Wednesday 17 February 2010

A letter from M.Italiano

Published at his request.

As the people addressed by this letter have made many personal attacks on me, I must disqualify myself from making further comments as there's an obvious conflict of interest.

ANDREA BROWN-HER BIZARRE ATTACK AND NEGATION OF INTERSEX

I was stunned to read what I consider Andrea Brown's bizarre attack on intersexed individuals.

http://womenborntranssexual.com/2010/02/04/bizarre-intersex-claims/

It is flawed and has poor fact checking.. I have written an open response to her letter. For her statements I abbreviate her name using the letters AB which then is followed by her statements which I have quoted.
My comments are between the signs designated ***. Finally I include
citations from pubmed and other references. I hope my response
validates the lives and experiences of not only the intersexed individuals whose existence she negates, but all intersexed individuals as well.

Sincerely,

M. Italiano, MB BS (AM)
Board Certified in Alternative Medicine (India)
Advisor, Biosex variations, Organisation Intersex Internationl
Staff, Gendercare Inc.


The letter itself:
AB: "People claiming to have fathered children then suddenly claim to have had a spontaneous sex change, found an ovary, uterine tissue or uterus in surgery are liars or deluded and may require psychiatric help, which transsexual people normally do not require."

***Fertile individuals who have fathered children can have a uterus.***

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/oup/humupd/2005/00000011/00000004/art00351

***A fertile individual who has fathered two children can have an ovary with follicles and devloping ova. This individual also has a Fallopian tube and a uterus.***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4532534?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=49

***A fertile individual who fathered a child and also had an ovary with ovarian follicles and evidence that ovulation also occured. It is the first case where cytogenetics and not just a buccal smear was used***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7200380?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=18


AB: "Some transsexual people have claimed to have a period because they have pissed blood. They have not had a period. Kidney infections can cause a person to piss blood. Physical damage from impacts can cause a person to piss blood. A period cannot occur when a person has two testes, as the testosterone would suppress any possibility of a period if the tissue actually existed. People who have pissed blood because of childhood surgery are people who have had just that happen. They would strongly refute any claim that they are having a period, regardless of what any LGBT activist, queer theorist or trans activist states. They will state the truth and inform you it is from a bladder or kidney infection or scar tissue failure."

***While having a period as an ovulatory cycle is not likely, certainly
Andrea Brown's statement that "They will state the truth and inform you it is from a bladder or kidney infection or scar tissue failure" is WRONG since the blood may be coming form the uterus or uterine tissue. Not only is Andrea Brown wrong in this regard, but people who believe her may be harmed since they may be overlooking a possibility of having endometriosis or other problems associated with their uterus or uterine tissue. Blood in the urine coming from a uteurs or uterine tissue in these cases is sometimes called menouria or hematuria which may or not be cyclic. ***

http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/953196-overview

AB: "The number of female to male transsexuals and transgenderists also falsely claiming to have CAH is also a problem....Issues such as gender identity are quite often a non-issue for people with CAH. Most are to worried with trying to stay alive to worry about gender identity, contrary to what LGBT transgender and queer activists like to claim."

***In at least one report, F to M transsexuals have a higher incidence of non-classical CAH than control females.***

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=2785051

***Secondly, there is quite a bit of controvery as to how to assign gender in CAH individuals due to issues with their gender identity. Andrea is very wrong in her dismissive attitude with regard to gender identity in individuals with CAH.***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15216426?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=6

AB: "Regarding gender identity in 5 alpha people, it literally can be anywhere from male to female. Contrary to the literature that is quoted, which also appears to be highly suspect. Most actually appear to identify as female, not male."

***Again Andrea Brown is not correct. Here are two recent reports on gender in 5 Alpha Reductase Deficiency individuals. They both contain a review of the literature. The first study link demonstrates that about 70% develop a male gender identity. The second demonstrates that of those raised as girls, 56-63% changed gender roles.***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11534997?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=7

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16010463?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=35


AB: "Spontaneous sex change. This does not occur in humans and is a fiction created in pornographic magazines, porn films and the minds of deranged fantasists."

