So, I am probably going up upset a number of my friends with this post but I am finding myself drawn to defend Rachel Dolezal, the woman who has been claiming to be black despite being born and raised white.

Now anyone that knows me knows that I stand for trans-gendered rights. Perhaps some do not know why, so let me explain and then I will explain why I am also defending this woman.

I stand up for trans-gendered folk because I believe that gender is a social construct, and that is to say that whatever genitalia you were born with shouldn't effect how you see yourself or how other people see you.

Of course, it does and that's unavoidable.

I don't believe women or men have to act or look a certain way just because of the accident of their birth, and if someone wants to transition into another gender I support that because what society considers what a female or what a male should be isn't reason enough to hold someone back from what would make them feel more whole and complete. If that means changing their bodies so they can fit into what they feel is who they are... then I believe that is their right.

This is not a popular way to look at gender among most trans-gendered people that I know, since many believe gender identity is personal and fully natural to the human experience. My stance is that gender identity and norms are entirely a social construct that we internalize after being raised around them. Over the thousands of years that we have been treating one sex one way and one the other, it's become second nature to the point we believe it's the natural way of things.

Maybe I am wrong about that, but I don't believe I am. So, it might be obvious why I choose to defend this woman...

Obviously, someone's skin color is not a social construct. You are born black, white, yellow, red, blue, green, whatever. However, how we treat people and what we expect of them based on that skin pigmentation is very much a social construct.

Some people are calling what she did offensive in the same vein as people doing blackface performances. I think if you believe that someone that has lived much of their life defending the rights of black people to be putting on an offensive blackface performance then maybe you're an idiot. Blackface is intended to mock black people for the entertainment of (non-black) others. By all accounts this woman lived her life very much not mocking black people's struggle, but engaging in ways to help rise them above it.

Some people talk about the black experience, and how it shouldn't be co-opted, because black people have faced truly outrageous prejudice in their history just because of how they look. So have women, and yet more people seem to accept that it's okay to transition to a woman. Why? The prejudice faced by black people historically (and lets be honest, very much so today as well) was a result of social construct. Society said black people were like X, Y, Z, and thus used that to justify the awful way they were treated. Black people in turn socially constructed their culture in response to that poor treatment.

And as I believe for trans-gendered people, social construct is not good enough of a reason to tell someone they can't be what they feel they are at heart. I feel like I would be a hypocrite if I didn't speak up for this woman like I do for others that have been the subject of scorn just because they change who they are outside to reflect who they believe they are inside.

I realize I am speaking from a position of privilege, I am after all a white, straight male who was lucky enough to have been born the way I feel I am inside.

I just don't agree with the argument this is somehow inherently different and wrong, and maybe that's my privilege speaking, but I stand by what I said here.

I fumble-fingered that mod; it was supposed to be "Interesting", not "WTF".

If gender was just a social construct then no one would would have gender identity issues. You would just be born with certain genitalia, be treated accordingly, and you'd internalize that identity. The fact that people can be born a certain way and treated accordingly but still have strong conflict between their brain and their junk speaks to the very real and powerful genetics and physiology that determine those things. They just don't always match up. To say it's a social effect implies it can be "fixed" socially as well.

Religion is unarguably a social construct, but people struggle with it just the same.

So like one can choose to change from religions that they no longer identify with to another one that suits them better, one can just choose to change which gender they would like to identify with? Odd that some people would kill themselves instead of making that choice. Or maybe it's a terrible comparison.

People kill themselves rather than change religion. Granted, sometimes they have help.

You are not born a Christian, yet people struggle with religious identity sometimes just as hard as people struggle with race or gender identity.

You are not born Republican or Democratic, and yet people often struggle with party affiliation.

Etc, etc, etc.

I am sorry, but you're idea that people would not have issues when it comes to social constructs since social constructs are not "real" doesn't hold water. And yes, they can be fixed socially, either by doing like I do and having society say it doesn't matter what you do, or by having society change how they treat genders all together.

That said, you might as well ask people to hold back the tide at that point. Some things become so ingrained into social consciousness it's nearly impossible to change. You can see the backlash in society this causes with transgendered people, with people falling back on religion (a social construct), the belief that it would confuse children (another social construct), accusations of being "perverted" (another social construct), and accusations that it's just not "natural." Which, I am arguing that the belief that gender is somehow natural to us is just as much a social construct as every other lame excuse.

That's why it's way easier to change yourself than all of society to correct this sort of problem.

