posted
A girl posted this article on her LJ. I think this is a great and positive way to handle the situation. It teaches the children not to make fun of or pick on the student, thus making something that is difficult even harder on a person. I like this approach and I wish more people would use it.
School helps girl student change to boy Thursday, March 3, 2005 By Jason Tait Staff Writer METHUEN -- A fourth-grader who was attending Comprehensive Grammar School as a girl before the February break returned to school this week as a boy.
The parents of the 9-year-old say their child was born with the body of a girl but his real gender is male, and they have asked that he be referred to and treated as such by teachers and other students.
School officials said they are accommodating the family's request and, so far, other children seem to be taking the change in stride, though some parents have called with concerns.
The child's parents sent a letter to family and friends explaining the decision to let their child grow up as a boy.
The mother said this morning the decision was made in consultation with medical professionals but her child has not undergone any medical procedure to change his sex physically.
"My child has the brain of a boy," said the mother, who asked that her family not be identified.
"This is not a decision made in a vacuum," she said. "There have been a lot of medical professionals who have confirmed it."
The mother said that her child has never identified as a girl.
"Obviously in the beginning we dressed him as a female," the mother said. "When he began identifying at 2 (as a male), he was ripping the dress off his back."
The mother said that she and her husband at first thought of their child as a "tomboy." But as he kept insisting, "I'm a boy, I'm a boy," they sought medical help. Eventually, they reached the decision to change his gender identity at school, including changing his first name.
The mother said her child's condition is the result of a "birth defect that happens during the formation of the gender" in the uterus. "Basically the brain develops in one direction, the body the other," she said.
School Superintendent C. Phillip Littlefield said the grammar school is making "reasonable changes to accommodate the child," who the mother said has been a student there since first grade.
Littlefield said "curious and concerned" parents have called the school as they learned of the change from their children or other parents.
Littlefield said that because some people become fearful when they do not understand something, the school system is being "open and honest" with parents with questions.
"There is nothing harmful about this youngster being in school," he said.
The mother said that she hopes her child is accepted for who he is. "These few parents who are upset about it, I'd love to talk to them," she said. "My child is not a threat."
Littlefield said the child is "in the process of -- I'd call it a gender clarification," and school officials are treating him as a student like any other with special needs.
"I've never dealt with anything like this before," Littlefield said. "But we have unquestioned responsibility for dealing with the specific needs of this youngster."
The school has about 1,200 students in kindergarten through eighth grade. About 150 are in fourth grade.
Littlefield said the parents of the 9-year-old spoke with Principal Brandi L. Kwong and Director of Pupil Services Ryan Plosker about their child and their plan to have him return to school as a boy this week, following February school vacation.
Littlefield said children at the school are adapting well to the change.
"For a lot of kids, (we tell them) 'We're going to call Phyllis Phillip now,'" Littlefield said, using different names. "They say, 'OK.' "
Dr. Stephanie Sidney, who practices psychology in North Andover, said she has dealt with childhood gender identity issues on a couple of occasions. She said there is still a great deal of research to be done in the field, as causes and treatment remain surrounded by mystery.
Sidney said treatment is a "Catch-22."
"You don't want to reject or deny a person's true identity or who they really feel they are," she said. "But there is a reality as to how society may treat this person."
Sidney said someone who commits to leading the life of the opposite sex may face "rejection and negativity."
The situation can be equally challenging for the parents, Sidney said.
There is a risk of depression for all those involved, she said, and the greatest obstacle can be talking about it and deciding how to deal with extended family, friends and the community.
quote:The parents of the 9-year-old say their child was born with the body of a girl but his real gender is male,
How do they know this? Because the child tells them she thinks she's male? Because she doesn't like dresses?
quote:"birth defect that happens during the formation of the gender" in the uterus. "Basically the brain develops in one direction, the body the other," she said
This is a documented condition? It's been studied, and we know how it happens, what types of thing cause it, etc? Or is it just speculation?
Is it not possible that the child has some sort of gender identity problem that could be corrected with psychotherapy, helping her identify herself as the female she physically is?
