While I was away at FantasyCon the UK newspapers were of of stories about trans people. Mainly this appears to have been sparked by a 12-year-old kid whose transition was announced publicly at her school. Naturally the kids told their parents and someone immediately phoned The Sun. Goodness only knows what the school thought it was doing. However, not all of the stories have been bad. The Independent has a nice feature on Kim Petras, who appears to be a remarkably talented young lady. The Herald has an interview with Richard O’Brien that is purportedly about his new musical but is mainly about his struggle with his own gender identity.
The top story, however, continues to be poor Caster Semenya. The results of her “gender test” have still not officially been announced, but the IAAF appears to have enough leaks to sink a battleship and salacious rumors continue to fly. It is beginning to look awfully like the South African athletics authorities knew about her condition from the start and put her in competition anyway because they were greedy for medals, while people within the IAAF have been trying to embarrass the South Africans with no thought for the poor girl whose life they are ruining.
Yesterday’s Independent had a fascinating article by another intersex woman which really brings home some the issues. If you have been raised a girl from birth, and are happy with your gender identity, it must be awful to discover that in fact you have no ovaries and can never have children. To have people saying that you are “really” a man, and in Semenya’s case to have people doing so in newspapers and TV reports all over the world, must be unbearable.
Sarah Graham’s article also lays bare the web of deceit that is often woven around intersex children. Meddling doctors often remove some organs to “normalize” their victim’s body. Parents are either not told, or are so embarrassed by their “freak” offspring that they go along with the cover-up, not telling the child until it is way too late for objections. Having an intersex (or trans) child is still viewed as a matter of shame for a family in our supposedly liberal and civilized culture. About the only thing we don’t do to intersex kids is practice “honor” killings. It is time we started treating them with a bit of respect.
Where I grew up, being a woman with short hair was enough to get one cornered in the locker room and called a “lesbo” . . . I shudder to imagine what being publicly intersex would be like.
Gender (like a lot of things in the real world) is analog, not digital.