Oh come on you guys, religion and politics are such obviously inappropriate generalizations to the specific example of gender identity that I was arguing about. It's no surprise that my claim doesn't hold up in irrelevant comparisons. That you didn't address it directly, or provide anything specific to counter my main point that gender identity has a biological basis is noteworthy.

Here's the difference anyway. A person isn't born with religion. A person isn't born with political affiliation. They aren't innate aspects of your personality that happen to you when you hit puberty, or some other developmental stage, they are environmentally acquired traits. Of course you can struggle with them, but that struggle is dependent on either your changing ideals with respect to the organization, or changing ideals of the organization with respect to you. In either case, identity in those examples is strongly tied to some outside influence, that being the religion or party that exists outside of your participation in it.

With gender identity, the entire struggle happens within your own body and mind. You have a mind that (for example) believes it is female but a body that is male. That is a self-contained struggle that can exist in complete isolation from whatever social constructs exist or do not exist. I can only imagine that it must be very alarming to feel that your body is somehow foreign to you, or contains foreign elements. To some people, the only solution is to alter the body to match the mind, others might choose to tolerate the dissonance.

"...having society say it doesn't matter what you do, or by having society change how they treat genders all together."

These are good and useful social goals, and will help people to be accepting of differences, and feel less ostracized, but neither of them directly aid the internal struggle of an individual.

Finally, to further explain my original point in its intended context, is the following:

If you believe that a * 1) person's gender identity is socially constructed, and 2) that people born with penises are generally treated in a way that fosters male identity while people born with vaginas are generally treated in a way that fosters female identity, then logically, there should be extremely few cases where a person with a penis feels like they are female, and a person with a vagina feels like they are male. Furthermore, these cases should be highly unusual, (e.g. isolated child and crazy parent or some such). I have only known 2 (openly) transgendered people, and can only call 1 of them a friend, so it's an admittedly small sample, but they described a very natural and internal realization of who they were in their mind, not some influence from outside.
On the other hand, if you believe that 1) a person's (mental and physical) gender identity is a product of biology, and 2) that it doesn't matter how many times a person is told they belong to one gender or another, then the observed pattern -in my observation anyway (thatpeople with 'normal' upbringings still can still have gender identity conflict) is more fully explained.

*I think you agree with #1 based on your comments. If you disagree with #2, I'm very curious to know what you actually mean by gender as a social construct.

There are people that take their faith so seriously they commit suicide when they have crisis of faith. Just because you and I do not believe religion is serious doesn't mean it's not to someone else. Political thinking has an observable effect on the brain.

Again, just because we don't personally hold these things if high regard in our own identities does not mean they are ridiculous to bring up. Obviously others hold them in all seriousness.

My stance is agnostic to whether or not transgendered people are "correcting" something wrong with them. Because I don't care if they believe they are women or men inside. I am saying what a woman or man is or is not is entirely artificial. Perhaps there is a physiological reason for transgendered people believing what they want, but that is a slippery-god-damned slope. Could you find the genetic causes of it? If so, can you treat those causes? See where I am going here? My support of transgendered people does not hinge on anything scientific or emotional, because all it would take is an experiment to totally undermine that support. I support them because it's the right thing to do and society at large can suck all sort of dick for trying to tell people what they can and not be.

To answer your questions:
1) I do not, obviously agree with 1. Gender identity is a social construct, not a physical one. It has fuck all to do with biology. I don't know how on earth you thought I would agree with #1 based on my comments.

2) Gender identity conflict have nothing to do with how someone is raised. Perfectly reasonable people have wanted to become transgendered. Why they want to, I can't say for a fact. What I am saying is that how they express it is a product of social conditioning.

Follow the asterisk for point 1: You responded to the wrong item.

But now that you've made it explicit that you firmly believe gender identity is a choice based, apparently, on your gut feeling ("Maybe I am wrong about that, but I don't believe I am") and a lack of information from actual transgendered people ("Why they want to [become transgendered] I can't say") I'm done wasting time with this.

EDIT: Goddammit, I just can't help myself.
"Perhaps there is a physiological reason for transgendered people believing what they want, but that is a slippery-god-damned slope. Could you find the genetic causes of it? If so, can you treat those causes? See where I am going here?"

Yeah, you're going nuts. "Perhaps there is a social reason for transgendered people believing what they want, but that is a slippery-god-damned slope. Could you find the social causes of it? If so, can you treat those causes?" Guess how well it works to socially treat gay people? It's a fucking disaster.

