Anne Fausto-Sterling’s chapter “Of Gender and Genitals” posed some very interesting and serious situations regarding the intersex newborn. Sterling outlines a lot of biological logistics, detailing several procedures that some intersex newborns are subjected to. What interested me, however, were the different angles that some doctors and researches chose to take on this issue. As we’ve started to discuss in class, all these issues stem from the fact that people are still generally uncomfortable with sexual ambiguity. This desire to fix “nature’s mistake” causes doctors to pressure parents to make a decision that can drastically affect their child’s future.
The first argument I found troubling was the fact that some researchers are primarily concerned with the emotional welfare of the parents, as opposed to the situation at hand. Dewhurst and Gordon tried to appeal to the emotions of people, labeling intersex individuals as “sexual freaks who are doomed to live in loneliness and frustration.” Their arguments lack the required sensitivity, and if I were a parent, there is no way I would be appealed to even finish reading their research. It is scary to think that some doctors pressure parents into making a decision, without even offering parents the necessary time to consult other parents with intersex children, or the time to do proper research.
Throughout the chapter, Sterling highlights various complications with gender reassignment surgery, as well as the consequences of doctors and parents “choosing” the wrong gender for their children. I guess my biggest question is while I was reading focused on the need to “correct” the sex of intersex newborns. If these babies are born healthy in all other aspects, why are doctors so eager to subject them to surgeries that in some cases can leave children with “densely scared and immobile penises?” The fact that some doctors caution parents to keep the information about the surgery from their children, highlights the fact that something is wrong. Why should doctors, who are trained in the field of medicine, want to hide a procedure from a patient?
I think reading Middlesex alongside of Sterling’s chapter definitely highlights our understanding of intersex issues. Although the book is fictional, it provides the psychological aspect of the scientific details discussed in Sterling’s chapter.
As Maria has pointed out, throughout the chapter "Of Gender and Genitals", Fausto-Sterling has explained that throughout history there has been a medical and social need to identify the sex of a newborn as either male or female as soon as possible. Doctors recognize this need as both a medical and social necessity in order for the child to fit into society and proceed with the proper development. However when reading this chapter, I caught myself in an internal debate over the nature vs. nurture issue. As Fausto-Sterling explains, when dealing with newborns that do not have clearly identifiable male or female parts (most often they have both male and female attributes), doctors immediately feel the need to identify what the "natural" sex of the baby is. However, as Fausto-Sterling has pointed out, nature obviously has more than just the male and female categories, thus how are doctors capable of claiming whether or not a baby is "supposed" to be a boy or a girl? So, hypothetically let's say a doctor encounters a newborn with both male and female attributes in his/her anatomy. And hypothetically let's say the doctor believes based on the anatomy, the baby is more like a boy than it is a girl. So the doctor proceeds to "fix nature's mistakes" and the parents raise the baby as a boy while he also physically develops like a boy. However, once the boy reaches his teens, he discovers that he has many feminine qualities including a sexual preference for other men. So here we reach the obvious question: does the boy have these feminine qualities including his sexual preference because the doctor got it wrong and he should have been a girl? Or did something happen during his childhood or adolescence which influenced his sexual preference? As Fausto-Sterling points out in this chapter, these are the questions doctors have been trying to answer for decades and have come up with many different solutions. But is it even possible to identify the root of one's sexual preference or whether or not the person was "naturally" supposed to be a male or female?
ReplyDeleteI think Fausto-Sterling would respond these questions by saying, perhaps there is no answer for these questions because the doctors are asking the wrong questions. Instead of asking why people do not fit into the "normal" heterosexual male and female categories which seem to be the "natural" human identities, perhaps there should be more of a spectrum in reference to sex, gender and sexual orientation. By having a spectrum rather than strictly-defined categories, doctors would not have to "fix nature's mistakes" and make the child either a male or female. Instead the child could simply be a person with the attributes that he/she (whatever pronoun) was truly naturally given. While this spectrum idea does call for a complete restructure of our society, it could potentially help hermaphrodites and people that do not identify as one sex be able to cope and deal with who they are, instead of try to force themselves into one category or the other, both of which they just do not fit into. However the problem is that statistically the majority of the population do identify as heterosexual males and females as a result it would be extremely difficult to restructure a system to fit the interests and well-beings of a minority, however validated they may be.
I like your points Maria and have to agree on what you are saying
ReplyDeleteWhen reading this chapter, I found it hard to believe that we as a society are scared so badly by what isn't normal that we have to use slanted evidence to ensure that the right choice(immediate genital fixing). The doctors who provided the "freakish" evidence should be worrying about the child, rather than the emotional toll it will take on the parent
I found the arguement of Money vs Diamond to be particularly interesting. In class our discussions have leaned heavily towards the money view, that children are very gender neutral when born, and that gender roles play a significant part things. We have also talked about how immediate surgery to create a boy or girl can effect the induviual all throughout life. I think one major flaw that both of these scientists leave out is that the examples they provide to us we know nothing about. Who raised them? how were they raised? who did they play with on the playground? did they have any brothers or sisters who they looked up to? who influenced them? The lives of these people we have learned about, who are so uncomfortable in their bodies, who want to be someone else, what were they like?
This is why I find it very hard to take a side in the idea of immediately "fixing" gender malfunctions at birth.there is so much complexity, so many variables, and so many conditions that are developed in the atmosphere you grow up in. Should we wait? but will the child be teased, called a freak, for not having a sex. I understand why a parent wouldn't want to put their child through that. There is also religous views, and beliefs to take into consideration.
as Diamond says, with any sex reassignment surgery, no matter what the age "the long term outcome is less than perfect"..... I believe this is not only a psycological problem, but a problem with society. With change being a constant thing around us, perhaps we should change our thinking about the idea of having only two sexes. Why should hermaphadite people have to pick?
I think that Maria, Jessi, and Brittany bring up some very interesting points in this post. While reading Sterling's chapter I also kept coming back to the question of nature vs. nurture and why it is so imperative that a baby be labeled with a specific sex immediately after birth. I think that doctors often try to remove themselves from the situation and do not see an intersexual baby as a person and instead see the baby as a "situation" that needs to be "fixed." I think that our society needs to make an effort to view sexuality on a continuum so that nature is in fact "natural" as opposed to nature being determined by someone else. I also really liked Brittany's point about the various influences that can play a role in determining how a person molds his or her own gender identity, and how it is unrealistic for people to assign a baby a certain gender at birth and expect it to stick throughout their life.
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