Negaci´on Selectiva

I will call the rules for socially ascribing and scripting genders in western societies the Prevalent Gender Structure.59 One of these rules (the gendered behaviour rule) seeks to capture the content of the labels (scripting). The others pertain, in Appiah’s terms, to the mode or procedure of their socially legitimate ascription. Some of these rules are currently being modified, as the social conception of gender develops, in part due to the increasing visibility of transgender and gender non-conforming persons in the media, and the action of transgender advocacy groups. Nevertheless, I maintain that the rules outlined below still constitute the traditional notion of gender for most people, and in many countries still influence the way gender is socially – and I would add, legally and medically – ascribed and scripted. I articulate the rules as follows:

Rules of gender ascription

1. The Gender Extension Rule. Gender labels are applied to all human embodiments;

2. The Biological Determinism Rule. The gender labels ‘woman’ and ‘man’ are ascribed to human embodiments through some correlational procedure based on one or more determinate, observable or presumed, biological feature such as: particular chromosomal sex, gonadal sex, external and internal morphological sex, hormonal profile, phenotype (primary and secondary sex characteristics).

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The rules I present as part of the ‘Prevalent Gender Structure’ are similar to those of ‘bigenderism’ as described by Gilbert (2009, 95). However, the rules I present are somewhat more detailed and grouped in light of procedures of ascription and scripting. Compare also Shrage (2012, 237–9) for a somewhat different classification of sex and gender identities.

Ascribing a different gender to the one correlated by the rule with a given embodiment is illegitimate;

3. The Gender Invariance Rule. The gender labels, once ascribed, are permanently so ascribed. Once a gender label has been ascribed, one cannot ascribe a different one;

4. The Gender Exclusivity Rule. The gender labels are mutually exclusive: gender ‘mixing’ is ruled out;

5. The Bi-Gender Exhaustivity Rule. The gender labels are ‘woman’ and ‘man’ and are exhaustive, that is, they are the only gender labels that are ascribable (ascribing other ‘genders’ is ruled out).

Rules of gender scripting:

6. The Gendered Expectations Rule. Gender labels conceptually encompass broadly accepted social roles (scripts) which will tend to regulate such things as occupation, dress, and bodily comportment, as well as inter-personal interaction. Gender scripts may be explicit or implicit. Scripting (the assignment and enforcement of scripts) may be purely individual (agentic) or structural.60

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I am interested in the ways that structural oppression of trans persons can be eliminated or reduced through the political and administrative institutions of liberal democracies. I do not treat here other forms of structural oppression, for example, within religious communities, particular cultures, or the family. Neither will I treat directly agent oppression against trans people. Haslanger (2012c, 100; 106) characterises structural oppression as “a social/political wrong … lying in our collective arrangements, an injustice in our practices or institutions” usually taking the form of a misallocation of power resulting in psychological, political or economic disadvantage for members of a particular group. Agent oppression, on the other hand, occurs when particular persons inflict harm on others through an abuse of power (100; 106). I agree with

The above analysis of the Prevalent Gender Structure allows us to situate various processes of identification or dis-identification with gender labels within western society. Lack of identification can be seen to play out on two distinct, though internally complex, levels: one may dis-identify on the level of gender scripting, for example, by acting in a way that rejects or challenges the notion that women are incapable of leadership roles; or one can dis-identify on the level of processes of gender ascription, for example, by rejecting or challenging the gender label assigned at birth; or on both levels.61 Any person may dis-identify with gender scripts. They therefore reject the prevalent Gendered Expectations Rule. Within such dis-identification, I maintain, one could locate many feminist and gay, lesbian or bisexual political postulates. For gender scripting will elicit certain expectations as to how men and women are to dress, behave, and otherwise relate to their social environment. This may include, for example, the expectation of heteronormativity, or the expectation that women are not fit for certain social and political roles.

The resistance of gender non-conforming people to the prevalent structure of western gender identity is more tightly (though not exclusively) focussed on the process or procedure of ascription. Many regard themselves as always having been women or men, but not on the basis of the gender labels ascribed to them on the basis of biology. The

Haslanger that the focus on structures and institutions is more important, as structural reform is generally more efficacious in eliminating oppression than are efforts aimed at the moral improvement of individuals. For a contrary view, however, see Garcia (2004).

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Dis-identification may consist in a way of speaking, acting or experiencing. I will generally focus on public ways of dis-identifying.

Biological Determinism Rule is thus not something according to which they aspire to shape their lives; this is what I mean here by ‘dis-identification’. It expresses itself in words, actions, emotional reactions, and so on.62 Some transgender people, on the other hand, might be quite comfortable with the idea that they have simply changed the gender ascribed at birth, in which case they would tend to resist the Gender Invariance Rule. Further, gender non-conforming persons may identify partly as men and partly as women (they may be ‘androgyne’ or ‘bi-gender’). They would thus dis-identify with the Gender Exclusivity Rule. And still others may regard themselves as neither men nor women but belonging to a ‘third gender,’ thus resisting the Bi-Gender Exhaustivity Rule. Finally, some may regard themselves as not having a gender at all (‘genderqueer’), thereby resisting the Gender Extension Rule.63

3.2

Gender Pluralism between Conditional ‘Recognition’ and