#also DSD has to do with intersex people

[stressedbeetle]

very disturbed by the fact that when I googled "how many people have dsd?" the first site that popped up was a transphobic one. I didn't know it was transphobic at first but when I read more about it I realized it sounded just incredibly transphobic. So this is a warning guys

Stats for gender is run by "genspect" a transphobic and gender critcal organization that OFferS sUPorT tO pAReNts Of tRaNS ChILdReN

#because the parents are obviously the ones who need support #/sarcasm #also DSD has to do with intersex people #it's like when you're body “presents” as male/female but you actually have the opposite chromosomes #but seriously though why the frick didn't it show me an intersex site??? #Is it based on what I've been on before??? #I haven't been on any transphobic websites right??? #RIGHT????? #OH GOD I HOPE I HAVEN'T #intersex #transphobia

[radfemfyodor]

Why “intersex” is an outdated, misnomer term? Why TRAs need to stop using DSD conditions as argument against the fact that sex is binary? Why gender ideology is doing huge damage to people with DSDs, especially to women with these conditions?

As a woman with DSD, I want to speak on behalf of myself and other people with DSDs. We have been weaponized by TRAs, used by them to deny biological facts. I will talk about why “intersex” is not appropriate term, about my condition and other DSD conditions in general, about how TRAs exploit us and more. I also want to educate and help other people with DSDs. English isn’t my first language, so I apologize if something doesn’t make sense.

“Intersex” is an outdated, misnomer term.

Term “intersexuality” was coined by Richard Goldschmidt in 1917 and was used as replacement of “hermaphrodite” since 1950s. “Inter” is a Latin word meaning “among, between”. That’s one of the biggest issues with term “intersex” - this term literally means “in between sex”.

DSD and VSD are better, less offensive terms that are used in medicine.

Term “intersex” has been seen as offensive by patients and their families, doctors were concerned that this term is confusing and misnomer, as it implies that patients with such conditions are “between sexes” or “third sex”. In 2006 a group of endocrinologists at the Chicago consensus created category called DSD - Disorders of Sex Development. DSD list contains all reproductive development conditions, including ones that aren’t treated by endocrinologists, such as the whole suite of uterine malformations and birth defects. Not all DSDs count as “intersex” conditions, as DSD is a more inclusive term. DSD can also mean Differences of Sex Development, and some other people use Variations of Sex Development (VDS). DSD and VSD are better terms, are used in medicine unlike “intersex”, are straightforward, less confusing, not offensive to many patients and inclusive.

Sex is binary, there are only two biological sexes in humans - female and male.

“What about intersex people?” is an extremely common phrase amongst TRAs whenever someone mentions the fact that there are only two sexes. DSD conditions extremely depend on biological sex. For the first example I will talk about myself - I have Clitoromegaly which means I’m biologically female, because only females can have Clitoromegaly. Other example is Turner’s Syndrome - only biological females can have this condition. Third example is Klinefelter Syndrome - only biological males can have this condition. While reading about Clitoromegaly or Turner’s Syndrome you will see that those who have these DSDs are referred as females, girls, women. Same goes to Klinefelter Syndrome, you will see term males, boys, men being used. While reading about any DSD condition, there’s extremely high chance that language will focus on biological sex of those who are affected by that condition.

“Intersex” can’t be a “third sex”.

Let’s start with the fact that DSDs vary a lot. If “intersex” is “third sex”, then it would mean that all “intersex” conditions are the same, right? To be more precise, would that mean that every “intersex” person is born with ambiguous genitalia? Like I explained before, DSDs extremely depend on biological sex of the one who is affected. If “intersex” really could be considered as a separate sex, then it would mean that “intersex” people would either produce both eggs and sperm, or they would make a different gamete. Which is impossible is humans.

The other big issue of “intersex” is that this term is used by TRAs to spread misinformation, such as saying that “sex is a spectrum”. “Intersex” is used to silence us who have DSDs and are against the gender ideology.

When you search “intersex” on TikTok, first videos will you see are women with conditions such as Swyer Syndrome saying that “they are biologically male”. When you search “intersex” on Pinterest, you see pictures where it’s shown that “sex is a spectrum”. “Intersex” is a term used by TRAs to validate their agenda. Say that women can’t have penises, there comes TRA saying “What about intersex women with penises?”. We don’t have penises, we have an enlarged clitoris. I find it extremely offensive that us who have Clitoromegaly, are seen as “women with penises”. Stop grouping us with trans women who are males with a fetish. Women with DSDs are female, trans women are male.

Stop grouping us who have DSDs with transgender people. TRAs don’t actually care about people with DSDs and their families.

Like I mentioned before, why TRAs think that me having Clitoromegaly is comparable to trans women who have penises? I want to mention, there’s a high chance that Clitoromegaly isn’t actually a full diagnosis of what I have, as I suffer from a lot of health issues such as problems with kidneys, thyroid and many more - my doctors suspect that my current diagnosis is actually not complete yet, as there’s high possibility of me having a more complex DSD which one of the symptoms is Clitoromegaly. Not only, in my country it takes a lot of time and it’s extremely hard to get diagnosed with anything + it’s extremely expensive. I mention my situation to show how TRAs don’t care about those with DSDs, they only want to use us for their harmful ideology. They don’t care about our pain, our struggles, about how our already diagnosed conditions are suspected to be actually a symptom of a more complex, serious condition. They don’t care about how much it gives us and our families stress. But they are extremely quick to accuse us of faking our DSDs if we don’t support the gender ideology.

People with DSDs taking hormones is not same as transgender people who also do this. Apparently, many transgender people have been faking DSDs to get hormones.

Us who have DSDs take hormones because we need to. Transgender people take hormones because they want to. Being transgender is a choice, having DSD is not. Many transgender people even have been faking DSDs to get hormones. Stop using our health issues to get something you shouldn’t take.

STOP COMPARING WOMEN WITH DSD TO TRANS WOMEN.

I don’t know how many times I have to repeat this, but stop comparing us to trans women. Me and other women who have Clitoromegaly don’t have a penis, we have an enlarged clitoris, not a penis. Stop mentioning us when someone says that women don’t have penises. It’s extremely offensive how TRAs think that an enlarged clit is a penis. The second extremely common “gotcha” that TRAs use are women with DSDs that make them not menstruate. Females who don’t menstruate are still female, stop comparing them to biological males. These women have been expressing extreme discomfort with being grouped with trans identified males, yet TRAs won’t listen. If you think that women who don’t menstruate are same as males who “identify” as women, then you are the problem. Stop using women’s health issues to validate your harmful gender ideology.

DSDs are not something you “identify” with. Stop using our conditions for your fetishes.

The third biggest problem with term “intersex” is that TRAs use it to “identify as intersex”. DSDs are not something you “identify” with. And it’s suspicious how most TRAs absolutely never say what condition they have exactly, or what are their symptoms - absolutely nothing about their DSD. Not only, many TRAs obviously lie about having DSD by saying false information about condition that they claim they have. Not enough, transgender people, mostly trans women, are using DSDs for their fetishes, such as saying that “their penises are long clitorises”.

