Transcript: Lesson 26 - Terms/Language

Friends, welcome. As we think about this unit, we are examining what it means to be the  people of God, the family of God and LGBT+ people. How do we take a posture of grace and  truth with ourselves with one another, again, because we're not talking about people out  there, we're talking about people in the church. And part of doing this, I think, is making sure  that there's clarity in terms of the different language issues, the terms that are used. This is  important because again, if you're in the, in the thick of these discussions, this, some of what  I say in this video might seem like old hat, you know, this, it's just review. But for others of  you perhaps if you're not in the midst of this discussion, it can be a little bit overwhelming to  hear the variety of language, the variety of terms that are out there, and maybe not  understand exactly what's what's being referred to with these. So in this video, I just want to  take a few minutes to clarify some terminology, and some language, I think it's important to  understand the difference between gender identity, and sexual identity or sexual orientation,  that when we talk about gender identity, we're talking about who somebody identifies as in  terms of male or female, or, as we'll see in a minute, something maybe in between, or maybe  something different altogether. And so gender identity has to do with how I think about myself as male or female, whereas sexual identity or orientation has to do with, with who I'm  attracted to. And so it's important to distinguish those things, as we think about LGBT+  people, because those are two different things that we shouldn't, we shouldn't lump them  together and think about them as though as though they're the same. Another two key terms  to differentiate is cisgender versus transgender. And I mentioned this a little bit in the earlier  video, but when we say that somebody is cisgender, part of what we mean is that their their  internal sense of gender identity matches their biological sex. And so as I would, I am a  cisgender person, because my internal sense of being a man of masculinity is aligned with my biological sex, that is male, whereas a transgender person is somebody who experiences a  misalignment, if you want to put it that way between their internal gender identity, and their  biological sex. And so we'll we'll spend a whole unit thinking about transgender people. And  so we'll dive into that in more detail. But I just want to clarify and highlight those terms at this point, so that we have an understanding of the difference there and what's being referenced.  When we think about gender identity as well, masculinity, femininity, male, female, there's  also a couple other terms that you might sometimes encounter. One of them is gender fluid.  And that's where the way that a lot of people think about gender is that, that it's on a  spectrum of, of male to female, that you have your really, really masculine men really  feminine women, and that when we think about masculinity and femininity on this, this, this  kind of continuum or spectrum, that gen, somebody who identifies as gender fluid would just  say, you know, I don't, I don't just kind of stay at one point on that spectrum. But there may  be some, sometimes some places some roles or avenues of life where I would identify as  more masculine, but then in other ways more feminine, and that there would be kind of a  sliding back and forth on that scale of fluidity on that spectrum, that you don't just stay static, you don't just stay in one spot. gender queer is a little bit different. gender queer is, is more  like saying if there's this line the spectrum. I don't really, I don't really fit anywhere on that  spectrum. You know, I'm up here, I'm, I'm over here. I don't really fit on that line or that  continuum at all. And so when we think about how people understand themselves, one of the  key things, I think to do to show respect to show care for for a person is to make sure we let  we let them articulate for us how they would define themselves that you don't you know,  some of you might know this, some of you, this might be helpful to say, you don't walk up to  somebody and just start asking questions about their, their gender identity or their sexual  identity in kind of a, you know, blunt, rude way, but that you let people articulate to  themselves how they understand themselves, it's fine to ask you to humbly ask questions  like, Well, how do you identify how do you understand yourself in that way, but these are  some of the key terms that I think can help us understand how people might some some  different ways that people might identify. Now I do want to distinguish when we talk about  LGBT+ people, I do want to clarify some of the differences between these terms and  understanding the alphabet A little bit. We could do more than this. There are more more  terms here. But for our purposes, I just want to highlight some of the differences. Because  oftentimes, and even in this unit, we're talking about LGBT+ people, which can include a wide

range of folks. And it's important to recognize that we're not talking about not not all of these  letters are referring to the same thing. And so when we talk about somebody who is lesbian or gay, or bisexual, part of what we're highlighting there is sexual orientation. Who are you  attracted to? Lesbian is a woman who's attracted to women. Somebody who's gay, even  though in gay is a more umbrella term that could include lesbians as well. We're talking about a man attracted to another man, when we're talking about bisexual orientation, we're talking  about somebody who is either man or woman and who is attracted to both male and female.  And so some of these letters are referring to sexual orientation, who someone is attracted to.  Other letters here are connected to gender identity. And so again, a transgender person is  somebody whose sense of gender identity doesn't fit their biological sex, that there is that  there's a difference there. And so now, again, we're not talking about who is someone  attracted to, but who do they identify as in terms of their gender. I also put not only  transgender but queer here, again, this is a term that sort of originated in a more derogatory  use, but that many people today have have reclaimed in a positive way to say, look, I don't I  don't fit into maybe standard categories of male or female or masculinity, and femininity. But  again, we're talking about not who someone is attracted to, but how they identify as in terms  of in terms of their gender. And then last, the I here refers to intersex. And this is something  that we are going to unpack all three of these dimensions in the next three units. But when  we talk about someone who is intersex, that's actually a biological condition. And we'll talk  about that more. But again, that's important to distinguish that all three of these are different. And we're not talking about people who are the same. And so, unfortunately, sometimes  people have lumped folks all together and thought about transgender people as though if  you're transgender, then that also means you're gay, or that if you are an intersex person,  then that means you're transgender, that means you're attracted to someone of the same  sex. And so it's important to distinguish between all three of these. Because if, if we don't  properly distinguish between these, we won't actually do a good job of understanding. What  does it mean for yourself is if you identify as LGBT+, or if you're called to connect with care  minister to LGBT+ people, a lot of a lot of damage, I think has been done, because people  often lump everyone into the same group, and make assumptions about who they are about,  they're about their sexual identity, or even about their sexual practices based on some of  these markers. And so we want to be really clear here about distinguishing these and  clarifying what exactly is at stake. Well, now that we're on the same page with some of these  terms, and as I said, we're going to dig into these more in future units. I want to spend a little  bit of time reflecting on some of the theological missteps. That everybody in not just LGBT+  people, but some theological missteps that maybe especially straight cisgender Christians  have have made that actually lead people to assume that same sex marriage is is the only  option forward for gay people or assume that that singleness is not really an option for gay or  straight people, and reflect a little bit on some of the mistakes that the church has made. That often leads to confusion when we have these conversations. And so we'll dig into that more in the next video. So until next time, blessings