Boy or Girl? Probably!

[Eos of the Eons]

Geez, I was under the impression we were discussing hermaphrodites, not kids with cleft palates...sheesh.

When a kid has ambiguous genitalia (that is of course not detrimental to their health), who are you to decide if they are a boy or a girl?

Which are they most genetically? Are they xx or xy? Even then, with their gonads not matured, how do you know which will be the hormones that affect the body most later on?

Even then, the person may still be attracted to males or females depending how their brains are wired.

If you turn a person completely into a guy, thus destroying all of the femal genitalia, then it is going to take a heck of a lot more surgery to become female after being turned into a male.

Add on top of that, if the kid doesn't know how they came into the world, the dilemma of being gay. Society is not kind there either, especially if the parents are religious.

Leaving the child alone and letting them know they have some choice in their sexuality would be less devastating then above scenarios.

Who are we to decide who they are? Why should the parents get to have all the power in their child's physical make up when they don't know the child's actual sexuality?

What if they have a uterus and ovaries, and the parents decide to hang onto the penis cause that is easier than lopping it off, and then adding on testes where the vagina was? The kid would be sterile, when it may not have had to be. Or the other way around. There are testes, but also a vagina, and they lob off the penis?

From the ambiguity I've seen, if left to the parents' choice only, they could really destroy the kid's chances of fertility.

There is always more to it than the 'external' look of things.

Waiting until the child matures to see what developes mentally and physically is far more fair.

 

[BillyJoe]

Eos,

Geez, I was under the impression we were discussing hermaphrodites, not kids with cleft palates...sheesh.

Geez, I was only commenting on the success of early v delayed surgery in achieving an optimal result and "cleft palates" was the only reference I could find...sheesh

Add on top of that, if the kid doesn't know how they came into the world, the dilemma of being gay.

I got a shock for you. Gays do not want to change their sex, they just want to have sex with the same sex. The word is "transexual".

BillyJoe
(Still friends though)

 

[Terry]

I got a shock for you. Gays do not want to change their sex, they just want to have sex with the same sex.

This is true However, I think the problem being alluded to is that if you assign the "wrong" sex to some person who had very ambiguous genitals, then they might turn out to be attracted to (say) women, but have been assigned a female set of "plumbing". Thus the person would have been "made" to be gay.

--Terry.

 

[Terry]

This is true However, I think the problem being alluded to is that if you assign the "wrong" sex to some person who had very ambiguous genitals, then they might turn out to be attracted to (say) women, but have been assigned a female set of "plumbing". Thus the person would have been "made" to be gay.

--Terry.

Augh! I'm such an idiot... you haven't "made" them gay, you've "made" them transexual. Which was exactly the point BillyJoe was making. Apologies to BillyJoe.

--Terry.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

Eos,

Geez, I was only commenting on the success of early v delayed surgery in achieving an optimal result and "cleft palates" was the only reference I could find...sheesh

I got a shock for you. Gays do not want to change their sex, they just want to have sex with the same sex. The word is "transexual".

BillyJoe
(Still friends though)

Yes, so the success of delayed surgery for making someone one sex vs another may not be as easy on the person, but if the person gets to be the sex they want, then that would be better than being made male when one wants to be female. Heck, they may prefer being the way they are, and don't care to be one or the other instead.

If one is male and wants to be female because they are attracted to males...doesn't that mean they are gay? Aren't there gay people out there get sex changes? I've seen such cases.

If you found out you were ambiguous, and then made 'gay' by being made a male attracted to males, then wouldn't you be a little ticked off?


Anyways, there are "intersexed" and other such stories on the net if you do a search. You can read some personal stories. Understanding it from a person who is there is the best way to start forming an opinion on the subject.

I found one on a person who took male hormones to bring out the maleness (he was born xxxy) and had a teste and an ovary. He even had children with women.

http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/gender/intersexuals/about_me.htm

I am one of several types of true hermaphrodites. The XXXY (mosaic) karyotype is extremely rare. One theory of the cause of my own condition has a lot of support. It maintains that two ovum were produced simultaneously in my mother and the eggs fertilized independently as maternal twins. During gestation the eggs merge into a single fetus, one ova was destined as male the other as female.

There are also people who are xy, but have ambigous genitalia as well...you'd have to do a dna test to see what their genetic make up is.

 

[BillyJoe]

Eos,

This is my take....

I suppose we should use the word "homosexual" and, if "gay" is synonymous with "homosexual", then the following applies to gays as well......

Homosexuals have a body that matches their brain. Those with a male body are happy that they have a male body because they feel themselves to be male but they are sexually attracted to males. Those with a female body are happy that they have a female body because they feel themselves to be female but they are sexually attracted to females.