It doesn't matter if there's a genetic cause, or if there's a treatment. People are already seeking treatment through modification of their bodies to match their minds. If people want treatment, whether it's through gene therapy or surgery, that's their decision to make, not yours. Refusing to identify causes of phenomena take peoples' choices away, not add to them.
If your support for transgendered people would really be undermined by an experiment then your support is worth nothing, and your progressive mask is a total farce.

"I'm not going to speak for them"

... Holy shit, you actually think you can claim that.

Please tell me where I spoke for anyone but myself? If I do so, believe me it was unintentional. I laid out *my* logic.

Gee, I don't know, somehow I got the idea that you were explaining the whole phenomenon (that you admittedly don't experience) as a social construct. And in your benevolence you also insinuated (if not on their behalf, then on whose?) that finding a treatment for something which can cause people severe anxiety and psychological harm would be undesirable.

At this point I'm just hoping you don't really understand transgenderism. This isn't a little girl who wants to play with trucks, or a little boy who wants to play with dollies. This is about people who look at their genitalia or other sex characteristics and think "that shouldn't be there, that's not right, it doesn't belong to me, that's not who I am." For some people it is so distressing that they go through great expense and great physical pain, and risk persecution to transform their bodies to match their self-perception. To dismiss it as a choice or merely the effect of social influence is as obscene as telling a depressed person "Hey, just cheer up buddy! spend some time around these fun folk!"

Look, I was explain why *I* support transgendered people, that support is agnostic to why they became transgendered, and based on the fact that social constructs like gender identity are not good enough reasons to tell someone what they can, and not do with their own bodies. That has been consistent thoughout everything I have said, if you feel that somehow that stance belittles people, then fine... feel that way, but know you're fucking idiot.

I will say it again for: I DO NOT GIVE A FUCK WHY SOMEONE TRANSITIONS. The fuck I give is that we don't use social constructs as a reason to tell them they can not, because society should not be allowed to tell you who you are and what you can do if you're ultimately not hurting anyone.

It has also just occurred to me that our disagreement might stem from personal differences. For me, my gender identity is not something I choose. I can't just choose to change affiliation like I can religion or political party. I don't believe it was programmed in to me either. I don't believe that a person with gender dysphoria was socially programmed to have conflicting attitudes about themself, and I don't believe that they can be socially programmed to be"corrected" either. That might not be the case for everyone, apparently you and some others here. It's a big world and there are lots of possibilities. For people where it is something they can easily change about themselves, gender identity need not be so problematic as those with conflicting and immutable mental and physical conditions..

Indeed you are speaking from a position of privilege, and that's the problem. Plenty of black people have weighed in with a compelling argument- it doesn't work both ways. Sure, some people of color have gotten away with passing- but the vast majority are stuck being black, with all of the baggage that comes with.

...and that is somehow different for woman vis-a-vis transgendered people?

Every argument I have seen the black community level against her, is directly comparable to anti-trans feminist arguments.

Sorry but your argument here only holds up if impersonating a different race was the same thing as transgenderism. For whatever reason she made a deliberate choice not just to become black, but to to become prominent in the community. Sure there may be some kind of underlying identity crisis at play here, but certainly not on what is now considered the physiological basis of gender identity.

There is no demonstrable physiological basis of gender identity. There are differences in the physical makeup of the male and female brain (extremely minor.) But no one has ever (and I am certain they never will) shown where gender identity is the result of anything going on in the brain. The studies so far have simply pointed out that MTF transgendered people have brains identical to male brains: http://www.medicaldaily.com/brain-mapping-gender-identity-what-makes-boy-girl-247122 *

People make deliberate choices to become women, and sometimes they even take up social activism for women too. So let me ask you this, if a transgendered woman became a leader in the women lib movement and a professor of women's studies, would you suddenly cry foul on her?

*Slight correction: they found some differences between MTF and control men, but again nothing that establishes gender identity in the slightest.

OK just to parse my words here- what I mean to say is that the current thinking is that gender identity is not a choice- that most people are hard-wired to identify as a particular gender, despite the physical equipment they may have been born with. The physical transformation is just kind of a 'correction' or adjustment to what that person sees as their true 'normal'. And sure, If a person is say female by identity, why not be an active feminist? The only issue is that trans people have their own equality battle that may be more pressing. The objection to them you cite is a marginal radical subset, certainly not mainstream feminism.

