Sometimes very active discussions about peripheral issues overwhelm a thread, so this is a permanent home for those conversations.
I’ve opened a new “Sandbox” thread as a post as the new “ignore commenter” plug-in only works on threads started as posts.
Tragic events in Australia. Even more tragic: US gun nuts leaping on this to say “gun control does not work”. It is a precise echo of the refrain “vaccines don’t stop transmission”, as if anything other than 100% can be regarded as effectively zero. It is a tendency I’ve noticed particularly on the Right: the inability to grasp concepts of proportion. The Nirvana Fallacy.
A mirror of the argument is: “Good guys with guns don’t stop 100% of mass shootings, so ‘good guys with guns’ don’t work”. (In fact, they barely stop any).
Loss of life was reduced in the Bondi case by an unarmed Muslim…
New interesting insights into consciousness, quantum field theory and reality by none other the inventor of the first computer microprocessor Federico Faggin…
I need time to sink this info in… If Fed is even close, I’ve had my second quantum awakening… lol
BTW:
Love all the DNA/mRNA vaxxed with what is claimed to be a biowarfare weapon now….can’t be true can it???
I called Federico and we argued who has more clients… he won because he has more active clients than anyone in the world I can think of…
Will AI going to equal or surpass human consciousness?
Here is one problem. Since AI is algorithmic, can creativity be defined as algorithmic?
I think to answer these questions meaningfully, we need a pretty solid consensus on the definitions of consciousness and creativity. As far as I can tell, nobody has come up with a definition of either one that doesn’t either include something widely recognized as not qualifying, or excludes something widely recognized as qualified, or both at once!
I wonder, is someone more creative for finding unique and innovative solutions to life’s series of little problems, or for having one single great idea that changes the world?
I don’t think this is an inability to grasp concepts of proportion, I think it’s a refusal to accept any refutation of an ideological position. Kind of like the Left refusing to accept that in nature there are only two sexes.
Flint,
Oh wow.
I’m a biologist (and my Ph.D. is in sex determation), and you have never been more wrong.
You really need to meet Miss Jackie Blanks.
Or any number of people who are XY female or CAIS.
And to pile on. Since you specified “in nature” rather than just humans, we have dozens of examples where there are more than two mating types. The most extreme example are probably basidiomycetes, some of which have hundreds of mating types.
But you mentioned “sexes” so then your claim is correct, but only when referring to haploid cells. If you are referring to multicellular organisms, there are hermaphrodites (e.g. snails), and in flowering plants all kinds of exotic combinations of male and female function in the same flower or plant.
Not quite what I was driving at. The biological view of sexual reproduction is that there are organs that produce a great many small mobile gametes (sperm) and organs that produce a very few, very large essentially immobile gametes (eggs). This is true in both the animal and plant kingdoms. Granted, there are individual organisms that produce both types of gametes (plants can have both male and female organs), and there are organisms (like some fish) that change sex as needed – which means they start to produce the opposite type of gamete.
But the point is that biologists are looking at the gamete, not the organism. And no organism produces a spectrum of gamete types or sizes – all gametes are either one type or the other. And maybe I should have made it clear that I was talking about sexual reproduction, and not about fungi. Anyway, yes, I’m talking about haploid cells, and the organs that produce them.
And pray tell, does Miss Jackie Blanks produce some intermediate, middle-size, somewhat mobile gametes? If so, what are those gametes called? Perhaps with your Ph.D., you can coin a new name for them? Or does she produce both male and female gametes?
(Note that I definitely do NOT claim there are only two genders. Gender and sex aren’t at all the same thing. And I wasn’t talking about budding or other forms of asexual reproduction.)
Basically, I’m taking issue with the notion that sex is a cultural rather than a biological attribute. It’s not. Yeah, I know that the T in LGBTQ is referring to people who claim to be a sex other that what they are – women pretending to be men, men pretending to be women. And I know that some hormone and other medical treatments can alter gross visible sexual attributes – anything from growing or cutting hair to surgery. Thiese techniques can make the pretense more plausible, but it doesn’t change the sex. And I know there are sort of intersex people, as you mention, whose chromosomes don’t fall into normal categories – which causes all kinds of trouble in areas like olympic boxing and weight lifting.
