First-person authority over gender: metaphysical, ethical, and epistemic but non-absolute

Suppose I say: “I am a woman.” Many people agree that, in almost all cases, it would be wrong in some way to challenge this claim. I have some kind of first-person authority over my gender. Being able to recognize this first-person authority is a key desideratum for accounts of how gender claims function in trans-inclusive contexts. However, there is disagreement about exactly what kind of first-person authority needs to be recognized. Bettcher argues that we should recognize ethical rather than epistemic first-person authority over gender. Critics argue that ethical first-person authority, as generally understood, is not enough. I argue that Bettcher’s influential account of gender claims as acts of existential self-identification has the resources to recognize non-absolute metaphysical, ethical, and epistemic first-person authority over gender. Moreover, I argue, this kind of non-absolute metaphysical, ethical, and epistemic first-person authority is exactly what we should want an account of gender practices to recognize. It gives plausible results about tricky cases and enables us to clearly identify the ways in which someone is wronged when their gender claim is wrongfully challenged. I identify the features of the Bettcher’s account which enable it to recognize this first-person authority and use Bex-Priestley’s account as a model to show that we can identify these features in other promising accounts. I finish by discussing the implications of Bettcher’s recent monograph, in which Bettcher revises and reformulates her earlier arguments, situating them within an account of interpersonal spatiality.