The problem a lot of black people seem to have with Rachel Dolezal is that she appropriated this identity and become a prominent activist in order to gain status within that community- even claiming a legacy of victimhood she wasn't entitled to. See I can't say that she wasn't acting out of earnest righteousness, but like you I'm speaking from that perch of white privilege, so I disqualify myself from judging her one way or the other. My approach is to defer judgment to people who are actually potentially affected by her actions.

Where I am coming from at this is agnostic to the idea that trans people are "correcting" something. I believe since these things are socially constructed they are only as real as opinion. If they want to be considered a woman, I will do that because it's the non-dickhead thing to do, since the difference between "men" and "women" is social.

I think it's super racist to say that "blackness" is inherent, and also racist to say that white people can't talk about or have an opinion on the matter.

Oh sure I agree. Everyone's entitled to an opinion on the matter. What I'm saying is in trying to decide if words or behaviors are truly offensive I tend to defer to those to whom the offense is aimed at. I've previously used the example of the Washington Redskins. Is the name racist and offensive? Well since most Native Americans seem to be offended by it, I'll defer to their opinion and say 'yes'. Maybe this is pandering but we do it all the time. We don't use the terms 'colored' or 'negro' any more because the consensus of black people prefer 'black' or 'African American'.

" I think if you believe that someone that has lived much of their life defending the rights of black people to be putting on an offensive blackface performance then maybe you're an idiot."

That's pretty much it in a nutshell right there.

Here's a related one, closer to me personally:

Q. How long does a non-Japanese have to live in Japan before they are Japanese?
A. Never. Your kids, maybe your kids kids, if they intermarry, will be considered "sorta, kinda Japanese ... but not, you know, really Japanese."

The other one is why is Barack Obama considered to be a black person, not a white person? Genetically its 50/50. I also don't understand the logic that as a half-Kenyan he is automatically better able to relate to needs and issues facing black Americans than Hillary Clinton.

Or why you have to be black-skinned to work at the NAACP.

(Actually the NAACP issued a very gracious statement in her support, confirming that nothing could be further from the truth. Which I thought was nice.)

I really understand the value of the material, but I have a difficult time taking it seriously coming from Buzzfeed.

Interestingly I found their story to be the most straightforward, with a minimum of reflection and analysis. But I hear you, other news sources added in extended.

True! It's interesting to see an article about a person accused of being disingenuous by a media site that is often accused of being disingenuous...

The story of Rachel Dolezal is making the rounds on the 'net - the only thing I'm confused about is the adoptive brother/son thing.

Raises an interesting idea: (liberal) people accept that it is possible to have a mental identity that is at odds with one's genetic identity. For example, transgender people. So is it possible for a genetically white person (inasmuch as such a thing exists) to be mentally black (whatever the hell that means)?

I mean, we joke about Michael Jackson turning himself into a white person, but what if there is such a thing as "racial dysphoria" the same way there is gender dysphoria?

I don't think so because 'blackness' is a social construct. There is no specifically 'black genes' and nothing about the amount of melanin in someones skin has real bearing outside what society makes it.

That is also true for gender roles, but I feel like gender itself has a specific physiological component.

Of course the more prominent history is black people passing as white- but usually for more obvious reasons of social acceptance and gain (see my link on 'passing' in the extended). But the reverse must happen for different reasons- admiration for a culture that's different, exciting, edgy maybe. Some people strive for underdog status. And maybe 'racial dysphoria' may be at play. No doubt the fact that this woman grew up with four black adopted brothers was a factor. But it's just ironic that as a black person she actually found success and prominence. As a white person she probably would have been a nobody.

I am loving black twitter rn

Are we entirely sure she is faking it? It seems at least plausible that her mother desperately doesn't want to acknowledge an affair.

Um...you understand that that right thumb photo is her, right?

Here's another:


Draw your own conclusion.

Her mother claims it is, sure. I don't know that.

Her mother, father, and adopted brothers. Just look at the side-by-side. It's definitely her, in nappy hair and brownface.
But y'know, if she's really clever she'll adopt your theory. She apparently hates her parents anyway, so why not claim her black identity and impugn their reputation all in one shot?

She already has claimed another man as her father.

I'm not so willing to just take the word of what looks like a pair of creepily religious, possibly abusive people.

...who she just happens to totally resemble without the hair and makeup.
But that's cool, she totally has the right to disclaim them as her parents and adopt a whole new identity.

