What is a Woman?

[Grigoris]

So basically we are talking about three different things here:

Female/Male - Genetic/physical
Woman/Man - Physical and Psychosocial
Femininity/Masculinity - Psychosocial

[A Ah Sha Sa Ma Ha]

So basically we are talking about three different things here:

Female/Male - Genetic/physical
Woman/Man - Physical and Psychosocial
Femininity/Masculinity - Psychosocial

Yes...it's complicated. ..

[A Ah Sha Sa Ma Ha]

It's complicated, because samsara is complicated. But samsara is a concept, woman is a concept. Everything is conceptual. Nothing is what it appears to be. We are talking about illusions. We're in love with illusions. Especially beautiful illusions.
But this is the lounge.....If it was in a different category, such as TB,women would be looked upon as Goddesses...Dakini's...as the illusion becomes a symbol for Wisdom....

[Dan74]

Whether identifying with one's sex at birth, or being transgender or queer, the biggest issue today seems to me that we've largely forgotten what it means to have a healthy balanced identity. Many clutch at the Dharma and especially at the no-self teaching as a purported solace to this deep identity malaise, which just makes it worse in the long-term. A teacher once told me 'before you can let go of the self, you need to have a healthy self to let go of.'

Insecurity, narcissism, weak and indulgent identities, these contemporary problems naturally pose greater challenge to people whose identity development is already complicated by issues like adoption, distant mothering, gender dysphoria, etc. That's why I think many folks confound these problems with the issue of these alternative identities themselves because sometimes (especially in the case of young people) these contemporary identity issues are more visible in people with alternative identities, because they pose a greater challenge to them.

[Matt J]

I think emptiness points out the futility of any endeavor to draw lines, boundaries, and borders. I don't think dependent origination makes such things any easier. I suppose it depends on whether we want to take these teachings into daily life or not.

Sort of ironic OP for a Buddhist forum given, you know, emptiness.

Not really, cause, you know, dependent origination.

[KristenM]

I have the same hang ups. Anyone could call themselves whatever they want, but in truth, I'm more discriminating than my ideals.

I disagree. If everybody did this it would make communication impossible. Imagine if an idiot could call themselves intelligent and be allowed to get away with it. And now imagine that idiot as president of the U$. Doesn't take much imagination, I know...

Defined categories are necessary for social functioning.

We'll just make up new categories. Megalomaniacs can now refer to themselves as stable geniuses and 50% of the populace will agree with them. This is the USA where you can be whomever you want, after all.

[Ayu]

XX chromosome = Female
XY chromosome =Male

You are quite right. My mistake.

The narrowness I'm talking about starts as soon as the judgmental mind starts to work.

Some people think (or propagate) that the XY chromosome is an incomplete XX chromosome and thus women ar the more perfect beings...
Some people compare female to water and male to fire. This means for them e.g. that a woman is not allowed to be burning to do something and men are not allowed to flow. A woman is expected to cry, a man is not allowed to do so.

And many women worry about having too many muscles in the arms, appearing too strong. We are supposed to be underweight and never laugh loudly... So, these stereotypes are too narrow and I admire every celebrity who fights for the women's right to be fat and loud.

[Caoimhghín]

There's also cisgendered women with XY chromosomes. One was in the Olympics a while ago and there was a big media show over it.

They are genetically "men", having their XY chromosomes, but their bodies have immunities to masculinizing hormones (thats the best I can explain it from what little I know) in the womb. As such, they develop, biologically, into infertile women with undescended testes inside of their bodies (which generally have to be removed as so that they do not become cancerous).

They are completely "biologically" female. Female sex organs. Female appearance. Female everything essentially.

But they are completely "genetically" male.

[Nemo]

Depends what country you are in. If you have been to a number you no longer have a concrete answer. Too much power over women makes men sick. It reveals all their defilements.

[KathyLauren]

Where to even start?

It is not about chromosomes. It is not about genitals. It is about the brain. Female brain = woman. Male brain = man.

No, you can't scan someone's brain and diagnose their gender. The structural differences have a large degree of overlap so a test cannot be diagnostic. Nevertheless, the differences are real and can be measured in aggregate data. So how do you know? You ask them.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

[Lucas Oliveira]

Where of an evening they gathered and carried away for supper, there next morning the rice stood ripe and grown again. Where in the morning they gathered and carried away for breakfast, there in the evening it stood ripe and grown again. No break was to be seen [where the husks had been broken off].

Then those beings feasting on this rice in the clearings, feeding on it, nourished by it, so continued for a long long while. And in measure as they, thus feeding, went on existing, so did the bodies of those beings become even more solid, and the divergence in their comeliness more pronounced. In the female appeared the distinctive features of the female, in the male those of the male. Then truly did woman contemplate man too closely, and man, woman. In them contemplating over much the one the other, passion arose and burning entered their body. They in consequence thereof followed their lusts. And beings seeing them so doing threw, some, sand, some, ashes, some, cowdung, crying: Perish, foul one! Perish, foul one! How can a being treat a being so? Even so now when men, in certain districts, when a bride is led away, throw either sand, or ashes, or cowdung, they do but follow an ancient enduring primordial form, not recognizing the significance thereof.

