Why Are Young People Encouraged NOT to Label Anyone?

geerex

Anatidaephobia wrote: »

Regardless of your opinion on whether or not it's the technical terminology, referring to other people as "abnormal" is a good example of labelling people without their permission in a way which is likely to be viewed as offensive to many.

Tough.

Whether they like it or not, they are abnormal in the strictest sense of the word as they don't conform to gender "norms" (there's that word again).

"Cis" is just another label that is offensive, are you trying to say that it can't be offensive because it applies to the majority? You can't have it both ways.

Anatidaephobia

geerex wrote: »

Whether they like it or not, they are abnormal in the strictest sense of the word as they don't conform to gender "norms" (there's that word again).

Thinking a word is "technically correct" is one thing. Using the word to openly refer to others while aware that it may cause offence is another.

Just because we can use a label doesn't mean we have use to it.

Edwardia

I was shoved into pink and frilly and I hated it. I didn't want to play with dolls and pretend to be a mother. I wanted to be riding ponies, climbing trees, riding my bike, fishing and swimming. I wanted to learn fencing not ballet, judo not tap dancing. I didn't want to learn to knit or sew or cook or any of the 'female' things my mother required of me. She wanted a mini-me. She got a very independent person who didn't need wrapping in cotton wool.

lostinrates

]

Edwardia wrote: »

I was shoved into pink and frilly and I hated it. I didn't want to play with dolls and pretend to be a mother. I wanted to be riding ponies, climbing trees, riding my bike, fishing and swimming. I wanted to learn fencing not ballet, judo not tap dancing. I didn't want to learn to knit or sew or cook or any of the 'female' things my mother required of me. She wanted a mini-me. She got a very independent person who didn't need wrapping in cotton wool.

How many of those were denied to you because of your gender though? Riding ponies certainly doesn't seem not a 'girly' activity, ( boys might get an advantage due to their rarity in some areas) .... and fencing is something women do ( it was an option at my all girls school. Like judo) Sewing and knitting might remain somewhat 'feminine' in perception, but cooking?

I feel very girly and loved swimming independently where we lived and did not need wrapping in cotton wool ( I did not equate my 'girly ness ' with weakness nor my tomboy streak with lack of feminity).

j.e.j.

onomatopoeia99 wrote: »

I was not "cisgendered" when I was eighteen, as the word didn't exist then. Someone made it up in the 1990s by jamming a Latin prefix on the front of "gender" to create an antonym for transgender because they wanted to label people. So, a horrible made-up word.

I've just checked my Oxford English Dictionary and quelle surprise the word cisgender(ed) is not in there..

It is indeed a made-up word.

geerex wrote: »

The word normal suffices.

I would agree with this ^^

The trouble is, there is a group of people who seem unable to see the contradiction in not wanting others to label them or treat them differently, but then applying a label to themselves which sets them apart from others and demanding special treatment.

Edwardia

Gender dysmorphia is basically a brain of one gender and body of the other and it happens in the womb, caused by incorrect hormone levels. Children can realise that they aren't seeing the body they expect, even at two years old.

Sam Smith has said that he basically came out as gay to his mother at the age of four

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/showbiz/news/a614205/sam-smith-i-came-out-as-gay-when-i-was-4-years-old.html#~p7nzKWrfsGFbWZ

So when parents make assumptions about their children and start putting them into all that pink for a girl blue for a boy stuff as soon as they're born, they can just be making life harder for themselves and their child, later on.

I knew that I was different aged eight, three years before I got SexEd but even when I realised what the difference was, there was no same-gender SexEd at all.

When same-sex relationships have been legal in England and Wales since 1967, Scotland since 1980 and N Ireland since 1982 and when same-sex civil marriage is available everywhere but NI, there's now no excuse for leaving any kids - however much of a minority they are - clueless.

I don't agree with forcing kids into things they aren't happy with - including gender neutral clothing if they want pink and frilly though.

Humans aren't baked beans, we don't need labels. Labels make it easier for other people to take an irrational dislike based on ignorance and start bullying.

I'd be quite happy with non-heterosexual myself.

tea_lover

Surely all words are made-up words.

j.e.j.

Edwardia wrote: »

Gender dysmorphia is basically a brain of one gender and body of the other and it happens in the womb, caused by incorrect hormone levels. Children can realise that they aren't seeing the body they expect, even at two years old.

But then you get people on these forums who swear blind that there is absolutely no difference between girls and boys except their genitalia.

The above just confirms my suspicions that that's nonsense, and that there ARE innate differences between men and women.

j.e.j.

tea_lover wrote: »

Surely all words are made-up words.

er.. nope :rotfl:

tea_lover

Right ok then, you must be using only the words that have been mined out of the ground.