do I understand the definition of a woman?

[Morley]

What's a woman?

I'm reminded of the perennial question: "What is art?" Though difficult to define, the short answer is that art is that which society recognizes as art. Needless to say, the designation is entirely contextual.

Approaching it that way, a woman is that which society recognizes as woman. Which is why there's such a tempest over the definition. Like the term marriage, some folks want in, some folks want out, while others want to build barriers around the term.

Morley, art is an expression, a woman is a biological being, not a subjective abstract object. I can’t believe women will put up with the discrimination that is being thrown at this.

Ha! The terms female and woman are not the same thing. Woman isn't a term used in biology. As the category art is subjective, so is the category of who is a woman. Woman is a word we use to label those whom we wish to place into a category.

"Our daughter is now a woman," is not a statement of biology. It's assigning a person a categorical designation. We may decide that our daughter became a woman when she began menses, got her first job, or when she got married. None of these is a biological designation. First menstruation doesn't doesn't signal biological maturity, neither does learning to cook nor getting laid. We use the term woman to signal that we've subjectively placed a person into cultural category.

Transitioning people would like to be placed into that category; folks who consider themselves nonbinary want to be excluded from that category--not on the basis of biology, but on that of culture.

[Morley]

What's a woman?

I'm reminded of the perennial question: "What is art?" Though difficult to define, the short answer is that art is that which society recognizes as art. Needless to say, the designation is entirely contextual.

Approaching it that way, a woman is that which society recognizes as woman. Which is why there's such a tempest over the definition. Like the term marriage, some folks want in, some folks want out, while others want to build barriers around the term.

Art is a form of self expression.

So can be gender.

[Morley]

Art is a form of self expression.

I disagree. Art is not just an act of expression but also of reception. I mean, sure some people have artistic outlets they use to express themselves. But a person can engage in creating what they wish but aesthetic is more than just expression. One of the questions I found interesting in neuroscience had to do with if there is a universal, biological basis for a shared sense of aesthetics. That's not clear, and some things like music clearly demand early exposure in life to find certain sounds and types of music pleasing.

Excellent.

[honorentheos]

???I answered that…just tell me your end game and point?

The question is if having a penis compared to a vagina influences the decision-making. You brought up culture and roles (rightly, in my opinion) but didn't answer the actual question about if having a penis vs a vagina mattered. The question is a yes-no question. I think you can answer it as yes or no. So?

Markk, would it be too much to ask you answer the question? Is the answer to the question tied to physiology and if a person has a penis or a vagina? Or is it complicated and not a binary as the penis/vagina dichotomy might demand? That there is more to it than biology? And if it is culture-driven, is it necessarily binary?

[Markk]

Morley…

From the dictionary of biology ….

woman
1. An adult female person; a grown-up female person, as distinguished from a man or a child; sometimes, any female person. Women are soft, mild pitiful, and flexible. (Shak) And the rib, which the lord god had taken from man, made he a woman. (gen. Ii. 22) I have observed among all nations that the women ornament themselves more than the men; that, wherever found, they are the same kind, civil, obliging, humane, tender beings, inclined to be gay and cheerful, timorous and modest. (J. Ledyard)
2. The female part of the human race; womankind. Man is destined to be a prey to woman. (Thackeray)
3. A female attendant or servant. By her woman I sent your message. Woman hater, one who hates women; one who has an aversion to the female sex; a misogynist.
1. To act the part of a woman in; with indefinite it.
2. To make effeminate or womanish.
3. To furnish with, or unite to, a woman. To have him see me woman’d.
Origin: OE. Woman, womman, wumman, wimman, wifmon, AS. Wifmann, wimmann; wif woman, wife – mann a man. See Wife, and Man.


https://www.biologyonline.com/dictionary

So I assume you are a man, correctly if I am wrong? But either way, man or woman you compare a woman as an object, comparable to a piece of art? Correct?

[honorentheos]

I disagree. Art is not just an act of expression but also of reception. I mean, sure some people have artistic outlets they use to express themselves. But a person can engage in creating what they wish but aesthetic is more than just expression. One of the questions I found interesting in neuroscience had to do with if there is a universal, biological basis for a shared sense of aesthetics. That's not clear, and some things like music clearly demand early exposure in life to find certain sounds and types of music pleasing.

Excellent.

