 Alright, I'm super excited to talk to you guys about this topic. When we think about post-genderism, you might be envisioning some 1970 sci-fi film where you have like this totally homogenized group of people that are all dressing and doing the same thing and acting the same way with even the same voice pitch and everything. But I'm here to take us on a different journey that is more about diversity than homogenization. So let's begin by taking a closer look at what composes gender. And I'm going to talk about three things. I'm going to talk about biological sex, I'm going to talk about gender identity, and I'm going to talk about gender expression. So first with biological sex, where's my clicker? Alright. So with biological sex, we're going to talk about what it means to be female and what it means to be male. There are basically five categories that basically distinguish the different biological sex of a person. The first one is going to be chromosomes. So the simplest way to think about this is girls are XX and boys are XY, right? So simple enough and tell, it's not. Not everyone is either XX or XY. A third gender exists quite naturally without any technological, social, or philosophical intervention. Roughly one in a thousand births are born with XXY chromosomes. Other criminal variances include Turner syndrome, XYY, or triple X syndrome. These people are intersex and cannot be easily categorized as either male or female, biologically speaking. So the second thing I want to talk about is gonads. So gonadal tissue is actually, Dorland's medical dictionary defines sex as the particular distinction of gametes produced by an individual. So gametes are reproductive cells. So boys have sperm, girls have eggs, right? And they go inside the gonads, which are either ovaries or testes. So it seems straightforward and simple until it's not. Some people don't have just ovaries or testes. Some people have what's called ovotestes, where there's different hormones in place in the mother's womb when biological sex is being developed. Next we have sex hormones. So natural sex hormones are made of sex hormones interact with androgens or estrogen receptors. So androgens being male, estrogens being female. One could argue that extreme hormonal abnormalities could constitute a biological sex variance that is not binary. For example, females who contain high levels of testosterone may experience deepening the voice, increased muscle mass, enlarged clitoris, or frontal balding similar to what males would experience. Their hormonal variance plays a significant role in how they experience their gender within relation to their biological sex. High concentrations of androgens have also been associated with infertility in women, particularly polycystic ovarian syndrome. An interesting study done in London showed that lesbians are twice as likely to have an imbalance of sex hormones. The doctor who did the study commented, our research neither suggests nor indicates that polycystic ovarian syndrome causes lesbians. Only the polycystic ovarian syndrome is more prevalent in lesbian women. So in other words, if a woman has higher levels of testosterone, it may change the way she's experiencing her biology and the way she interacts with other people. So this could be the beginning of linking biological sex to how we experience sexual attraction and sexual orientation and things like that. We are a product of our anatomies and a better understanding of our anatomies will better understand how we need to interact with each other in a cohesive society. The next topic, the fourth topic in biological sex is internal reproductive anatomy. So internal reproductive anatomy for women generally includes vaginas, cervix, uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries. And for men, it generally includes vas deferens, seminal vesicle, prostate gland, cowper's gland, epididymis, and testes. However, it seems all binary until it's not, right? So some people are born, again, in the intersex population that challenge our binary core assumptions about our categories. A person might be born with external male genitalia with a fully functional uterus. This has actually happened and what happened was during puberty when men cease started, there was no way for the men cease to be released and so they had to end up having surgery and having that intervened right away. But there are definitely different variances that occur within the natural world that are not binary. Lastly, we'll talk about genitalia. This seems to be the most controversial one because when people think of biological sex, they think straight to the genitalia. So the clitoris and the penis are homologous organs, meaning they share the same biological structure even though they function differently. Clitoris and penises are made out of the same tissue and when you're developing the womb, you're basically kind of looking unisex, genitalia speaking. And then based upon the hormones that are there, the sex hormones that we talked about, the genitalia were either developed into traditional male genitalia, penis or traditional female genitalia, clitoris and vagina. And it all seems good and binary and tell, well, it's not. Sometimes people are born with ambiguous genitalia depending on the hormones that are present when they're developing the mother's womb. So let's go ahead and move on to gender identity. Okay, here's the biological sex spectrum. Okay, so when we talk about the gender spectrum, I'm hoping that these visualizations will kind of help give you an idea of what we're talking about. So this is the biological sex spectrum, just one part of what we identify as gender. So on one side we have female and on the other side we have male. Now I plotted myself on here, right here. I'm mostly biologically female, right? There's only one small variance. My internal reproductive organs don't work like everyone else's. So one of the characteristics that we identify with females, the ability to reproduce with a functioning uterus and things like that, I had some problems with that. Lucky for me, we live in a time of technology where I was able to reproduce, which is really nice. But biologically speaking, I'm definitely female, but there's some other things happening there too that are caused for a little bit of variance. Okay. These are the hard biological, tangible realities of the world we live in. Now we're going to talk about gender identity. Okay, this is what's going on in your head. This is what it means to be identified as either a woman or a man, or maybe not. So gender identity is a person's inner self of being male or female, a blend of both or neither. A person's gender identity may be in likeness or contrast to