this post was submitted on 21 May 2026
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[–] Witchfire@lemmy.world 12 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago) (1 children)

That isn't even a reliable indicator, and it is a discussion between the patient and the doctor and no one else if it even comes up. We have the language to be specific. Besides, doctors don't even know what to do with trans people regardless of gender or surgeries because all medical research on the topic has been blocked, erased, or burned by knuckledraggers

(MTF) When I go to doctors I have to explain to them that if they run my bloodwork as Male, every single damn metric on it is going to be flashing bright red. When it's run as Female, I can get actual data out of it. Also guess who you go to if you have titty problems.

[–] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 4 points 10 hours ago (2 children)

I wasn't saying "organs" was an indicator. Obviously that's not the question on the medical form. I was using it as a placeholder because apparently I'm not allowed to use the term "biological sex." If you rule out the basic term used to describe something, don't be surprised when people use a less reliable descriptor to get the point across.

We have the language to be specific.

Yes, and the language for that is "biological sex." If you go to the doctor, they will ask you for your biological sex. Are you saying every medical questionnaire is really using transphobic dogwhistles?

Besides, doctors don't even know what to do with trans people regardless of gender or surgeries because all medical research on the topic has been blocked, erased, or burned by knuckledraggers

Doctors don't immediately get amnesia when something gets defunded. If a doctor already specialized in gender-affirming care, then they still know as much as they did before this administration shut down new research. If they didn't specialize in it before, then they were already ignorant about it anyway so it's not like this makes them more ignorant.

Using the government to hamper medical research is a bad thing, yes. Giving bigoted doctors an excuse to let their religion or politics influence the care they give is a bad thing too. And so is making doctors who do care have to fear for their medical licenses in order to continue providing medically necessary treatments. But claiming that doctors suddenly don't know what to do is a hyperbole that misses the actual issue.

and if it comes up, it is a discussion between the patient and the doctor and no one else.

I wasn't saying otherwise. You said "biological sex" is a useless concept and nothing but a dogwhistle, so I gave a counterexample of a situation where it's has a legitimate use as a concept.

If a trans man goes to the doctor, it's not transphobic for that doctor to ask if he may be pregnant or when his last period was. That's standard information that doctors ask every patient who has ovaries. When it comes to routine medical exams, gender simply doesn't matter as much as biological sex.

Obviously if someone is on hormone therapy then it changes the indicators and target ranges for lab work. It changes the specific things to mainly look out for, like types of cancers and bone density or cholesterol issues. Having organs removed, whether cis or trans, changes risk factors for a variety of diseases and renders some screenings less necessary. That should all be taken into account, of course, but pretending that "biological sex" is useless in medical contexts is an ignorant take.

And besides, if "biological sex" is such a bogus concept, then what do we even contrast "gender" with in the first place? If those are different things, then each one logically must be something, or else there wouldn't be two different concepts, in which case the two concepts would collapse in on each other and become functionally the same. If you want them to be distinct, then pretending one of them doesn't really exist is counterproductive.

It's like race and ethnicity. Race is a social construct, sure, but nobody takes that to mean ethnicity doesn't exist or is just a useless dogwhistle.

[–] davidagain@lemmy.world -1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

You are sealioning. You don't speak to your doctor in order to use the loos. In this context, "biological sex" is a transphobic dog whistle.

[–] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

I'm not commenting on the top-level post, I was replying to a comment that said:

Biological sex is a dogwhistle made digestible to appease the apathetic moderate

That's not sealioning.

[–] davidagain@lemmy.world 0 points 54 minutes ago

You don’t speak to your doctor in order to use the loos. In this context, “biological sex” is a transphobic dog whistle.

[–] thethunderwolf@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

the term "biological sex" doesnt make much sense tho

what are all of those complex medical treatments trans people can get, if not biology? far more advanced and interesting biology at that

and "biological sex" isnt a binary either, 1 in 40 people are intersex, mostly with almost no effect, but not in the binary either

[–] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 2 points 8 hours ago

So what do you want to call it then? It's not like I'm attached to the term itself, but the point is that it's a useful and necessary concept in some contexts so there needs to be a term that refers to it, and you can't just assume anyone who uses the most common term to describe it is transphobic.

And I never said it's a binary, but if a person is intersex then that's probably important information for their doctors to know because there may be certain medical complications that they're more at risk for as a result.