Your opininions on Transsexuality

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your thoughts?

Transsexuals are the same gender they were (i.e. a man who gets special surgery to become a woman is still a man).

They just look like the gender they've changed to. Transsexualism is about changing one's apparent gender, not their real one.

But that's their trip, not mine.

I don't know, but I'm sympathetic and willing live and let live.

I guess I'd say that it's actually an ill-posed question, because "gender" is defined more by (other people's) instinct than any chemical or genetic fact. IOW, it's not a rational concept, and trying to treat it as such is problematic.


OT: There's a woman in Texas with an intersex condition, and because the judges there can't understand the difference between that and transsexuality, she's had her deceased husband's estate stripped from her and given to her husband's ex-wife. People can be such idiots.

^ He/she obviously had a snot-for-brains lawyer.

I take a genetic/empirical pov on the issues, but a person is still a person, and should not be discriminated against no matter how much surgery he/she has on his/her body.

It appears that the lawyer on the other side knew the attitudes of the local judges better. She's appealing the decision, though. It's a very scummy case: ten years ago she had a bankruptcy, and the guy who was her bankruptcy attorney is now the lawyer who is representing the ex-wife. So, the whole thing was probably his idea. He should be disbarred for that, but somehow that hasn't happened.

But yeah, totally agree -- it is outrageous that that anyone could have such injustice done to them, and the fact that a person has an unusual background shouldn't somehow make it acceptable.

Biological gender is not as simple as having XX or XY chromosomes. All humans start out from the same type of template and possess the same proto-organs. A normal XX fetus can be manipulated to develop male genitalia/testes and a male brain by exposing it to sufficient levels of androgen and testosterone, and even if those testes do not become completely functional, they can still virilize or be made to virilize and be indistinguishable for normal XY adult men.

A normal Y chromosome contains a gene called SRY. This gene is responsible for causing ovotestes to develop into testes, and is responsible for controling the masculinization process.

Occasionally an XY male lacks this gene. This is called Swyer Syndrome. The person and will develop as a female with the exception of the fact that they will not have functioning testes. The gonads instead will be "streak gonads" and they are usually removed as they frequently otherwise become cancerous.

There are other genetic defects which can cause different forms of Swyer Syndrome as well. In all cases, the person presents as female despite having a male genetic makeup.
These XY females are usually only diagnosed when they fail to menstruate.

Conversely, there are XX males. Men who have an XX genetic makeup but have an SRY gene on one of their X chromosomes.This is called de la Chapelle Syndrome. While they are sterile and lack Mullerian tissue, and some have been noted to have hypospasias and gynecomastia, low libidos and sparse facial hair (probably from the hypospasias), most of these individuals are usually indistinguishable from normal XY males, and my never find out they do not have a Y chromosome.

Another disorder is androgen insensitivity syndrome. These are XY males who, for one reason or another, can't respond to the effects of androgen, either partially, or completely.
Individuals with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome develop as infertile females while individuals with partial androgen insensitivity syndrome may have ambiguous genitalia or partially virilize to some degree (this is probably what Caster Semenya has).

It could be the case that some female to male transexuals have some form of partial androgen insensitivity syndrome, where their brain can't respond to androgen, but other areas of their body can.

It can go the other way as well. Some XX females for one reason or another are exposed to high levels of androgen in the womb and this virilizes their brain, and can even cause ambiguous genitalia. This has been demonstrated in a clinical setting.

There is also something called Klinfelter's Syndrome, who have an XXY makeup. They are sterile, have small male genitalia, a female pubic hair pattern, female fat distributions, they develop wide hips, breasts, have sparse facial hair, and about 20% are have a sexual preference for men.

True hermaphrodites, people with an XX/XY kerotype, are thought to be rare. One thing that can cause this is chimerism. This can occur in humans when two zygotes of non-identical twins merge into one person, who has the genetic makeup of both zygotes. If one zygote was XX and one was XY, the person will have some cells in their body with an XX genetic makeup, and some cells in their body with an XY genetic makeup.

In the instances where this is called to the attention of the medical community, it's usually because the person has ambiguous genitalia at birth or fails to menstruate or virilize at puberty. Or they may begin to menstruate or virilize when it was thought they shouldn't. However there are likely cases where the mixed genetic makeup is never discovered.

There's also Turner Syndrome, where a person has an XO genetic makeup. They only have one X chromosome. These individuals present as female but they usually don't develop adult female attributes such as breasts and widened hips without hormone therapy (conversely people with androgen insensitivity syndrome often do).

So you see, there is plenty of opportunity to have someone who physically appears one sex and neurologically or genetically is another.

There's a huge difference between genetic and psychological gender. While transsexuals are technically still the gender they were born as, their physical appearance matches how they view themselves.

The only "objective" part of sex/gender is that a Y-chromosome exists.

How we choose to classify it, and what role it plays in society, is 100% subjective.

Saying, "If you have a Y-chromosome, you are male and a man!" is every bit as subjective and arbitrary as looking at a color and declaring that the color will now be referred to as, "gwashi" instead of "purple." We can take a shape with four equal sides and call it a "square," but it's only a "square" because we say so, not because of some immutable, objective law of the physical universe.

There's no particular reason why a Y-chromosome should dictate anything other than a person has a Y-chromosome. There's no particular reason why a Y-chromosome human cannot be considered a "woman," except in the minds of people who cannot distinguish between what is truly "objective reality" and their own personal biases.

That is all.

Which means that they are still the same person they were when they were born, just surgically altered.

You've echoed my feelings here.

Yes.

And now their external appearance matches their internal state, and there's the added convenience of the world knowing the proper way to address them at first glance.

So yes, an XY person who has had surgery to add breasts and a vagina is still the same person they always were and has gained the advantage of everyone else knowing it too. Continuing to regard an XY person with a vagina as a "man" is a silly cultural convention, not an "objective, scientific truth."

A few home truths:

1) Sex and gender are not equivalent terms! Gender has become a euphemism for "sex" during the last 50 years, but overuse does not mean that we can uncritically use one word for the other. When referring to an organism karyotype or physiology, the more correct word to use is, "sex." When referring to a person's psychological identity and social sex role, it is generally accepted to use, "gender."

2) A person's sex can be determined in at least four different ways--and these are not always equivalent

i - Sexual Karyotype. A person with an XX karyotype is a female. A person with an XY karyotype is male. A person with X- (Turner), XXY (Klinefelter) or any of a number of other atypical karyotypes is, generally, inersexed.

ii - Physiological Sex. A person with male genitalia is male, a person with female genitalia is female. A person may, however, be karyotypically male (XY) but have no male genitalia. Since all embryos begin with female physiology, a male whose Y chromosome is faulty will not develop male genitalia, despite having an XY karytype (Swyer).

iii - Gender Identity. A person may self-identify as male or female entirely independently of their sexual karyotype and their physiological sex.

iv - Social sex role. People may present the outward appearances of a sexes different from their physiological sexes or their gender identities, even when these latter two are consistent. Examples include not merely cross dressing, but also the adoption of careers that are typically filled by the opposite sex.

It is only the most narrow minded and deterministic view that says that karyotype determines all. The incidence of Klinefelter's, for example, is approximately 0.2% of males (that's 300,000 XXY people in the US, alone), some 30,000 - 75,000 people in the United States have Turner's Syndrome (X- karyotype, with resulting gonadal dysgensis).

And even when people have a typical XX or XY karyotype, there is still an abundantly wide range of conditions which render them either sexually ambiguous, or present a physiological sex that is inconsistent with their karyotype.