Western?

I am going to have to agree with Chandler when he says that defining genres such as 'the Western' is a problematic enterprise, because what exactly is a Western? Normally when people hear the word Western they think about cowboys, desperadoes, shoot-outs, bank robberies, etc. All sorts of things come to mind. Lee K. Abbot's short story The Purpose Of This Creature Man contains many of these features such as Doc and his crew who rob people and then ride away on horseback. Many of the characters had aliases too which is common in Westerns like "The Doc", "Chicken Jim", "The Verdigris Kid" and "Duke". In Merriam-Webster's dictionary Western is defined as "of, relating to, or characteristic of a region conventionally designated West" and the story does take place in the western part of the United States.
The setting, language, and everything about the story implies that it is a western. But it is still too vague, just because a story or film contains bandits on horseback in Texas, it doesn't necessarily have to be classified as a Western. It could have been a drama or something else relating to these things. Doc's crew doesn't consist of your average bandits, he has weird people who do awkward things. Best example being " The Verdigris Kid" who was a sissy and turns into a women at the end of the story, thats not what a bandit is supposed to be like, they are suppose to be these tough rugged guys who like to commit crimes and fight a lot.
Stories like this support Chandlers theory because there is no specific or definite genre. I believe in the Chandler reading there was something about how genres constantly change over time and we keep creating new genres and categories for things. In the near future this story might fall into another genre and no longer be a Western.