The binary does not exist

From an article in the current Scientific American:

“Sex” typically refers to biological sex, which can be defined by myriad characteristics such as chromosomes, hormone levels, gonads, external genitalia and secondary sex characteristics. The terms “female” and “male” are often used in relation to biological sex. “Gender” refers to how an individual identifies—woman, man, nonbinary, and so forth. Much of the scientific literature confuses and conflates female/male and woman/man terminology without providing definitions to clarify what it is referring to and why those terms were chosen.

So “woman” and “man” don’t label biological sex? They’re purely social? They label only how people “identify” and not what people are? And this is settled knowledge and everyone agrees with it? But nevertheless the scientific literature confuses the terminology?

Are we quite sure about that?

For the purpose of describing anatomical and physiological evidence, most of the literature uses “female” and “male,” so we use those words here when discussing the results of such studies. For ethnographic and archaeological evidence, we are attempting to reconstruct social roles, for which the terms “woman” and “man” are usually used. Unfortunately, both these word sets assume a binary, which does not exist biologically, psychologically or socially. Sex and gender both exist as a spectrum, but when citing the work of others, it is difficult to add that nuance.

Oh, neither sex nor gender is binary? Both are a spectrum? I did not know that.

The inequity between male and female athletes is a result not of inherent biological differences between the sexes but of biases in how they are treated in sports.

Therefore it’s totally fair for men to infiltrate women’s sports. That’s science, baby!

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