Doesn't that seem like a much more reasonable approach than just suddenly announcing that she will now be referred to as a he and changing everything in the child's life?
quote:Dr. Stephanie Sidney, who practices psychology in North Andover, said she has dealt with childhood gender identity issues on a couple of occasions. She said there is still a great deal of research to be done in the field, as causes and treatment remain surrounded by mystery.
Now that I can buy - sounds reasonable. The mother seems pretty sure she knows the cause though - wonder where she got such information?
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quote: Littlefield said "curious and concerned" parents have called the school as they learned of the change from their children or other parents.
Dear God, please let 'curious and concerned' mean 'curious and concerned about how they can help ease the transition'.
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I was wondering all the way through the article why they didn't transfer their child to a different school and make the change then.
Aside from that, I found it more shocking that there are that many young children in one school. 150 4th graders?? That's crazy.
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One reason why this interests me is I've read specualation that gender is formed in the womb and has to do with hormones at certain parts of development, etc. Basically if the hormones don't get transferred right, a physical boy can have a girl's brain just like this mother described.
I find that very interesting and fascinating, because I have boy/girl twins. And unlike most fraternal twins, my twins shared a placenta. That's not uncommon with identical twins, but with fraternals it's very rare. Basically, the twins implanted very close together, and the placentas fused into one. This happened very early in the pregnancy, my doctor noted on the earliest ultrasounds how it looked as if there was only one placenta, and after delivery he confirmed they had been sharing one for quite some time.
So my boy and girl were as closely linked together as it's possible to be in the womb, and yet in both appearance and behavior, Daniel is distinctly male and Abigail distinctly female.
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I don't get this idea of a male or female brain. I'm all for being open and understanding, but I think in hindsight we will decide that this was probably a bad way to deal with the situation. I certainly don't think a toddler ripping off dresses is evidence of being a "transgendered kid."
I guess I'm in the minority on this, for now.
I don't think anybody should be mean to this kid, but this doesn't strike me as any kind of ideal solution.
And I bet the kids won't be nearly so understanding in middle school, when s/he gets to be that age.
I think this kid is destined for an adolescence of confusion and humiliation. This may well have been inevitable, but now, instead of being between her and her shrink, it will be played out in the open, with parents and peers playing key parts.
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My son is doing a documentary about this right now. There are various conditions that can be called transgender. He knows more about it than I do, but I'll try to explain.
This is definitely not a condition of sexual preference. It is a medical condition.
Transgendered children often have indeterminate genitalia. These used to be called hermaphrodites, but the name is not accurate, since no matter what the genitalia look like, there is only one set of sexual organs, which are definitely one sex or the other. Sometimes they will be assigned a sex by doctors or parents, and it might be the right one, but it might be wrong.
About 5 times a day (in the United States) infants are given sexual reassignment surgery to "Correct" the genitalia, but adults who have had this surgery now argue that this shouldn't be done. The reassignment could be to the wrong sex, for example. The surgery also interferes with sexual function once the child grows up, even if the surgical assignment was to the correct sex.
According to the transgendered community, the accepted thing to do is to tentatively assign the child a sex, but allow the child to reassign themselves as soon as they are old enough to state what sex they are, if that is necessary.
Sometimes a child born with male-appearing genitalia will be assumed to be male, but develop breasts at puberty, and no development of the male appearing genitals. Further investigation may reveal female sexual organs. This often verifies what the child has been saying all along.
Or a female appearing child will not develop breasts, but other genital features will enlarge at puberty, again making the actual sex of the child obvious.
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I have seen this language (male brain, female body) used before in discussing the difficulties faced by a child with androgen insensitivity syndrome. In this case, the chromosomes were XY but the developing body did not respond to testosterone as one would expect. The child had a male build (broad shoulders, narrow waist, thick wrists) but no penis. Interestingly, no internal female organs to speak of, either.
I'm finding it really impossible to make any judgment claims about the details of this case, as I have no idea what the particulars are. It could really run the entire gamut -- who knows?
We used to think that gender was a matter primarily of nuture. This has changed, sparked in part by the efforts of a family to raise an accidentally castrated boy as a girl. Things look much more complicated now that people are taking more information into account. The attempt to raise this child as a girl was a miserable failure, and the child had much the same behaviors reported as above. He wrote As Nature made Him as an adult.
