now, this perticular example is clearly a really REALLY complicated situation, something that needs to be reported carefully to make sure that facts are not glossed over and accont is taken to the fact that many people know very little about this subject, so, off you go mail...

Boy, 12, turns up for school as a girl after sex swap during the summer holidays

o......kay.

well thats a good start, its clear from the first few lines that this hasn't happened, there has been no surgury, or hormone treatment (and the use of the term "sex swap" always annoys me, its just unhelpfully flippant).

to what seems to be happening is a young person is in the very early stages of having gender realinement so is going through the compulsory assesment which requires a cirtain (pretty long) period living in the new gender first.



a few problems here, the first highlighted one is the mails insistance in refering to the child as "he" inspite of the fact they are now living as a female, if they we'ren't sure about using "she" and "her" when the process (inspite of their own wordings) is still at a very early stage the least the mail could have done was use nutrual terms like "they".
secondly, this is clearly a hatchet job on a sun artical, they've done no real extra research, so the best we're offered are frivilious details that make it look like a large and extensive group of doctors, psyciatrists, and this kids own parents are basing the assesment of this kid on nothing other than their acting a bit girly.
which is obviously bollocks.

obviously there is something in this in that it seems to have been fudged by the school, or that the communication between the hospital and the school was insufficiant (from personal experiance, this wouldn't surprise me)

*sigh* anyway, the comments are a mess, the issue at hand is almost unfathomably complex, the mail have done basically sqat to explain it, so predictable the comments have more or less exploded...

from the twats:



to people just showing utter ignorance of how this works



many are like this, as cocked up as the artical was, its IS clear that no surgury has, or indeed can take place at this stage, no there is nothing for a doctor to have "carried out" never mind that these situations are NEVER handled by a single practitioner.

and the occational liar



the youngest recipiant of realinement sugury EVER was 16 years old, and it only took place this year. so i call bollocks on your anecdone elaine.

thankfully there are a wealth of sensible informed comments, i'm pretty sure as a result of this link having made its way into tansgender support messageboards and sites.

A very complicated situation indeed, However.



I presume by this, "Scrible" from Suffolk would rather this child be put in a "special" place for such people. Did the German government of the late 1930's not have similar views?

At the end of the day, this is a "real" situation and not one that should be hidden from her peers. Progress will never be made in educating others about this situation if it is to be constantly swept under the carpet.

I note that many of the commentators on the DM site have not read the article properly and think that she has had the re-alignment surgery already.

C**t of the Day, surely, if not the week.

I wonder what some of the "it's the chromosomes, stupid!" people would think about, for example, Kleinfelter syndrome (XXY) or AIS (where the chromosomes are XY, but the brain doesn't register male hormone, so the outer body develops as female). Or even Turner syndrome (X0).

Then I remember (a)that there actually are some people in the world who insist that poor Caster Sememya (for example) must be addressed as "he" now because she was discovered to be intersex and (b)that these people don't want to learn stuff about stuff anyway, because any kind of knowledge that isn't immediately relevant to someone passing their GCSEs and getting a job is not only worthless, but actually suspicious. I feel this kind of anti-intellectualism forms part of the base of many bad things about society.

Also, to the people who say things like "Well, I could paint myself pink and call myself a flamingo!" need it drilled into their heads, possibly with an actual drill, that men and women are the same species. There do actually seem to be a lot of intertangled issues in there somewhere, not just with the filthy homoqueers, but also with traditional gender roles and how respectable people should stay in their own boxes and not frighten the 800 year old blue rinse Nazis in Tunbridge Wank with things that are different.

That is quite wonderfully splenetic vitriol. I feel like standing up and applauding. Jolly well done.

As if I didn't have enough contempt for this disgusting, filthy, hypocritical rag

Fucking GROW UP you pathetic arseholes and try writing a report by yourselves for a change!

I saw Caster Semenya's name mentioned there, and I know we shouldn't laugh, but I think it is quite funny that an anagram of her name is "Yes, a secret man".

Does that make me a bad person?

As long as you recognise you're laughing at a wrong joke, and try not to use it to hurt people, I think it's probably forgiveable.

Pupils told 'a new girl is starting' after boy of NINE returns to school female

gah.

curious that this should be news only the day after the first story. it's almost as if some cynical cock has gone and hunted this example out so we can have a secound round of gawping at difference.

comments again, tawt filled



yes mickey, people don't call it mental illness out of fear. its got nothing to do with it not meeting any of the critirea for a mental illness or anything like that.
knobworth.

This could, ultimately, be a good thing as it's raised awareness of transgender issues somewhat. There will be some who read the tabloids then go off to find out a little information, some of who have possibly never given a second thought to the subject.

I don't half feel sorry for the kid though. Being outed as potential pre-op transgender by the school and then becoming a tabloid headline? That would be hard enough for an adult to deal with, let alone a school kid.

Absolutely! A very brave kid. Being 12 and dealing with this is hard to imagine.

was going to post what jollility did about chromosomes and anti-intellectualism, but they did it better than i could have.
i did an essay at uni which was about marriage law but i ended up going into a lot of detail about how there are rare cases where it is hard to tell what sex someone is (they cannot get married as marriage is only legal between people of the opposite sex). i ended up researching a lot of science as well as law and it is fascinating stuff, raises a lot of questions about how you define sex in these cases and really makes you think, but obviously very unfortunate for the people concerned.
i do wish the media would improve how they report these issues: they confuse a lot of different issues (for example implying that these kids have had surgery) and they sensationalise these stories to grab attention and push the "world's gone mad, bloody PC busybodies" or "ho ho, look at the funny weirdo kid, lets have a laugh at someone else's expense" messages. the journos are being insensitive, ignorant bastards on purpose and they discourage their readers from learning anything and maybe showing some compassion because that would mean they're no longer part of their gang. they're no better than playground bullies.

Two excellent stories today. This

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1288642/Transsexual-waged-year-spying-campaign-neighbours-faces-jail.html

Where the transexual status of the woman involved seems to be COMPLETELY irrelevant to the story. No comments as yet.

And this...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1288613/Married-man-sex-change-wins-right-receive-pension-womens-age-60.html

Of which the comments are a fucking disgrace. Most seem to concentrate on the disparity between men and womens retirement ages, despite the fact that they are being equalised, under legislation brought in by.... you guessed it! Labour! The rest are just the same old 'Born a man die a man, XX or XY no inbetween (conveiniently ignoring such chromosomal disorders as XXX and XXY syndrome, but that is beside the point), and HUH looks like a man in drag to me! Better get your money back!'

To be honest I think the worst aspect of this story is that transexuals who transition after marrying are not allowed to have their new status recognised by law unless they divorce their partner. Now hetero and homosexuals have almost equal marriage rights, and the Tories are the party that support marriage, perhaps they should look into repealing this particular caveat.

Or would that be a bit to much of pandering to the minorities?

"i don't understand this, it doesn't effect me, but i am outraged and disgusted!"

_________________
i left so malcy could stay, sorry guys!

boo fecking hoo.

Funnily enough, a lot of people here have the same attitude to religion!