Words are just sound ideas

What are words? Well arguably they're ideas communicated through sounds. When written down the ideas are communicated through symbols and combinations of symbols to communicate the idea, and although the symbols are a replication of the sound. I'm English we use phonetic writing where it is agreed that a symbol or combination of them equals a particular sound.

Maybe it was several sounds that over time we're consolidated into a single agreed sound (as populations merged within an area and a single language became possible).

There's this quite tense debate going on throughout the interwebs and in communities across the globe about transgenderism (is that a word?) and whilst it is a very serious topic and one that deserves reasoned and serious debate it seems that many people are focusing on one thing, and that is whether a transgender woman is a woman (weirdly I don't hear people saying the same thing about transgender men. Maybe they're just being quieter about it). Battle lines have been drawn, all sides are preparing their weapons. But here's the thing, the word "woman" in the English language has historically referred to someone who is biologically female and therefore someone who isn't biologically female can't be a woman!

Still with me?

Ok so if communication is an agreement within a group that certain sounds mean certain things then that group (or society) can use those sounds to communicate ideas. So let's try it out, say out loud the word "cup". In English the idea it conveys is a receptical for holding liquid and drinking from. We can go further and also say that it is usually ceramic, has a handle and typically is used for hot drinks. Sounds reasonable doesnt it. What if I said "to cup"? Does that mean to be like a cup, or to use a cup, or could it mean to hold something gently by putting your hand flat, palm upwards and then curling your fingers slightly to make a bowl like shape. You can do this with one hand or two but the meaning is the same. Cup can also be used to name a menstruation device that eliminates the need for period disposables (tampons, pads etc) as it is reusable, but you probably wouldn't want to drink tea from it, and it's not ceramic!

When the word cup came into use in the English language do you think that there were menstruation cups available or would the word have had only one meaning?

So you see words and language are mutable, they changed and adapt over time and are not set in stone with only one meaning that can never change! I'm guessing that someone bright spark will have spotted where I'm going with this, so I'll just get to the point, what is a woman?

Why not? Why can't we just change what the word means? Pedantic morons will then say "but a woman has female anatomy and can menstruate" or some other pedantic argument. Well what should we call women who no longer menstruate, have had historectomies or mastectomies? Are they no longer women? Maybe we should just decide that the word means more than just one thing. Maybe we should be respectful of people's privacy. I don't care if someone has a vagina or penis, if they tell me they identify as a woman then that's what I'll refer to them as. 

"But what about sport, we can't have people who are biologically male but identify as female competing against real women". And you know what I say to that, "Piffle". Why not? Why can't men, women, trans, non-binary etc compete against each other? Because genetically they may have different capabilities? Adapt the sport then, change our way of living, evolve so that our way of living reflects our way of thinking and our way of being. Our society as it stands today has developed over thousands of years, this is not the pinnacle of our development, things will continue to change and we need to continue to adapt to that change.

Language is mutable, as it should be. Our societies and culture are constantly evolving, twenty years ago the internet was in its infancy and mobile phones were quirky. Now we have mobile devices that can order sushi for us and track our location to within a few metres almost anywhere on the planet. 

So for all those people that don't like it if people want to be referred to by a pronoun that is different from their biology, I say get over yourselves, it's just a sound that conveys an idea and if the ideas evolve then so should the sounds!

There is only one category that should matter, that we are all human.