Haha, no you were not. You were talking about the Left refusing to accept any refutation of their ideological position so we were talking about the LGBTI+ community and about how some people feel other people should lead their lives. Usually talk about how there are only two sexes in nature is from somebody trying to derive an ought from some biological fact. The point I (and I believe Jock as well) was trying to make is that nature is messy, wild and diverse and the only ought I can spot there is that we better be a bit more tolerant of the stuff we cannot pigeonhole in two neat boxes.
Now, I believe you are reasonably broad-minded so probably I am just preaching to the choir. But it is good to know that the phrase “there are only two sexes in nature” is only true in such a limited sense that it is rather pointless to bring it up in a discussion about LGBTI+ rights.
I think we need to unpack some of this, even if just to separate the cultural from the biological.
I was kind of surprised by the response from you and Jock. It seems uncontroversial to me that biologically there are only two sexes. Yes, I agree that nature is messy. But evolutionarily, there has been no third (or range of) sexes for gigayears. And there are good evolutionary explanations for this, mostly revolving around reproductive efficiency, variability and stability. Just google “why are there only two sexes” and this is all presented quite clearly. Mid-sized, mildly mobile gametes simply were not able to compete, if they ever existed. I suppose we could say there are only two types of haploid cells.
Now, look at the protests I elicited. You tried to change the subject by pointing to asexual reproduction. Not relevant. Then you pointed to individual organisms which produce both types of haploid cells. Which still adds to two, last I counted. Jock protests that individuals can suffer from developmental glitches, resulting in scrambled chromosomes, nonworking reproductive machinery, etc. But even Jock, the self-proclaimed expert, doesn’t make a case that there is a third sex (which would reproduce with what, exactly?) There are plenty of reasons why accidents during development (or incompatible species) can result in sterility. NOT a third sex.
Anyway, the discussion I was hoping for was exactly one of LGBTQ+ rights. My ideological position is that this general label doesn’t in any way constitute more than two sexes, and that it (IMO unfortunately) creates more boxes than necessary. To me, people meeting those descriptions are people, and that people generally should have equal rights, protections and opportunities.
What I think I’ve been seeing is two distinct responses, but I may be wrong. The first is basically, if not straight bigotry, at least a strong ick factor. At a sexual level, I know I could not make an enjoyable partner, but I have worked both academically and professionally with plenty of them, and their sexual orientations were never relevant. And I believe they should not have been relevant. I also find it irrelevant that “female” representative Sarah McBride has a penis and the equipment to impregnate actual females. It shouldn’t matter whether she does or not. If she wants to claim to be a woman, so what?
The second response concerns conditions or situations where sexual orientation makes a functional difference socially. Primarily, this means athletics. Secondarily, it means situations where sexual segregation is enforced, and/or regarded as necessary. I’m not really sure whether this sort of segregation is inevitable when it comes to rest (or locker) rooms, or beauty contests, or departments in clothing stores. I spent quite a few evenings at a bar that had only a single rest room, and people of both sexes went in and out as they needed, and nobody really cared who else was in there at the same time. So I find these segregations arbitrary and unnecessary. Reproduction is not involved.
But athletics is a hard one for me. Biologically, in general males tend to be larger and stronger (with a very large overlap, of course). But at top levels of competition, these differences can matter. I remember watching a debate between Billy Jean King and John Newcombe about prize money. King was complaining that the purses in the men’s draw were much larger than in the women’s draw, and that’s not fair. Newcombe responded that there IS NO men’s draw. There is an open draw, open to men, women, or Martian. King is perfectly welcome to compete in that draw, but Newcombe is prohibited from competing in the women’s draw, and that’s not fair. But King had to admit that when it comes to sheer tennis skill, the women can’t compete with the men (though they are allowed to if they can qualify).
(If you didn’t follow this controversy, King and the women attempted to prove their point by starting an exclusively womens’ tour (Virginia Slims Tour). It went broke! Turns out fans won’t pay enough to watch inferior tennis. So the women have been obliged to be sideshows at the major tournaments, but are paid equal to the men for political reasons, not reasons of competence.)
I find it disturbing to see that trans women who were top competitors as men, are winning state titles as women. And I wouldn’t know how to resolve instances where people of indeterminate sex (as in Jock’s examples) are winning olympic gold medals at boxing, weight lifting, etc. What if Bruce Jenner transitioned in his prime, and (now) SHE started dominating women’s events? As for the genetic anomalies like Jock mentions, who can presumably defeat all the women but none of the men, I don’t know how to deal with them. Disallow them? Have one prize for trans competitors and one for others?
