20/20 vision

[Bernice]

Stephanie W wrote:

OK Bernice, how many times would you say you've been fooled as to someone's gender? Once? Twice? Ten times? One hunderd times?

Short answer: I have absolutely NO IDEA.

Perhaps that is my point. I have no way to know if I've been fooled unless I inspect gonads, passports, chromosomes, etc. which I'm sure none of use are inclined to try to do.

I'll readily concede you know that you have been fooled only a very small percentage of the time. The question is: how many times have you been fooled without knowing it, and today you still don't know that you were fooled? And if you have an answer for that question, then how did you determine your data?

Gender representation is another issue altogether. If a person wants to be seen as gender "3" (to avoid either common gender in this example), then I quickly assess that that person wants to be viewed as that same gender (again, only as far as I know, since I don't normally ever actually ask them to confirm my asessment). But I expect I am much better at guessing which gender people wish to be thought of as. (Sorry for any bad grammer.) There is often not much deep thinking involved here. Makeup, dress/skirt, boobs, stockings, heels, etc. pretty much sums up wants to be thought of as female.

Then again, few here have offered much of a countering response to the notion that gender is really not digital or binary, rather only somewhere along a continuum. Any definitive line between male and female is indefensibly arbitrary.

Hugs,

Bernice[/i]

[Beauty]

Hi Bernice,

Thanks.

That's the truth of the matter. If anyone has been fooled it has been 100% not an "oops, I nearly thought that was a female". No one can have any idea how many times you've been fooled. They absolutely can tell how many times they've been almost fooled or not fooled at all.

I still think it's really bold to say that you, as a person can spot anyone who is TG'd, when it's not always possible.

Otherwise, like Bernice, I agree with what you're saying Stephanie.

[Stephanie W]

Bernice

Hmm, somehow I didn't expect this thread would be winding down anytime soon.

OK, you said:

The question is: how many times have you been fooled without knowing it, and today you still don't know that you were fooled? And if you have an answer for that question, then how did you determine your data?

Hmm, do you really think I have an answer for everything? Reading through my responses, I couldn't find anywhere in there where I had offered any kind of data, or at least any solid numbers relating to how many times we are fooled or not. In fact, it was you who provided a solid number when you said:

even though we are "sure" of a person's sex - with only a fleeting glance, we fool ourselves if we think we are "right" more than 85% of the time.

Just curious how you arrived at that figure.

The only quotes I found that might be the source of the confusion was in my Cadillac analogy where I stated:

you determine immediately that it's a 59 Cadillac. You don't need to see the grille or anything else because you just 'know'. ..assuming you know your cars.

Or:

If we see elements that point to a certain something, we identify it. male/female, Cadillac/Ford

In the first quotes, I should have replaced 'know' with 'make that assumption' and in the second, replaced the word 'identify' with 'make an assumption of identity'.

Then Beauty said:

I still think it's really bold to say that you, as a person can spot anyone who is TG'd, when it's not always possible.

Beauty, perhaps you were also confused by the above quotes but I have never claimed I could spot anyone (everyone) who is a TG. That would infer an accuracy rate of 100% of those TG's I laid eyes on and that would be a dumb thing to say. I did say 'I think we can safely claim our degree of accuracy is pretty good' which I believe to be a fair comment. However, we all may have our own interpretation of what constitutes 'pretty good'. Perhaps Bernice's 85% is her benchmark? Whatever it is, it doesn't infer total accuracy. I know from experience what it's like to be unknowingly fooled because I know one Asian TG gal whom I was convinced was a GG when I first saw her and didn't believe it until I met her and she told me herself. Truly Wow and Gorgeous too! So yes, even Stephanie can be fooled which is not really surprising because as I've said before, we do make a lot of assumptions just to satisfy ourself, even if only to the point of 'thinking we know' what we are looking at. Not 'know' but 'thinking we know', just to be clear. As I also said, that's good enough for me as I simply don't agonize over whether I was right or wrong as I toddle off along the street, ever conscious of putting one heeled foot in front of the other.

So, have we....er.....


.....yet?

Stephanie

[Beauty]

Hi Stephanie,

Got it!

[Absaroka]

My impression was that this thread started with discussion of being able to tell male from female from far away very quickly among folks who consider themselves to be either/or and are not trying to convince anyone that they are a gender other than what they think they are. I.E. transexuals, transgendered, crossdressers and people falling towards the middle of the spectrum are not in the mix as far as subjects for observation. Just that someone presenting unambiguosly provides enough cues for us to know quickly from a distance. And I have discovered that I don't do this as well as I thought I did which was very interesting. In both cases it had to do with hair and facial structure.

At least I don't think either of the people was trying to present ambiguously. I didn't ask them.

As for can I tell with someone who is ambiguouisly gendered, I am not sure even what it is I am trying to tell. That it is ambiguous? Okay. I have been able to figure that out at least once with a member of our church. Ferreting out knowledge of someone that I need a physical exam or a passport to see through their presentation? That's really none of my business anyway is it unless we have a relationship of the kind where I should reasonably expect to have that sort of knowledge about them shared with me. Funny thing, since we talk about these issues here I can expect truthfulness here about stuff that in f2f might really be very private. Part of the usefulness of these forums I guess.

Andrea