I'm not saying your wrong, I'm just waiting to see how it plays out. She did offer to take a DNA test, after all.

She herself hasn't denied anything, just dodged and made excuses. But I'd argue that she shouldn't have to take a DNA test. If she wants to be black, all she has to do is be accepted by the black community.

The former may now be necessary for the latter.

Well, then I suspect she might have a problem.

I'll admit that I'm as uninformed and confused about this rather than make up the rules as I go along like many people are doing. Her parents adopted and she had adopted black siblings. It started early on. The lying is definitely bad. It doesn't invalidate all the good she has done defending the black community.

Honestly, I just have a lot of questions. Was she discriminated for being allegedly black? Or light-skinned black? Is she black on the weekends? Is she black for work? Is she full time identifying as black throughout her life. Why would someone want to be part of a marginalized group? What is her motivation? I just want to talk to her.

Many people from different walks of life have been alienated from their families based on religious beliefs, sexual orientation or even the friends they hang out with. So it's not a stretch she's distant with her parents because of how she grew up and what she identifies with.

My friend in college was half Korean, half Chinese. He identifies with the Japanese. Also ironic cause everyone in Japan are of Korean descent, but the Japanese don't want to hear about it.

There's also the case of Wayne Joseph who at age 75, after taking an ancestor-by-DNA test, that he wasn't black. He was born in Louisiana and creole. He was raised black and identified as black. His phenotype looked like he's black. His parents did, too. The test results of his genetic makeup:

57% Indo-European
39% East Asian
4% Native American
0% Black

His wife is white. His kids grew up identifying as part black and part white.

So what makes someone black? Is being black just the culture or does it also include your heritage?

This woman is a harbinger of a new word.... wait for it... TRANSRACIAL

That's actually been a thing on Tumblr for years now.

D'oh!

Does that mean I can finally be accepted as the half-dwarf/half-ork I've always secretly known was my true self? #dorkpride!

Sure. You can even claim to be the consciousness of a sentient galaxy trapped in the body of a human and prefer to be addressed with the pronouns galaxy/galaxy's/galaxyself and there will be a frightening number of Tumblr users who'll flame anyone who makes fun of you.

Rachel Dolezal joins Jackie Robinson as pioneers who broke the colour barrier.

this bitch right here.....
gender is a social construct
race is not

So if gender AND race are social constructs...

How can white male privilege exist?

If God isn't real, why do we have religious wars?

That's pretty tacky.

Funny, that's how I feel about the sounds of all these people pumping their brakes.

Actually I give Caitlin Jenner a lot of credit for very publicly embracing her true identity. Is the Vanity Fair cover tacky? Maybe, but also a strong affirmation for people struggling with gender identity.
As for Rachel Dolezal, we're talking apples and oranges.

Is that because you think transgender people are faking it, or because you think there is an intrinsic physiological element to blackness that goes beyond melanin production?

False Dilemma.

For about ten grand in equipment and whatever the coding requires I could make a VR experience that would have you wanting to identify as a very large penguin. :D

There's no free will, papango. With the right equipment and an extensive semantic network of your internal metaphors I could make those voices in your head dance to a 4/4 or Rumpshaker.

So my answer to the much more ambiguous question you should have been asking instead of your false dilemma is because I don't think you fools (and I really do mean that in the nicest way; you've seen my facebook coverphoto) have a clue how identity works, but in all your misplaced "holier than thou"-ness are happy to not let that stop you from picking and "choosing" who gets to be your cause or poster child.

Of course, I don't believe you have a choice in the matter either. Which is why rather than getting into some heated, fruitless argument, I made a joke that I felt captured the irony of the situation :)

That's nice, dear.

Aw, he can't help it.

Well, I don't think he should help it. I'm sure the aspects of identity he's talking about are worth exploring and maybe they do have a bearing on gender and identity. But it's not a conversation I'm equipped to take part in. My world view with regard to identity and free will is too much opposed for us to even find common ground on which to base a discussion. But it's nice someone is thinking about these things.

Really? You're gonna drop a lecture from an online conservative university?

First of all this guy goes off the rails when he starts claiming no one can have access to what you are thinking. We may not have all the necessary technology available yet, but that doesn't mean it's forever inaccessible. We've already gotten to the point where we can pull images from peoples heads. His argument just went out the fucking window. :P

Hell, by this guys logic @ 3:37, just because we understand how a computer works we still shouldn't be capable of telling it's memory states, and as I programmer I can tell you his premise is complete bupkis. Psychology is reducible to physics, biology, and chemistry. We're just not there yet.