(And I take issue with your claim that “there are only two sexes in nature” is true but so limited as to be pointless. Good grief! I submit to your consideration that sexual reproduction relies on the “two sexes” truism, and if male-female reproduction were pointlessly rare, there would be a completely asexual biosphere! What IS rare is organisms of appropriate reproductive age who biologically cannot reproduce. It is THESE anomalies who would be pointlessly rare, except we have made a cultural crusade around the (human) exceptions.)
That got quite an elaborate response, so thanks for that. However, I still stand by my comments. Let’s start with correcting some misunderstandings:
First, I never referred to asexual reproduction. Individuals producing indistinguishable (isogamous) gametes still are said to reproduce sexually.
Secondly, in biology it is perfectly valid to refer to individuals that differ in their allocation to male and female function as a separate sex. Hence, hermaphrodites are a seperate sex from males and females. For example, in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans there are two sexes: males and hermaphrodites. This is why your claim “in nature there are only two sexes” is only valid for haploid cells. I apologize on behalf of all biologists for the confusing terminology, but your claim is simply incorrect for multicellular individuals.
Thirdly, people who are XY female or have CAIS combine several male and female characteristics, hence do not fall neatly into your two categories. You dismiss them on account of not being “a third sex”, but it wasn´t really clear from your original statement this is what you meant.
These are the dry facts that biology provides us with. Of course this was never about biology but about people, so I am glad to hear that you find “people generally should have equal rights, protections and opportunities”. As far as I am concerned, this is the only important part and I am happy we agree on that.
Then finally, you seem upset that trans women have an advantage over cis women in sports. I never quite could get my head around that, since it is painfully obvious that all sports are unfair. I am 1.69 meters so I will never be able to compete in professional basketball and that’s unfair. East Africans make good long distance runners because they are genetically endowed with higher hemoglobin levels and that’s unfair. In the paralympics, swimmers differ in limb morphology which affects their swimming ability and that is grossly unfair. Life is unfair, sports are unfair, always! Why the fuss over trans women?
That’s an interesting example of that to which I refer: dogmatic insistence that there is no middle ground. Corneel and Jock argue the point as well as I, but one can accept the ‘two sexes’ line while still recognising that there are people who do not fit neatly into the dichotomy. Whatever biological marker you try and base it on (as ever in biology), there will be exceptions. My personal take is that ‘gender-fluid’ and dysphoric individuals may well agree there are just two sexes, but are either uncertain precisely where they lie, or are certain they are ‘the wrong one’.
As an aside, I have no idea why the Right are so determined to bring this one up at every opportunity.
I do not wish to engage in a pointless argument, but will point out that regardless of biological and medical complexities, there have always been humans who did not conform to gender stereotypes.
You said it yourself – the reason that many sports have separate competitions for men and women is that on average men are physically stronger than women. If sports like athletics were routinely mixed, women would on the whole have far less chance of ending in the top tiers and winning medals than the men. In that case women would be easily discouraged from taking up such sports because they have this built-in handicap, and who could blame them? Having separate men and women competitions for these kinds of sports is meant to avoid this situation and, I think, is beneficial for most athletes and for the sport in general.
So, if mixed competitions are a bad idea for many such sports, then what to do with transgender individuals, especially those who have the physiques of men but are of the female gender? Letting them compete in the women’s competitions would be unfair to those who are originally female. On the other hand, barring them from competing there would be unfair to the transgender individuals. There doesn’t seem to be a win-win solution. So, if some groups will unavoidably be discriminated against, would it not be reasonable then to base the decision on the relative numbers? I would think that barring transgender people from competing in women’s sports would disadvantage far fewer people than allowing them to participate. On that basis I would support barring them, sad as it may be for the individuals concerned.
But then, as you say, sports is inherently unfair, so perhaps the advice to them would be to suck it up and find some other activity where they may have more equal chances. Either that, or participate in the men’s competitions. Not a nice choice, but not that different from you having to decide to forego a career in basketball and find something else to do instead.
Professional sports requires attracting a paying audience. For what it’s worth, that includes several collegiate sports.
Less intense sports can, and sometimes do, have handicapping systems based on things like weight, or prior performance.