***While I am not aware of penis to vagina spontaneous sex changes in humans, there can be no doubt that gonadal changes occur where a post-natal or adult human gonad changes and acquires features of the gonad of the opposite sex. Commonly associated with a tumor, the organ nonetheless acquires both structural and functional properties of the other sex gonad.
Thus, although an adult ovary has not been known to become a fertile testis, it may undergo pseudo-male transdifferentiation and even develop Sertoli and Leydig cells which are male-specific testicular cells as well as other testicular specific structures. (Links below). This process is known as gonadal transdifferentiation. It also occurs in other mammals such as mice and cattle.***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9343329?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=25

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11521222?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_SingleItemSupl.Pubmed_Discovery_RA&linkpos=2&log$=relatedarticles&logdbfrom=pubmed

AB: "Hermaphroditism. On very rare occasions a person has been born with an ovary and a teste. However this is so rare that it is practically unknown in the majority of intersex clinics and there appears to have never been a case of this in a transsexual person either."

***This needs clarification. Zucker and colleagues have indeed described a case of gender dysphoria in true hermaphroditism ***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3676994?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=8

AB: "The existence of people who are true hermorphodite is extremely rare and most experts in intersex will never meet one."

***Andrea's attack on intersex seems evident here with her very plain use of the offensive and slang term "hermorphodite".***

AB: "If a person has two testicles, even if they are undescended, there is no ovary. The only possible combinations are, two testes, a testis and an ovary (so rare it is almost unheard of), or two ovaries."

***No Andrea. These are not the only combinations. There are also persons who have bilateral ovotestes, OR a testis on one side and an ovotestis on another OR an ovary on one side and an ovotestis on another.***

AB "Some facts: It is impossible to have two testes and two ovaries.
It is impossible to have two testes and one ovary. It is impossible to have two ovaries and two testes. It is impossible to have two ovaries and one testis."

***The first and third categories of Andrea's are the same biological categories which oddly she uses in reverse in her bizarre dismissive and blanket anti-intersex statements. Actually 2 ovaries and two testes in a single human individual HAS been reported 4 times. Although cases a and b below are spurious, case c provides ample evidence of 2 ovaries and 2 testes in one human individual and case d is quite definitive of this.***

http://books.google.com/books?id=ZKERAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA478&lpg=PA476&ots=5BzeTCe7ER&dq=Dr.+Schrell+hermaphroditism&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html

***It should also be noted that an individual can have penile duplication (2 penises) and two vaginas (vaginal duplication). Since this occurs, it is not difficult to understand that a penis can co-exist with a vagina in the same individual.
Furthermore, it should be added that it does not seem to be impossible for a human to be self-fertilizing with assisted reproductive technologies or even without the use of technology***

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7782419?dopt=Abstract

***Andrea Brown negates the very existence of several types of intersexed conditions which negate intersex experience. An example of an attack on intersexed woman Zoe by someone who goes by the name of "Nicky" is also in the comments section of her article. (Nicky's comment follows and is in the response area of Andrea Brown's article).***

"Nicky Says:
02/04/2010 at 4:24 PM
'Well, even a good example would be ____is one of those Transsexuals who like to claim intersex and claim to have a spontaneous and natural Intersex condition. Zoe is one those who goes around online proclaiming to be an Intersex person and claiming to have 5ARD or 15BHDD...'"


http://womenborntranssexual.com/2010/02/04/bizarre-intersex-claims/

***An attack on intersex and intersexed individuals to try to discredit intersexed women who may have thought or been told that they are instead transwomen seems unfortunate.***

*Sigh* I'll answer to both. Whatever. The reason that I'm publishing this is because a)It contains at least two articles I wasn't aware of, so deserves a place in my reference list, and b) Because although I'm virtually immune to personal attacks, they don't bother me, obviously other people are bothered by them. I should not be guilty of universalising my own experience, and should think of other people.