TRAs don’t see women with DSDs as female, they see us as anything but female. That’s why they encourage us to identify as “transfem”.

I’m writing about this to make other women with DSDs aware about how TRAs view us - we aren’t “female enough” in their eyes. That’s also the reason why for such long time I thought that “intersex” is an appropriate term, until I recently saw other people with DSDs and got educated about this. “Transfem”, full name “Transfeminine” is normally associated with biological males - how biological females could identify with it? Because TRAs weaponize DSDs, making us women with these conditions believe that we aren’t “female enough”. I heard from TRAs that Clitoromegaly is an “intersex” condition, which means I’m not a biological woman, so I can identify as “transfem”. While I identified as “transfem” I felt way worser than before. Before I was told by TRAs that my Clitoromegaly is an “intersex” condition, I didn’t feel bad nor insecure due to having Clitoromegaly. Because “being intersex” literally means “being between sexes”, “being third sex” and “not being female/male enough”. TRAs take advantage of people with DSDs, especially ones whose English isn’t first language, to make us believe that we are “intersex” - that we are “third sex”.

If you don’t have a DSD, or at least aren’t suspected to have one, then please listen to us. We are being exploited by TRAs, silenced every time we speak about it. If you say things like “What about intersex people?” while someone says that there are two biological sexes - please stop. All humans are either female or male, sex is not a spectrum. You hurt us by saying that we “aren’t female enough” or “aren’t male enough”. You give us insecurities by claiming that we “are between sexes”. Women with DSDs want to be seen as female, men with DSDs want to be seen as male, we aren’t “third sex”!

To other people with DSDs - I hope you’re doing well, stay safe and don’t be afraid to call out people who harm us. Especially the ones who were brainwashed by TRAs, as I myself was the victim of the gender ideology - we should speak out about how TRAs exploit us, so no more people with DSDs become victims. Remember, you are heard 💕

For now, this is all I want to say. If anyone wants to correct or add something, feel free to contact me! I made this post for educational purposes - I want to help other people with DSDs, show how TRAs exploit our conditions and why there is no “third sex” and sex is not a “spectrum”.

If you want to learn more why sex is binary and not a “spectrum”:

I’m showing screenshots of how TRAs treat me and other people with DSDs - accusing me of faking my condition, saying that I’m excluding myself and other women with DSDs from the definition of female, TRAs being the ones who fake their conditions:

#Youtube #radical feminism #radical feminists do interact #radblr #radical feminist safe #sex not gender #gender critical #feminism

[catboybiologist]

Hi I'm a former high school science teacher and now a doctor. While teaching, I was officially advised to explain that current understanding of gender is that it is complex and that sex is not necessarily the same as gender. I also got told not to mention intersex people outside of explaining that they exist, because tbh 14 year olds need to understand the normal stuff first.

I can also confirm that during medical school I was officially taught that "we refer to patients as male or female because man and woman are complex terms that do not adequately describe our patient population". We also did not use the term intersex at all, we generally referred to either "sex variants" or (in newborns/paediatric patients) we would refer to "disorders of" or "differences of sexual development" (DSDs).

There's not a hard and fast difference between "disorder" of sexual development or "difference", but generally it got called a disorder if it mandated surgical correction (e.g. vaginal agenesis, cloacal exstrophy, severe hypospadias, urethral atresia etc). If you didn't have to operate to prevent irreparable harm, it usually got called a "difference". We try not to recommend operations that aren't biologically necessary, but parents are currently permitted to request them and generally it'll be approved - though if I were the surgeon (which I'm not) I would probably request a different person perform it because I am not comfortable with unnecessary genital surgeries on unconsenting children.

Medicine currently recognises that sex and gender are not synonymous, that correlation is not causation, and that intersex conditions come in a wide variety of forms and functions. We also do not have a clear idea of whether something like hypospadias or imperforate hymen even COUNT as intersex disorders, even if they're definitely DSDs, and it's not very important because "intersex" isn't really a medical term.

Thank you so much for this perspective! I'm really happy, honored, and excited that I got the opinion of a doctor on this stuff.

I do have a couple of poorly articulated, rambly thoughts here, which I hope don't come off as criticizing you, because I'm just trying to build off of what you're saying and possibly get your perspective.

"male" and "female" are still interesting terms to me, and still have some of the same pitfalls as "man" and "woman". This is purely my own opinion, I don't want to falsely represent how scientists and doctors use them, but I personally use them more frequently as adjectives for individual parts of a body. Mostly, I do this to refer to myself. Because... Am I currently male, or female? I have a typical male height, male genitalia, but female physiology, female fat distribution, female hormonal systems, etc. It's hard for people to think of biological sex as dynamic and changing, but if you want to accurately describe me, that's what I am currently.

And yeah, you can totally use male and female to refer to individuals who dominantly have those male or female traits overall. But you have to be ready to get nuanced about it- which is exactly what you're doing here, which I appreciate.

It's also somewhat useful when referring casually to hermaphroditic organisms, although by that point you're probably just using more specific terms. I digress. I'm rambling.

I have a barely-relevant tangent here that I'm gonna put under the cut. There's an interesting parallel here between another linguistic quirk of terminology in genetics.

When a gene varies by a single base pair (eg, one of the As, Ts, Cs, or Gs is something else, or has been deleted or added), it can change the function of the gene. Sometimes, this is called a mutation- which, yes it is. Mutation implies a deviation from the general population, a distinct molecular event that happened which now exists in the gene pool in small numbers.

The trouble lies with assuming what the "default" form of the gene is. When gene A is say, 50% G at a certain location, and 50% T at that spot, it's called a SNP- single nucleotide polymorphism (often pronounced as "snip").

But what's the cutoff? 80-20? 95-5? 99-1? More extreme? What about SNPs

This is purely a linguistic thing, and in scientific contexts, people know what you're talking about based on the context around the words you use.

SNP as a term has p much been around for as long as genetics as a field. Within the field, I don't think anyone cares much, except as a discussion topic to get undergrads interested. However, I do think it's important for scientific communication- mutation has a much different connotation in people's minds than SNP, a term they may have never heard or feel neutrally about. The same can be applied to sex- the way we talk about male/female traits is extremely relevant to public perception. It's very similar to the terminology you're talking about here. And I'm really glad that medicine acknowledges that!!

In general, I think that these linguistic debates can seem trivial to professionals- but it dramatically affects public perception. There's whole other rambles here about how scientists and doctors generally don't know how to talk to non-scientists and non-doctors, but that's a whole other thing.

