#so. i can get more specific now but overall ill still just say im nonbinary for simplicity

[arielluva]

came to a better understanding about my gender identity but theres still the elephant in the room (do i find men attractive. who knows. comically large question mark in the corner of my eye)

[askanonbinary]

how do you feel about the xy xx stuff? like for me i like seperate gender identity and sex as different things, like i know i was born as one or the other but like my brain does not correlate with that like ya i get im a boy or a girl but i dont feel like one or the other i feel like both

Well, I mean. XY and XX are two of the common chromosome pairs you can end up with. I don’t think anybody is denying that. What I have heard said is:

Those aren’t the only possible chromosome pairs to end up with, and it’s disingenuous (and intersexist) to act like they are, especially from the medical community.

There are several ways in which someone may be born with chromosomes other than XX or XY and never even know it (or not know it until later in life), so there’s no reason to stress those combinations and only those combinations.

Your chromosomes do not determine your sex/gender. They determine your anatomy.

What I believe you’re actually asking is “do you subscribe to the belief that sex =/= gender?”

I will not speak for the other mods, but personally? Short answer: ultimately, no. Longer answer: I have a lot of conflicting thoughts. On one hand, our perception of gender is, no matter how much we try to detach, wrapped up in the cissexist/exorsexist gender binary that has been constructed. So, for many, the idea (or for them, fact) that sex =/= gender is an incredibly helpful explanation, especially in tackling and dealing with any physical dysphoria. Particularly for people who are not cis but still fall within the binary (although not just these folk), the sex =/= gender idea is a useful one to explaining and categorizing how they feel and how they know they are not cis. However, I also think that the claim sex =/= gender can be overall as harmful as it may be helpful. It can be a less helpful idea/concept/fact for nb/trans people with no dysphoria, nb/trans people with gender euphoria, nb/trans people who do not want to transition, or nb/trans people who prefer the idea/concept/fact that they are biologically whatever gender they are. I think it’s also harmful for its part in holding up the gender binary: specifically in the mutilation of intersex babies and mislabeling/misgendering trans/nonbinary folks for “official” purposes (specifically medical purposes).

Personally, I have a hard time reconciling myself with sex =/= gender because for me, sex = gender and I simply have the body I have.

tl;dr I’m not opposed to having the two camps (sex =/= gender AND sex = gender) coexisting, as both concepts are useful for different people. For me personally, sex is just a synonym for gender and my sex/gender has really nothing to do with my anatomy. I do not personally consider the dysphoria I’ve experienced in the past to be intricately connected with my gender, only my perception of my body (which is something I’ve struggled with even before I ever started questioning my gender). But my experience is not everyone’s experience.

I’m also going to go ask the other mods to chime in if they want, so you can get a robust answer to your question.

~ Mod Sock

I disagree that sex=gender, although I understand what you are saying. My sex, however, is not and will never be my gender, will never in any way be connected to my gender. I am not an intersex individual, this is actually something I have looked into when I first began struggling with my identity with the understanding that it is easy to not know that you are intersex early in life. Biologically, I fit every standard for what is considered female. Thats just how it is. 

Now, having said that, I am not female. Understand, I am a mentally ill individual who has a very weak grasp on reality- I do not experience delusions nor hallucinations, but my concept of “self” is so far removed from my body and even my experiences that to describe any portion of my identity as connected to my body would undermine the relationship I have with it- which is to say, none at all. My body is not me, my gender has always been an expression of my self, removed from my sex and removed from other’s perceptions of who I am based on my body, if that makes sense?

This is not the experience of every other nonbinary individual. However, neither is yours. A lesson we have been pushing here a lot is that there is no one way to be nopnbinary, and this is a great example of that. The concept of sex not equating to gender is not a belief that many subscribe to, but rather, a reality for a huge amount of nonbinary people. The idea of the gender binary, and its inherent relationship to the idea of a sex binary is incredibly harmful, yes. Medical focus should move beyond describing sex and more about describing specific anatomy, yes. But in discussions about identity, it is important to recognize that everyone lives with a very different view of reality; what is blue for some may be something else of others, yes? But that doesn’t make my blue any less blue than yours, it is just a different perception of it. This is my reality, and yours is yours, but something as incorporeal as gender should not be discussed in terms as how it exists to you, rather, as understanding how others exist to themselves.

(note to readers: both of us discussed this separately and edited our arguments to reflect our changes in thought process so if it looks like I’m responding to a different argument; whoops, my editing was not super effective)

-Kan