Our sex should obviously not be a major part of our lives outside of, like, medical things. But our society forces gender on us as a set of roles, expectations etc. to follow based on our sex. So, ideally, there would be no gender, right?
But trans people throughout history have wanted to present as the opposite gender. This is in addition to cis people who oppose their own gender’s roles and do the opposite things. But trans people, obviously, go much further than any cis person does.
Is this because trans people want to actually be the opposite sex and for a long time being the opposite gender was the only possible thing? But now thanks to medical advancements they can get closer to that goal than any other time?
Why is this? Is it something in the brain, like with gay people? So, can you do a brain scan to see if people are actually gay or trans? Would that even help? Actually, I can imagine it helping in an ideal world, but in our fascist reality that will probably just end up genociding people. So, uh, scrap that.
Any essential books for reading up on all this stuff? Thanks
Enlightenment science :brainworms: try to deconstruct and categorize the world, which is related to how our brains use signification to simplify the reality we perceive via our senses. This is why binaries can feel correct to people, and why stereotyping is a real aspect of human brain cognition. This isn't always a terrible thing, it's part of survival mechanisms and such.
Reality and material conditions don't care though, and trans people along with lots of other marginalized humans that don't fit into the category buckets easily are often repressed due to this reactionary mindset. As we learn more about the realities of the complexity of the world via science, we start to see how poorly the accepted understandings are. Just look into lateral gene transfer to see that the orderly 'tree of life' concept is not an accurate representation of genetic lineage and evolution for example.
In regards to your question, just accept that people have different understandings of themselves. Categorization and labeling can help people connect to each other via these significations, which is positive, but it also can feed back into sectarianism and other negative reactionary impulses. See the friction between forms of transness and gay/lesbian sexuality as an example. Once the category becomes a faction, these reactionary impulses can become repressive to the transcendent folks.
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The problem is attachments to categories that no longer serve the practice and purpose of science. It's a social process, and so it has similar pitfalls of social dynamics. The reactionary nature of defending established understandings is what I think needs to be guarded against. A binary is a shorthand way to describe a spectrum for instance, but if only the binary understanding is what is taught as established knowledge, it is all to easy to deride the reality of the spectrum as an affront to established science. This pattern has played out numerous times over the short history. This is why study of science as a social practice is really invaluable.