It's useful to recall that the uterine environment isn't just that of the uterus, but really a dyad of fetus and uterus (or, in Belle's case, a triad ). Some events seem preprogrammed and are secondary to local effects; i.e., not bloodborne or what we think of as broad hormonochemical influences, but induced by direct contact. E.g., the development of the vertebral column is induced by the notochord (in great part by very limited-range secreted growth factors), and this is specific and localized only to that area, so other areas (though they share the same bloodstream) cannot be persuaded to form this structure without the prior triggering presence of notochord cells already there.
We really don't know how much of the uterine environment responsible for brain development is hormonochemical, how much may be directly induced by contact with preprogrammed structures, or what have you. It's a huge, fascinating mystery still. Regardless, there are definite and reproducible structural and functional differences between the average male and average female brains.
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I say if a person is mentally male, physically female or vise versa they should be treated as the gender they view themselves as. If he feels more comfortable in male clothes, acting as a male why not let him? There is no harm in it, and forcing a person into an identity that isn't theirs just seems wrong. It's a difficult road though, especially in high school and jr high school. But, I suppose in college it would be much easier.
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Hermaphrodites (and yes, as someone mentioned earlier, this is not the correct term, but it's the one I can remember and use - I've just woken up) appear fairly frequently in Hindi movies. I find this quite interesting because I've never seen them appear in any television series or movie or anything in North America. But Hindi movies - it comes up all the time.
It seems, from the way they're presented in the movies, that the hermaphrodites aren't surgically altered, but are raised essentially as a third sex. They may appear as very feminine malese or very masculine females, or something like that. But you can always tells who the hermaphrodites are - they're very distinctive. Not shunned, either.
I guess what I'm saying is that there's also the appearance of being very open about the existence of the condition with no attempts made to make that person conform to one sex or the other until or unless they want to.
I don't know that this is how it's dealt with in actual life. I haven't lived there. But it seems like a step in the right direction anyway. And who knows, maybe that is the best way.
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SRY and SOX first provoked interest in tests on XYfemales and XXmales found during research on sterility in humans. The rat and mice studies were secondary/confirmatory experiments, as well as basic research on the mechanics of how the genes interact.
Even with the genderization/transgenderization of body type due to SRY and SOX (transposon)genes interaction with the XY or XX chromosomes, natural levels of androgenic and estrogenic hormones -- both before and after birth -- can have very different effect on individual brain&bodys. Enough so such that the individual child can feel whether his/her own gender identity of boy or girl matches his/her own bodytype: whether XYmale, XXfemale, XYfemale, XXmale, or some other chromosomal variation.
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The book Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (author of The Virgin Suicides) deals with this exact subject- transgendered "girl" chooses to be a boy-though as a teenager, not a child. Of course, coming from a Pulitzer Prize winner, it has a lot more going on than that (I highly reccomend it), but it does has a lot of information on hermaphrodites. The author really did his research as well.
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As far as how to treat physical hermaphroditism is concerned, I pretty much agree. It's awkward however it's dealt with, but noncoercion seems to work best.
But sex is essentially a physical thing. Being physically male and thinking of yourself as female, or vice versa, seems to me to be a delusion, not fundamentally different from thinking you're Napoleon (to use the classic case). You aren't.
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Not really exactly the case though... It's hard to explain why, but it's different. Perhaps because gender is just so... fluid and hard to pin down. For example, some people sya there are more than 2 sexes. Some say there are about 5, just as some say that sexuality is on a continuum, a spectrum. I like that way of looking at it a little bit better.
