Which is more correct: gender or sex? [duplicate]

Solution 1:

For most purposes, the terms sex and gender are interchangeable. There are not many people who will be confused when met with a box on an immigrations or medical form asking "sex" (although I have seen this answered with a yes/no/rarely (etc.) These people really are confused by the question.) More and more often, this is replaced by a choice: M/F.

For purposes of clarity, the World Health Organization defines sex as referring to either of the two main categories of biological and physiological characteristics that define men and women, as well as most living things. The answer to sex? is male or female (or unknown). Males have male sexual organs, make more testosterone than females, are often larger overall, may be more colorful, etc. Females have ovaries, produce more estrogen, gestate young or lay eggs, may be samller generally, more subdued in coloration, etc.

The WHO lists gender as that which refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women. The answer to gender? is masculine, feminine, (or, in the case of language and microorganisms, neuter). Examples of gender differences are, e.g. in the US, women earn significantly less money than men for similar work; in Saudi Arabia men are allowed to drive cars while women are not; in most of the world, women do more housework than men; in some countries, women alone are allowed to own land; in others, women themselves are property.

Since the recognition of gay rights, sex and gender have become politicized terms. Still, we have documents proclaiming that "X" does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, creed, color, sex (more often than gender), national origin, marital status, age, sexual orientation, military status, genetic predisposition or carrier status, disability, or any other, etc.

A good indicator of the difference between sex and gender is that in language, non-living things have gender. In French, house is feminine (la maison), fire (le feu) is masculine. In Latin, table (mensa) is feminine, field (ager) is masculine, and entrance (limen) is neuter. None of these have a sex. In some Latin words, sex and gender are contradictory: a female poet is still a poeta (masculine), a female farmer is masculine (agricola) and an idiot (idiota) is always masculine.

Therefore male and female are sexual categories, and masculine, feminine and neuter are gender categories.

Solution 2:

We need to decide whether you are talking about “correctness” or “usage”. Up until maybe 50 years ago “gender” was a technical term in grammar and linguistics. We spoke about the grammatical gender of nouns in languages like Latin, French, German. The question of whether a person (or animal) was male or female was a question about the person’s or animal’s sex. Then, sometime in the 20th century people decided to use “sex” as an abbreviation for “sexual intercourse”. We started talking about “having sex” and so forth. This meant that the grammatical term “gender” was annexed to mean what used to be called “sex”. So in modern usage “gender” is about whether you are male or female, and “sex” is about what people do with each other. That is the current usage. Is it “correct” English? That is a matter of debate.

Solution 3:

Neither is more correct than the other. They merely mean different things.

Sex refers to whether your chromosomes are XX or XY (male vs. female).

Gender is an attitude. Man vs. Woman. It is your identity, not your chromosomal makeup (or external genitalia).

This is why someone who has a "sex change" really has gender reassignment surgery. This is why someone who wishes to live their life as the opposite of their sex is transgender and not trans-sex.

The comment you saw is someone who is not clear on the difference. The usage in pipes is merely a convenient nomenclature. It is ridiculous to say that gender is only to be used on inanimate objects.