You cite two objections: first, that there are freak individuals (sports?) which don’t fit neatly into two boxes. Second, that there are species which produce both male and female gametes, which (if I understand you) have been designated with some other label than male or female. I suppose the label doesn’t apply to the haploid cells, but to the adult individual. I guess it’s OK to coin terms for those species or individuals that don’t fit into the male/female boxes, but I see the sex of these individuals as either neither or both. I see hermaphrodites as falling into the both category. But I understand what you’re saying. I also distinguish between whether such individuals are normal or abnormal for their species, and I think that distinction relates to normal reproduction.
Apparently the point I made about the King/Newcombe debate escaped you completely. The basic idea was that sports construct separate groups to make competitions as fair as possible. King was quite correct that she wasn’t competitive in the open draw. So should she throw her hands in the air, complain that sports are inherently unfair, and find a new profession? Perhaps you’re aware that in a variety of competitions, the sex categories don’t exist. Women compete head to head with men in chess, bridge, even golf (with some tweaking). Now if you consider boxing, the divisions aren’t between men and women entirely (though those exist as mentioned earlier) but instead between weight classes. Boxing attempts to be more fair by ensuring the competitors are nearly equal in weight.
I understand that your height would work against you in basketball. But would you find it acceptable to strap on some stilts? At some point, making changes to become more competitive crosses the line from inherently unfair to cheating. Let’s agree that in many walks of life, not just athletics, normal human variation matters. Generally, efforts are made to neutralize these differences somewhat. Something bothers me about a competitive man claiming to be a woman and winning the trophies in womens’ competitions. But I don’t have a solution.
We have here two distinct groups. The first are biological exceptions, rare mutations or developmental glitches. But the claim that there are only two sexes refers to normal individuals reproducing normally. Saying that there are biological exceptions doesn’t refute the general principle.
The cultural divide concerns the second group: those individuals who are clearly and normally one sex, but have some urge, feel some need, to be the other. I admit I don’t understand the underlying desire to be trans – this falls outside my experience. Do trans men ever desire to give birth (they can), and do trans women ever wish to father children (they can). Is being trans some extreme form of being gay? I don’t know.
I think even professional psychologists disagree about this. It might be related to the cultural sexual hangups. I have had no problems sharing rest rooms with women, but this seems to horrify some people. I have spent many hours swimming naked with people of both sexes, and nobody seems to have a problem. I have read that unwanted pregnancies are almost unheard of in nudist colonies, so sexual hangups are a cultural thing.
As to whether the Right (at least those who are irrational about sex) really are offended by the concept of unmarried people seeing each other naked (after puberty, I guess), or just pretend to be offended as a political stance to appeal to Mrs. Grundy, I don’t know. They do seem to take prurient interest unnecessarily far.
You have a pretty good grasp on biology (especially when it comes to other species than humans) but no grasp on sports. Sports happens to be one of those things that people try to make as fair as possible (weight categories, gender separation, etc). Otherwise it is not competitive.
As to biology, I always notice when somebody fails to deploy the notion of norm versus pathology. Gender serves a purpose. It has a function. When it is not functional for its purpose, that’s pathology. Is this no longer standard in biology?
I like the norm vs. pathology distinction, but gender is not sex. Gender is fluid and covers a fairly wide spectrum, while sex has evolved to be highly dichotomous, which species survival depends on. Gender doesn’t dictate reproduction, sex does.
Many sports practice sex separation, but gender separation would be a category error. Gay males have been world champions, competing against other males despite gender difference.
In terms of athletic prowess, differences within sexes is almost as great as between.
Life is unfair and frequently cruel.
Flint,
If one is looking for a rule, reproduction has a great many exceptions. Post-menopausal women are still women, likewise sterile men. “They could have reproduced but for this issue” doesn’t quite satisfy. It’s a bit pedantic to even want to try – we all know a man or a woman when we see one (generally), but if you do want to try, to issue some algorithmic rule, reproduction is not a great candidate.
I know a trans woman who has a trans daughter – both biological males. This leads me to suspect a genetic component. Such a tendency could persist in the population, as a hypothetical ‘gay gene’ could, by not being a complete barrier to reproduction. An environmental explanation seems unlikely-.
