Gender and sex affect everyone
particularly those of transgender people. Although gender and sex both, to some
extent, refer to either masculinity or femininity, each term defines complete
different aspects. Gender denotes the ‘social and cultural traits associated
with males and females’[1]
while sex is ‘the biological categories: male and female’[2].
Therefore, gender is socially constructed, it means that ‘gender differences
between men and women are viewed as being developed not through biology, or
even individual choice, but through the collective choice of society’[3].
In fact, gender is a social fact which attaches to people’s identity from very
first days of their life; in some instance even before a child is born, the
preparation for welcoming is managed to be based on gender i.e. name and cloth.
The first major point about gender is that social desire for sex categories has
fixed gender into a dualism which can be either male or female. The second issue is that there is an assumption
that gender is based on sex but in reality, it is a social construction. Therefore,
this inconsistency about gender has led it to generate various social problems
with regards to transgender people.
The gender binary is
exclusive and does not include transgender people. Consequently, many
transgender people are experiencing difficulties with regards to their daily
needs of using public toilets. There has been a long history of hegemonic
masculinity resulting in ‘patriarchy […] shaped by intersectional social forces’[4]
which caused women to be ranked lower than men. Quite similarly, the gender
binary has affected those who cannot fit into this dualism. The video of TED
Talk titled ‘Why We Need Gender-neutral Bathrooms’[5] by Ivan Coyote, highlights this issue. Ivan
Coyote explains the harsh experiences the transgender people face when they
need a toilet ‘we need a safe place to pee’[6]
. Almost everywhere in the world, public toilets are designed mostly based on the
binary sex of male and female. Ivan Coyote, urges for the exigence of building
‘some single stall, gender-neutral bathrooms’[7].
This demand may not just solve the problem of the specific group of people, but
it also triggers to destruct the very fundamental idea of dualism gender which
is created by society and supported along with the history through powerful
institutions like religions.
[1] Denise Buiten.“Sex and Gender” in Sociologic: Analysing Everyday Life and
Culture, ed James Arvanitakis, Victoria, Australia: Oxford University
Press, 2016, 120.
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