their biological anatomy. An individual whose identity matches the biological sex they were assigned at birth, that's what it's called cisgender. That's a cisgender person. Different cultures have different gender identities and different gender labels, which include non-binary, gender queer, bi-gender, tri-gender, pan-gender, age-gender, transgender, and one of my favorites, two-spirit. I love that one. So recent studies suggest that a person's gender identity is usually formed between about ages three to six. Again, this is most recent studies, so take it for what it is. But prior to that, it's quite common for children to play in gender cross-play. So for example, my three-year-old daughter has recently taken an interest in peeing while standing up. And I don't think this is necessarily an indicator of her gender identity or anything, but just a typical natural, normal way that children develop. She has two brothers and a father, so I'm sure she's just expressing her feminine side and saying, I can do anything a man can do. So gender identity, though influenced by others, is determined by the individual. For example, I identify as a woman, I perceive myself as a woman, and I call myself a woman. If someone were to come in and tell me something opposite of that, that's where you start to get some dissonance, right? Okay, let's move on to gender... No, sorry, here's the gender identity spectrum. I'm so boring, I'm just woman all the way. There may be a hilarious messandry in there, but we're not going to talk about that. Moving on to gender expression, the third category. So for gender expression, when people say, gender is socially constructed, this is the part they're talking about, they don't mean biological sex, it's what we are assigning to biological sex, right, that we're creating as societies together. So gender expression is talking about what does it mean to be feminine and what does it mean to be masculine? So with gender expression is usually the external appearance of one's inner gender identity, which is also influenced by their biology. The expressions and mannerisms, behaviors, apparel style, voice pitch are all a part of the gender expression and gender performance, meaning how do we present ourselves? Many people express some sort of androgyny containing both masculine and feminine qualities. Gender performance is highly subjective and classified on geographic location, time period, religious belief system, political belief system. For example, men in Scotland can wear kilts and traditionally men in America don't really wear kilts or skirts, so depending on where you're at, something may or may not be a social taboo or a social variance. When we look at the timeline of things, if you take a look at the Suffragette movement in the 19th century of women who wanted to vote and women who wanted to wear pants, we had so genderized the idea of voting and the idea of wearing pants that when these women were advocating for the fact that they wanted to vote and wanted to wear pants, they were told they were trying to be men, they were trying to be masculine. So we had the socially constructed idea that having the right to vote was something only a man could do. And if you wanted to vote, well of course you're trying to be a man then. Without taking into consideration, well maybe we shouldn't genderize voting. So when you put all that together, so for gender expression, for the most part I'm pretty feminine. I like wearing dresses and makeup and things we socially ascribe to feminine qualities, but I also express myself in some ways with some slightly masculine characteristics. So when you put all these together, you have three scales on the gender spectrum. We've talked about biological sex, gender identity and gender expression. When you put me on there, this is what I look like for the most part. Still a cisgender woman, but with a little bit of variation. So I still fit in the woman category for the most part, but it's not totally concrete. Moving on, this is what a friend of mine looks like. She is also a cisgender woman. And she's biologically female, identifies a little bit with men and mostly has a feminine presentation. Now, when you put the two of us together on there, we're both women, right? But we wear the word woman differently. We interact with it differently. Our biology is different. So that while many people may identify with a label woman, no two women are the same. I'm going to introduce you to a few people to help you get an idea of the variances I'm talking about on the gender spectrum. This is a cisgender male. This is a friend of mine. He's biologically male, identifies as a man and generally has mostly masculine characteristics with maybe some feminine qualities in there. Over here is a friend of mine. He is a trans man. So he was born mostly biologically female with some variances, but he identifies 100% as a man and tends to masculinize himself or has a masculinized presentation. Nathan, it won't let me click. It's a sign. Maybe I'll try it. I'll do it manually. Okay. So this over here is another friend of mine. She's a trans woman and she was born mostly male with some biological variances, mostly identifies with a woman, but really presents themselves in a masculine way. So you can see in the presentation there's some dissonance between the identity of what's going on cognitively and what's happening performatively. This could be a source of tension. This could be to conform to societal norms, religious beliefs, things like that. But this is also a possibility of what a trans woman may look like on the gender scale. I'm not clicking. Okay. This is an intersex man. So this is a friend of mine who was born intersex and mostly identifies as a man and has slightly towards the male side of the biological spectrum and presents themselves generally in a masculine way. But as you can see, there's definitely a lot of androgyny going on. The next person is an intersex woman I know. She's absolutely wonderful. And she actually was born a little more biologically male but was assigned woman at birth or female at birth and presents herself in a generally feminine way. Am I clicker? It makes me feel so powerful. Okay. Okay. So we have a male cross dresser, which is different than transgender. So this male crosser friend of mine, he's fabulous and I don't use that word lightly. He is fabulous. He was born biologically male, identifies as a man, but he loves to present himself in a feminine manner. Like anything feminine you can think of, he really just, that's how he really likes to present himself. This is another friend of mine. She's a female cross dresser. She was born biologically female, identifies as a woman, identifies