or exclusively female genitalia that correspond to their gametes
• The vast majority of individuals identify emotionally with their genitalia as female or male
• Most individuals are attracted sexually to the opposite sex
• There are individuals who are attracted exclusively to members of the same sex
• There are individuals who are attracted to both sexes
• A small number of individuals do not identity with their genitalia (transgendered)
• A small number of individuals do not identity as male or female but rather as
gender fluid or non-binary
• An Ipsos 27 country poll of 2021 reported that, on average, globally:
• 80% identify as heterosexual;
3% as gay, lesbian or homosexual;
4% as bisexual;
1% as pansexual or omnisexual;
1% as asexual;
1% as “other”;
11% don’t know or won’t say.
Policy Recommendations for Discussion
• Children, adolescents or adults who do not identify simply as heterosexual female or heterosexual male should not be the victims of discrimination based on their orientation. They should be recognized and supported as members of minority groups.
• No surgery or hormone therapy should be applied before puberty for those children who self-identify as transgendered or otherwise.
• Surgery or hormone therapy for adolescents who have reached puberty should be used only after very carefully consideration by a team of health experts. Children who are distressed by adolescence should be offered counseling. Since children lack the capacity to give meaningful consent, consent should be left to the parents. Parents also need to be involved in the selection of professionals they trust.
• What school children of various ages are taught about sex and gender needs to be carefully considered. Too much information at too young an age can be confusing and disconcerting. We do not need sex education in kindergarten and elementary levels.
• Teaching toleration of others and life skills like not accepting candy from strangers is not sex education. So-called “gender education” is indoctrination of stereotypes.
• All students should be taught be understanding of and compassionate towards those who are different from the vast majority. No bullying is to be tolerated.
• Parents should be kept informed by schools and health professionals if their children
self-identify as transgendered or otherwise non-heterosexual. Child welfare laws already exist to protect children from parents who do not provide the necessaries of life or in any way abuse their children. “Children’s rights” vs. “Parents’ rights” is a false dichotomy.
• While some individuals and experts may argue that there is a range of genders, not everyone has to agree that there are genders other than male or female. But the freedom to so believe is a right. Neither side has the right to discriminate against the other based on varying points of view.
• In order to protect women, who are far more often the victims of sexual assault than men, those who identify as female but have a penis should not be allowed in women’s spaces such as prisons for women. [See “Gender diverse prisoners and sex-based patterns of offending”, Macdonald Laurier Institute, September 26, 2023]
• For the emotional comfort of the vast majority of people and the physical security of everyone, public washrooms should be designated for females or males according to their genitalia. For sanitary reasons washrooms for males should have urinals. Where reasonably feasible single-occupant non-gendered washrooms should also be available.
• In order to maintain fairness in athletic competition, adolescent and adult athletes who self-identify as female but have male anatomy and physiology should not be allowed to compete against women with female anatomy and physiology in sports where strength is an essential component, e.g., weight-lifting, shot-put, swimming, etc.
We intend to contact institutions involved in the issues outlined above as well as elected leaders and the media to let them know what policies and actions we support.
5 replies on “Sexuality and Gender Discussion”
I think that this is a sensible approach. A couple typos – identity where it should be identify. Perhaps not important when discussing mammalian reproduction, a broader categorization of gamete sexes is that the male gamete transfers its nucleus to the female gamete. A distinction based on size or motility would not apply to many plants, fungi, or protists. But this may complicate things needlessly when discussing human sexes.
I really like this piece and am in almost total agreement. The only issue I have is with the statement that parents should be informed if the child self identifies as transgender or “otherwise non heterosexual”. In my opinion it’s no concern of the school if a child is identifying as gay ( a sexual orientation) not a gender issue. Rather parents need to know if a child wants to be called by a different name and pronouns, which mean schools changing their behaviour towards that child. eg allowing the child to use different bathrooms or play on different sports teams. That should be shared with parents… because this has many implications that parents should be aware of.
I agree with the principles laid out in general, but the terminology and euphemisms deployed there tacitly approve woke ideology and need to be corrected to normative English and accurate terms.
“Gender expression” is a made up and unnecessary notion deprived of any scientific backing. How someone feels about himself and expresses his sexuality do not need a special term – just like the feeling about one’s race does not need a special “race expression” term.
Similarly, “self-identification” is a recently made up woke term, which is effectively serves as euphemism for “delusion” when it comes to identifying as something else than what you are.
