# Gender

Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between, masculinity and femininity. It is often distinguished from biological sex.

## Quotes

* Our notions of what a human being is problematically depend on there being two coherent genders. And if someone doesn't comply with either the masculine norm or the feminine norm, their very humaness is called into question.
** Judith Butler The Believer Magazine - Interview - Issue 2.
* Some men think that staying away from sex psychs them to win, but most of the women I know get psyched by having sex.
** Suzy Chaffee, as quoted in Women & Sports (1979) by Janice Kaplan.
* Gender is another false division of life into arbitrary categories, none of which can adequately describe or contain any of us, in order to define us against each other in the interests of Power. There is no male. There is no female. Get free. Go off the maps.
** CrimethInc., Days of War, Nights of Love (2001)
* Gender is one of the way that human subjects come into existence. The technical term here is "subjectification" and that process happens publicly. Gender creates the illusion of a private self, which exists before all of that, but this is just an illusion. If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, it has no pronouns.
** Abigail Thorn, The Most Misunderstood Philosopher in the World, 17 May 2024
* One of feminism’s central ideas: that gender is a reductive trap which limits freedom and curbs individuality, forcing people to deform themselves and their desires in the service of an exploitative and violent system.
** Shon Faye, The Transgender Issue: An Argument for Justice. Allen Lane. 2021. ISBN 978-0-241-42314-1. Chapter Seven
* Gender is a huge hot-button issue for lots of people who feel strongly about it, I am not interested in triggering those strong feelings.
** Sue Gardner, as quoted in "Define Gender Gap? Look Up Wikipedia’s Contributor List" by Noam Cohenjan, New York Times, (30 January 2011)
* Women complain about men, and men complain about women. Who is right?
** Nikolay Karamzin, Poor Liza and Other Tales
* Could the terrors and crimes of today be possible if both origins [genders] had been balanced? In the hands of woman lies the salvation of humanity and of our planet. Woman must realize her significance... she should be prepared to take responsibility for the destiny of humanity. Mother, the life-giver, has every right to direct the destiny of her children. The voice of woman, the mother, should be heard amongst the leaders of humanity. The mother suggests the first conscious thoughts to her child. She gives direction and quality to all his aspirations and abilities. But the mother who possesses no thought of culture can suggest only the lower expressions of human nature. But in her striving toward education, woman must remember that all educational systems are only the means for the development of a higher knowledge and culture. The true culture of thought is developed by the culture of spirit and heart. Only such a combination gives that great synthesis without which it is impossible to realize the real grandeur, diversity, and complexity of human life in its cosmic evolution. Therefore, while striving to knowledge, may woman remember the Source of Light and the Leaders of Spirit—those great Minds who, verily, created the consciousness of humanity. In approaching this Source, this leading Principle of Synthesis, humanity will find the way to real evolution.
** Helena Roerich Letters I, (1 March 1929)
* Between a real man and a real woman there are innumerable others, some of which are significantly characterized as belonging to the intermediate sex.
** Eugen Steinach as quoted in "Eugen Steinach: The First Neuroendocrinologist" Endocrinology, March 2014, 155(3):688 –702.
* As far as I'm concerned, being any gender is a drag.
** Patti Smith, quoted in Levine, Martin P. (1998). Gay Macho, New York: New York University Press.
* Jesus said to them, "When you make the two into one, and when you make the inner like the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female, ... then you will enter the kingdom."
** Gospel of Thomas, 22
* Virtue cannot be separated into male and female. ... The difference is one of bodies not of souls.
** Theodoret of Cyrus, as cited in The First Thousand Years: A Global History of Christianity (2012), p. 106
* If we [researchers] should keep the environment of boys and girls absolutely similar these instincts would produce sure and important differences between the mental and moral activities of boys and girls.
** Edward Thorndike (1914), Educational Psychology: Briefer Course. New York: Teachers College, Columbia University. p. 203.
* The rare Sumatran tiger called Asim and a female named Melati were put in the same enclosure together. He promptly killed her
** Yonette Joseph (Feb. 9, 2019), "A First Date for Two Rare Tigers Ends in Death", The New York Times
* The process of establishing Gender justice in Muslim society is neither simple nor straightforward. There is not one strategy, one method or one process. What works today may be unsuccessful tomorrow.
** Amina Wadud, Inside the Gender Jihad: Women's Reform in Islam. Simon and Schuster. 2013. p. 103. ISBN 978-1-78074-451-3. Quoted in Hidayatullah, Aysha A. (2014). Feminist Edges of the Qur'an. Oxford University Press. p. 146. ISBN 978-0-19-935958-5.
* People are born female or male but learn to be girls and boys who grow into women and men. This learned behaviour makes up gender identity and determines gender roles.
** World Health Organisation, "Gender: definitions" at euro.who.int, 2014.
* The dominie's daughter eloped with a suitor, And the baby was masculine, feminine, neuter.
** Palladas of Alexandria (AG 9.489). Translated by W. S. Marris as "A Question of Gender" for The Oxford Book of Greek Verse in Translation (1938), p. 655. The 'dominie' is literally a grammarian.
* What is often expressed and understood by the term “gender” ultimately ends up being man’s attempt at self-emancipation from creation and the Creator. Man wants to be his own master, and alone – always and exclusively – to determine everything that concerns him. Yet in this way he lives in opposition to the truth, in opposition to the Creator Spirit.
** Pope Benedict XVI, Address to the Members of the Roman Curia for the Traditional Exchange of Christmas Greetings (22 December 2008)

## See also

* Gender bias on Wikipedia
* Gender dysphoria
* Human sexuality
* Non-binary gender
* Transgender

## External links

* Encyclopedic article on Gender on Wikipedia
* Media related to Gender on Wikimedia Commons
* The dictionary definition of gender on Wiktionary