I think it could be because the Women Born Transsexual blog is usually of such high quality that Dr Italiano feels so strongly about it. If some nutter says something factually incorrect, it does no harm. If it comes from a usually credible source, it may do.

UPDATE: A previous version of the letter appeared on this blog briefly, but Dr I sent me a version with some minor changes of wording shortly thereafter, and this version is definitive.

UPDATE II: - M Italiano's letter is now available at http://www.gendercare.com/English/italianopaper4.html.

26 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't understand all of the posts that AB makes, but she makes them with a passions whatever the subject matter. However, with regards to matters of transsexual, transgender and intersex, she speaks from a seamingly self-appointed position of authority, she knows all and cannot possibly be questioned.

She is intersex. She had various surgeries performed on her as a child, and uses every opportunity to tell the world, and to seemingly blame the whole world too.

I don't have children, am never likely too, but I would never want to be in a positin where I would have to make the decisions for a child that her parents felt they had to make at the time. Even thinking about it on a purely theoretical basis, I wouldn't know what to do for the best.

Andrea, we are not the people that made those decisions. We are not the people that made the decisions that you obviously see as being the wrong decisions.

Direct your hurt and anger into better ways of helping other people, so that they do not have to go through the pain and suffering that you and others like you have.

Posting this as anon tc5r

Anonymous said...

http://wp.me/pc1BQ-5M

I will have more to say on this in the future......

Unknown said...

Well, I posted a comment which got published, pointing her to the PubMed sources that M. Italiano published. She seemed to instead attack M. Italiano for not having a doctorate, and because of that apparently she does not have to read the PubMed sources he linked. She then went into attack mode, calling you a liar and presuming to know your motivations. She then closed the comments to disallow any response, so no response from me directly to her will she get.

Also, her blog seems weird. Apparently Andrea Brown writes the posts, which are then edited and posted by Suzan? Either way, that seems to be the weird end of the community, and I'm not going to have much to do with it.

Zoe Brain said...

She had the intellectual honesty not to censor your post, pointing to this article.

Given my own doubts about my sanity while things were happening in 2005, I can't blame her over-much for being sceptical.

The point is, Reality wins in the end. Facts are, whether we believe them or not. Does it really matter whether she believes the contents of my medical records or not? They are what they are, regardless.

What *is* important, regardless of whether I'm genuine or some elaborate hoaxer, is the data. She made a number of statements that are just plain incorrect, and could do harm to some other IS people. Now that's been corrected, the whole personal attack business is, well, inconsequential.

I really don't want to disrespect her, but I genuinely have more important things to worry about.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Zimbel said...

I'll freely admit that I was originally skeptical of the theories posited on this site regarding Transsexuality and Intersex; after all, I am a radical feminist who was taught that gender is a social construct.

However, just because I happen to believe in something doesn't mean I'm right, and I do have a (now mostly antiquated) background in biology, so I read a bunch of the papers that Zoe referenced.

They, of course, suggest that her (present) theories are well-supported. However, skeptic that I am, I went to a (retired) professor of Neurophysiology to try to determine if this was just a small pool of researchers who had created a theory not widely accepted within the sciences he worked in, or whether this was representative of the view of the field as a whole.

Needless to say, it's the later - he mostly expressed surprise that I wasn't already aware of this.

@"Mac"-
Andrea gets basic biological facts wrong, frequently; I've yet to read an article of hers which would pass muster even with my now-ancient high school biology textbook. Andrea has no support that I've seen for her claims about Zoe, whereas Zoe has support and/or documentation backing up her major claims, some of which is independent of Zoe. I see no reason to consider Andrea's claims further, any more than I'd consider the claims of someone who suggests that since my thumbs are hyperflexable, I must not be human.

However, if you really think that about Zoe, you may wish to consider commenting somewhere where your time and effort will be better appreciated.

Zoe Brain said...

