Weekly Reading List

March 26, 2023

This is a specially-curated reading list for RLS supporters. It contains my personal selections and summaries of the week’s best articles on a variety of topics. Happy reading!

Understanding the Sex Binary | Colin Wright

For City Journal, Reality’s Last Stand Founding Editor and Manhattan Institute Fellow Colin Wright wrote long piece clarifying what biologists mean when they talk about the “sex binary” and why it’s important, how to avoid the “intersex trap” set by activists by keeping intersex and transgenderism distinct, and how to draft effective legislation and policy relating to the biology of sex to preserve the integrity of female-only spaces.

When biologists claim that “sex is binary,” they mean something straightforward: there are only two sexes. This statement is true because an individual’s sex is defined by the type of gamete (sperm or ova) their primary reproductive organs (i.e., gonads) are organized, through development, to produce. Males have primary reproductive organs organized around the production of sperm; females, ova. Because there is no third gamete type, there are only two sexes that a person can be. Sex is therefore binary.

Wright says that both sides of the sex and gender debate perpetuate misunderstandings of the sex binary, and that in order to be the most effective in defending the truth, “we must not make the biology of sex more (or less) complex than it is.”

Read the full article.