On the Meaning of Sex Thoughts about the New Definition of Woman

A new definition of woman has taken hold in Western societies. Instead of a matter of biology and material reality, we are told it is an identity. Anyone who declares herself to be a woman is a woman; the body has henceforth become irrelevant. Gender, we are told, is a spectrum, and it resides in the mind. In countries such as Norway, Canada, Argentina, and Australia, laws have been enacted that give anyone the right to change his or her legal sex, irrespective of whether the person has had a medical procedure. At the same time, the industry for gender reassignment surgery is growing at an unprecedented pace. Seven out of 10 teenagers who seek treatment are now girls. The new definition of sex has been hailed as progressive. But is it really? And is it new? In this groundbreaking book, Swedish feminist and Marxist author Kajsa Ekis Ekman traces the ideological roots of this new definition.

Stockholm born, Kajsa Ekis Ekman writes for the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter and is on the editorial collective of the anarchist magazine Brand. She has an MA in Literature from Sö dertö rn University and is author of Skulden - eurokrisen sedd frå n Aten (Leopard Fö rlag 2013). She has founded the network delete comma, Feminists Against Surrogacy and the climate action group, Klimax.

Preface PART 1. Seventy-One Genders – A Revolution in the Making A Wider Horizon Woman – Does She Exist? Climbing Boys, Bead-Making Girls – The Return of Stereotypes Chasing the Gendered Brain Gender in the Eye of the Beholder 2007: The Order of Modernity 2017: The Gender-Congruent Man Help – My Son Loves Pink! The Invisible Theory The History of Sex: One-sex and Two-sex Theories Return of the One-Sex Theory Biologism without Biology How Feminism Started Loving Gender How Patriarchy Kidnapped Trans Experience PART 2. One Pill Makes You a Girl, One Pill Makes You a Boy – the 71 Genders Become Two When States Reassign their Citizens' Sex Us Doctors Are Salivating at the Prospect of Applying Puberty Blockers They Will Probably Become Infertile, but that's the Price You Pay – The New Era of Sterilizations When States Convert Homosexuals Younger, Faster, Happier? Hormone Evangelists – On the Pharmaceutical Industry Tumblr, Trans and Trauma – Testimonies from Teens Mastectomy or Death – Suicide as Pressure Tool The Case of Keira Bell PART 3. The One Sex Theory A Tale of Trans People? Woman: A Dangerous Word Vagina: A Dangerous Word The Creation of the Cis Person – or the Art of Making Us Love Gender Roles Self-Identification A Room of One's Own Unspeakable Violence Every Man's Right The Invisibility of Trans Men Open Female Spaces, Closed Male Spaces Female Sports Will Change Drastically Sex Is Not a Political Issue She Deserves a Kick in the Ovaries Sex, Race, Class, or ... an Exception to Intersectionality? Nature and/or Nurture – A Dialectical View Notes on the Word Woman Bibliography Acknowledgments Index