I bow to the master. Your comment above to Markk? Brilliant.

[honorentheos]

a woman as an object, comparable to a piece of art? Correct?

Object? No. A term whose meaning is a construct of culture? Hmmm...

Chap really already laid it out for you in the first few pages of the thread, to be fair. If you took the time to understand what Chap had said it may have helped the discussion.

[Markk]

The question is if having a penis compared to a vagina influences the decision-making. You brought up culture and roles (rightly, in my opinion) but didn't answer the actual question about if having a penis vs a vagina mattered. The question is a yes-no question. I think you can answer it as yes or no. So?

Markk, would it be too much to ask you answer the question? Is the answer to the question tied to physiology and if a person has a penis or a vagina? Or is it complicated and not a binary as the penis/vagina dichotomy might demand? That there is more to it than biology? And if it is culture-driven, is it necessarily binary?

I answered it, you just did not like my answer Honor. So get to your point if you have one. I said it is not a yes or no question with too many variables. That is my answer…so again if you have some kind of point based on a preconceived answer, I am all ears.

[Morley]

Morley…

From the dictionary of biology ….

woman
1. An adult female person; a grown-up female person, as distinguished from a man or a child; sometimes, any female person. Women are soft, mild pitiful, and flexible. (Shak) And the rib, which the lord god had taken from man, made he a woman. (gen. Ii. 22) I have observed among all nations that the women ornament themselves more than the men; that, wherever found, they are the same kind, civil, obliging, humane, tender beings, inclined to be gay and cheerful, timorous and modest. (J. Ledyard)
2. The female part of the human race; womankind. Man is destined to be a prey to woman. (Thackeray)
3. A female attendant or servant. By her woman I sent your message. Woman hater, one who hates women; one who has an aversion to the female sex; a misogynist.
1. To act the part of a woman in; with indefinite it.
2. To make effeminate or womanish.
3. To furnish with, or unite to, a woman. To have him see me woman’d.
Origin: OE. Woman, womman, wumman, wimman, wifmon, AS. Wifmann, wimmann; wif woman, wife – mann a man. See Wife, and Man.


https://www.biologyonline.com/dictionary

So I assume you are a man, correctly if I am wrong? But either way, man or woman you compare a woman as an object, comparable to a piece of art? Correct?

Your "biology online" source also has definitions for "whore' and "witch." Neither of these are biological terms either.

[honorentheos]

Markk, would it be too much to ask you answer the question? Is the answer to the question tied to physiology and if a person has a penis or a vagina? Or is it complicated and not a binary as the penis/vagina dichotomy might demand? That there is more to it than biology? And if it is culture-driven, is it necessarily binary?

I answered it, you just did not like my answer Honor. So get to your point if you have one. I said it is not a yes or no question with too many variables. That is my answer…so again if you have some kind of point based on a preconceived answer, I am all ears.

If you think it's not "no", how does having a penis compared to a vagina matter to answering the question?

Look, you seem hung up on being unable to understand a penis does not equal manhood nor does a vagina equal womanhood, but are not able to see that having a penis is no more or less necessary in this instance than in the question about the dress. You don't need a vagina to be able to wear a dress. The cultural aspects of dress wearing are associated with the biological female but do not actually require it.

So we have two different issues here, not one. What defines manhood compared to womanhood isn't absolutely equal to male or female anatomy or chromosomes or biology in an absolute binary way.

So a place to make progress is to recognize that this non-binary, dual-axis male-female, Manhood/Womanhood reality we live in isn't as neatly defined as the equation of determining the diameter of a perfect circle. It's reality with no square corners. The answer you gave seemed to acknowledge that one cultural expression of a question fifty years ago wouldn't have been a question to many people shows even a gorilla like you is moving when you don't realize it.

At its heart, the issue is that binaries and socially defined concepts are constraints that post-modern people challenge precisely because they aren't accurate or allow for individual identity. That traditional way of looking at gender expected people to be in one of two buckets based on an idealized concept of manhood or womanhood. And like so many ideals of modernism, they ended up being damaging to individuals on the margins of the ideals. So non-binary post-modern understanding isn't attempting to make gender a decision one makes in the morning while deciding what to wear. It's acknowledging that the binary view of it was misrepresenting reality in favor of a social model that limited individuals in favor of a social order.