Transexuals have a body that does not match their brain. Those with a male body are unhappy that they have a male body because they feel themselves to be female and they are sexually attracted to males. Those with a female body are unhappy that they have a female body because they feel themselves to be male and they are sexually attracted to females.

Homosexuals do not want a sex change and transexuals do.

Then, of course, as you hinted in your post, you can have combinations.....
A homosexual transexual, for instance might have a male body but is unhappy that they have a male body because they feel themselves to be female but they are also sexually attracted to females.

If one is male and wants to be female because they are attracted to males...doesn't that mean they are gay?

A male wants to be a female only if they feel psychologically/emotionally that they are "females trapped in a male body" as the saying goes. This would mean thay are transexual not homosexual.

Aren't there gay people out there get sex changes? I've seen such cases.

Yes, they would be homosexual transexuals.

If you found out you were ambiguous, and then made 'gay' by being made a male attracted to males, then wouldn't you be a little ticked off?

Yes, I think you may be right here.
A hermaphrodite who feels psychologically/emotionally that they are female who is sexually attracted to males but ends up being given a male body would, in a very real sense be "made into a gay" as you say.

Anyways, there are "intersexed"

Yes, the combinations are endless. There are females and males who are sexually attracted both to females and males. There are males and females who are happy at times to be male and female respectively but at other times would prefer to females and males respectively and in both cases they could be sexually attracted to males or females respectively or males and females respectively or both males and females.
Are you keeping up?

BillyJoe

 

[Eos of the Eons]

Whoa, yeah, I'm learning!

Yes, I think you may be right here.
A hermaphrodite who feels psychologically/emotionally that they are female who is sexually attracted to males but ends up being given a male body would, in a very real sense be "made into a gay" as you say.

This is my concern when interfering with the children born ambiguous or intersexed.

It's not fair to have something pushed on you that you did not ask for, and it would be confusing to a person who may never be told of how they were born becaue the parents don't want them to know.

This is where teaching tolerance comes in. Make it a law that parents can't change their kids just for the parents' sakes. If it isn't necessary to mess with the kid, then give the kid a sense of control.


In the case I posted, the parents left the child intersexed, but unfortunately, the child became a target of curiosity and was abused.

It angers me how little children know of their own rights. Then there's the other extreme where kids know their rights, and parents are passive.

How to get to that middle ground?

Never gonna be a perfect world, but I can't help but be scared of the scenario...what if that were me? What if I were born that way, and my parents made all those decisions for me? Here I would be....wondering why I was gay...and knowing that my parents are homophobic. scary. Society is mean.

 

[Earthborn]

A homosexual transexual, for instance might have a male body but is unhappy that they have a male body because they feel themselves to be female but they are also sexually attracted to females.

The terminology you use would be more or less correct if it wasn't for J. Michael Bailey who confused things a lot by using the term 'homosexual transsexual' to mean the exact opposite.

In his view, there are basically two types of transsexual: homosexual transsexuals who have such a bad case of homosexuality that they want to transition to female to be able to have a normal heterosexual relationship with men. This is clearly hinting towards the idea that all homosexuals are somehow feminized.

The other type is supposed to be 'autogynefilic transseksual': men who love women so much that they want to become one.

The whole 'theory' smacks of rehashed old stereotypes, and is basically a false dichotomy. It assumes that transsexuals who are attracted to females are sexually aroused by the idea of becoming a woman, while transsexuals who are attracted to men have little sexual feelings at all. Transsexuals who have strong autogynefilic ('love of oneself as a woman') feelings but are attracted to men, or who have little sexual feelings but are attracted to women, or who are attracted to both sexes (bi- or pansexual) don't fit in to Bailey's theory. People who transition from female to male aren't even mentioned.

You can read the book that made him infamous for free here. Now you can read for yourself why you should take his claim of presenting 'The Science of Gender-Bending and Transsexualism' with a truckload of salt. It just presents anecdotes and his own biased view.

 

[BillyJoe]

Earthborn,

And I thought my terminology was complicated enough!

In his view, there are basically two types of transsexual: homosexual transsexuals who have such a bad case of homosexuality that they want to transition to female to be able to have a normal heterosexual relationship with men.

This seems an incorrect terminology to me.
This person is psychologically/emotionally female having an apparent homosexual relationship with men which becomes a true heterosexual relationship once they have an operation to make their body match their brain. I would think that this person would object to being called a homosexual because this is not the way this person feels in her head.

The other type is supposed to be 'autogynefilic transseksual': men who love women so much that they want to become one.

This sounds like a psychiatric disorder. Like a person who is so obsessed with a particular person that he starts to dress, think and act just as this person does. In this case the other person happens to be the generalized female.

BillyJoe