[...]Gender and Biology[...]…

[...]Gender and Biology[...]…

Cultural Myths,Gender Stereotypes

I think because people (read: parents) like to think they have knowledge and control over their children. That they know them better than they know themselves, that they can basically trace a future for them, and for it to be bright etc.

But then comes the intersex and the trans person, shattering that hope by bringing uncertainty in the mix. Suddenly, your amniocentesis at 3-4 months of pregnancy might have been wrong, you might not have known your child as much as you thought. Trying to know a child through gender stereotypes is all too common nowadays - as opposed to REALLY getting to know a child. Even for parents.

Thank you for that very interesting historical exposé! I certainly learned a lot from it.

It’s interesting that even with the overwhelming biomedical research we have nowadays regarding gender identity and neurohormonal differences between the sexes, many people still want sociocultural programming to reign supreme. I wonder why it’s so hard to accept that there are many different factors at play? Culture, biology, upbringing, personal choices… They all form us, no?

Read about John Money.

From wikipedia, I’ll post the relevant bits:

“John William Money (8 July 1921 – 7 July 2006) was a psychologist and sexologist well-known for his research into sexual identity and biology of gender.

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Money identified several influential concepts and terms during his career, including gender identity, gender role,[2] gender-identity/role, and lovemap. Money was a professor of pediatrics and medical psychology at Johns Hopkins University from 1951 until his death. While there, Money was involved with the Sexual Behaviors Unit, which ran studies on sex reassignment surgery. He received the Magnus Hirschfeld Medal in 2002 from the “German Society for Social-Scientific Sexuality Research”, for which he worked.

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During his professional life, Money was respected as an expert on sexual behavior, especially for allegedly demonstrating that gender was learned rather than innate. Many years later, however, it was revealed that his most famous case was the result of fraudulent reporting on the part of Money. The subject of Money’s fraud was his involvement in the sex reassignment of David Reimer, in what later became known as the “John/Joan” case.

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Money’s ideas relating to gender and gender identity formation have come under intense criticism in the scientific community. Money argued that a child’s gender identity is fluid up to a certain age, after which this gender would become consolidated and more-or-less immutable.

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Money claimed that media response to the exposé was due to right-wing media bias and “the antifeminist movement.” He claimed his detractors believed “masculinity and femininity are built into the genes so women should get back to the mattress and the kitchen.”[14] However, intersex activists also criticized Money, stating that the unreported failure had led to the surgical reassignment of thousands of infants as a matter of policy.[15] Privately, Money was mortified by the case, colleagues said, and as a rule did not discuss it.[16] Money’s own views also developed and changed over the years.[3][17]

Johns Hopkins University maintains a Sexual Behaviors Consultation Unit (SBCU).[18] The Psychiatry Department, however, has concluded that gender identity is primarily innate, and the university no longer performs sex change operations for adults with sexual dysphoria.[19]”

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That’s all for the article. But its also easy to find a link between John Money, feminism and social construction theory.

John Money brought his theory to light in the 60s and 70s, and was acclaimed as “being right” until 1995 when his flag case was discovered as fraud.

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“table in Spanish is feminine (la mesa), in French it is masculine (le table)”

I’m afraid not lol, table is feminine in French. (that’s also from the following article)

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“His theories on the psychosexual flexibility at birth of humans forms the cornerstone of an entire medical specialty - pediatric endocrinology - and his influence even reached the Victorian Committee on Equal Opportunity in Schools.”

“Money did describe Brenda as always the “dominant twin”, though by age three he reported her dominance over Brian had become “that of a mother hen”. The twins seemed to embody an almost miraculous division of taste, temperament and behaviour along gender lines, and seemed the ultimate proof that boys and girls are made not born. (9)

The importance of the twins’ case cannot be underestimated. It was seized on by the feminist movement which had been arguing for years against a biological basis for sex differences (except when they were also arguing that research on sex differences should be completely stopped because it might be misused - presumably by the fundamentalist religious right).(l0) Money’s papers from the 1950s on the psychosexual neutrality of newborns had already been used as one of the main foundations of modern feminism. Kate Millet in her 1970 definitive feminist tome, “Sexual Politics”, had quoted Money’s papers as scientific proof that the differences between men and women reflect not biological imperatives but societal expectations and prejudices. The twins’ case offered apparently irrefutable proof to support that view.”

“Although Money’s views on psychosexual neutrality or the malleability of gender identity was the established wisdom of the scientific community and particularly of the feminist movement, there was at least one researcher who had been questioning his conclusions. With a pioneering team of endocrinologists at the University of Kansas in the 1950s, working on guinea pigs, biophysics researcher Dr. Milton Diamond and colleagues established that prenatal sex hormones played a significant role not only on the development of the reproductive system and external genitalia of a fetus, but also on the masculinization or feminization of the brain.

The results were published in a 1959 issue of Endocrinology.(11) In a follow-up paper entitled “A Critical Evaluation of the Ontogeny of Human Sexual Behaviour” Diamond rejected outright the John Hopkins team’s theory. Reporting on the guinea pig findings, Diamond stated that prebirth factors set limits on how far culture, learning and environment can direct gender in humans. Citing evidence from biology, psychology, psychiatry, anthropology and endocrinology, he argued that gender identity is hardwired into the brain virtually from conception. Later confirmation of the guinea pig experiments was to come from effects observed in girls who had been exposed to testosterone in utero - either accidentally or as medication given to their mothers.

Diamond’s 1959 paper was a direct challenge to the scientific authority of John Money, who had become one of the gurus of the feminist movement. A long and acrimonious academic debate spanning decades ensued. It may explain why when fate delivered to Money the opportunity for the “perfect” experiment on the identical twins, he seized it so eagerly and why he was so reluctant to acknowledge the signs of failure.”

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from here: http://www.endeavourforum.org.au/articles/babette_social.html

Diamond was mostly ignored until 1995 when he proved the case was fraud. He’s considered an authority on intersex, and also researches transsexuality in his university in Hawaii.

And I agree with Pelle, if we take the evidence from both fields seriously and asked ourselves “how can ALL of this be true; how can we make sence of the information?” then yours is a sound opinion/view.

Problem is, this means a lot of people need to challenge their deeply rooted ingrained worldviews and values. And I’m afraid education is a slow help, but perhaps all we can hope for. Although, as it stands today, the “everything is a social construction” argument is a very strong and dominating argument in todays schools.

Artificial interference with this process, like affirmative action, is bad.

I agree completely.