Read on Twitter
1 / A thread about ‘gender markers’. I’d never heard of the term until I visited a friend in hospital after they’d just been castrated and had their penis inverted (‘bottom surgery’ in gender woo woo speak). I went along to be supportive and gave my friend a pink “It’s a girl!”
2 / card. Because I knew that would make my friend feel good. Also brought a cupcake, stuck a candle in it and celebrated the new ‘birth day’. At one point I reached for my bag on the floor and as I got back up unsuspectingly caught a glimpse of the bloodied bandages in between
3 / my friend’s legs, that was only visible from that particular angle. “You’re having your first period!” I squealed nervously, and felt a weird pang in my groin, knowing my friend used to have a rather sizeable and beautiful penis b4 the surgery and now it was all so... flat!
4 / We laughed and my friend also joked about having been worried that the newly created ‘canal’ wouldn’t be deep enough (for penetration, I assume), but that the surgeon had said it was pretty deep (due to big penis) & my friend better be careful not to lose anything down there
5 / There were 2 other friends there - males identifying as women. The talk was all about surgery, and particularly FFS (facial feminisation surgery). I never knew that was a thing. FFS is about reducing or removing the appearance of ‘gender markers’. I felt so naive and asked
6 / “What is a gender marker?” The answer: “It’s what gives the game away. You can have a massive rack but if you’ve got a protruding Adam’s apple everyone can tell you’re a man”. More info followed on facial gender markers: women generally have a lower hairline, less space
7 / between the nose and upper lip, a less pronounced / flatter brow, a softer jaw line, wider eyes, daintier noses... A whole new world opened up for me. Isn’t it funny how on the gender woo woo side so many people claim that there is no such thing as a typical male or female
8 / body, yet the market for FFS, genital surgeries and hormones is booming, predicted to grow by around 25% year on year to reach ~$1.5bn by 2026? Clearly those opting for the surgeries know what a man / woman ‘look like’. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/03/31/2009112/0/en/Sex-Reassignment-Surgery-Market-to-hit-USD-1-5-Bn-by-2026-Global-Market-Insights-Inc.html
9 / And most of us can correctly and instantly spot a person’s sex without having to pull their pants down. Most of the time we can just tell, even if someone takes hormones or has had surgeries. It’s one of the most natural human instincts, not surprising if you consider how
10 / long humans have walked this Earth. All this chanting of TWAW and “you must respect my pronouns!” is not going to stop that most essential of instincts. In fact, *denying that instinct* is what fucks with your head https://fairplayforwomen.com/pronouns/
11 / Ok, back to the hospital room. One of the friends, with a curious delight, tells me he’s going in for FFS soon and details how they’ll cut the skin near the hairline, pull half thee face down so they can shave the brown bone, also perform a nose job, pull the upper lip up
12 / and also shave the jaw bone, and make sure that when the skin is put back the hairline will be lower. I felt kinda queasy and asked “How are you hoping to feel after all that’s done?”. The answer: “I just want to be prettier”. It had a sad ring to it and the room fell silent
13 / And it makes me think how all this talk of ‘being my authentic self’ is so much about fighting the very authenticity of who we are as humans - our bodies are us, we are our bodies. These gender, or rather sex markers, are literally proof of our human nature, the reality of
14 / our sexed bodies. Sex is real. Our ability to tell someone’s sex is real. The first time I saw a pic of @SecretaryLevine, not having read anything about them or knowing who they were, my brain went “male!”. And I was right. This morning I saw someone called Sophie was
15 / trending. Unfortunately they lost their life in a sudden accident, aged only 34. Didn’t know anything about them so checked some posts. The name is Sophie, the posts use she / her. I see a pic. My brain goes “male!”. And indeed Sophie was born male and on cross sex hormones
16 / I read an interview between Sophie and Sophie’s girlfriend. Who’s the girlfriend? Ok, someone called Tzef Montana. I see a pic of Tzef. My brain goes “male!”. And sure enough, Tzef is male but identifies as non-binary. For what it’s worth, my condolences to Tzef. So what’s
17 / my point with this thread? Simply that we have an innate ability to sex people. It’s human nature. It’s not wrong, it’s not bigoted, it just *is*. And we are free to name reality not just for how we see it, but for what it *is*, objectively. There is a reason why people
18 / resort to surgeries, hormones and fantastical identities - they’re trying to be free and find their way through the world, as we all are. I wish more people could find that freedom by embracing their sex rather than fight it or deny it, and without gaslighting the rest of
19 / the world into thinking that sex somehow isn’t real or relevant.
Without is, there would *be* no life.
And gender identity has got nothing on nature, or reality, for that matter #sexnotgender
Without is, there would *be* no life.
And gender identity has got nothing on nature, or reality, for that matter #sexnotgender
