Another Dolezal, another day that trans and/or BIPOC queers will need to explain to the world that race and gender are constructed differently.

Why are trans women not the same thing as white people pretending to be POC? I’m glad you asked. [thread]

Ppl will say things like, “If someone who is male can identify as a woman than why can’t someone who is white identify as Black?” Often this question is posed as a “gotcha” by those looking to take cheap shots at what they see as “wokeness.”

However, many people do struggle to answer this question. The confusion comes down to a mistaken belief that sex relates to gender in the same way that skin color relates to race. This is a false equivalence.

Sex does *not* determine gender. Sex refers to biology (specifically your sexual anatomy), whereas gender refers to identity (or who you are as a person). A woman can have male sexual anatomy but still be a woman.

On the other hand, things like skin color, ethnicity, culture, country of origin, eye shape, etc—these things *do* determine race. In fact, race is inherently defined by these things.

Yes, both race and gender are social constructions, but that doesn’t mean they play by the same rules.

Gender = NOT determined by sex

Race = 100% determined by skin color, ethnicity, culture, heritage, eye shape, country of origin, etc

So a white woman born in the suburbs of KC masquerading as a Puerto-Rican from the “hood” is lying about her race because race is determined by things like skin color, culture, ethnicity, etc.

But a trans woman coming out as a woman is finally telling the *truth* about her gender, perhaps for the first time. One woman is lying but the other is not.

One woman’s race is indeed determined by her skin color, culture, heritage, etc, whereas the other woman’s gender is NOT determined by her sex, whatever it may be. Race and gender are constructed in fundamentally different ways.

Perspective from a trans woman of color: https://www.dazeddigital.com/beauty/head/article/42208/1/transgender-is-not-the-same-as-appropriating-an-ethnicity