OT: how to deal with gender

rubyonrails-talk
1

Michael Pavling wrote:

What's the best way of to deal with gender.

i.e. a Person is either Male or Female (generally and fot my purposes I'll stick with that rule).

Agreed if we're talking about sexes. For genders, there are more than two categories, and the list might change as other gender categories are recognized (yes, the issue is more complex than you'd think), so I'd probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.

As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the difference between physiological sex. But that's the point - it's the physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

It might be an interesting experiment to store both sex *and* gender-identity of the subject of the DB, but probably outside the OP's requirement.

For genders, there are more than two categories

I did say that... '"Masculine", "feminine", "neutral", etc'

but for the vast, overwhelming majority there are only two choices; either being male or female, and that's your sex (whether it changes over the duration of your life is a different debate :slight_smile:

No. Your sex doesn't change over the duration of your life if you're a human (at least, not without surgery, but that's a different debate).

That (the potential surgical change) was my point. But it's interesting that you say "Sex is biological" (whereas I used "physiological"), as can "biology" be changed with surgery - does having my genitals removed change my biological sex as well as my physiologically identifiable sex? If not... does that mean my DB needs three fields?! arrgh!

God gave them.

right... time for me to stop there :slight_smile:

2

Michael Pavling wrote:

probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.

As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the difference between physiological sex. But that's the point - it's the physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

I think this is an open question, and the OP needs to decide this for himself. Baby names would seem to have more to do with gender than sex. This is actually something of a data analysis issue.

It might be an interesting experiment to store both sex *and* gender-identity of the subject of the DB, but probably outside the OP's requirement.

Probably so.

�For genders, there are more than two categories

I did say that... '"Masculine", "feminine", "neutral", etc'

I wasn't sure whether you were talking about grammatical gender or sociological gender.

but for the vast, overwhelming majority there are only two choices; either being male or female, and that's your sex (whether it changes over the duration of your life is a different debate :slight_smile:

No. �Your sex doesn't change over the duration of your life if you're a human (at least, not without surgery, but that's a different debate).

That (the potential surgical change) was my point.

OK.

But it's interesting that you say "Sex is biological" (whereas I used "physiological"), as can "biology" be changed with surgery - does having my genitals removed change my biological sex as well as my physiologically identifiable sex?

That, I think, depends on how you define biological sex. If you interpret "biologically male" to mean "has a Y chromosome", then no. If you interpret "biologically male" as "possesses a penis", then yes.

If not... does that mean my DB needs three fields?! arrgh!

I suppose that depends on whether you care about all three pieces of data. I could imagine medical applications where you *would* need all three.

God gave them.

right... time for me to stop there :slight_smile:

? I'm using "God" as convenient shorthand for "God/whatever combination of natural forces came into play here". If that's a discussion-stopper for you, then I'm not sure how to respond to that. :slight_smile:

Best,

3

Marnen Laibow-Koser wrote:

Michael Pavling wrote:

probably use a model or at least an enumeration for that.

As the OP said, s/he needs to store either Male or Female - those are sexes.

Certainly I agree on all the musings about gender-identity, and the difference between physiological sex. But that's the point - it's the physiological that I assume the OP wants to record.

I think this is an open question, and the OP needs to decide this for himself. Baby names would seem to have more to do with gender than sex. This is actually something of a data analysis issue.

Well, this discussion certainly has "gone down the rabbit hole" so to speak.

I mean let's face it. When people think about baby names. and creating lists of them for a boy or a girl this discussion of sex vs. gender, and attempts to define either, completely misses the point.

What about "the boy named Sue?" It really only matters to the individual picking the name whether they consider it suitable as a boy's name, a girl's name or both. All that's required is that the name can be categorized by the person creating the lists.