"Mac" is in fact another of Nicky's sockpuppets.

I've already told him to post under a consistent monicker - WBF I think was the one he chose - or his comments would be deleted.

He's welcome to post whatever he wants, just not to pretend to be a hundred different people all agreeing with each other, as is his habit. Though I'm not certain it's pretence, his personality may be disintegrating.

Unfortunately some of his sub-personas are quite violent - see for example here.
One of his comments:
You ever say shit like that again you little mother fucking white trash shit, i'll come over their beat the living shit out or you and put u in the hospital myself. You aint the shit, You aint no FIRE GODS so quit being Da shocker before i shock your ass into a beating of you life. Ya know what, i'll even beat ur ass up in front of your mother. You and ur kind are nothing but a fucking freeloading crap of shit. I don't take shit, I give SHIT.

He's been cyberstalking me now for 4 years.

M Italiano said...

Since Suzan has made an ad hominem attack, I'd like it to be known that I never said I have a doctorate. Most physicians do not. An MBBS or MBBCh are bachelor level degrees and an MD is technically a professional degree. A doctorate requires original research, its publication and its defense. An example of a doctorate is a PhD. As for being an alternative med physician, I can do all clinical exams, order any medical test, and make any medical diagnosis on equal grounds that an allopath can. Surgery and antibiotics are certainly valuable, and for these, allopath is often a good option.
But there is nothing fraudulent or quackery about BIHT
being better hormonal therapy for endocrine conditions than synthetic hormones (like from horse urine)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19179815?itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum&ordinalpos=6

Likewise there is nothing fraudulent or quackery about herbal medicines being better than drugs for menstrual problems
http://www.naturalnews.com/022969_Chinese_Medicine_menstrual_pain.html

There are so many legitimate alternative medicines, that to dismiss it with a blanket statement is terribly uninformed.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Sophie said...

Having read this entry I do hope Zoe doesn’t mind my commenting. I have read Andrea’s article and Prof Italiano’s response and think as someone with 5 aRD. I would like to make a few points. Firstly “Anonymous” who made the first post seems to believe that being angry about having been subjected to surgery as a child is a bad thing. While I am unaware of either of the authors of both articles (AB and Prof Italiano) having had surgery as children, the assumption seems to be that at least one of them has and they are “Bitter about it and blaming the world” Well you only have to read a comment like that of Zimba’s to notice that when you are subjected to surgery as a child and disagree with what was done, someone comes along and claims it was done because “Gender is a social construct” Well David Reimer didn’t agree with that. Nor do I. And yes this is why some of us who were subjected to surgery are angry about the view that the surgery defined who we are and our anger about it can be simply dismissed as a “Social construct”. Being born with a physical condition that causes doctors to intervene surgically, without consent is very real and painful. Especially when you are made to suffer because of that non consented to non sought after surgery.

The same applies to some of the theories that fly around, I am Sorry Prof Italiano but I don’t agree with your sources on 5 alpha, and you know I am fully qualified to question those theories. Also you are aware of my views about Mc Ginley’s papers and her deeply flawed studies, I am actually quite surprised to find you supporting Mc Ginley’s ideas knowing the problems they have caused. I don’t know fully what the row between you and Andrea seems to be. But I do not want the debate to, yet again, arrive at the same demeaning consensus that people with 5 alpha are all “Girls who want to be men”. (And In fairness to Andrea, Mc Ginley did say “They become male 100% of the time” after openly excluding subjects who did not fit that assertion).

Zoe: I don’t know your personal history and I am not going to make any judgments about it, I take what you say at face value and leave it at that.
Can you not afford those of us who have not made any public statements about your situation the same respect. I have noticed that every time someone comments on your history, you immediately respond with claims that put people, like myself with 5 alpha in an impossible situation, knowing full well what the consequences are. I am not one of your critics and yet hear I am reading this again, this time coming from someone (Prof Italiano) who I thought also knew better. Can you all just debate this properly instead of making the sort of generalizations about each other that negatively impact on the rest of us, You all have a responsibility to present the facts as they are, not tell people things that will only cause problems for others.

