Nature Journal accepts that people with Y chromosomes have vaginas

[NotAnotherJaffaCake]

Not editorial, but on the front page:

www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01606-8

For the uninitiated, Nature is one of the top science journals. Articles in Nature make and break scientific careers. It is supposed to be a bastion of the most rigourous scientific thought.

We're fucked.

Where on earth does this idea that Nature is 'a popular science magazine' come from? It is bloody heavyweight -- at least once you've got past the front puff pieces into the actual science.

(Tip: if it says Letter or Article it's proper peer-reviewed science. Ditto if it has multiple authors, sometimes going on for pages.)

National Geographic seems to be on a mission to make up for decades when it seemed to be targeted at schoolboys looking for pictures of ‘exotic’ breasts.

I'm still puzzled by all the hand wringing within sporting bodies about CS. Y chromosome, receptive to testosterone - compete with men. It's not like CS can't partake in sport at all. Of course, there wouldn't be the glory of winning the Olympics, but heh, I'm not good enough either.

As far as I know, there aren’t any people with penises with no Y chromosomes, as the author states. I take your point that the article is in relation to intersex, not trans.

As far as I know, there aren’t any people with penises with no Y chromosomes, as the author states.

I believe that XX males can have perfectly normal male genitalia (crossing over of the SRY gene onto an X chromosome). Rarer than XY females I think (both are rare) but a I'm sure google will tell you the details.

The point is that this being in Nature (especially as an Op Ed) is perfectly reasonable.

They may be deterring to XX male syndrome, AKA De la Chapelle syndrome.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/XX_male_syndrome

It’s really the SRY gene that matters. That’s the part of the Y chromosome we are referring to when we say the Y determines sex.

Beat me to it!

Another aside: the twisting of language has now made this statement ambiguous:

”The IAAF estimates that 1 in 20,000 people assigned female at birth have a Y chromosome,”

Were some of those 20,000 women without DSDs?

Or were the 20,000 actually ASSIGNED female at birth (ie all were people with DSDs)

I'm confused by what people who complain about Semenya being allowed to complete want.

Easy, for Semenya not to be allowed to compete with women. As it is, they are still allowed to compete with women in certain events, or if they lower their testosterone to what is still much above the range for women in their usual events.

We know Semenya is XY with internal testes. We know they are sensitive to the testosterone their testes make. Semenya is male and has known they are male since at least 2008/2009 (if not before) and is yet allowed to continue competing with women, as are the other men with XY DSDs with testes and androgen sensitive.

Why? Because apparently it comes down to visible penis = male and everyone else = female. Women aren’t just non-men.

We know Semenya is XY with internal testes.

How? I haven't seen anything which gives her medical details.

as are the other men with XY DSDs with testes and androgen sensitive.

So do you mean that anyone with XY DSD is a man? Even with a vagina, uterus and undeveloped gonads? Or only XY with internal testes and ambiguous genitailia?

Nature is not a magazine 😲 It's an extremely prestigious journal (with many offshoots) and as a pp said, careers are made on a Nature publication. And like all journals, of course they want to publish articles people will find interesting and want to read, because that's how they make money.

However, this piece is not an article. It's a 'World View', therefore an opinion piece. They're used to start debate about difficult topics and are by their definition often controversial.

The refusal of some people on this site to refer to CS as a woman using female pronouns is sickening. She was raised a woman. She has a complex medical condition. I doubt very much she would have been ‘raised a boy if she had better healthcare’. She has no penis. Sex is partly about genetics but genetics are not visible so someone who appears to be female (ie female genitalia) would always be identified by others as female rather than male, regardless of genetics. It makes zero difference in day to day life other than for things like sport. However, being raised male but lacking in male genitalia would have been unimaginably difficult I would guess.

Doctors over here wouldn’t do internal x rays on a baby for no reason so I can well imagine this situation occurring here too. Caster is not a man just because she discovered at age 18 that she has undescended testes. If you have an issue with her competing in the women’s race, that is one thing but leave off with the ‘they’ (and ‘he’ on other threads).

So I got deleted for mentioning the fact that someone who is identified in the article byline as an Expert Witness for the the Semenya team is paid for this opinion by the team. This job title is disclosed in the article for all to see.

Do people think expert witnesses do their work for free? They don't.

I will start this by saying I have limited knowledge of current intersex medical policies, BUT I have heard that the current trans experiment started as an extension to the observation that people with DSDs had better outcomes if they were allowed to decide which sex they most felt like.

Biological purists might point to chromosomes and internal testes and conclude someone is male. Others might note the female appearance of the external genitalia and socialisation and conclude that the person is female.

So those who consider best medicine is to allow those with DSDs to select the sex they feel they are, might object to any suggestion that this is not fully accepted in all given circumstances.

And though personally I feel, for the sake of women’s sports, that some differentiation is valid, I don’t see it as being as clear cut as “x person is a man and should just get over it.”

I am not talking about the right to compete here. If she wasn’t seeking to compete in the 800 metres, would you refuse to use female pronouns because she discovered she had a rare medical condition at 18? Would you expect her to now live her life as a man despite having no male genitalia and being raised as a woman?

What material difference do you think living life as a man would make to Caster's life other than no longer being able to run in races for women?

She’s in a self-described ‘heterosexual’ marriage to a woman so, apart from racing against women, she is living as a man.

I have zero sympathy for Semenya or any other athlete with similar conditions. They know. Their trainers know. Anyone who takes one look at them knows, but women are expected to act all silly and nice.

I feel sorry for women athletes who are not competing in a fair competition

Where he says that “some people with vaginas have xy chromosomes and some people with penises do not” I thought that wasn’t the case ? That males with total AIS do not develop a penis, ( but would have an incomplete vagina and no uterus or ovaries, but internal testes) but how can a woman with no Y chromosome have a penis ?

I am not talking about the right to compete here. If she wasn’t seeking to compete in the 800 metres, would you refuse to use female pronouns because she discovered she had a rare medical condition at 18?

Pota is making a fair point.

I don't think Semenya should be competing in any women's sport at all. Virilising male puberty is virilising male puberty. I don't feel the ruling went far enough.

The issue here is fair competition and the focus now, post-ruling, should be on preventing athletic orgs from going around scouting for 46XY DSD children so that countries can win medals at international games in events still permitted. It's sporting corruption.

As a person who actually was incorrectly assigned at birth, Semenya should be respected in a personal choice as to social role/presentation.

SirVixofVixHall
I think the way the piece is worded is a mixture of identity where it suits and the science is muddled in to attempt to cement that.

It's misleading.

how can a woman with no Y chromosome have a penis ?

SRY gene ends up on the X chromosome during crossover, so two X chromosomes, one containing a gene we’d normally expect on the Y, which is why we call that gene SRY (Sex determining Region on the Y chromosome).

And again nothing to do with trans. Having an SRY gene on the Y chromosome isn’t an anomaly, whatever McKinnon might think. That’s where it’s supposed to be.