10 thoughts on “EXTRA CREDIT ASSIGNMENT!”

1. The experiences of inter-sexed changed my understanding of sex. Prior to this article I knew about the biological aspect of chromosomal abnormalities and the like. However, I didn’t understand why it was such an issue. As a society we demonize those who are different from the accepted norm and, try to conform ourselves to a particular image. When has being an individual become a bad thing? I always believed sex was just another way to identify an individual. So my suggestion is the addition of an other categorization of sex. I believe this would create a suitable compromise for everyone. Inter-sexed individuals should be granted their privacy. By being labeled as an “other” gives inter-sexed individuals to assume any gender role they seem fit.
   The article also stated the practice of sex assignment at birth. This was very disturbing to me. Why not accept the child as is. If the condition of the child is not life threatening then medical intervention is not needed. If the child grows up and decides that a change is necessary, then that is the child’d decision alone. I believe parents of an inter-sexed child should let the child know that they are different and support them. Our society is continuing to change, one day our gender norm and expectations might not even be relevant.

2. Before reading the article or even entering the class, I have never heard of inter-sexed individuals. The article opened a door of possibilities in which it helps readers to question the norm of only two genders. Learning about the experiences and the existence of inter-sexed individuals has changed my views on gender. While reading their experiences, I began to think of the parents who in fact raise inter-sexed children. I thought about the choices they had to make and wondered how do they go about making gender choices for their children at such a young age. When an individual is born with both genitals, how can a parent know if they make the “right” choice or not. It feels as though the child’s sex is being gambled. For inter-sexed individuals I can only imagine that it is confusing. I feel as though because they are inter-sexed, it leaves questions about their sexuality and themselves as an individual. Bringing those who are inter-sexed into the light I feel is another way to question the norm of society just as any other issue that does not seem “normal” in everyone else’s eyes.

   Reading the article, many inter-sexed individuals went through gender reassignment as children. However, I also read that these individuals usually changed their sex as they got older and are labelled as “transgender”. This raises the questions I stated before because what are the parents to do? As a parent , you want the best for your child and try to see what will be the best gender. However, when they get older, they feel differently than the sex they were assigned. I see a lot of cons with parents picking their child’s gender but I also see why they makes those choices for their children. It must be hard being different from everyone else and not knowing where you belong especially when the normal two genders subject you to choose instead of being comfortable with exploring the possibility of being both. I hope that one day better methods are used. Although many people still believe and live in an old fashioned world I hope that they start to realize, that inter-sexed individuals are still human beings and genitalia should never be the only thing that defines an individual for life.

3. My experiences and knowledge of the existence of inter-sexed individuals changed my understanding of sex. Prior to reading this article I was very narrow minded and believed sex was very black and white you were either female or male, there was simply no in-between. Little did I know there was an entire community of in-between people and I believe they should be given the same recognition as the male and female sex. Even though sex is biological it should not over ride the happiest of individuals. And that happiest gets taken away when a person decides to chose the sex of another.
   When a child is born inter-sex the parents are given an enormous load of stress to chose a sex for their child and to raise that child according to their choice. This eliminates the parents ability to let their child develop naturally. With regards to this, I do not believe that parents should have the rights to chose the sex they want their child to be; that is solely a decision that should be decided when the child is old enough and more aware of their sex/sexuality. If society stopped putting pressure on raising children to be gender stereotypes and focused on raising them in a gender neutral manner, inter-sex individuals would feel more accepted in society.

4. I can honestly say before reading this article I had little knowledge of intersexuality. This article made me understand why Anne Fausto believes there is actually five sexes. Whether it is our parents, family, or society, we are taught that we are either male or female but not both. It is often looked as kind of impossible to some people. Moreover, when an intersexual child is born, parents are often pressured into making the decision of choosing their child’s sex. It is understood that as a parent it must be difficult to raise an inter-sexed child, but it is important to reflect on the consequences it may cause or if any harm will be done to the child in the future. Therefore, I strongly believe the choice should be the child’s once he or she is old enough to understand this concept. If parents choose for them, it is most likely confusing for the child as they grow up and as Fausto states, they often change their sexuality once they are older.
   In many cultures or religions, the only normal is being female or male. We are not aware that generations are changing and we may often reject inter-sexed individuals without realizing it makes it difficult for them to “fit in” in the “ideal society” people dream of. Inter-sexed individuals should be accepted for who they are and it should be their own choice to decide who they want to be. Pressuring them into choosing one or the other will not help in any way but affect them, sometimes in the most tragic ways.

5. Before reading this article I really had no knowledge about intersexuality. This article helped me understand why Anne Fausto believed there are five sexes. When an intersexual child is born, parents usually are pressured into making the decision on what sex their child is. When I think of intersexuality I think of male and female. I was not aware that there is a community of in-between people. When a child is born inter-sex the parents are given a load of stress. Parents should not have the right to choose their child sex, which should be something they decide when they become older. Inter-sexed individuals are humans but people in this society tend to not realize that. What does knowing someone’s sex have to do with anything? Certain personal information should not be questioned and the person should want to state what sex they are. That is the problem with the world today; people are too focused on what type of sex someone is and not on the person personality. We need to come together as a unit and stop discriminating on different genders.