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Sexual preference of asexual, heterosexual, bisexual, and homosexual combined with just the bodytypes of XYmale, XXfemale, XYfemale, XXmale, combined with gender identity of man or woman alone produces 24 different variations.
quote:"Females are 'repressed' males and males are 'repressed' females,"
I read the first link, but I don't entirely agree, especially with this statement. Males are not repressed females. As far as I understand it, the SRY gene holds what's called TDF (testes discriminating factor) which is what causes the male genetalia to develop. Female physical orientation is the default, and males need TDF and SRY etc. to develop outwardly as a male. If a male is lacking these genes or if say, a DAX genes (the only one yet known to be required for female differentiation, in this case ovarian development) crosses over from the X to the Y, there's two DAX genes and they can suppress the TDF and make a genetic male appear outwardly female. However, that male may still have SRY which also is associated with other typically male attributes like broader shoulders, higher BMR, etcetera, and this could confuse things a little. Perhaps this gene also contributes to a "male brain" which can cause psychological problems. That's way beyond my knowledge.
So that's to answer you too, Mabus. It's not therefore a delusion - in fact, there's an extremely high percentage of people in the population with genetic sex abnormalities of one sort or another like this. I'm positive you know some, though you or they may not know it. Of course, there are cases of purely psychological problems too, but physical sex is nowhere *near* as clear and defined as people generally think.
Edit: Just realized this post makes it sound like I *didn't* read the article. Neglected to point out that he's working with mice, and human SRY is extremely different from even chimp SRY, and yet shows exceedingly little differentiation among human males, leading to the postulatation of modern human male SRY being only a couple hundred thousand years old. There's no firm evidence human SRY works like mice's does.
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Yes, Aspectre...I did. They contained a large amount of information about genetic sexual determination and subsequent differentiation resulting from differences in the amount of hormones being produced at different times in one's life. Basically, an elaboration on what I learned in embryology (along with a few bits from other classes).
Aside from a very brief section on behavior, I didn't see much that could remotely be considered to differ from what I said, and the behavioral section was a weak disagreement at best.
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Astaril, I thought I made it clear I recognize the existence of genetic sex abnormalities. What I'm pointing out is, there's a level of minimum physical difference at which it makes no sense to call a person with an essentially male body female, or one with a female body male.
It's possible that my car contains some components from a Toyota--but that doesn't make it a Toyota overall, not in any meaningful sense.
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Yeah, you did, rereading it now. Sorry, I don't pick up on obvious things occasionally...!
All the same, as I mentioned I thought perhaps there might be a link between a person's genetic un-expressed sex and their specific psychological need/want to feel like and to want to be referred to by the opposite physical sex, in which case it might be deemed more acceptable and less of a purely psychological delusion. Or at least more of a psychological delusion that's genetically determined Posts: 624 | Registered: Mar 2005
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I understand what you're saying, Astoril. On the other hand, it's pretty clear that schizophrenia has genetic components, but it's still considered a form of insanity. Therapists don't necessarily confront each delusion directly, of course, but the ultimate goal has got to be to enable the person to see the world as it is.
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That's true, but then schizophrenia, depression, and most forms of 'insanity' or psych 'problems' in general are things that require treatment because they have potential to harm someone, either the patient or someone else by the patient's hand. Arguably, life can be very difficult being transgendered in a culture where this is seen as abnormal but I think that's a function of culture, and shouldn't be considered an illness.
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Good point. I was thinking about something like this today when I was reading about anerexia. But I need a better way to state it. You stated it very clearly Astaril.
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I don't get the impression from the article that there is an issue of indeterminate genitalia. The child is described as physically a female.
I understand there can be cases where determining gender is not so simple, but I'm not sure this is one of those cases...there is no mention that the child was ever viewed as anything but physically female.
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I like your internal/external dichotomy though. Yeah, there's definite differences between having trouble because you're not fitting in because the culture views you as abnormal (if this culture is not ready to change and you don't want to move, this can lead to real, harmful problems too) - external - and having trouble because you have harmful issues that can't be fixed by a change in society's views - internal.
Belle, yeah, I noticed the lack of detail on just what the problem was too. It's too bad, it makes it harder to debate fully in places like this Posts: 624 | Registered: Mar 2005
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I don't think it matters if it is physiological. It's just sad that he has to be so young... But, at least the kids are not being cruel, so that is good. Still though... Kids seem to be coming out at an earlier age whether it's being transgendered or gay. It's such a hard road for such a young child. I am glad that his parents are supportive at least.