#trans #biology

[identitty-dickruption]

there’s this misunderstanding going around that “hermaphrodite” is the scientific term, and “intersex” is the social/identity term. this probably comes from learning about hermaphroditic animals. so here we go again:

humans can’t really be hermaphrodites, because we can’t have two functioning sets of sex organs. no human can BOTH impregnate and be impregnated

there is still an intersex variation that is sometimes called “true hermaphroditism”, but this is an inaccurate term, so is not in common medical use

the more accepted medical terminology is Disorders of Sex Development (DSD). this is also a controversial term, as it pathologises intersex variations and makes it seem like we’re always “disordered” for being intersex

so, in a way, “intersex” is the community term for having a so-called DSD, but that’s also changing in some spaces. I would always rather people refer to me as an intersex person rather than anything else

once again, hermaphrodite is a slur that has a particular history of being used against intersex people (as well as being used against trans women in some parts of the world). you should never use it to refer to a HUMAN BEING unless they ask you to do so

hope this makes sense!

#intersex #h slur #queer

[tirfpikachu]

trans ppl need to stop assigning gender identity to cis people.

you might experience womanhood, manhood, being afab etc differently but for me personally i'm a woman bc i'm just a female human, the way that there's male cats or female cats. it's just a body type for me, nothing else, i didn't choose to be it and i just don't need to change it. intersex cats do exist, but we typically still say male & female and casually call our kitty a girl or boy, right? we still talk about male & female dogs reproducing or getting neutered and having different body needs but we still see them as just dogs, we don't impose gender roles upon them so they just vibe in their sexed bodies. that's what i do, i just live in my body and vibe, i don't have womanhood outside of my body, though my body impacts my life in huge ways with afab body issues and misogyny being mostly directed at ppl who look like me, naturally or thru surgery/hrt. i understand that's not the set of beliefs others may have for themselves. i've been told i'm nonbinary for not having an inner feeling of gender, for just having my sex/agab, for just being a female human, a female animal. but to me it's complete freedom and explains everything abt myself!! it's been personally incredibly healing to identify as just a female human. i was born with a certain kind of body and it means NOTHING about me or what's going on in my mind. i can have the exact same thoughts and feelings as someone born amab (except the misogynistic thoughts lol) can bc everyone's brains are unisex. we're all just people, just humans, sexed humans who aren't defined by their bodies. while human experiences are very varied and amab & afab lives are often very different in certain ways, no study has yet convinced me that human brains aren't neutral and that all cis people have a gender identity and girly brain & manly brain are a thing. i don't have ~womanly energy~ inside me, and neither does the grand majority of cis women honestly. we didn't choose to be women, we were born into a body type and don't care to surgically alter it or use different pronouns. i don't really believe in souls either, at least a lot of the time i don't. i think everything outside of bodies should be gender neutral, and bodies are just two different types (small ova gametes & larger spermatozoa gametes) each w different varieties in very rare cases, only around 1.7% of people are intersex and all are still afab or amab after tests are done to figure out what kind of gametes they have. they also often have health problems, and fun fact, those people tend to prefer the term people with DSDs, aka differences of sex development. my body matters to me, i live in it, but it doesn't define me and it's male society that tries to make me reduced to my body type. i used to have severe dysphoria for most of my life but it was treated, and i healed, and now i know that i personally don't experience a gender identity. i'm cis, but i just have a female/afab body type. that's how i comprehend my womanhood. this isn't to invalidate trans women, they can have a different experience of womanhood, whatever womanhood means to them. but i was just born female. i have mixed feelings about it sure, cuz who tf is overjoyed at living under the patriarchy as an afab woman? from birth we're treated differently, sometimes even before birth. but i'm coming to terms with my femaleness. i'm just a human animal, a female animal of the human species. that has been wayyy more freeing for me!! and it's #valid

#lay text #transmasc #transfem #nonbinary #kicking the hornets nest once more sorry lol #it's just a thing that trans ppl keep doing!!! #everybody experiences the concepts of man/woman differently #but for cis people THIS is what it's like #yet they try to say that we identify as something. when we were just born into a certain sexed body #and use the term traditionally associated w that body type #and just feel fine about it #seeing it as neutral (except for misogynistic men) #but ppl just don't get it :/

[ipso-faculty]

A point a friend on discord made was

People with "mild" variations are often invalidated when they call themselves intersex and attacked, and not all people feel safe saying they are intersex for that reason and end up saying they are perisex. A term between the two would help with the safety of those people who do not feel safe and who are often forced to be put in a position they are not in.

Not all people with mild variations consider themselves intersex. However, they are not considered perisex because they have variations in sex.

Not everyone likes to use intersex. This is because they may find it very medicalizing (and sometimes the person has a variation in visible sex, but does not fit or does not want to see it fit into any medical term) or they may find it not medicalizing at all (some people really have problems with their sexual variation, causing disabilities, for example, and prefer to use more medical terms that define this). So, for those who feel that intersex is too medicalizing a term, you may prefer to use alternative terms

I'm the asker about spectrum and I wanted to let you know these points

Also. When I think about intersex as a spectrum, I meant in the linguistic/conceptual aspect. As like graysexual is in the asexual spectrum.

Myself, my intersex variation isn't studied yet (partial or mild EIS). And mesosex resonates with me. Even though in the end I could go with just being a dyadic ally or questioning/quoisex/extersex. I also feel as if like both the terms perisex and intersex could fit me

Some people also say sex is a statistically bimodal spectrum. What do you think about it?

Thanks for sharing! I'm glad the term mesosex resonates with you 😄 It's honestly really useful to hear from people who feel the term mesosex resonates with them. I put the word out there because I had a sense there's a demand but as somebody who feels solidly intersex I feel honestly weird having a say in a label I don't myself use.

If you didn't see it already, a mesosex person chimed into the original thread.

To me intersex is the anti-medicalizing term, especially in contrast to DSD, which to me is 100% medicalized. But that's just me!

Analogies about Biological Sex

So you also asked about my thoughts on sex as a "statistically bimodal spectrum", and the short answer is I think the term bimodal is misleading and possibly circular, and there are better analogies out there.

I already agree with what others have pointed out about sex not being a spectrum - a spectrum has one dimension (a line), and sex has dozens of dimensions (chromosomes, hormones, etc). Out of the analogies I've seen, I like most Hans Lindahl's train tracks analogy for sex development.

But I'm gonna guess that by "sex as a statistically bimodal spectrum" you mean "sex as a statistically probability distribution/density" and take this as something distinct from the sex-as-spectrum model.

As it turns out, I have a lot to say about "bimodal"

In my experience, people tend to have huge misconceptions about what statistically bimodal means. It understandably gets conflated a lot with the idea that there are two separate populations.

So let's think about height. People will say things like "height is bimodal" because they're conditioned to think that men and women are separate, and the average man is taller than the average woman.

And when they say things like "height is bimodal" they think the distribution for adults will look like this:

But here's what the adult human height distribution looks like:

The thing about normal/Gaussian distributions is that adding them together is tends to result in something that also looks normal/Gaussian.

