When a man is a woman he can do no wrong...

When I was pregnant with my daughter, I had an irrational fear.  A deep and frightening worry that my little girl would be born with something called "Ambiguous Genitalia." There was nothing or no one who could convince me that she would be born healthy and "normal" until her actual birth and I could see for myself that she was healthy, whole and completely female. 

But 1 out of every 15,000 live births results in an intersexed child, also known as a "pseudo hermaphrodite" and while I was one of the lucky ones, not everyone is.  Those children are born with parts that don't automatically indicate whether they're a boy or a girl.  They either have a very large clitoris, or a very small penis (photos after jump)

Children who have this condition are often hidden away by their parents, ostracized by their community, or made to feel as if they are somehow less of a person.  In reality, they are the same as any other child, but their development was changed within the womb.  It's not the mom's fault, it's not the dad's fault, and it's certainly not the baby's fault.  It's nature's fault.  And there are only a couple of ways that this condition can be dealt with.

When a child is born with this condition, some people opt to have surgery right away -- to make sure that the genitalia appear normal; as a normal GIRL'S genitalia.  Because it is much easier to create a vagina from a very small penis than it is to make a penis out of a very large clitoris.  The child is then raised as, for all intents and purposes, what they are: a girl then a woman.  Some of these children, however, while looking like a girl, have the genetic make up of a boy -- which can cause even more complications, requiring life-long hormone treatment.  Sometimes, however, the child is genetic female, and the genitalia reflect that.  If that's the case, there are rarely long term problems.  Either way, the choice to make an intersex child a girl is one that can effect them for life.

What happens then, when an intersex child grows up, thinking that they are a girl, believing that they are a woman, and acting as such... only to have their secret become public knowledge?  To leave them fodder for ridicule, all for being born unique.  And worse, what if they find somewhere that they excel, a place where they've succeeded... only to be told that they don't deserve that success because of a birth defect?

Caster Semenya is such a woman (or probably is, since little information is available). 

She is a runner for South Africa who won a gold medal at the World Athletics Championships, and did so by kicking everyone's butt so badly that she drew attention.  Because of her masculine appearance, people questioned her sex, and thus questioned her win.  And then you see, it has been discovered that testing done prior to her win indicated that her genetic gender was ill-defined.  What to do, what to do?  She believes that she is a woman.  Her family believes that she's a woman.  Is she less entitled to her win because of a birth defect?

I believe that just as we would protect someone's rights if they had MS or MD, we should protect the rights of another person who suffers a congenital handicap.  This woman is entitled to her win.  And to take it away from her will only add additional stigma to those 1 in 15,000 babies whose only sin is to be born different.  Give her the medal, let her live her life, let her be "normal".  Let a child, a girl, a woman, succeed, despite their limitations and handicaps.  She deserves it -- not because she has a birth defect, but because she ran, and she ran well, and she did so as a woman -- legitimately.  There was no deception involved, no unfair practices.  This woman had a genetic advantage, just as any champion may have a genetic advantage by having a disposition to greater strength, to an agile body, to a better physique.

There's fair and right, and then there's simply jealousy.  Let us not be a petty world.

Comments

[Shannon]

Seriously! THANK you!

[Matt]

Genetic testing first, then go with what the genes say.
That'd be the simple solution.
But we don't live in a simple world.
And sometimes parents are either scared, too frazzled, or get bullied by the medical staff for immediate decisions that may not be the best ones at hand.
Or, in NY state, the parents just don't care.
(Welcome to the Socialist Workers Paradise, will that be one lump or two?)

[Gissel]

I think in some countries they wait until the person develops a sexual identity, THEN they perform the surgery.

I too believe that that woman deserves her medal.

[The Queen of the Blog]

Matt, the problem is that (as we know with transgendered people in general) the genes don't always tell what sex the person identifies with. Gissel has the right of it in that we should wait until the child develops a sexual identity before assigning them a gender. The problem is that the parents are more concerned with image, or that they're worried that their children will be ostracized, so they "hide" the problem. When I was pregnant, because this was my fear, I had decided that if that WERE the case, I would wait, even if it meant homeschooling or not changing diapers unless completely in private. Because there was no way I would force what amounts to gender reassignment surgery on my child.

I was a bit distracted when I wrote this, and I should mention that sometimes there are under or non-developed reproductive organs so the child may never be able to reproduce on top of these other issues. It's just a sad occurence in general -- why does society have to make it so much harder? In this case, the entire world now knows that woman's secret, and it should have been up to HER to talk about it or not. I feel so bad for her.

[Matt]

Understood.
I'm also used to some in the medical profession pushing people to make decisions that likely are best left to 'later' as deciding immediately may not be in the best interests of anyone at that point.
But.. there are some docs out there who actually paid attention to the Hippocratic oath and practice "first of all, do no harm."
Those docs are worth the effort to find.

[The Queen of the Blog]

Medical "professionals" push for too many procedures that are just plain unecessary, starting with episiotomies. But that's for another post./

[Olivia]

Yeah, they should do the test when she is a bit older, then give her an operation according to the results.

I say give her the medal. She didn't cheat, she just didn't know. Its not like she took steroids or other drugs.

Maybe this will become a thing now, to genetically test everyone before they can compete. Will be very sad if it does. Hope it doesn't come to that.

Great blog Jen :)