|
|
| (51 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown) |
| Line 1: |
Line 1: |
| − | {{FairMormon}}
| + | #REDIRECT[[The Family: A Proclamation to the World#Is gender a social construct?]] |
| − | <onlyinclude>
| |
| − | ==Question: Is gender a social construct?==
| |
| − | ===Introduction to Question===
| |
| − | It’s a common refrain among the cultural left of Western politics that ''gender is a social construct''.<ref>Unless otherwise stated, all quotations and citations come from Ryan T. Anderson, ''When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment'' (New York: Encounter Books, 2018).</ref> A social construct is any category of thought that is created and imposed onto reality through and because of human, social interaction. Key to the idea of a social construct is that the category of thought is not extracted from reality but imposed onto reality. For instance, we can all agree that the boundaries of nations are good examples of a social construct. At a finite moment in time, someone had to come along and say "here is where the boundaries of what we'll call the United States are going to be!" From that moment on, we have acted as if the boundaries of the United States have an objective, primitive existence when, they don't.
| |
| − | | |
| − | The view of gender as a social construct stands in stark contrast to the ideas of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that "Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose."<ref>"[https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/the-family-a-proclamation-to-the-world/the-family-a-proclamation-to-the-world?lang=eng The Family: A Proclamation to the World]," 2nd paragraph.</ref>
| |
| − | | |
| − | When saying ''gender'' in the statement “gender is a social construct”, most are referring to the idea that there are sex-specific, biologically-determined, psychobehavioral differences between men and women. According to these people, there are no substantive differences in preference or behavior between men and women. Postmodern-adjacent philosopher [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Butler Judith Butler] refers to gender as conceived here as a “performance”.<ref>Judith Butler, ''Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity'' (New York: Routledge, 2006), 171–80.</ref> This performance is an outward showing or demonstration of the expectations that have been imposed onto a person through [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_act speech acts] in their cultural environment. In other words, what we call “femininity” and “masculinity” is just people conforming to how society says that a man or woman “should act” and nothing more. There is no biological, neuroanatomical basis for any cognitive or behavioral differences between men and women.
| |
| − | | |
| − | When others say ''gender'' in the statement "gender is a social construct", they mean to say that the biological sex binary of male and female itself is a social construct. Butler in a 1994 book chapter regards the immutability of the body as pernicious since “successfully buries and masks the genealogy of power relations by which it is constituted”.<ref>Judith Butler, “Bodies That Matter,” in ''Engaging with Irigaray'', ed. Carolyn Burke, Naomi Schor, and Margaret Whitford (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 148.</ref> “In short,” summarizes social conservative philosopher [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_T._Anderson Ryan T. Anderson], “‘the body’ conceived as something in particular is all about power.”<ref>Ryan T. Anderson, ''When Harry Became Sally'', 153.</ref>
| |
| − | | |
| − | Some people refer to both the male-female sex binary and cognitive-behavioral differences when saying gender.
| |
| − | | |
| − | The theory that gender is a social construct is the brainchild of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-wave_feminism second-wave feminism]. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simone_de_Beauvoir Simone De Beauvoir] is thought to be the mother of the movement. She is famous for the saying from her 1949 book ''The Second Sex'' that "[o]ne is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. No biological, psychological, or economic fate determines the figure that the human female presents in society; it is civilization as a whole that produces this creature, intermediate between male and eunuch, which is described as feminine."<ref>Simone de Beauvoir, ''The Second Sex'' , trans. H.M. Parshley (London: Jonathan Cape, 1953; 2009), 294.</ref>
| |
| − | | |
| − | This article will respond to these assertions
| |
| − | </onlyinclude>
| |
| − | {{endnotes sources}}
| |