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quote:"My child has the brain of a boy," said the mother, who asked that her family not be identified.
Then is "he" better at math and engineering than other "girls?" (remembering the firestorm over the Harvard President's comments)
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posted
Thanks for posting this article, Syn. I studied transgenderism for some time in a college class, and I'm so glad that this child is in an environment of acceptance.
And Glenn, so very well said.
I definately believe from the research I've seen that this condition is not a delusion. Particularly in cases where there is physcial support (eg indeterminate genitalia). I've also seen another study in which the brains of deceased transgendered people were studied (these people were born with definate male or female genitals) and they found that the brains of males who considered themselves females physically corresponded to a "normal" female brain.
Documentaries I've seen in which transgendered people born with "normal" gentalia but who consider themselves to be the opposite gender are heartbreaking. Many of them claim to have known they were in the wrong body since age 3. To me it was very akin to hearing a gay person say they knew they were gay from a young age.
I honestly don't know what the best decision is for a young child who does not have indeterminate genitalia. I think the parents in the article love their child and are doing the best they can.
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I know a woman who had this sugery 10 years ago. She is in her mid-fiftys and said that she knew from the moment she realized what gender was that she was a girl. She has also said that the first time she felt whole in her life is when she woke up from the surgery.
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You passed over the SOX&SRY interaction in your reading, Astaril. And while it is possible that the SRY&SOX and XX or XY complex arose independently in mice, apes, and men through convergent evolution, it is also VASTLY more probable that the variations emerged from divergence out of a common ancestral SRY&SOX and XX or XY complex.
It isn't simply a matter of the appearance of external genitalia, Belle. How the X and Y chromosomes are expressed also affect how much androgenic and estrogenic hormones the body produces; and how the individual organs and cells receive&use them, as well as other hormones. Knowing the above, and how structurally different the brains of XYmales and XX females are -- and of how males and females differ in the use of various combinations of brain regions to solve the same type of problems -- it isn't an overstretch to think that perhaps the brains& minds of XYfemales are affected by actions/inactions of XYchromosomes in their cells, and that the brains&minds of XXmales are affected by actions/inactions of XXchromosomes in theirs.
Undoubtedly, there are some overlaps between XYmales, XXfemales, XYfemales, and XXmales brains&minds: just as there are similarities between XYmales' and XXfemales' brains&minds. But the fact that XXmales' and XYmales' external genitalia appear to be more similar to each other than to XXfemales' and XYfemales' -- and visa versa -- doesn't mean that the XYmales&XXmales are similar or that XXfemales&XYfemales are similar. eg XYmales and XXfemales are commonly fertile while XYfemales and XXmales are commonly*infertile. So in a certain meaningful sense, XYmales&XXfemales have more in common with each other than with XYfemales&XXmales; and XYfemales&XXmales have more in common with each other than with XYmales&XXfemales.
When such a commonality in appearance can have such different results in fertility, it could also result in differing brain structures leading to different minds. Thus it is better to accept "I am a boy!" from a child who is externally female, and to accept "I am a girl!" from a child who is externally male out of kindness than to insist that an "I am a boy!" external female or an "I am a girl!" external male force themselves into the boxes we create out of our own desire for simplistic classification schemes.
* Don't know of a single case of a fertile XYfemale or XXmale. Admittedly if there were some who were fertile, it would be unlikely that they would be going to a fertility specialist and hence be discovered through chromosome testing.
Mabus, your automatic acceptance of "Boys look like boys, and girls look like girls." smacks more of ancestor worship than considered thought. As a whole, our predecessors were probably as smart as us. I wouldn't even argue against them being smarter: they accomplished a whole heckuva lot with far fewer resources than what we possess. However, they as a whole were also FAR more ignorant about how reality works than we as a whole ever have been or ever will be again. I prefer the results of intelligence applied to a LARGE knowlege base over intelligence applied to a small knowlege base. Even though that also means that I hafta admit that my ancestors were less than paragons of perfection.
Your insistence that folks whose gender identity fails to match body type are suffering from a form of insanity also brings to mind the death of BrandonTeena. Such willingness to view the different as the less than is disturbing in its own right.
