Most mammals, including humans, have an XY sex-determination system: the Y chromosome carries factors responsible for triggering male development. In the absence of a Y chromosome, the fetus will undergo female development.
Female sexual development is kind of the fail-safe option; male development depends on the presence of the Y chromosome.
For example in Turner syndrome (45,X0) a fetus develops with only the X chromosome (and only 45 of the typical 46). This always presents as sexually female.
But then that’s not always true because there’s XX male syndrome, in which a 46,XX individual develops male sexual characteristics.
Many cases of these anomalies do not present significant health concerns and therefore are rarely identified (for instance, triple X syndrome (47,XXX)), which means that it’s likely that anomalies are more common than what is represented in the recorded data. We simply don’t have complete karyotype records for everyone born on the planet.
Basically, biology laughs at attempts to define strict categories. All we can really do is define what is most typical, and what is atypical, and of the atypical cases it’s the ones that present health concerns which receive the most study. There is a lot of gray area.
And all of that only covers human sexual differentiation. Other mammals are generally similar (using the XY system), but have not been studied to the same depth as human genetics (because healthcare). And of course there are other systems.
So the original point is valid - “biological female” is at best a vague category with fuzzy edges and weird overlaps, with “normal” defined by statistical representation more than specific characteristics. Reality is too complicated to fit in neat boxes.
Fun fact about Italian politics: in the Veneto region (where Venice is) the governor for the past 4 years was a super right wing guy (Zaia) that always won elections with like 90% in favour.
During his last term at some point he vouched in favour of opening a new sex change clinic in the region, bringing forth a lot of criticism from the right and his party. But this guy has a degree in agricultural science, and at a Press conference he started an argument about biology and how sex is not always a clear cut and things aren’t that simple in the real world.
Then everyone started joking about how maybe he was about to come out as leftist, and he had to clarify “no guys, I’m not leftist, I just need to take care of everyone’s rights, I’m everyone’s governor, independently of gender or sexual identity”. Bear in mind that this is all coming from a guy that during the COVID pandemic said on live TV “of course it was the Chinese, we all saw them eating live rats” (direct quote, translated).
Anyway it was funny. The leader of his party (Salvini) instead said “I think they shouldn’t approve it, I for one will never need it” and the joke was that if he became governor and you got breast cancer that’s tough luck for you because Salvini will never need breast surgery.
There’s really only one rational way to discuss this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_differentiation_in_humans
One of the more interesting aspects of this:
Female sexual development is kind of the fail-safe option; male development depends on the presence of the Y chromosome.
For example in Turner syndrome (45,X0) a fetus develops with only the X chromosome (and only 45 of the typical 46). This always presents as sexually female.
But then that’s not always true because there’s XX male syndrome, in which a 46,XX individual develops male sexual characteristics.
Genetics gets progressively weirder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_chromosome_anomalies
Many cases of these anomalies do not present significant health concerns and therefore are rarely identified (for instance, triple X syndrome (47,XXX)), which means that it’s likely that anomalies are more common than what is represented in the recorded data. We simply don’t have complete karyotype records for everyone born on the planet.
Basically, biology laughs at attempts to define strict categories. All we can really do is define what is most typical, and what is atypical, and of the atypical cases it’s the ones that present health concerns which receive the most study. There is a lot of gray area.
And all of that only covers human sexual differentiation. Other mammals are generally similar (using the XY system), but have not been studied to the same depth as human genetics (because healthcare). And of course there are other systems.
So the original point is valid - “biological female” is at best a vague category with fuzzy edges and weird overlaps, with “normal” defined by statistical representation more than specific characteristics. Reality is too complicated to fit in neat boxes.
Fun fact about Italian politics: in the Veneto region (where Venice is) the governor for the past 4 years was a super right wing guy (Zaia) that always won elections with like 90% in favour.
During his last term at some point he vouched in favour of opening a new sex change clinic in the region, bringing forth a lot of criticism from the right and his party. But this guy has a degree in agricultural science, and at a Press conference he started an argument about biology and how sex is not always a clear cut and things aren’t that simple in the real world.
Then everyone started joking about how maybe he was about to come out as leftist, and he had to clarify “no guys, I’m not leftist, I just need to take care of everyone’s rights, I’m everyone’s governor, independently of gender or sexual identity”. Bear in mind that this is all coming from a guy that during the COVID pandemic said on live TV “of course it was the Chinese, we all saw them eating live rats” (direct quote, translated).
Anyway it was funny. The leader of his party (Salvini) instead said “I think they shouldn’t approve it, I for one will never need it” and the joke was that if he became governor and you got breast cancer that’s tough luck for you because Salvini will never need breast surgery.
Male breast cancer exists, though.