We don't.
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We don't. They're entirely immaterial to a modern world.
The instant 2 atheists got married, it opened the door to people of any gender pairing to get married. Marriage is just a social contact between 2 consenting adults ahemwith tax invectives. Only religion dictated which genders are allowed to do what.
Conservative hand wringing over public restroom use is mitigated by making all bathrooms gender neutral. Easy fix.
What else? Pink is for whoever the fuck likes it, you salmon short wearing closeted frat bros. You do you. Blue is for people doing Frozen cosplay. I dunno, gendered colors are so stupid.
Because church and patriarchal society basically.
So that people with an M on their passport can do obligatory military service
(Yes, I am salty about this, how'd you know?)
((Also I think that's the only remaining way in which people with an M or an F are treated differently where I live so at least we're making some progress I guess))
(((Oh also they need it to more effectively grope trans people at airport security)))
Medical issues.
Men and women have different anatomy and needs. Knowing your biological sex for medical reasons is kinda important.
Everywhere else, it's a social construct and does not matter in the slightest.
"Biological sex" says jack shit about a trans person's biological characteristics, especially deep into transition. It's more often than not a dogwhistle that transphobes use to imply that trans women have the same violent sexual tendencies as many cis men, and to imply that those characteristics are somehow immutable.
The state does not need to get involved in a medical discussion between a trans patient and their doctor.
Lol imagine going to a doctor and they can't figure out your gender if it's not on you legal documents.
Get another Dr. I think this one got his license from Trump university
The blood group is very important too, for medical issues, but I don't think it is common to make it a legal marker (such as on passport).
Also, some people are born not matching exactly the classical genders, and labeling them legaly male or female can be misleading for medical things...
Does it need to be tied to the legal system, though?
Only in-so-far as medical regulation would require. Like if the hospital failed to check this crucial information and made a mistake because of it they should be held liable. Having it on your ID might also be important if you list yourself as an organ donor; not sure if that would matter but it might.
I can think of a handful of ways of confirming someone's biology without checking official documentation. After all, hospitals still check blood types and tissue types
Everyone has a different anatomy/needs. You know how many random foramen and bones people can have? Random extra shit that the body spontaneously develops on it's own for no reason? Most of them are fine, some are not, but to say we need to know if you fit into the "male" or "female" box to treat you is incorrect. We need to know so much more. In fact, I think the mere presence of a vagina seems to tell a lot of doctors "Don't take this persons pain seriously," so I think if we just assume everyone is a male or a testosterone/testes-deficient male at the clinic, we might get better results.
Tbh most of the medical history men's anatomy was treated as the default, not much far off from what you're suggesting. Therefore now medical doctors still have no idea wtf is going on during perimenopause despite half the population going through it and as someone in the thick of it I can tell you that no, we abso-fucking-lutely need a more specialized women's healthcare.
This also I think could be fixed by taking a more human-centric holistic approach. Don't need to know you're a woman, just that you're experiencing drastic hormone changes. BAM, we gotta help regulate those hormones. Men love finding out they're low on testosterone, so they can start taking a bunch. Women should be able to get their hormones just as easily.
Trans people should go to the doctor and be like, I appear to be missing a bunch of estrogen and progesterone! and the doctor should be like "no shit, that sucks, here's a prescription for them."
This assumes that men and women have the same medical needs. They don't. Our average hormonal balances are completely different so for a doctor to be able asses doses, they need to know what the average hormonal balance is for women.
but what they really need to know is the average hormonal balance for that specific person, before they started going out of whack.
Except women's hormonal balances change during different phases of each month, but not for men. Thus the need to study women's health since women and men have different phisiologies. Oh look, we've come full circle.
I mean, yes, we need to study women's health more. It's a big glaring hole in a ton of medical research. I'm just trying to stay with the vibe of the thread. I think that just like with cutting edge cancer research being done that focuses on tailoring the specific drug/method of action to that persons specific cancer, so too should most of our medical treatments be tailored not just to what's between your legs, but to you, specifically. More research into everyone, but especially the largely ignored demographic of women, is needed to accomplish this. So... you're right, but I think I'm right too.
It would be cruel to send women criminal convicts to prison with men.
It's so the state can attack people. So it can control "marriage" privileges. Etc.
That... is a good point
It obviously did matter when same-sex marriages were not legal for example (some countries still do this...), but in most parts of the developed world today... yeah. I guess it does feel a bit grandfatherer-in right now
Obviously things such as the medical system need to know what biological sex someone is, but they don't have to tie into the legal system
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