If we look back at pink and blue distributions I hand drew, there's a visual sleight of hand going on there. Where the area under the curve is pink or blue, we can think of one pixel as representing one human in the data set. But in the part where they overlap, it's not one pixel per human, its one pixel for two humans - one from the womens' data set, one from the men's data set.

The result is that the size of the overlap looks half as small as it should be. It leads people to mistakenly think there is less overlap between men and women than there actually is.

So if we actually take that overlap and show how the distributions add together, we get something that immediately stops looking so "bimodal":

With the two probability distributions that I drew there might be a small dip in the middle, but it would be quite small. 🙃

Two probability distributions need to be really far apart for them to produce something that actually looks bimodal. (Specifically, the difference between the means needs to be smaller than twice the standard deviation - details here.)

True bimodal distributions are rare. They do exist in nature. But most of the time when people see a probability distribution with two peaks, it is a result of misleading visuals, noisy data, or poorly-binned histograms. 👀

In grad school I was taught that bimodality is a sign your data is suspicious: "Statisticians are trained to be suspicious of distributions with multiple modes. Such distributions usually indicate inhomogeneity in the system, or, in plainer language, different causes for the different modes. All familiar proverbs about the inadvisibility of mixing apples and oranges apply." (Gould, 1981)

In particular, the misinterpretation of (apparently) bimodal data has been used to confirm eugenicist ideas about racial differences, because when it comes to statistics we're always a step or two away from having to grapple with the legacy of eugenics. ⚠️

So let's get back the original question about seeing sex as statistically bimodal. The average person understands bimodal to mean "two populations", not statistical bimodality.

So before I even get into what sex even is, right off the bat this analogy is dangerously circular: sex is what it is because it's two separate populations.

Sex in humans is determined by a whole bunch of things that tend to correlate with each other (chromosomes, SRY gene, androgen levels, androgen sensitivity, estrogen levels, estrogen sensitivity, etc), so I can see the desire to illustrate that some things co-occur together more than others!

But I agree with @queercripintersex in the discussion of your previous ask that trying to project the multiple dimensions of sex into one dimension loses too much information, and is difficult to even do because so many factors are non-continuous (chromosomes, etc).

For the continuous variables, you can in theory try to find out if they have bimodal probability distributions. But quite rapidly run into issues of poor data. The data on testosterone levels in women is shockingly insufficient. Like I went looking for distributions of free testosterone levels and just look at how much noisier and sparse the data is for women (on the left) compared to men (on the right):

Source: Ooi et al, 1198

Even with all the noise in the data it's still unlikely that at any of the age categories, that the men's data and women's data added together would produce bimodal distributions. There's too much overlap.

As a general rule of thumb, any given physical difference (hormones, measurements, etc) has more variation within the sexes than between them.

Our culture has vastly overestimated the biological differences between the sexes. 😫 So I worry that adopting a sex-as-bimodal-distributions analogy will only feed this misconception. 🫤 I'm personally going to avoid using the analogy.

#sorry this is so long #but you asked an academic so this is what you get haha #eugenics: it's always there #biology of sex #biology education #science education #statistics education #text #intersex #mesosex #actuallyintersex #actually intersex

[lordmushroomkat]

PCOS = intersex is just saying anyone who doesn’t fit perfectly into stereotypes isn’t REALLY female. Like fuck you. DSDs are still always male or female and to say otherwise is just going oh you’re infertile? oh you’re shorter than average? chromosomal problems? Not female or male! So fucking insulting. Yeah some people have incongruous genotype and phenotype, but that’s so fucking few and to do this is to throw so many people under the bus because they aren’t Exactly What You Wants. Absolutely evil.

Dearie, I'm coming at this from the perspective of throwing the whole male/female binary assumption out the window.

I also come at this from the perspective of being a non-binary person with PCOS who has suspected they are intersex for a while.

Anyway, even the amount of people already considered intersex under our current definitions is about the same as natural redheads. There are a lot of natural redheads in the world; you almost certainly know at least one. You almost certainly know at least one intersex person.

Anyway, it's not intersex people vs "normal" people, if you're not intersex you're endosex. So I suppose you could categorize people with PCOS as intersex female rather than endosex female. Again, I would prefer if we simply threw out the boxes altogether, but I understand that some people are rather attached to the sex binary.

TLDR: I think the sex binary is stupid and I think that intersex is very valid and I would prefer if we all categorized sex characteristics as a spectrum. Thank you and goodnight.

#abnormal is not inherently bad #god you're making so many assumptions about my perspective here #there is no bus #PCOS #intersex #PCOS as Intersex Female? #endosex vs intersex #I'm not a fucking terf; I think gender and sex are both spectrums that don't necessarily have anything to do with each other #god I am not the binaryist here #kat has feelings about sex and gender #ask from anonymous

[trash-and-trash-accessories]

Researching Intersex conditions after being diagnosed with one at age 30 has been an absolutely WILD ride. (This post is absurdly long and niche)

First of all there's no 100% agreed upon definition of Intersex. Doctors and scientific researchers use the term in a very different way than the intersex community does. And the popular definition most cis people think of only refers to people with ambiguous genitalia or both sets of genitalia.

Even in the medical community there's not a set standard for what is Intersex. Some define it as specifically the chromosomal abnormalities like XY androgen insensitivity, XXY, and other specifically chromosomal variations. Others add in other genetic conditions. Some include any disorder of sexual development. Some consider any kind of condition which results in an AFAB person being masculine and vice versa to be an intersex condition, including PCOS which causes AFAB people to have traits like extra body hair, infertility, and high testosterone levels, and hypogonadism in AMAB people which can result in a micropenis.

The Intersex community and experts in intersex conditions consider what I have to be an intersex condition but general practice doctors don't necessarily see it that way. Some doctors do consider it an intersex condition in AMAB people but not AFAB people, despite AFAB people also experiencing sexual dysfunction and infertility but because untreated it makes our bodies resemble the current beauty standards (hairless and child-like), it's very rarely seen that way by regular doctors.

Doctors are also very unwilling to prescribe Testosterone as a treatment for the symptoms despite a growing body of evidence that it alleviates a lot of the worst symptoms much better than an estrogen-progesterone regiment (fatigue, sexual dysfunction, low bone density).

Because I have a hypogonadism condition, only a small segment of the medical community consider me to be Intersex, but the Intersex community considers me Intersex. And judging by how the way I feel about my body, my mental health, and my actual health improved when I started taking "cross-sex HRT" (that's what my chart says), I am 100% on board with it being called an Intersex condition. I was on Estrogen-Progesterone for years because I thought pregnancy was a risk (HAHAHAHA it was NOT) and it made my mental health worse, it made me grow boobs which I HATE, and it didn't actually improve any of the problems the condition causes. The treatment that worked the best was literally transitioning.