Thanks

Sophia Siedlberg, UK representative of OII.

M Italiano said...

HI Sophie, I don't believe the McGinley reports either. 100% is just nonsense. What I was questioning in this example is Andrea's statement that "Most" individuals with 5 alpha identify as female. I am not sure where to find that "most" identify as female. The 2 reviews I linked to
were literature surveys. When the seperate studies were added, about 56%-70% of those raised as girls changed gender role. That would seem to suggest that about 1/3 to nearly 1/2 of those with 5 Alpha raised as girls do NOT change gender roles.
That is far from McGinley's data.
If we take McGinley's data out of those two literature reviews, it
would seem to be 1/2 half do not develop a male gender or do not switch to male, but instead are female. I just didn't find evidence to support Andrea's contention that "most" individuals with 5 Alpha identify as female.
If there are studies which show that "most" individuals with 5 alpha have a female gender, I am big enough to correct myself.
It just seems that with what is out there, there is alot of uncertainty, since it may be around 50%. My concern is that if we listen to Andrea's statement that "most" persons with 5 alpha
will have a gender of being girls, that then the gender police will continue to feminize them without having respect for the reports that 56-70% may request a gender role change to boys. But again Sophie, I agree that there is
a SUBSTANTIAL number of individuals with 5 alpha who do NOT have a male gender.

Sophie said...

Hello Prof

I think it is fair to say that the gender policing of 5 alpha has bordered on the pathologically insane with a distinct bias towards “Male” with flimsy evidence to support it. (I do agree with AB to some extent on that) The real ratio of people with 5 alpha probably is 50:50. You only have to look at comments sections of blogs like this to see the number of times people quote Mc Ginley to know that online there is a very distinct bias. It is what the gender police want to hear. The intended sex is actually irrelevant. Not wanting to sound too cynical but I tend to believe that a lot of people would simply want to see intersex people assigned the sex they would least probably identify as to satisfy some masochistic ideal within the “Gender binary” or the “Two sex system”.

I will be honest no one has come up with a reliable statistic about the gender ratios among people with 5 alpha. Most the studies have been biased or incredibly selective. As someone with 5 alpha I was not born with a penis as such, I have no intention of trying to grow one (This would never happen now anyway even if I did want one) or trying to get one attached surgically. I tend to feel that most people who have an “opinion” about 5 alpha (And by default therefore my body and my life) are imposing something on me which they have no right to. Personally I can settle for 50:50 but I will only truly accept any statistic either way when the studies done are truly un-biased and every child has been given the freedom to decide for themselves what they want. Until then, in all honesty, the actual ratio is something we are not going to know.

Zoe Brain said...

I think we can agree that at least one in three people with 5ARD have a female gender identity.

My own opinion is that about another third could function adequately in a male role - or a female one - if they had to.

And the final third have a male gender identity.

So forcing everyone to have a male gender role and anatomy, or a female one for that matter, is very obviously contrary to the evidence.

I've only had contact with 3 people with 5ARD. Of those, 2 had female gender identities, one was "bi-gender", and took his masculinisation in his stride. Nothing he wanted to have happen, but not something he cared too strongly about either way.

Most of the numerical data I've looked at has come from the Pacific region, in particular Micronesia and New Guinea, rather than McGinley's works. The social pressure there to masculinise is strong in the Sambia tribe, but not so elsewhere. Probably as strong as it is in the UK, whose bureaucracy is ill-informed about the situation. Actually, I'd say bloody-minded, pig-ignorant and inhuman. NOT ALL 5ARD PEOPLE ARE MALE, YOU TWITS!!!!

One thing I must be careful of - I've looked at 5ARD but not 17BHDD in detail. The results there could differ, and I hope that Milton Diamond will get around to publishing his work on that soon. He studied the Gaza cluster of 17BHDD around 1999, but hasn't written up yet.