6. Inter-sexed individuals face internal and external imbalances that cause many conflicts in their lives. Reading and understanding what an inter-sexed person goes through, makes me realize that there will never just be two identifiable categories of gender. Whether people choose to accept it or not, gender ambiguity has existed and will continue to exist. Such an occurrence arises from the very birth of a child and immediately places doctors and parents in a confused and desperate state. The traditional mentality that there can only be a male or a female forces surgical procedures like sex reassignment to occur. Genital surgery becomes an instant option with the plan of choosing an applicable gender, which would presumably help the child from facing any adversity while growing up. Consequently, failed sex reassignments that are irreversible can occur and affect the child later on if they choose to have physical changes made. Genital ambiguity in infants is common and the medical procedures made early on will greatly impact the future of that child; therefore, it is imperative that doctors advise a therapeutic approach as opposed to performing any irrational surgical procedures. Regardless of the statistical chances of a newborn being inter-sexed, it is important for not only the parents, but the doctors to be accepting in that situation. Inter-sexed conditions should not be treated as a disease and surgical procedures should only be attempted as a resort to save or improve a child’s life. Choosing therapy over surgery will allow the child to understand what is going on with their body, since much of the imbalance will affect the child psychologically more than it would physically.

   Gender ambiguity may contribute to the conflict a person has between their social gender and physical genitals. This difference will certainly affect a person when society strictly focuses on only the male and female gender. A gender-diverse world would be ideal, but a society that has a dominating population of individuals who solely identify themselves as either male or female will have a difficult time forming more than one category for inter-sexed individuals. I believe a reasonable solution in our current society is to encourage school subjects like health to educate our youth about gender variations. Understanding and acceptance are the key principles to forming a non-discriminatory outlook on inter-sexed individuals. Seeing that our society still has a relatively noticeable amount of homophobia and fails to fully acknowledge gay marriage, it is hard to predict that there will be an immediate acceptance of the individuals who do not necessarily fit into the developed gender norms. Societal standards and views regarding this issue will continue to remain very traditional and primitive unless advocates of gender equality push to inform others about inter-sexed individuals. Everyone deserves to feel comfortable in their body and identify themselves in any way without feeling fearful of not fitting in.

7. The article has opened my awareness to the inclusion of different sexes that should be considered. The only other sex that I knew about were hermaphrodites. Hermaphadites contain both male and female genetalia. intersexuality is quite complex topic to discuss. For one, the chances of a newborn being intersex is very rare. According to Fausto-Sterling, the occurrence is as low as 1.7 percent (Fausto-Sterling, 2000). Prior to the recognition of intersexuality, doctors would decide the sex of the newborn. The parents of the newborn were kept in the dark about the details of the decision the surgery.

   Because society is used to only two sexes, there becomes much stigma about a person with ambiguous genetalia. Anything that is unexplained or different from the social norm tends to be stigmatized. Fausto-Sterling’s article goes on to discussing that assigning a newborns gender due to ambiguous genitalia does not mean that it will be a solution (Fausto-Sterling, 2000).The article mentions the instances in which people rejects their sex reassignment surgery.
   An interesting point that was suggested in the article was that the decision should be left to the individual. This suggestion seems easier said than done. For one, society is stuck on separating individuals by two genders: male and female. I think that there needs to be more of an acknowledgement between different sexes. The exclusion only makes those who are intersexed to feel unrepresented. The individual may feel often conflicted as to which to know exactly identify The more I learn There is a conflict of interest between the individual, and society. To society, genetalia is the focalpoint of intersexuality. However, as the article explains, intersexuality has more to do with how the person identifies themselves. The topic has an emotional component to it.

8. Before this reading I did not know that about 1.7% of the population are born with some form of inter-sexuality. Also the fact that there are many different variations of inter-sexuality was a new piece of information, since I was under the notion that there were only hermaphrodites. With that it is extremely unfortunate that those that are born intersexual have to mute their own feelings and self to fit society’s binary view of sex.
   As for my view on those that are born intersexual, there is none in the sense that I view them no differently then all the other people around me. There shouldn’t be this alienation pertaining to all those that do not fit the society’s norm, male or female. It is sad and frustrating that these children are meant to forgo their true self identity because of society’s fear and ignorance. Without a doubt, or so we would hope to think, the parents choose what is best for their child when it comes to the sex reassignment process but why not leave the child as is? If there are no life threatening issues at hand then there should be no reassignment of any kind. Granted the process of gender reassignment can alleviate difficult questions when the child is young but the amount of psychological issues that can arise astronomically outweigh the benefits. There is even a possibility of the situation becoming life-threatening when the child finds out the truth.

9. With the existence of five sexes, is it fair to still abide by the rigidity of sex relating to gender? Gender is fluid where as sex is binary, and to accept other sexes would be to further complicate gender identity/expression. Deciding the sex of an inter-sex individual should be the choice of the individual. Irreparable damage could result from an outsider choosing the wrong sex.

10. This was a very knowledgeable article. I learned a lot about inter-sexed individuals. I never took any gender related courses, so almost all information was new for me. Examples that Fausto -Sterling brings about Max Beck and John Colapinto helped me to understand what inter-sexed individuals have to go through in their life to feel comfortable. The author also reported statistics on births of intersexuals, which are only 4 percents from the whole population. That seems not a lot on the world scale, but it is still important to know about inter-sexed individuals and treat them without discrimination. The article also provides a good explanation about biological differences between sexes and explains who are they.
    It is very sad to see how inter-sexed minority mistreated by society. I think the reason of it is a luck of information and education about inter-sexed individuals. The medical and scientific communities have not yet adopted a language that is capable to describe intersexuals and everything that relates to them. Which certainly causes unfair treatment for inter-sexes individuals. As we see the situation gets better compare to 1993 when the author published her article the first time, but it still needs to progress. It is great that we have people in the society such as Fousto-Sterling and Cheryl Chase who are not afraid to step to the front and speak up about inter-sexes issues and equality for everyone.

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