I also found out there is no good medical literature on how much testosterone a cis woman should have. Doctors have decided that AFAB people with hypogonadism conditions need ZERO testosterone despite the levels considered healthy in cis women being 15-70, but the studies on how much cis women should have are heavily skewed because they eliminated basically any woman they considered too hairy or manly from the studies, even if she was perfectly healthy. So we literally don't even know what the actual average range or healthy range of testosterone is in cis women. We just don't know.

Finding out how much the medical community doesn't know and doesn't care about intersex conditions/dsds is so concerning. Like AFAB people who have what I do experience all kinds of horrible things and doctors are like "Nah testosterone will make you ugly so you have to suffer and keep having fatigue and sexual dysfunction but I can offer you pills that make you grow tits and increase your risk of stroke."

It's so so frustrating. Like we're literally not strictly female, we don't have entire female or male reproductive systems we just have like non-functional stuff in there and for some reason doctors are like no you absolutely can't become an ugly man you have to be an attractive, suffering girl. Even though you literally aren't one. Since you're naturally hairless and small and cute you have to stay that way even if it means you can't have pain-free sex.

#omg sorry this was so long #Intersex #intersex condition #non-binary #lgbtq #queer #medical research #medical bias

[intersex-support]

I've only just started researching so if you have any good resources to share for me to do further reading on my own that would be super nice, but i also have to ask here because it was just mentioned: hyperandrogynism (in combination with pcos) really falls under the intersex spectrum? I keep seeing conflicting answers and my next doctor's appointment is quite a few weeks out still. Has there been a lot of debate over whether it 'counts' in the past or is there a loud group of people going around saying it's just not in the intersex ballpark?

Hey, anon!

So honestly, I can only really speak to the dynamics in American intersex community, but I can say that in my experience, every irl intersex space that I have been in has welcomed people with PCOS and hyperandrogenism. I also can say confidently that I know people in InterACT who are welcoming of people with PCOS and hyperandrogenism. I think, that as more research is coming out about the similarities between PCOS and NCAH, that the intersex community has begun to more openly embrace people with PCOS and hyperandrogenism in our community. A lot of people have realized just how similar the experiences of NCAH and PCOS are, and since NCAH has always been intersex, people realized there was no reason not to consider PCOS intersex.

Traditionally, PCOS wasn't thought of as an intersex variation by doctors, basically because no one with PCOS was presenting with ambiguous genitalia at birth. And as a whole, the medical world is really hostile to intersex people and has an interest in downplaying the numbers of intersex people that exist, so doctors do not view PCOS with hyperandrogenism as intersex. But fuck doctors--they don't decide who is or isn't intersex, and according to the definitions of intersex that intersex organizations have decided on, PCOS with hyperandrogenism definitely fits those definitions. Having higher testosterone that is naturally caused is a characteristic that is outside the typical definitions of the biological sex binary, and is a characteristic that can cause stigma.

Honestly, these days, the intersex people and organizations that are really adamant that PCOS isn't intersex are the organizations that are transphobic or made up of radfems or made up of parents who really want to enforce the sex binary. I do not trust or share any values with transphobic intersex organizations and I think their whole approach to intersex activism is entirely bullshit. I'm not sure how familiar you are with intersex activism, but there is a pretty big split in intersex community about whether you use "intersex" or "disorders of sex development." Generally, intersex people and organizations that use DSD terminology are organizations that hate trans people, are strongly allied with parents and doctors, and generally come at intersex activism from a way that I think is fucked up. So those intersex people and orgs don't see PCOS as intersex, but that is more reflective of a larger perspective that is very flawed.

Whether people with PCOS claim the intersex label and participate in intersex community is entirely up to them--that is a personal choice that individuals can make, but know that much of the intersex community will absolutely welcome people with PCOS.

I absolutely love this video by Hans Lindhal talking about this exact topic!

-Mod E

#asks #pcos #actuallyintersex #intersex #this blog always has and always will embrace intersex people with PCOS

[intersexreuploads]

Intersex-Exclusive Terminology Masterlist

This is heavily inspired by the masterlist by intersexfairy; however, it has not been updated in a while and has quite a few broken links as well as possibly questionable sources - I have nothing against him (he/ze/they) at all!

Part 1 of 2 posts. Next post will be about gender identities of intersex individuals, because neither do all exhibit difficulties regarding gender nor do all identify as LGBT due to their conditions and prefer to be excluded. As a result, please do not tag with LGBT or MOGAI as this post is not inherently tied to these two communities. Thank you <3

General Terminology:

Intersex (adj.) / Intersexness/Intersexuality (n.) / IS (abbr.) - Intersex is an umbrella term for differences in sex traits or reproductive anatomy. [source] It is common knowledge that the term "intersex" stems from them being "between" the sex binaries - female and male. Differences in Sex Development (n.) / DSD (abbr.) - A common medical term for intersex traits. Intersex people frown upon the usage of "Disorder" rather than "Differences" because it supports the hypothesis that we are to be "fixed" or "cured." [source] Variations in Sex Characteristics (n.) / VSC (abbr.) - See DSD. Variations is used as a term to label the cause of someone's intersex condition. They are listed as variants of the human condition, rather than being inherently disordered. [list of variations] [source] Intersex, Sex, and/or Gender Diverse (n. / adj.) - A term that is widely frowned upon by the intersex community due to not only its redundancy, but also how it feels like an attempt at erasure of the word "intersex" in itself. [source]

Dyadic (adj.) / Dyad (n.) - An umbrella term for people whose sex characteristics fit within the normative sex binaries - female and male. There is no direct source of where this term was first used. It is the most commonly used term, but is frowned upon by some communities due to suggesting the strictness of the sex binaries. Perisex (adj.) - See Dyadic. Coined by tumblr user actuallyintersex (dating prior to November 2014) due to the possible implifications that the usage of "dyadic" can have in terms of sex binaries. The original post has since been deleted, and the blog can be searched regarding the controversy of this term. [source] "Peri" is used rather than dyad because it means "around," as dyads may not fit directly within the normative sex binaries. It should also be noted that "peri" within medical terminology is used as the "outer layer," of things, such as the pericardium. Endosex (adj.) - See Dyadic. [source] *It should be noted that none of these three terms are more accepted/acceptable than the other, and all are used.

[TW - Intersexism] Intersexism / Interphobia (n.) - The discrimination or prejudice faced by intersex individuals. Intersexism is more commonly used. Dyadism (n.) - The concept that being dyadic is the norm of society, and inherently implies that being intersex is unnatural and intersex people are need of being "cured."