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To me gender refers to what body parts you have.
If you're a girl and want to be treated like a boy, it Won't Happen. You will be treated as a girl who wants to be treated like a boy. Which for the most part, won't be well.
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I agree with MyrddinFyre and with Belle, I think. If this were a case of a child with ambiguous anatomy, I would feel differently. But that's not what the article says. The article gives as evidence the fact that as a toddler, this child would rip off dresses. A lot of toddlers do that, and they are not transgendered. Later, the girl said she "feels like" a boy. What does that mean? How could she know? What does it feel like to be a boy or a girl? I feel like neither. I feel like a person. I know who I am sexually attracted to, but even if I were sexually attracted to men, that would not make me "really" a woman, just a man attracted to men. This child is too young to know what gender she will be sexually attracted to anyway.
I think we create gender confusion with our truisms of what boys and girls are like. I don't fit the boy stereotypes. Does that make me transgendered? I don't think so; I think it just makes me an unstereotypical male.
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posted
There is no medical professional interviewed for this article. What you have is the layperson reports of the school principal and the mother, which are doubtlessly going to be a mishmash of their impressions.
Additionally, let us remember that these are people who care about the child speaking to the press. I would not fault them (in fact, I would praise them) for not making a point of describing the child's exact genitalia.
Come on, would you do that to your kid? I mean, would you really? Or would you consider that Not A Matter Of Public Discussion?
Pretty much what was said was all that needed to be said. There is a mismatch between the body and the brain. Mind you, I know how hard it is to sex type an infant with ambiguous genitalia. Sometimes, they are not obviously ambiguous. That is why I was trained to always look very carefully, and for certain specific structures; e.g., when I have your newborn little girl under the warmer drying off, I am also palpating the external labia for testes -- it is a part of my routine newborn exam. I do this for the most "normal-looking" little girls.
Sure, this could just be a matter of an XX little girl with no genetic (or endocrine) abnormalities, perfectly average except for her desire to be a boy. *shrug Might be. If we knew that for sure, then in that case, it would make sense to have this discussion as if this were the case. However, given a mother who seems somewhat tearful and at extreme pains to clarify that this decision was made under consulation with many medical professionals, all of whom were in agreement, I bet there is more going on than is being revealed in the mass press.
If so, in my opinion, this would be entirely appropriate.
posted
I agree. It seemed to me, though, that everything in the article pointed to the child being a physically normal little girl.
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CT, I understand we don't have all the information, so let's just consider a hypothetical, not this particular child, but a child that is from all appearances a normal, physical female. No ambiguity, no XXY or anything along those lines - an XX female with normal genitalia.
Given those hypotheticals, would anyone here be in favor of treating this child like a boy because she says she doesn't feel like a girl? At age 9?
Abigail went through a period where she wanted to be a boy like her twin brother.
I didn't over react, figured it was a phase and it would pass. It did. I would think identifying with the other sex is a pretty common thing. If you're patient with the child, usually it sorts itself out. I can imagine a situation where a child goes through one of these normal, adjustment phases and instead of waiting the parents begin assuming the child is transgendered and start therapy and hormones to help them change their sex.
I still feel very uncomfortable with the idea that any child that doesn't act very feminine is a "male brain in a female body." Absent any obvious abnormality, I think kids should be treated as the gender they physically are. I would think therapy to allow them to overcome the gender confusion and identify as their physical gender is a heckuva lot better than telling everyone to "treat her like a boy or him like a girl."
Which, as pointed out, won't happen. What about in the high school locker room? Say she does develop breasts and start menses? You still going to have her changing in the boy's room?
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posted
Has anyone heard of the huevodoces? There's a disorder that's fairly common in the Dominican Republic that is what I immediately thought of when I read this thread. I'd like to see a genetic workup on the child before I speculate further.
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So long as we are speaking purely and clearly in hypotheticals, I have no quibbles.