5ARD isn't some monolithic condition either, the effects can vary from an almost imperceptible masculinisation of a basically female external anatomy, a similar only just perceptible further masculinisation of a mostly male base, all the way through to an extreme masculinisation of a female base.

There appears to be no correlation between degree of masculinisation before or after puberty and sex identity.

We have to treat individuals as individuals. Listen to them.

Zoe Brain said...

Oh and Sophie - not only do I "not mind" you commenting, but I really hope you do, now and in future. Especially when you don't agree. You know more about 5ARD than I ever can. All I know is what others have written about it.

M Italiano said...

Dear Sophie, Thanks for your comments. I have no problems with the 50:50 ratio. There may very well be a bias towards male assignment as you say. Often in many intersexed conditions there is
a female bias because of the gender police's belief that "it is easier to dig a hole than build a pole". But since 5 alpha individuals have an XY karyotype, there is another type of gender policing that is going on here. That gender policing is that
XY individuals "should or are"
males and therefore "should" get
a male assignment. Therefore if there is any doubt in a culture
that favors males (most do),
XY individuals will get pushed in the male direction. As for cultures
where there is not early surgery and karyotypes are not known,
the pubertal masculinization
may be enough for some individuals who would otherwise not conform to
changing gender roles from female to male, to do so even if by coercion. An interesting question would in the lack of cultural bias, if 5 alpha individuals were generally assigned as girls
(surgically as well), how many
would seek a male gender role
in the absence of a masculinizing puberty? Perhaps it would be even less than 50%. Perhaps most would
want to stay as girls, which would seem to confirm Andrea's statement.
But before agreeing with Andrea "that most actually identify as female" I personally would need more data. But your 50/50 settlement or Zoe's 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 doesn't seem to be an unreasonable statement based upon the studies even with the shortcomings that they seem to have.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
M Italiano said...

Is that some novel diagnostic technique that you are using?
I can think of at least 5 intersexed conditions that can cause those results. That is quite startling for 7 months to become that pretty. If you don't think Zoe is intersexed, perhaps you are
a member of the new DSD recruitment effort. LOL.

Anonymous said...

I don't understand why Suzan seems to have a need to dismiss intersexed people as transsexuals.
On her blog in the comments section around October 19, 2009 Suzan re-cast many intersexed people as transsexual with her following statement-

"As far as I see it you are transsexual if you change the
sex you were assigned at birth, end of story. The action
taken is is what makes one transsexual not the root cause
behind it all.
Hence if you, of your own volition change the sex you were
assigned at birth then you are transsexual. You are
transsexual if you change the sex you were assigned at
birth. It becomes a tautological arguement."

Really? Whose Zoomin' Who? So if someone with XX CAH was assigned as a girl and later changed that assignment
to that of a boy, they are not intersexed but instead are transsexual and "end of story"? If someone with 5 Alpha was assigned as female and then changed that assignment to male, they are not intersexed but are transsexual?
Remember now-"it is not the root cause behind it all" but the action one takes of their own volition.

What double talk nonsense

I don't understand why a self-proclaimed WBT such as Suzan Cooke needs to make legitimate intersexed people who reject their assignment re-casted as transsexuals

Sophie said...

Hello Anonymous

I believe the real problem lies with the still consistent lack of self determination, a sort of Hobson's choice if you like. It is always "What if person X with intersex variation X wants to become a man?"

I often wonder whether if an intersex person rejected being "assigned" to "Male" and ended up female, if some people would then start using terms like "Transsexual".

What I am saying is that in gender land if you are described as intersex, people think "Female to male" and if you are described as "transsexual" people think "Male to female".

I have a bit of a problem with that because it is simply untrue.

The reality is that with transsexual people they are simply born into the wrong physical sex, With intersex people there are ambiguities that are diagnosable at birth, The target sex or accepted sex is not the issue, the way both groups of people are treated is. So to apply a generalization where one exclusively becomes female and the other exclusively male says more about pecking orders and misogyny than anything else.