Medical Terminology:

[TW - Intersexism] Intersex Genital Mutilation (n.) / IGM (abbr.) - Non-lifesaving procedures used to alter natural variations in genital appearance. It is connected with the concept of dyadism and trying to make intersex people appear more "normal." [source] Forced/Coerced Hormone Replacement Therapy (n.) / F/CHRT (abbr.) - Due to lack of terminology, this is separate from "just" HRT due to the fact that intersex children do not consent to receiving this, and may not be life-saving. Often seen frequently alongside IGM, especially as a response to the removal of gonads that produce required hormones. [source] [source]

[TW - Intersexism] Sex Assignment (n.) - The process of legally assigning a child "Male" or "Female" at birth. Some people may be recognized intersex at birth, but will likely be given one of the sex binary for legal purposes. [source] In some places, it is noted that markers other than these may be followed. "X" may also be used as a gender marker, but is not typically used for the legal sex. [source] Assigned Sex At Birth (n.) / ASAB (abbr.) - May also be called Assigned Gender At Birth / AGAB. See Sex Assignment. Coercively Assigned Sex at Birth (n.) / CASAB (abbr.) - A non-exclusive term referring to ASAB. Typically used by transgender individuals, but it is also common within the intersex community. See Sex Assignment and ASAB. Forcibly Assigned Sex at Birth (n.) / FASAB (abbr.) - An intersex-exclusive term referring to CASAB. See Sex Assignment and CASAB. *It should be noted that sometimes people put "I" or "IS" as a prefix in ASAB abbreviations to indicate that they are intersex; i.e., ICAMAB. *It should be noted that some people use "X" (see Sex Assignment), "I" (meaning intersex), or "Unassigned At Birth"/"UAB" when speaking on assignment. I cannot find credible sources for these statements being used legitimately, but that does not exclude their validity as a self-identifier.

#intersex #intersexuality #intersexness #intersex acceptance #intersex awareness #masterlist #medical terminology

[astrangerthatlovesyou]

In response to my post about intersexuality, I got asked a fantastic question, and I wanted to answer it here because it’s a really complicated topic. Tw: I will be using the H slur in a medical context.

The question: “Do you like the name change? Having “disorder” describe intersectionality sounds weird, since it’s how people are born, so the word “disordered” just doesn’t seem like the most respectable and humanizing fit/label for me?/gen/neu”

So I actually have thought a lot about this. Firstly, I don’t believe that “Disorders of Sex Development” is a good umbrella term for Intersex. The word “disorder” suggests that all intersex conditions are inherently harmful and this just isn’t true. (However, I do think we often forget that there are intersex people that did/do have a medically harmful intersex condition and they’re still valid.)

The alternate “Differences in Sex Development” is a bit better and more accurate to the broad range of intersex conditions.

To get to the crux of the question: how do I feel about the name change? I don’t personally like it. I believe that it’s already been harmful to the intersex community, however I actually do have a few reasons that I believe it may also be beneficial. For example:

A medical diagnosis that is associated with the LGBTQIANP+ community could absolutely endanger some individuals. Queerphobic parents are less likely to respond in the best interests of their child if they’re focused on making them not queer.

It removes some of the rampant anti-LGBT vitriol and legislation from babies’ bodies by disconnecting the medical language from the queer community/ using a word that doesn’t threaten the binary.

While little information is available on exactly why the name was changed, ostensibly it was not championed by intersex individuals. I think unfortunately it has further pushed the sociopolitical perception of intersexuality more towards exclusively true hermaphrodism. This is not an accurate definition, nor has it ever been, and it serves to minimize the public perception of the frequency of bodies not fitting in the created binary. True hermaphrodism makes up a VERY small percentage of the intersex population (which may include anywhere from 1 in 50 people, to 1 in 20 people).

I have already seen the term DSD used to harm intersex individuals. For example non-intersex “intersex activists” harassing an intersex person publicly because they “claim to be intersex, but they actually have a DSD.” I don’t doubt that part of the reason the name was changed was to erase intersex voices, and I think that’s already shown itself to be an effect. There’s a reason I cited three sources to simply support that DSD means intersex in my last post. I’ve seen plenty of people get harassed over saying that something classified as a DSD is an intersex condition (though always by non-intersex people, in my experience.)

Another reason that I think this name change has done so much harm to the community is that the usage of the term intersex has changed in a lot of literature that still does include it. “Intersex” has become a replacement for “hermaphrodite” in even pro-lgbtq writing. (Though again, I have never seen this language from an intersex person.) The term “hermaphrodite” has been increasingly regarded as a slur. Since no effective medical replacement has been popularized, those with a poor understanding of intersexuality have widely replaced the term with “intersex” in their vernacular. From a medical perspective this is wildly misleading.

Because of this, coupled with the fact that now, most young intersex individuals have never heard the term intersex used for them, we have swathes of intersex people afraid to speak up about their experiences. This is especially harmful because finding a community is lifesaving.

In conclusion: the term DSD is only acceptable if it means “Differences of Sex Development.” Even then, it should only be used when necessary in the medical field. If we as a community are to accept DSD into our language, then it is imperative that we also change the language of our activism to specifically address it as an alternative term for intersex. There is no reason that intersex as a social identity and label should change.

@flip-flopping-frede (thank you for this question!)

#intersex #intersex is beautiful #intersexuality #disorder of sex development #queer community #queer pride #queer activism #dsd #lgbtqiap #lgbtq #lgbtqa #lgbtq positivity #lgbt rights

[theforesteldritch]

I've seen mostly terfs on hellsites like twitter and on here claiming that intersex is a bad, offensive term and people should use the term DSD (disorders of sex development) instead. While you should respect individual preferences, as a whole, just call us intersex. DSD is honestly the term that feels dehumanizing and stigmatizing here.

I hate the term DSD and how people use it instead of intersex. I hate how it implies the way my body is is disordered. Yes, it has it's own unique challenges, but not only are there also positives, my body is mine and it works, just not in the way people expect. My body isn't wrong. The way I am isn't wrong or bad.

And even ignoring that it's so often used by terfs and intersexists (to be honest, terfs are already intersexists because of being terfs) and weaponized against us, it puts me on edge when people use the term.

It's sort of like if a term was corrupted by a group but even before that the term was shitty. Like what DSD implies makes me uncomfortable, but it's also been taken by intersexists and weaponized against us.

The people who want to use the term DSD also tend to be the ones who try to claim that everyone is either male or female and there is no nuance. But that's just wrong. Imagine a bunch of sliders, with each being chromosomes, hormones you make, hormones your body can use, primary sex characteristics, secondary sex characteristics and such. Dyadic people (people who aren't intersex) have these sliders all lined up within a certain range. But us intersex people do not. If you have one or more slider outside of a certain range, you're intersex.

Trying to cram us into the male/female but with a disorder boxes not only is plainly wrong, it's dangerous. The whole reason I'm intersex is because I don't quite fit into those categories. To try to erase being intersex, especially in a medical setting, not only erases a part of myself, it erases an understanding of how my body works and my specific medical needs. I fit into both of the male/female categories in certain ways, so trying to erase this to fit me into one box ignores what I need and don't need.

I am not male or female. I am intersex. I am not a female with a disorder of XY chromosomes. I am not a male with a disorder of female phenotype. I'm just intersex. My specific condition is CAIS. My body is not a disorder.

If you're dyadic, feel free to reblog but please engage with this post respectfully and don't speak over intersex voices. This is not your debate.