Doubtful. Trans people can go either or both ways in terms of their orientation to others; it’s more about their own identity. It must interfere with relationships, though I saw a couple the other day where the female was clearly, by face and voice, born male, albeit hormonally adjusted.
I must admit, I don’t really understand any of it. I don’t feel strongly attached to my ‘maleness’; no sense that it’s what I ‘should’ be from which I can understand another’s desire to be that. Nor can I properly comprehend attraction to men, although women seem OK with it…
On women in sport, I attended a talk by a lady remembering the early days of women in my sport, mountain running, who described one competition in which they were subject to intimate examination. People wishing to legislate against the relative rarity of trans people should perhaps be careful what they wish for.
Actually, gender is sex, plain and simple. This “gender is not sex” claim is peculiar to 21st century English only, a woke political correctness idiocy not found in any other language (also not in English prior to the 21st century).
What you mean is something like “sexual orientation” (as in desire to have sex with…) is different from sex (as in biological sex aka gender). Sure, and you know exactly what I – and both of us – are talking about: Sex/gender, not orientation.
But I take from you that they are called “sex categories” in sports. Thanks.
You are missing too much context. Without specifying whether your (?) sport has sex categories, you are not even making any sort of point.
If your sport has no sex categories, then why would the lady remembering her early days in your sport be subject to intimate examination? If your sport has sex categories and the lady wants to compete in the women’s category, then there are competition rules as per the purpose of setting up a women’s category – namely, there shall be no men in that category. Or would she be fine with men in women’s category? Even without being overly familiar with the world of sports it should be an easy guess for you where the overwhelming consensus of female atheletes lands on this question.
According to Corneel (and apparently some others), sex is not binary and e.g. hermaphrodites would uncontroversially constitute a third sex. So, why not have a third and fourth category, a category for each sex in sports? Why not think through the implications of one’s opinion?
Thanks faded_Glory. I agree with most of your comment. It’s a tough call and I do not have the solution. I will note that transgenders often have to fight to be acknowledged as their trans-sex so barring them from competitions is going to hurt them.
Quite understandable, because two distinct sexes (dioecy) is the norm in humans. However, I cannot stress enough though that there is huge variation in sexual systems outside of humans, or more precisely outside of Metazoans (animals) which we are most familiar with. Also note that the “male” versus “female” distinction is also just a label we stick to all sorts of unrelated anisogamous systems.
That is the point of course. Transwomen do not just claim to be women, they feel women. The question is how much we, as a society, are willing to grant that.
Not going to argue with that. True.
To me, that seems more a question for medicine than for biology. And whether a condition is pathological depends on how much the well-being of the afflicted individual is being affected. This may be true for some people in the LGBTQ+ community, but my gay colleagues for example seem to be just fine.
Erik,
You calling her a liar? Or me? This is what she reported. I was taken aback, hence it was particularly memorable. The context was a specific competition with a separate ladies’ course. Usually, they run the same course as men, but have separate prizes and male/female records.
Erik,
My opinion is that women – and men -should not be subject to intimate examination. I think – though cannot be sure – that most women would be on board with that.
The olympic games ran into problems a number of years back. A few women (according to intimate examination) were winning gold medals in some speed and strength competitions but had such masculine characteristics as male musculature, beards, deep voices, flat chests etc. So the olympics went to DNA testing, and discovered what Jock has pointed out – these competitors did not have XX chromosomes. They were a sort of hybrid of XXY and XYY. The olympics “solved” this problem, as I recall, by disallowing such people from competition.
But still trans women (biological men) are winning such events as cross country running, boxing, tennis, and other events as women. And actual women have been complaining that these men (uh, women) have innate advantages no true woman can compete with no matter how much skill or training. Generally speaking, where competitions have men’s and women’s divisions, there is a valid biological reason for it, and trans individuals just don’t fit.
From a psychology site, I quote the following:
I’ll stick with both professional and common usage of these terms. You can redefine them as you see fit, but recognize you are doing this out of personal preference and not reality.
Which very carefully misses the point. Sexual reproduction requires two sexes. This situation evolved billions of years ago, and has been stable ever since. Reproduction captures the essence of what sexes are for, and why there are only two.
To me, it sounds like you are claiming cars aren’t means of transportation because some of them are broken, have flat tires, ran out of gas, why, LOOK at all the exceptions! Seems cars can’t be means of transportation after all!