[Additionally, as an outsider in given case where I wasn't sure about what was going on, I too would defer to a panel of her physicians who were in unanimous agreement about how to handle this. Were I the principal, I wouldn't insist on actually seeing her bits myself before I'd aquiesce. I'm sure we are all in agreement on that. Whenever it comes to a particular child, things get much more complicated than with hypotheticals. Again, I'm sure we'd all agree.]
quote: Many of them claim to have known they were in the wrong body since age 3. To me it was very akin to hearing a gay person say they knew they were gay from a young age.
I honestly don't know what the best decision is for a young child who does not have indeterminate genitalia. I think the parents in the article love their child and are doing the best they can.
Let's pretend for a minute that nurture has something to do with the way a child turns out. Why would a child think it was so unacceptable to be one sex or the other? I think it would have something to do with how they were socialized. Or maybe they found the "I'm a boy" mantra to have a big attention payoff.
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I am firmly of the opinion that both gender and sexual orientation are more fluid (nuture/choice) and more fixed (biology-driven) than we generally imagine. I think the balance of which -- nature or nurture -- is the stronger drive can vary greatly between individuals and even at different times in a given person's life.
So sure, I have no doubt that intergender exploration occurs in some kids as a matter of fantasy play, pushing boundaries, manipulation, or what have you. It may be a part of the normal developmental process for them, or it may be something problematic. Sometimes, I'm sure, the healthiest thing to do is to redirect those energies if possible. I just hesitate to make that call about a particular child when I am not intimately involved with the situation myself.
quote: I can imagine a situation where a child goes through one of these normal, adjustment phases and instead of waiting the parents begin assuming the child is transgendered and start therapy and hormones to help them change their sex.
They couldn't do this without a prescription, as these items are controlled substances. I can't fathom any physician who could write that script without losing his license. There would be serious, serious censure from the medical establishment and colleagues for this.
quote:Which, as pointed out, won't happen. What about in the high school locker room? Say she does develop breasts and start menses? You still going to have her changing in the boy's room?
Well, were the child on hormonal therapy, that wouldn't happen. Regardless, why not just have such a child change on his or her own? Surely there could be a creative solution.
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Gender Identity Disorder is still a diagnosible mental illness. From Behavenet.com capsules:
quote: A. A strong and persistent cross-gender identification (not merely a desire for any perceived cultural advantages of being the other sex). In children, the disturbance is manifested by four (or more) of the following:
(1) repeatedly stated desire to be, or insistence that he or she is, the other sex (2) in boys, preference for cross-dressing or simulating female attire; in girls, insistence on wearing only stereotypical masculine clothing (3) strong and persistent preferences for cross-sex roles in make-believe play or persistent fantasies of being the other sex (4) intense desire to participate in the stereotypical games and pastimes of the other sex (5) strong preference for playmates of the other sex. In adolescents and adults, the disturbance is manifested by symptoms such as a stated desire to be the other sex, frequent passing as the other sex, desire to live or be treated as the other sex, or the conviction that he or she has the typical feelings and reactions of the other sex.
B. Persistent discomfort with his or her sex or sense of inappropriateness in the gender role of that sex. In children, the disturbance is manifested by any of the following: in boys, assertion that his penis or testes are disgusting or will disappear or assertion that it would be better not to have a penis, or aversion toward rough-and-tumble play and rejection of male stereotypical toys, games, and activities; in girls, rejection of urinating in a sitting position, assertion that she has or will grow a penis, or assertion that she does not want to grow breasts or menstruate, or marked aversion toward normative feminine clothing. In adolescents and adults, the disturbance is manifested by symptoms such as preoccupation with getting rid of primary and secondary sex characteristics (e.g., request for hormones, surgery, or other procedures to physically alter sexual characteristics to simulate the other sex) or belief that he or she was born the wrong sex.
C. The disturbance is not concurrent with a physical intersex condition.
D. The disturbance causes clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.
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Granted, CT, we're talking hypotheticals more than we're talking about this actual case, because none of us can know all of the facts. You bring up a lot of good points; I'm just telling you my gut reaction to this. In my case, this isn't coming from an anti-gay perspective. But I'm looking at just the context of the story that they are sharing with us and thinking, if that's it, it seems pretty silly. Now, I'm willing to grant that that may not be all of the story, but I can only react to what I'm seeing. So this true case becomes the hypothetical "cases that actually are like this one appears to be." Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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Why is it that any minor variation is almost always considered a disorder? I don't really see a problem with this other than the larger society. He's going to have to run the gauntlet until the age of 18 and even after then it will be hard. A lot of feminists and gays are against transgendered people as much as those on the right are. Mostly, I have trouble believing that brains can be gendered. This is because of my own personal experiences.
