Jeremy Stangroom

This is why people should have at least some knowledge of Wittgenstein's beetle in a box thought experiment before getting involved in debates on gender identity. https://twitter.com/oliverburkeman/status/960947159045582849 …

Also, you need to have some idea about the idea that speech acts have illocutionary and perlocutionary aspects; or, to put it another way, that we are inevitably doing things with words (which goes beyond mere ostensible meaning).

Plus, I'd also recommend the Wittgensteinian idea of "family resemblance" if you want to get an idea of how you might get to define gender in a meaningful way. (It allows you to deal with "edge" cases.)

Tim Williamson's epistemic theory of vagueness is another possible approach - vague concepts have sharp, unknowable boundaries - but it's highly counterintuitive.

Alternatively, you could eschew all the philosophy, and just read Everyday Feminism or Buzzfeed, because I'm sure that'll do just as well.

And finally, repeat after me - gender is a hierarchical, relational system, existing in a dialectical relationship with a biological substrate, that is imposed from the outside through inescapable patterns of socialization.

Hierarchical?