#dsd #actually intersex #intersex #intersexism #intersex thoughts #intersex info

[tirfpikachu]

okay so. controversial statement, once again lol. and this applies more easily to binary trans ppl than nonbinary ppl, or trans ppl who want to transition and pass as the opposite sex.

(if you disagree with me saying opposite sex, implying there's only two, why do we only say afab and amab? why does it matter in discussions? why do we say male dog and female cat and don't mention intersex (DSD) animals? amab ppl are of the sex that can produce smaller spermatozoa gametes, and afab ppl are of the sex that can produce larger gametes (ova), whether or not they're fertile. and people with DSDs are variety of one of those, there are no third options. lmk if you can disprove that. but imo that's why there's two sexes, and why those sexes matter in social justice discussions.)

i think if trans folks had just said, like old school transsexuals used to say, "i want to become part of the opposite sex socially, i want to live being perceived and/or treated as the opposite sex" a HUGE amount of trans vs non-trans issues would be gone. transness once used a language that wasn't telling bio men and bio women that manhood/womanhood means having manly or womanly feelings in one's head, identifying as a man/woman - when actually most people have historically ALWAYS used man/woman as just neutral body types (well, neutral without misogyny lol) one is born into, not an identity - and it said what trans people actually want and request from bio men & women. it says that you have been debilitated by an unusual condition that creates a disconnect from your sex at birth, and that after lots of therapy and self-introspection you and your doctors saw it just wasn't going away. instead of being combative you politely ask to be accomodated to a reasonable degree, and to be allowed to transition to look like the opposite sex and be treated as such, whether other people understand it or not, without assuming what the opposite sex goes thru bc you haven't experienced it at all, at least not yet. it was disability accomodations in a way, more similar to disability activism than gay & bi activism, and was seen as a disconnect in the brain, something being wrong, not a neutral trait like someone simply being born capable of homosexual attraction

this phrasing of "wanting to live as the opposite sex" would recognize that you're not a man/woman from birth and you don't live as a man/woman right now, you have no clue what it's actually like, bc you don't live that way. and you recognize that's literally all being a man/woman means and has always meant, it's that you live in a certain body type and are seen like that in your everyday life without needing to wear pronoun pins or disclosing it. you are part of the population that either risks misogyny or avoids it. and not just conditionally avoids misogyny btw, bc afab ppl are still oppressed under misogyny for their upbringing and their body type medically, no matter how many surgeries they get. and imo transfems experience terrible yet conditional misogyny which ends if they're outed, at that point they're treated as gnc men again, no matter how transitioned they are (which also fucking sucks). they also need to listen to bio women!! and transmascs! and afab people should listen to transfemmes' unique experiences too! everybody needs to listen to eachother and give eachother space to have a voice!

i think some people may identify as a man/woman but not plan to ever live as such, and they should acknowledge it, see it as just a personal life thing if they're not questioning transitioning to be seen as the opposite sex. they shouldn't claim bio male or bio female or transsexual experiences. they shouldn't blame average bio men and women for not being trans and for society not being trans-centric by default. they're blaming others instead of coming to terms with their unique and difficult circumstances and trying to communicate their experiences and needs with cis society respectfully. y'know, like older transsexuals tended to focus on, instead of trying to fundamentally change language and affect women's rights. older transsexual generations tended to show so much more care to bio/cis women, they tended to be wayyy more protective of bio women. and trans women knew that they were immigrating into womanhood, and shouldn't claim to be born into it or affect women's rights in any negative way. they knew they had been privileged of not living under misogyny up until this point. bio women didn't understand transfem life, and transfemmes didn't understand bio women's lives at all, at least until transitioning, usually later in life. older transfemmes and male crossdressers had such a radically different dynamic with bio women even just 20 years ago. it's sad, honestly.

i think trans ppl who have no plans of ever transitioning are closer to living gnc lives than trans(sexual) lives. i think they have radically different experiences and needs than transsexuals. transgender & transsexual maybe should become two different categories? they used to be iirc. and cis feminists have different issues with each side, but usually wayyy more with transgender folks bc they tend to unfortunately be loud and inappropriately try to claim bio women's, transmascs' and transitioned transfems' experiences with ACTUALLY facing misogyny or the oppression and violence that gnc amab people who are actually seen as such in society face. not just gncphobia (is that a term?) and ppl being weirded out and confused by them. non-dysphoric transmascs also at times show weird misogyny, bc of their disconnect from womanhood, and an obsession with men's rights, and sexism. after transition trans men experience a sudden lack in misogyny and actually get more respectful from what i've seen??? but non-dysphoric transmascs can be so disrespectful of women in general, cis and trans. and act like they know transsexual experiences

i'd be really interested in reading more about transmeds' views on things like this and the disrespect, sexism, misogyny and just unhinged chronically online behavior non-dysphoric trans ppl often seem to show, especially nonbinary folks. i'm a trans-inclusive radfem with a research-gathering blog that has not-so-respectfully worded posts reblogged (they tend to still make some good points and i like hoarding interesting points for my dumb wip tirf book) and that understandably gets ppl heated, so np if no transmeds or trans folks in general want to share. but i just really wish we got to see more nuanced opinions from trans folks. usually ppl w nuanced views just get harassed off the platform in classic tumblr fashion :/

#lay text #transmed #radfem #radblr #kicking the hornets nest once more sorry lol #idm getting angry asks though. i just like interacting w varied kinds of people and hearing their pov even if we disagree on certain things #an overwhelming amt of time i end up finding common ground if the person is genuinely looking for a conversation not a fight #and i really appreciate that <3

[fuckyeahilike]

Oh thank God

BREAKING: World Athletics bans transgender women from female events

Lord Coe told a news conference in Monaco: "The council has agreed to exclude male-to-female transgender athletes, who have been through male puberty, from female world ranking competitions from 31 March.

"In January, World Athletics said it was consulting with member federations on a proposal to change the rules on participation of transgender women in female competitions.

"The issue is thorny as sports try to strike a balance between inclusivity and making sure there is no unfair advantage."

Speaking to Sky News' Mark Austin, Lord Coe said the decision was made in the "best interest of our sport".

"It was a decision based on a very important and fundamental principle and that is, as an International Federation that has a vibrant female element in our sport, it was absolutely vital that we protected the female category."

Transgender athletes competing at elite level would "compromise the integrity of female competition", he added.

When asked how he would respond if a transgender athlete said the decision was unfair, Lord Coe told Sky News: "We don't have any transgender athletes in international competition, that day may come.

"But until we understand a great deal more about the science around this, which we don't, we have to fall back on a fundamental principle and that is that we are here charged with the responsibility of defending the female category, and that is what we have done."

The decision was welcomed by Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies, who tweeted that the rules around the female category should be extended to cover those competing at school level too.

But LGBT campaign group Stonewall described the decision as "disappointing" - and criticised World Athletics for "closing the door" on trans people competing at an international level.