as a woman and goes with a really masculine presentation. So genderqueer. Now genderqueer, I just did it straight down the middle for this purpose of this, but every genderqueer person is going to be different in the same. This is like the epitome of androgyny. It's kind of an umbrella term for, you just don't fit in the binary categories at all. And so what happens when you put me and all my friends together on the gender spectrum? We have a lot of diversity going on here. Some of them might identify as female, some of them might, sorry, as woman, some of them might identify as man, but no matter where we are on this, none of us are the same and our labels are going to vary depending upon that. Some of us will share the same label, even though we have some biologically differences or biological similarities, but the gender spectrum is extremely diverse. So in a very real sense, there is as many genders as there are humans, biologically speaking, cognitively speaking, and performatively speaking. Everybody is interacting with gender in a unique manner. So if you're at this point going like, oh my gosh, are you just challenged all my ontological categories and binary assumptions, what are you doing to me? But wait, it gets better. Okay, we're going to talk about gender fluidity, okay? So gender fluidity, I'm clicking and it's not working, Nathan. That's okay. I'll talk about gender fluidity. So some people are of the idea that gender is eternal and it's something that's a part of your identity forever. I think it's important to note that the word eternal doesn't mean fixed, it doesn't mean concrete. In fact, if something is eternal, it's in a constant state of change. We're constantly evolving. Our bodies are constantly generating and perpetuating a pattern of information all the time. The cells in your body are dying and being regenerated as we speak. So in a very real sense, you are not the person you were before you had lunch and you are now a different person now that you've had lunch, biologically speaking, and we could get into the philosophical notion of what a personhood is and things like that. But our biology is constantly in a state of change, in a constant state of flux. This idea could also be summed up by saying you can't step in the same river twice. So as a water is always moving and it's constantly changing, so is your body. And so is the way you are interacting with other people and their anatomies. And not only that, that in turn changes the way you interact with those people and we're constantly affecting one another in our performances. So moving, now that we've got gender identity, gender fluidity, and it's changing and at any given point in time there's a limitless amount of genders. Now let's talk a little bit about post-genderism, right? So what is gender going to look like in the future? My clicker still isn't working, that's okay. I don't feel powerful anymore. Okay, so while there are common categories, our categories are about as useful as they are accurate. And when our categories become silos in which there's no exchange between others, we're doing ourselves a disservice and almost being dishonest with ourselves in recognizing what exists in the world we live in. We don't live in a binary world. The law of excluded middle doesn't apply here. We aren't just things that are true and false. Sometimes things are true and false. Sometimes things are not true or false. So sometimes our binary illusions can be functional but sometimes they're highly inaccurate. Advanced technologies as they continue to increase, my hunch tells me that diversity and complexity is going to grow. And so will our ideas of gender and sex. So reproductive technologies that enable humans to create offspring in ways that have never been accomplished before. So for example, I was born with an abnormal bichornate uterus. So bichornate uterus is a weird thing. But on top of that, the doctor said, well, you have a mutated bichornate uterus. So like out of the outliers, you're like another outlier. And another doctor told me, oh, but it's tilted in the wrong direction too. So I had this really lousy uterus, right? I have three kids, by the way. I have this really lousy uterus that just doesn't want to work the way it wants to. But technology changed all that, right? So natural selection basically said to me, hey, Blair, if you try to reproduce and pass your genes on to your offspring, I'm going to kill you. And likely you're offspring too, because your uterus just shouldn't be passed on to next generation. But technology changed that. I had three children, and I'm still here. And again, my husband's very proud of himself that he is able to give us three beautiful children. But with that, our technologies are transcending the way we think about biological sex and gender. And isn't that a product of evolution itself? That as we are continuing to evolve and diversify, and our technologies, our extensions of that, we don't really have to question the naturalness of ourselves and our technology. This is evolution, in a lot of ways, just doing its job. Technology is the natural progression of evolution. So while my body may lack a certain femaleness, technology compensated for that. And as we continue to compensate for outliers that don't fit in the binaries, perhaps we'll find that post-genderism will result in a beautiful, complex rainbow and diversity of gender identities and gender expressions and sexual variances. So this challenges certain perceptions of sci-fi films who want to picture a homogenized group that all look the same and act the same when really I see a lot of differences coming into play. As with any evolution or revolution, transitions can be perplexing and frustrating and intimidating. So we need to be kind and trust that we can reconcile these differences and these diversities together as technology and science continues to develop and shape our possessions. I have a hunch it's going to amplify our innermost desires. So if those innermost desires are love, compassion, reconciliation, we're going to be okay. And gender is just going to get weirder, right? This is peculiar, this is a little different, it's going to get weirder. And that's okay because it's all part of the process and independent of gender identity. I think generally people want to be loved and loved in return. So as we're focusing on the future and watching these transitions happening and what a post-gender society might look like, it's important to acknowledge that maybe a post-gender society is just recognizing that a person's gender is an expectation or a limitation, that people have unlimited capacity to do great things. And so be kind and love one another. Thanks.