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I respect your opinion, but believe, from a religious standpoint, that we are all inherently male or female. I will now back off of this thread completely. *bows out*
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ketchupqueen, I would be very interested to know what you think of cases of transgenderism that aren't as ambiguous as the example given here. For example, there are cases of people with XY sex chromosomes who, due to a mutation in a particular gene on the Y chromosome, do not sexually differentiate into males. Physically and mentally, these people are identical to females, but genetically, they are technically "male." Would such a person be male or female in your eyes?
quote:I agree with MyrddinFyre and with Belle, I think. If this were a case of a child with ambiguous anatomy, I would feel differently. But that's not what the article says. The article gives as evidence the fact that as a toddler, this child would rip off dresses. A lot of toddlers do that, and they are not transgendered. Later, the girl said she "feels like" a boy. What does that mean? How could she know? What does it feel like to be a boy or a girl? I feel like neither. I feel like a person. I know who I am sexually attracted to, but even if I were sexually attracted to men, that would not make me "really" a woman, just a man attracted to men. This child is too young to know what gender she will be sexually attracted to anyway.
I think we create gender confusion with our truisms of what boys and girls are like. I don't fit the boy stereotypes. Does that make me transgendered? I don't think so; I think it just makes me an unstereotypical male.
Icky, there are a few things in your post I would like to address, because they represent some common misconceptions about gender identity.
First of all, gender identity is a completely different issue from sexual orientation. The gender a person sees himself/herself as has nothing to do with which gender the person is sexually attracted to. I've met female-to-male transgendered people who are attracted to men, for example. In a case like that, the person is not attracted to men because he is really a woman; he is attracted to men as a gay man.
Second of all, being transgendered is not simply a matter of not fitting into gender stereotypes. One of my transgendered friends explained to me the term "body dysphoria," which means my friend feels that he was born with the wrong type of body. He feels that he should have the body (and voice, and so on) of a man; being a woman just feels wrong to him.
That isn't something I personally can understand - I'm a woman, and I've always felt like a woman. But I can accept that this is how my friend views himself (notice I didn't say "chooses to view himself", because I don't think he has any control over the matter). And I respect my friend's wishes that I view him in the same way he views himself.
As for the child that this thread was originally about - I don't know his particular circumstances, so I can't really comment. However, I doubt that the matter is as simple as ripping off dresses and proclaiming, "I'm a boy"; as several have said, those things by themselves aren't enough to declare the child transgendered. I suspect there are other factors at play here that the mother just didn't choose to tell the reporters.
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Tarrsk, see my post about the huevodoces. Then see the post where I left the thread.
If you'd like to discuss in detail, I'd be happy to do so-- in e-mail. I can sense contention coming, and I don't want to be part of it...
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quote:One of my transgendered friends explained to me the term "body dysphoria," which means my friend feels that he was born with the wrong type of body. He feels that he should have the body (and voice, and so on) of a man; being a woman just feels wrong to him.
JaneX, in my opinion this is not something that should be supported. As mothertree pointed out - this is a diagnosable mental illness. If your friend were my child, and said such things I'd have them in psychiatric care and therapy to help them deal with their mental disorder.
Why do we think it's appropriate to treat this as okay, why can't we admit that anyone who thinks they're in the wrong body has a mental illness that needs to be addressed? We don't think it's okay for anorexics to starve themselves to death because they think they're in the wrong body.
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A lot of toddlers do that, and they are not transgendered. Later, the girl said she "feels like" a boy. What does that mean? How could she know? What does it feel like to be a boy or a girl? I feel like neither. I feel like a person. I know who I am sexually attracted to, but even if I were sexually attracted to men, that would not make me "really" a woman, just a man attracted to men. This child is too young to know what gender she will be sexually attracted to anyway. 