Lord Coe said the decision was open to being challenged and was not "written in stone" - but vowed World Athletics would to "vigorously defend" its position.

He earlier told the news conference a "working group" taskforce will be established in order to do further research on transgender eligibility guidelines, including an independent chair and transgender athletes.

Its remit will be to "consult specifically with transgender athletes to seek views on competing in athletics" - in the hope of reviewing and potentially commissioning additional research.

The decision to exclude transgender women was made after a consultation with a number of stakeholders including 40 member federations, athletes and coaches, together with community groups including trans organisations, UN experts, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and Para Athletics, Lord Coe said.

"The majority of those consulted stated that transgender athletes should not be competing in the female category," he said.

"Many believe there is insufficient evidence that trans women do not retain advantage over biological women, and want more evidence that any physical advantages have been ameliorated before they are willing to consider an option for inclusion into the female category."

Differences in sex development athletes

The new rules will also impact athletes with differences in sex development (DSD) - a group of rare conditions involving genes, hormones and reproductive organs, which means a person's sex development is different to others.

Some young people and adults prefer to use the term "intersex", according to the NHS website.

Athletes with DSD include two-times Olympic 800m champion Caster Semenya; 2020 200m Olympic silver medallist Christine Mboma; and Francine Niyonsaba, who finished runner-up to Semenya in the 800m race at the 2016 Olympics.

The maximum amount of plasma testosterone for DSD athletes will be cut in half, Lord Coe told the conference.

The announcement comes after British Athletics called for transgender women to compete with men in an "open category" in February.

The "open" category would replace the current male category, the governing body says - as it demands a law change to preserve women's events for those who were female at birth.

Swimming's world governing body, FINA, voted to effectively ban transgender athletes from competing in women's elite races and explore setting up an "open" category in June last year.

#transgenderism #videos #misogyny #feminism

[menalez]

What do you think of this cause personally I can’t make up my mind on the whole thing cause everyone seems to say something different

https://twitter.com/fondofbeetles/status/1550146184504909824?s=21&t=3fwAYTbXL92ElmTjdh5Zxg

i also didn’t like and didn’t agree with the apparent caster semenya quote. i do think such a line should be established in sports regulations because im sure there are intersex women with a sex-based advantage and while they are a tiny minority of the population, creating these distinctions and cut offs is so that women also get the chance to compete and succeed. i i don’t fully agree with OP either because various studies argue that the role of DHT is also significant, more significant than the op argues. the regulations are still not perfect and accurate and it’s also pretty blatant to see that caster semenya doesn’t have the same advantage the average biological male would. it is possible she has some advantage, nowhere near as much as males but still an advantage, and i think that should be adequately studied and evaluated and determined. also the 5-ard thing, while i see many people attribute that to caster semenya, i see no official documents singling out 5-ard or saying caster semenya has it. what i found confirmed was that she has 46, XY DSD iirc, but not 5-ard specifically. it is also true not all intersex conditions are excluded, but rather like 6 specific conditions. so i partially agree and partially disagree

#anonymous #intersex

[evenplayingfieldwis]

The Boundaries Of Femininity In Sport

Over the course of less than a century, what defines and confines women as female athletes has changed radically. The category of “female” has undergone several alternative definitions since the introduction of female participants in sport. While relying heavily on determining femininity on the basis biological characteristics of sex, international sporting federations have committed themselves to gender policing and discrimination. Proving femininity based upon sexual characteristics and imposed gender norms has created the situation where female athletes are considered not “female enough”. So a question comes to mind, what exactly is a female athlete?

I will be looking at athlete Caster Semenya as a case study for this blog post. She is a South African middle distance runner and winner of two Olympic gold medals and three World Championships in the women's 800 metres. She identifies as female, was raised female, is legally female and has boldly proclaimed, “I am a woman, and I am fast.” Yet in track and field, Semenya is subjected to restrictions for athletes defined as having a disorder of sexual development, or D.S.D. — genitalia that are not typically male or female; an X and Y chromosome in each cell, the standard male pattern; and testosterone levels in the male range, which, doctors say, suggests testicular tissue or internal testes. Following her victory at the 2009 World Championships, she was made to undergo sex testing, and cleared to return to competition the following year. In 2019, new World Athletics rules came into force preventing women like Semenya from participating in 400m, 800m, and 1500m events in the female classification unless they take medication to suppress their testosterone levels. In 2021, she filed an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights against the restrictions.

Caster Semenya lost her appeal of a rule by World Athletics (the governing body for international track and field) that established a testosterone limit for certain women in certain events. Semenya has a rare condition that elevates her natural testosterone level above that limit. She will not be allowed to defend her Olympic title in the women’s 800 meters unless she takes testosterone suppression medication, which she has said repeatedly she is not willing to do.

“I am Mokgadi Caster Semenya. I am a woman, and I am fast”

Semenya and other athletes with DSD have been affected by a restriction on the amount of naturally produced testosterone they are able to have in their body. The World Athletics have determined a testosterone level of 5 nanomoles per litre of blood (nmol/l) or more deems the athlete ineligible to compete as a female, regardless of their gender identity. Semenya, due to these imposed constraints upon athletes with DSD, was unable to defend her Olympic title in the 800m sprint at Tokyo.

Many of the women affected by gender verification were those accused of being males but were born naturally either intersex, with chromosome abnormalities and/or had hyperandrogenism (a medical condition where women may have high levels of testosterone). Transgender athletes have also been caught by the regulations and discriminatory gender policing. These processes confine womanhood and generate outliersof female athletes who are believed to have an advantage because of the presence of a natural trait generally associated with “maleness”.

People see this case as being unfair for female athletes who are "fully" female, ie. that they don't have abnormal testosterone levels. Yet it is never question for male athletes when they have a physiological advantage over other male athletes, for example Michael Phelps with his extremely long arms and large hands and feet which give him a competitive advantage. Yet this isn't just a gender issue but also a race issue and ideas on what conforms as other people’s ideas about womanhood.

Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi became the latest Black women athletes ruled ineligible to compete in a race at the Tokyo Olympics due to naturally high testosterone levels.

“There has a lot of hype and sensationalization in the media, making this assertion that Caster’s a man who’s trying to compete with women,” Sean Saifa Wall, a co-founder of the Intersex Justice Project, told Vox. “It’s a lot of fearmongering.”

It is also not mandatory to test all athletes for testosterone, only athletes who do not conform with female beauty standard, and what people perceive as what a woman should look like. No matter what her personal medical history is, her story illustrates the way people, especially people of color, can be scrutinized when they seem to fall outside gender norms.

Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi became the latest Black women athletes ruled ineligible to compete in a race at the Tokyo Olympics due to naturally high testosterone levels.

This is a huge debate in sport at the moment as we see conflicting views between doping and natural attributes to what qualifies as fair sport. But what gets left behind is the ethical practice around this and who gets marginalised for their performance and if it is deemed as fair?

#Youtube