Look at how many times the heritage foundation ghouls use the word "natural" or "inherent" when describing some stuff about women: https://www.transiticsnews.com/p/after-pushing-anti-trans-laws-to
Ideas about what's "natural" (vs "cultural") are central to a lot of messed up ideologies. The idea that something is "natural" is used as a cudgel to keep people in line: "girls shouldn't play sports, it's not natural" or "it's only natural for people to want to marry within their race", or "it's unnatural to be gay", etc etc etc.
This is why disciplines like cultural anthropology are necessary. The research that comes out of these fields helps answer the question "is x *really* natural, or does it vary by culture?"
Sometimes I wonder: if I didn't receive so many messages growing up about such and such thing being natural or inevitable, would I have been as interested in studying cultural anthropology in college, and would I instead have gone for a more practical major? Who can say.
As things happened, I absolutely *needed* to learn whether I really was meant to be a dumb, weak babymaker.....or whether it's inevitable for a certain number of people in a society to go hungry or be without a home (the answer is "no" and "no").
I defer to actual cultural anthropologists on this, but if someone asked me "ok, so what actually *is* natural about humans? (Meaning: occurs in all or nearly all cultures)", I think there's very little. I think almost all (if not all-all societies) have humans living in groups ("social species"), using tools (just like many other non-human animals), using language, and telling stories. That's about it. Pretty much everything else varies. If there's an obvious one I've missed, please let me know.
So don't let bigots bully you by telling you this or that is "natural"! Nearly everything about how humans are varies by culture, and anyway, where is the experiment that involves culture-less humans (which might show us what "natural" humans are like)? And those instances of"wild" children don't count, because humans raised alone do *not* reflect any kind of "natural" conditions (because we evolved growing up in groups).
#CulturalAnthropology #bigotry #feminism #trans