He's making an argument for god here. Is that really what you want to bring to this conversation?

I was actually trolling you and also for making fun of Papango's mental health, but you doubled down on The Secret Lives of the Brain and seems to be completely unaware or just masterful with the double entendre, so I let it go.

And as a programmer myself, I like turtles.

Apologies, but I'm surrounded by people here who are adamant as to religion being bunk while still being more than happy to claim free will. It can be difficult to determine who's being a troll and who's being a walking contradiction :)

No worries.

I think we have freewill from our view. It doesn't really matter that we live in a deterministic universe because that would imply a simulation.

Let's enjoy the meat puppet :)

Sure it seems like we have free will, but science disagrees. And I wouldn't even really care but as can clearly be seen we've got people making judgements about one another, sending each other to war, basing our judicial/political systems on this antiquated, broken religious idea.

So, I care. :)

Not that I want to rehash this debate with you, but the science on this is not necessarily settled.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will#Disputed_relevance_of_scientific_research

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/09/free_will_debate_what_does_free_will_mean_and_how_did_it_evolve.html

http://www.wired.com/2014/09/belief-free-will-threatened-neuroscience/

Yeah, I know these links may be not be on the level of peer-reviewed journals, but the point is legitimate questions can be raised over the conclusions of the research so far.

On the level? These links aren't even relevant, sanepride. You've got philosophers and semantic arguments. Seriously, your wired article doesn't even address free will, it's a clickbait title about a study that asks how people feel about free will. How does any of that dispute that we literally have studies showing unconscious activity precedes conscious awareness? Not to mention the plethora of psychological studies we have showing how we can manipulate behavior and conscious awareness.

And the worst part is you don't even get why this is important. In our last conversation on the topic you completely disregarded the most important point, the fact that how you approach something imposes itself on you respond to it. Angry sanepride literally sees the world differently than sanepride in love, as would depressed sanepride or even lsd sanepride. Different saneprides that will behave differently and have access to different thoughts and memories. How different would a sanepride that understands that humans are slaves to their DNA and experiential training see the world compared to the current sanepride? What ideas would a sanepride like that have to offer the world? How would that sanepride approach things like poverty, soldiers, crime, authority, and politics compared to the current sanepride?

Ah, but at the risk of being purely anecdotal and philosophical, I can at least consider, even visualize a sanepride who blithely accepts the notion of a predetermined conscious reality and illusory free will- even if science has yet to answer the vital question of how neurological activity even becomes thought and action, willful or not. And I'm equally capable of grasping the importance of it and totally dismissing it at the same time.
So try to give me just a little credit here and stop coming off like some kind of sermonizing street preacher, 'kay?

*poof*

Whoa, you've convinced me. I am but a helpless dandelion seed, adrift on the fickle breeze of destiny. I'll just relax and enjoy the ride.

OK, happy now?

Yeah, I'm gonna stop now.

You say that like you have a choice.

With the right equipment and an extensive semantic network of your internal metaphors I could make those voices in your head dance to a 4/4 or Rumpshaker.

Really? Mental health jokes?

Weak.

No, not at all. That's not a single voice in your head, you've just associated them together. Using voices metaphorically, of course. You're not actually talking in your head. Matter of fact, "you" is much more like the listener than you are the speaker.

“Brains are like representative democracies. They are built of multiple, overlapping experts who weigh in and compete over different choices. As Walt Whitman correctly surmised, we are large and we harbor multitudes within us. And those multitudes are locked in chronic battle.
There is an ongoing conversation among the different factions in your brain, each competing to control the single output channel of your behavior. As a result, you can accomplish the strange feats of arguing with yourself, cursing at yourself, and cajoling yourself to do something – feats that modern computers simply do not do.”
― David Eagleman, Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain

I do believe some are faking it. Internet posterchild Chris-Chan has even recently taken to claiming to be a woman now, his efforts of course focused on getting a lesbian woman to sleep with him.

And if you can't make a judgement about an entire group of people based on Chris Chan, what can you base your judgments on.

Well, he does serve as the benchmark for people who are really into Sonic the Hedgehog well into their 30's.

I have lunch in the Statistic New Zealand cafe, so I know how important that demographic is for planners and advertisers.