Friday, September 10, 2010
The Right to Decide
Who has the right to decide which gender an inter-sex child should be? One may argue that a parent has the right to make that decision, or the right should be left up to that individual. Because the responsibility of a child is its parent, a parent may argue that it is solely their right to make the decision of the gender for their inter-sex child. On what basis, I would ask, “would it be for its health or well being?” Since the gender of an inter-sex child has not been proven to be perilous to its health, a parent may argue that changing the gender of their child to either male of female is necessary for its psychological well being; to prevent psychological trauma a child—might endure being teased upon reaching the age of puberty by fellow classmates when undressing for gym. According to Guinet and Decourt, by far the most frequent form of true hermaphrodite they have encountered—55 percent appear to have more masculine physique, and during puberty will start to develop breasts. But that is not a good argument because kids gets teased all the time in the locker rooms; it has happened to me, and I was not an inter-sex child. An inter-sex child may experience perplexities about its body—haven’t we all? Since I cannot come up with a valid reason why a parent should have the right to determine the gender of their inter-sex child, they should not be given that right. Unfortunately, some children experiences teasing, sexual confusion, and alienation while growing up, and as parents we teach them how to handle it. I feel the true nature of a parent is to—love, protect and provide for our children. Many parents neglect to realize that children are also sexual beings, and upon reaching maturity it is within their nature to seek sexual gratification. Therefore, if a parent is given the right to decide the gender of their inter-sex child, they may indeed be doing more damage to the child then they realize, thus leaving their child with mental and physical scares. Through education and possibly counseling, the child upon reaching maturity can then objectively make their own decision. Consequently, the inter-sex adult will have the freedom to explore and choose what is best for him/her. Studies have been done proving that people who are inter-sex gender can live and have lived a normal healthy life. As mentioned in the article, “The Five Sexes” by Anne Fausto-Sterling, there are reports describing children who grew up knowing that they were intersexual (though they did not advertise it) adjusted to their usual status. Likewise in the video “Multiple Genders” Georgina and Arthur are hermaphrodites, due to his/her chromosomes Georgina biologically looks like a woman but has male genitals and appeared to be content with him/herself, and Arthur who is happily married enjoys the best of both worlds. These two people were given—the right to decided what was best for them (as it should be) because in the end they are the ones, inter-sex, who will live the life that makes them happy.
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The issue of choosing the sex of a child who if hermaphrodite is really a sensitive issue because it is someone’s life that is completely changed because this was the body that was chosen for them and gender roles take a part in this because they will be judge by their sex as they develop. Nevertheless I completely think that parents have the right to choose the gender of the child I think that it’s in the best interest of the child, for the simple fact that public scrutiny is a mother. However if the child chooses to be the other sex later in their development, the parent needs to be mindful of that as well. A parent should focus on the happiness of their child no matter what sex the child wants to be or feels comfortable I and they should support them. I would think that the hardest thing is choosing they sex. I was wondering if there was a test that could help the parent choose the sex. Like a hormone test determining which hormone is more dominate in the child, estrogen or testosterone. This could help a parent choose the sex of their baby. Either way I think it is the responsibility of the parent to be supportive and love their child.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with your argument. I just can’t imagine being an inter-sex person because most likely, my parents would have chosen a gender for me. And most likely, it would have been the gender that didn’t pertain to me. Don’t the parents think about that when the decide what to do? I also agree with you that it is the parent’s job to love, protect, and provide for their children. If you ask me, I really don’t see how choosing their identity is protecting them and loving them. Before they even decide what gender to choose (being that they will choose), parents should wait a couple of months to be well informed about their inter-sex child, and what it means to be inter-sex and have an inter-sex child. When they are babies, one can easily hide their gender, or choose one temporarily. But until the parents are well informed, they should not have the right to choose the gender of the child. Also if they give the child a temporary gender, the baby might not be affected as much because the baby doesn’t understand anything around them. And if anything, they should make the baby be treated both as a male and female. That way when the parents do decide (given they are already informed about inter-sexuality), the can finally stick with one and the baby already was treated as both sexes, so the baby can easily adapt to the chosen gender.
ReplyDeleteYes I also agree. A child should be able to choose what it wants to be. From its birth a child should be allowed to decide the gender it should be-- to not do so would ultimately cause death!!!
ReplyDeleteThink of all of the confused adults out there that do themselves in, ultimately confused by the hegemonic dichotomy that controls them in the confusion of ultimately understanding themselves.
Parents should not have a right to decide what a child should be because they do not know what the child should become. This is obviously because since it is unknown what the child should become-- it should not be the parents choice.
Also, this is just an idea, but I think they should have a system much like British system of public education where you have to decide in middle school what gender you should be. That way it will be the child’s decision—on whether or not they should study for the gender placement test that will assess their abilities. These abilities will be gender specific talents such as cooking, cleaning, hard physical labor etc. Whether or not that child chooses to study particular fields will ultimately decide their fate.