Having one’s psychological state (aka self-identification) out of sync with biology is nothing more and nothing less than a psycho-physiological disorder that needs to be treated (not just in a medical sense) as any other disorder. This applies to severe cases like gender dysphoria as well as to milder ones with unnaturally misplaced sexual attraction (homosexuality, pedophilia, dendrophilia). The use of euphemisms normalises those deviant conditions and confuse the beholders.
We do not placate those who identify as Napoleon Bonaparte with an opportunity to be throned, even though the physiological differences between an average man and Napoleon Bonaparte are immensely smaller than those in between a man and a woman. We don’t give a second glove to an amputee who might feel (self-identify) like still having another hand (very common delusion among those who lost a limb).
Misidentification of self is arguably a worse delusion than the feeling of God, because the former can be immediately challenged with physical evidence. And it must be honestly called out for what it is, event if it might “offend” some people.
Of course those who “disagree” with their biology to lesser or greater extent should not be victims of discrimination, bullying, etc. but application of the “minority group” term to them would be the same as to albinos, pica, or colour-blind without elevating their condition to the status of a normal or, worse, in need of special protection or benefits. My older son is left-handed, which in a way disables him from participating fully in this environment designed around right-handed people. He is abnormal, meaning, he is in minority. But he is not a member of some fictitious “minority group” or “left-handed community”. Similarly, being a lesbian does not automatically make one into a “minority group” – the use of this term is not only completely unnecessary (everybody is a member of some “minority group”) but also misleading.
“Different” is not equal to abnormal. Being white (skin-wise) is different from being black, but being green is not only different but abnormal. The use of the word “different” in the context of tolerance, obscures the distinction and thus tacitly normalized the abnormal. A man attracted to a woman is different from a woman attracted to a man, but a man attracted to a man is not only different, but also abnormal. Such an important distinction does not come out of the drafted policy, even though it is quite clear from the numbers presented in the “Observation” section.
“Transgender” is not a thing and should not be used in a serious document. Instead of “Parents should be kept informed by schools and health professionals if their children self-identify as transgendered or otherwise non-heterosexual”, the policy should say: “Parents should be kept informed by schools and health professionals if their children exhibit abnormal sexual tendencies or gender dysphoria”.
While every adult should indeed have rights to believe whatever and butcher his body to whatever extent, those practices should not be promoted or funded by the government and public money. This applies equally to religions and any other ideologies, including those that promote the “ghost in the machine” conjecture (self-identification).
With the aforementioned suggestions the statements about washrooms and athletic competitions become automatically moot and can be safely removed or kept as examples only.
An excellent article about dangers of “political correctness” and other vile usages of the language:
https://c2cjournal.ca/2023/08/from-relativism-to-wokism-a-path-of-confusion-fallacy-and-self-destruction/
I disagree with the view that we do not need sex education at the elementary level, if elementary includes grades up to eight. I don’t know what the average age of the onset of puberty is currently, but for me and my peers it was around grade six or seven, about the age of 11 or 12. We had health/hygiene education, which obliquely touched on sex, in grade five but it didn’t really deliver the goods. It would have been quite useful to have had sex and gender explained in grade six or earlier while we were rational, i.e., before puberty, when the mind descends to the testicles.
I’m not convinced that, “too much information at too young an age can be confusing and disconcerting”. Kids minds are great little inference engines that tuck away facts without a lot of fuss or bias, to be recalled later and tested against experiences in the real world. In the rural area I grew up in it was a truism that one never needed to explain sex to a kid who grew up on a farm because they observed all its aspects when they were old enough to fetch the hens’ eggs.
While I understand Gleb Lisikh’s desire for correct language usage, I would not avoid woke language, I think it would be a tactical error. These terms are close to becoming normative language terms ( if they are not so already). Going out of the way not to use them will not change this reality, it is just going to piss people off, invite an emotional response and degrade the message by inflaming an argument about whose words are the right words.
Hi John! I agree that the words should not be avoided if they are in active use. My grudge was about accepting false concepts through the use of the words.”Transgender” can still be used for describing someone’s understanding of the phenomena, but the policy should not surrogate “gender dysphoria” with it, where it refers to the condition.
Sorry for not being clear on that. The issue is not about mere semantics. That’s why I also offered a reference to an article. Words matter.