I say this because as someone diagnosed with 5 alpha myself, I have fewer legal rights in the UK as a transsexual woman and I have no desire to become male, despite the fact that in the UK the law wants me to go and get a new attachment between my legs, all because of the clinical stereotyping. It was this describing everything in terms of target sex and nothing else that ISNA did and the result was the emerging (Mind bogglingly False and grotesquely stereotypical) belief that TS = male to female and IS = female to male.

M Italiano said...

Dear Sophie, I had hit the wrong button and responded as anonymous. There is no need for me to be anonymous since I posted what I posted using M Italiano on Suzan's site.
Here is what I think is happening.
I think that it DOES matter if someone is intersexed that we can grant INTERSEX to female OR INTERSEX to male. To say that someone is a transsexual if they change the sex that was assigned to them and that's the "end of story" is nonsense. To say that the "the action taken is what makes people transsexual not the root cause behind it all".
"sex assignments" are usually made
by midwifes or physicians.
If the midwife or physician gets the assignment wrong because the individual is not a boy or girl but instead is intersexed and the intersexed individual changes this assignment that does not mean this intersexed person is a transsexual.
The root cause bhind it all does matter. In the case of intersex, the root cause is that the midwide/physician screwed up and got it wrong and the person was not a boy or a girl but instead was
intersexed. Therefore the intersexed person is not a transsexual for changing of their own volition their incorrect assignment by the midwife/phys.
And I mean this for intersexed to
female...not just for intersexed to male.

Sophie said...

Hello Prof

I get the feeling Suzan is pointing out the stupidity of the "I am more of a woman" pecking orders that we have all had the misfortune to witness in the past 15 or so years.

Let's be honest here, Chase and Tree etc did sort of go to people like Suzan saying "Oh I was born intersexed, I am more of a woman than you are!" And Chase etc were quite vicious about it.

My own view is that if all these lawyers and clinicians just stopped constantly splitting hairs about who is what and stopped granting or refusing the status of a given sex on people based on capricious rules. And they simply accepted the fact that where people end up is what they are then most of this arguing would not happen.

M Italiano said...

Hi Sophie, It may be the case that Suzan did get ridiculed by Chase and Triea. That is unfortunate if it did occur. But if Suzan is secure in being a WBT then I do not see why she would need to make statements that would make legitimate intersexed individuals who reject an assignment that was given to them appear to be transsexual and further to give these intersexed individuals a transsexual label.

M Italiano said...

Dear Sophie, In The Last Real Woman Syndrome" on Suzan's blog Suzan writes-

"One way is through denial. All those claims of obscure and often contradictory forms of intersex are a way of disassociating oneself from the class of people who all had one variation or another on the same sex change operation you had. 'I’m not like you. I’m not some trannie freak, I’m intersex.' As though someone who is intersex and decides to change the sex they were assigned at birth is not transsexual.'

I think Suzan's anti-intersex bias is evident here. Of course transsexuals are not freaks. But the fact is that someone who is intersex and decides to change the sex they were assigned at birth is NOT a transsexual. They are intersexed. I think you understand that Sophie. They and yourself are not a transsexual or a woman born transsexual (WBT) any more than Suzan is intersexed. LOL.

Sophie said...

Hello Prof

I really think you need to look at all this in a historical context.

:)

The Midnight Moth said...

Myself and a former friend actually both have one ovotestis and one testis. For myself, I am the same i always was... for hem, well, he was raised female and then transitioned to what he calls "the boi side of androgyne." So that's at least two people who are proof that there are far more "combinations" than she likes to think.

Anonymous said...

"While I am not aware of penis to vagina spontaneous sex changes in humans..."

But you have to remember: That's the only kind that matters to WBT. You must be operative if you were assigned male or you're not a woman.

Frankly I could never conscien womanhood being synonymous with vagina... that would mean some inherit and some buy, the exact kind of cissexist metric I like to think we would do well to avoid.