Thank you for that.
If you are biologically male, did you go through puberty with resulting changes to your physical body through testosterone related changes like facial hair and voice breaking? IOW was your body aware of being male, whilst your brain was basically silent on the issue?
Is your genderless identity purely a brain related abnormality or is it hormonally related as well?
Interesting too is the self focus and lack of empathy you speak to of. Are these related, do you think? Or do you see them as separate issues?
We are all learning here, so your insights are educational for us.
My body has become male ... I'm not sure what it would mean for my body to be aware of that maleness. I'm aware of my biological maleness but I'm not sure what it would mean for me to feel male.
I think my self focus and lack of empathy are related. I think that if I cared about other people I'd be more motivated to see things their way. But there are also plenty of people who care deeply about other people but struggle with seeing other people's points of views. And there are also people who don't care about others but are very good at seeing the point of view of others. I think I lack both cognitive (cold) empathy and affective (warm) empathy. I think that because I am completely selfish I'd be rather manipulative and psychopathic if I was good at cognitive empathy. But I'd have to be so good at it that I'd get away with being manipulative. And even the craftiest of psychopaths can get caught ... so perhaps it's also wise from a selfish point of view for me to not manipulative people no matter how good my cognitive empathy skills are or aren't. But I also think that the reason why I've never been a bully, even as a child, is not just because I have no sadistic bone in my body ... but also because I'm very bad at manipulating people. And very bad at lying. (This is also why I don't tell even white lies because I always think that the other person can tell I'm lying).
And I'm certainly not saying that people with great cognitive empathy skills are psychopaths. Like I said, there are plenty of people with such skills who care about people too much to manipulate them. And there may also be people who don't care about others and have such skills but still think it's not worth risking getting caught.
Anyway, I hope I'm making sense. I think that even from a purely selfish perspective it isn't a good idea for me to lie, manipulate or hurt others. Even though I don't care about others. Because I'm very bad at manipulating and deceiving. And even if I wasn't the risks are too great... even from a purely selfish standpoint.
I hope this isn't seen as getting off-topic. I am just trying to explain that while I do think that I lack both cognitive empathy and affective empathy .... and even though I think that that is somewhat related because I don't have any real motivation to be able to see the perspective of others .... my point, and what I am trying to explain, is that I don't think that lacking one kind of empathy implies a lack of the other kind. Perhaps there is some correlation but I don't think there is causation. There are plenty of people who care deeply about others even when they can't understand them ... and there are plenty of people who can understand others very well even though they don't care. It just so happens that I don't think that either applies to me. And I think that most people have at least some parts of both kinds.
There's male roles and female roles. So you not attracted to any of these gender activities?
My wife tells me it's a man's job to fix stuff around the house. Not that I agree as much but I suppose that is a gender role.
What manley stuff do I do...
Umm, fix toilets. That seems to be the man's job around my house.
Less stuff that I'm attracted to doing. More stuff that expected of me.
Don't like watching sports. Don't like working on cars. Don't like to barbeque.
I think that gender roles are social constructs and different from gender identity. I don't think any of those things are inherently male or female. I just think that such stereotypes are enforced by our society.
Well, I'm sexually attracted to women, that's about the only male thing I got going on.
I see that as also gender neutral. Lesbians, for instance, are attracted to women but I don't think that makes lesbians masculine.
I suppose I have to do the male role thing to attract the females who are looking for someone to fill the male role in a relationship.
I don't think that I'm particularly mentally or physically unattractive so perhaps my not doing the male role thing is partly what explains why I've never been particularly successful with women? Although, now I have the best girlfriend ever (hyperbole, my opinion, and only the best girlfriend ever *for me* ... not a serious debaters point!) and finding her eventually was 100% worth all my past failures with women.
I suppose evolution sets most up to be attracted to the opposite sex.
It does but I don't think that there's anything normative about that. What do you think?
We just enhance the gender thing to be more attractive to the opposite sex. It's all about the procreation.
I think that most people do ... because of evolution ... but I don't think that there's anything normative or inherently masculine or feminine about any of it, per se.
