What Is a Woman? Australian Court Says It’s Not About Biology

by Ken Ham on September 5, 2024
Featured in Ken Ham Blog

“Giggle for Girls” is an Australian female-only networking app that was recently sued by a man, who goes by “Roxanne Tickle,” for barring him from using the app, even though he identifies as a woman. Unsurprisingly, the Australian court sided with Tickle, stating that sex is more than just biology.

They claim:

Sex is not confined to being a biological concept referring to whether a person at birth had male or female physical traits, nor confined to being a binary concept, limited to the male or female sex. . . .

There’s a simple rule: If you have a Y, you are a guy.

This is, of course, anti-science nonsense. This man has XY chromosomes—even if he tries to change his external appearance, every single cell of his body is male. There’s a simple rule: If you have a Y, you are a guy. He always has been and forever will be a man, no matter how he disfigures and mutilates his body or what marker he has on his birth certificate. Biologically speaking, yes, sex is a binary—male and female (which is exactly what we’d expect starting with God’s Word!).

But whenever I write about the simple biological truth of male and female, I am asked about the so-called “exceptions,” the tiny (very tiny) fraction of people who have a chromosomal abnormality on the sex chromosomes, such as XXX or XXY (which is reportedly not the case with Roxanne Tickle, but such arguments are brought up often whenever we discuss cases like this). Doesn’t that prove that sex is more than just the XX/XY binary?

No, it does not. Consider this analogy: Someone asks you to describe the human body. You answer that a human has a head, two eyes, two ears, a nose, a mouth, two arms, two legs, two hands, two feet, five fingers on each hand, and five toes on each foot. But then you get the response, “But what about people who have six fingers or six toes?” Yes, a fraction of people have six fingers—but that is not the normal human condition. That’s an abnormality, and it does not mean that humans have a range of finger numbers!

In the same way, there are (in a fallen world) abnormalities that can occur on all of the chromosomes, including the sex chromosomes. But we recognize that those are not normal—these abnormalities are sad consequences of living in a fallen world and often bring about biological problems such as infertility or hormonal issues. It’s the sad effects of sin (our sin in Adam) and the judgment God brought on creation because of it.

The truth from biology is very simple and has been recognized by humanity for millennia: “Male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27).

The truth from biology is very simple and has been recognized by humanity for millennia: “Male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27).

Get More Answers on Answers News

This item was discussed Tuesday on Answers News with cohosts Avery Foley, Bryan Osborne, and Patricia Engler. Answers News is our weekly news program filmed live before a studio audience here at the Creation Museum and posted to Answers TV. We also covered the following topics:

  • Matching dinosaur footprints . . . across an ocean?
  • Can we blame “wokeness” on atheism?
  • Does the “law of increasing functional information” prove evolution?
  • And more!

Watch the entire episode of Answers News for September 3, 2024.

Be sure to join us each Monday at 2 p.m. (ET) on YouTube or later that day on Answers TV for Answers News. You won’t want to miss this unique news program that gives science and culture news from a distinctly biblical and Christian perspective.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,
Ken

This item was written with the assistance of AiG’s research team.

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