Examples of why legislating sex/gender is a bad idea

Monday, October 19, 2026 - 20:00 The Lesbian Historic Motif Project Linton goes deeply into the details of the 19th century French conflict between the law and biology around sex categorization. Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP LHMP #582c Linton 2022 Unmaking Sex Chapter 2 About LHMP Full citation: Linton, Anne E. 2022. Unmaking Sex: The Gender Outlaws of Nineteenth-Century France. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. ISBN 978-1-316-51182-4 Chapter 2 Outlaws from Birth: “Doubtful Sex” and the Civil Code The chapter opens with an 1881 French annulment petition involving a wealthy 22 year-old woman and a younger non-wealthy aristocrat. The case—which involved “doubtful sex” was covered in detail in the French press and even made it to the New York Times under the headline “Queer French Lawsuit.” [See side-note below.] (Note that both parties were Spanish, though the court case was in France.) The arrangement was planned as a double wedding, Mercedes de Campo to the young (less than…