That which was reckoned immoral at that time, Vāseṭṭha, is now reckoned to be moral. Those beings who at that time followed their lusts, were not allowed to enter village or town either for a whole month or even for two months. And inasmuch as those beings at that time quickly incurred blame for immorality, they set to work to make huts, to conceal just that immorality.

Agañña Sutta (DN 27) - A Book of Genesis
https://suttacentral.net/en/dn27

[A Ah Sha Sa Ma Ha]

Let's not forget about hormones....estrogen & testosterone....

[KathyLauren]

Let's not forget about hormones....estrogen & testosterone....

Indeed, let's not.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

[Jesse]

Pretty simple...

Biologically a female is a biological entity with two X chromosomes. While a male has a XY chromosome combination. (Sorry, there are only two known sexes as far as biology is concerned.. Well, there are also a few known genderless species, as well as some hermaphrodite species, as well as mutations in species which usually have male/female organs specifically.)

A female Identity is just that, an assumed identity. No different than any other. Any being can have a female identity, just as any being can have a male identity, or a lack thereof of any gender identity, as well as everywhere in-between.

Since Identity is an illusion to begin with there are not really any "Rules" that determine this sort of thing. It's up to the individual, but it's normally a culturally derived construct.

I'm sure anyone who has practiced emptiness meditation or simply reflected on emptiness of self, has realized just how ambiguous the self really is. What makes us one thing vs another? Easy, we accept what our culture, and upbringing told us (or tells us.), or we decide for ourselves.

[justsit]

Let's not forget about hormones....estrogen & testosterone....

Indeed, let's not.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

Amen, sistahs.

[A Ah Sha Sa Ma Ha]

Let's not forget about hormones....estrogen & testosterone....

Indeed, let's not.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

Amen, sistahs.

[Quay]

Parenthetical note, yet related: as of this posting there are 35 replies to What is a Woman and 119 to What is a Man?

And so it goes, as always.

[KathyLauren]

Pretty simple...

Biologically a female is a biological entity with two X chromosomes. While a male has a XY chromosome combination. (Sorry, there are only two known sexes as far as biology is concerned.

No, real biologists know that it is a lot more complex than that. Here (from Scientific American magazine) is what is involved in the development of primary and secondary sex characteristics.



Chromosomes are only the beginning, and a lot can change between the chromosome and the physical structures. Note that this does not even begin to address the experience of gender, which will be at least as complex again.

The idea that there are only two sexes or genders is a mental construct. Like all such constructs, it has no inherent existence. In fact, it has less existence, inherent or otherwise, than a lot of mental constructs, because this one does not conform to measurable reality. You are basically saying that there are no execptions to this construct, except for the exceptions. Biologists know that there are exceptions.

While the stereotype of the doctor whacking the bottom of a newborn baby and declaring "It's a boy!" or "It's a girl!" exists in the popular culture and in delivery rooms around the world, the medical and psychological professions recognize that gender - whether a person is a man or a woman - resides in the structure of the brain, not in the genitals.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

[Caoimhghín]

There's also cisgendered women with XY chromosomes. One was in the Olympics a while ago and there was a big media show over it.

They are genetically "men", having their XY chromosomes, but their bodies have immunities to masculinizing hormones (thats the best I can explain it from what little I know) in the womb. As such, they develop, biologically, into infertile women with undescended testes inside of their bodies (which generally have to be removed as so that they do not become cancerous).

They are completely "biologically" female. Female sex organs. Female appearance. Female everything essentially.

But they are completely "genetically" male.

Pretty simple...

Biologically a female is a biological entity with two X chromosomes. While a male has a XY chromosome combination. (Sorry, there are only two known sexes as far as biology is concerned.

No, real biologists know that it is a lot more complex than that. Here (from Scientific American magazine) is what is involved in the development of primary and secondary sex characteristics.



Chromosomes are only the beginning, and a lot can change between the chromosome and the physical structures. Note that this does not even begin to address the experience of gender, which will be at least as complex again.

The idea that there are only two sexes or genders is a mental construct. Like all such constructs, it has no inherent existence. In fact, it has less existence, inherent or otherwise, than a lot of mental constructs, because this one does not conform to measurable reality. You are basically saying that there are no execptions to this construct, except for the exceptions. Biologists know that there are exceptions.

While the stereotype of the doctor whacking the bottom of a newborn baby and declaring "It's a boy!" or "It's a girl!" exists in the popular culture and in delivery rooms around the world, the medical and psychological professions recognize that gender - whether a person is a man or a woman - resides in the structure of the brain, not in the genitals.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy

Androgen insensitivity syndrome, from the graph, might be what I was half-remembering above.

[KathyLauren]

Androgen insensitivity syndrome, from the graph, might be what I was half-remembering above.

I assumed that was the case.

Om mani padme hum
Kathy