I’ve been aware of chromosome anomalies for cell over 50 years, but the first trans person I encountered in a chat site like this was a chimera.
He married and had children, then began developing breasts and eventually became dominantly female.
I think politics has introduced a false certainty about the causes and preferred outcomes in cases of dysphoria, and I think politics has made research difficult.
The “value” of “precious metals” is going up for no particular reason…
I wonder how much will gold be worth is the Trumpet Presidente is going to decide what it is worth?
I come from the eastern block, Even though my father was privileged we never stacked up on precious metals but rather on sugar flour and spiritus for unknown reasons….
Flint,
This inaccurately reflects biology. It’s pedantic of me, an ‘ackshully’, but If you’re going to appeal to biology, you need to get it straight. The essence of sexual reproduction is the haploid/diploid cycle. That necessarily means two and only two haploid cells join to make a diploid. But that does not mean there are only 2 sexes, going back ‘billions of years’. In isogamous organisms, there may be only 1 sex. Alternatively, there may be dozens of sexes, due to mating type incompatibility.
Of course this does not apply to multicellular dioecious species: the very word includes a binary. The multicellular mode permits gamete asymmetry, and that tends to underpin the male/female distinction. Tissues producing the smaller are male; those producing the larger are female. Both tissues can appear on the same individual; many species can switch production mid-life. But the production of gametes is not in itself reproduction, and many individuals cannot produce gametes, or their gametes can find no compatible partners. We still call them ‘male’ or ‘female’ due to secondary characteristics that tend to cluster about that bimodal gamete structure.
No, I’m saying “it moves” would be a poor way of defining cars if we wanted to find a universal that includes those that don’t. “Well it would move if we spruced it up a bit…”.
This only matters anyway if you are trying to find a strict definition, applicable to all individuals. I don’t feel moved to apply one, any more than I dogmatically insist there is only one way to define “species’. But some do, and get quite worked up about it.
Sports is a bad subject for political posturing.
No matter how hard an individual works, the best athletes will be people having a genetic advantage.
This is true of all competitive enterprises, but most kinds of competition do not involve formal contests.
The decision to exclude men from women’s sports is neither entirely based on biology, nor entirely on politics. There might be a way to categorize people by muscle mass, or something, but allowing competitors to self classify is insane.
I understand what you’re saying. Nature has lots of variations. Defining “a sex” solely by type of gamete an organism produces is limited – some produce both, some produce none, some produce only one type, there are variations in mating type, etc. As far as I can tell, we can decide whether to consider all these variations to be different sexes, or we can decide to consider sexual reproduction as involving two gamete types, and other forms of reproduction are not sexual in that sense. As I read your responses, I’m reminded of a botanist identifying every kind of variation of every kind of tree and claiming that therefore there are as many kinds of forests as there are variations. Only an ignorant layman would think all these trees were a single forest.
And I had thought (incorrectly) I made it clear that the haploid/diploid cycle evolved billions of years ago – but was certainly NOT the only means of reproduction that has evolved.
But what you quoted spoke of cars as being a means of transportation, even if some of them don’t work. In other words, they were defined in terms of purpose, not capability. To me, this matters – the purpose of sex is to reproduce even if not all organisms are sexual and not all sexual organisms happen to reproduce.
Sigh. I never tried to apply anything to all individuals – only to those that have two sexes in the sense that they reproduce sexually. This is the forest.
For what it’s worth (go ahead and correct me), I think of a sexual species as a population of individuals similar enough to produce fertile offspring, but different enough to allow for evolution.
There’s some notion of fairness involved. If men and women enter a non-segregated competition and either the men or the women completely dominate, then some adjustment might need to be made. But maybe not, if biased results are acceptable. The olympics tried to disallow all professionals (even if they made money in a different event), but this distinction was too artificial – eastern bloc countries trained world-class athletes from birth, but nominally said their profession was “soldier” though they never did any soldiering. Apparently sex makes a functional difference and pro/amateur doesn’t.
There are many things going on simultaneously with the trans debate.
The one issue I would hope is non-controversial is safety. I think allowing biological men in women’s prisons and in restrooms is a safety issue. But there’s the question of how often it’s an issue. Is it equivalent in frequency to being struck by lightning, or equivalent to being burgled? There are so many concessions being made to protect people’s feelings that it seems reasonable to consider that people want to feel safe.