I have a DSD and am fed up.

[DSDFury]

A DSD (Disorder/Difference of Sexual Development) is a congenital medical condition, usually resulting in sterility, as it does in my case. Broadly, it means there is chromosomal or other genetic anomaly which has resulted in the foetus not developing along typical lines for a male or female. Not all the resulting abnormalities are external, and we are certainly not hermaphrodites.

I am sick to death of DSDs being co-opted by the trans movement as "proof" that sex isn't binary. I am not some weird third sex, I am not part of a spectrum, and I don't feel the need to tell everyone about my condition.

I am sick to death of DSDs being misrepresented as an identity (looking at you, Fife NHS). It comes with some shitty elements such as infertility, but that is just one of many, many things that makes me who I am. I am a very ordinary middle-aged woman who shops in M&S and doesn't have blue hair.

I don't want to be in the sodding rainbow, I don't want to be on a flag and I absolutely don't want to be seen as synonymous with trans (looking at you, Women's Institute).

To (possibly) coin a phrase, I have "gender euphoria". I have never doubted for a second that I am female and I was delighted to finally go through puberty once I had been diagnosed. I don't believe that my spirit has been fortuitously put in the correct body or any such nonsense; I am female because I embody a body which has a womb and a vagina rather than a penis and testicles. I look, and sound, entirely female in every respect.

I do want our existence to be acknowledged, as in certain situations (mainly medical, but some legal) it is important to recognise this group of conditions. However I think conflating us with trans hinders this far, far more than helps, as it obfuscates the issue.

I am not particularly concerned about the implications of the Supreme Court ruling, certainly don't regard it as genocide (ridiculous hyperbole) and think it would have been insane for it to go any other way, although I fervently hope that anyone in charge of policy has sufficient knowledge of these conditions to be aware that there will be people whose chromosomes do not match their phenotype/appearance because of a medical condition rather than because they are trans.

People on the Feminism board seem to be extremely knowledgeable, but I bet a sizeable sector of the general population would be surprised by more than one thing I have written,

Thank you for reading.

You still didn't answer what about those with PAIS who change back to male, as "always having been" biologically male because the court says so. Didn't you wanna answer that for "the lurkers"?

"under-masculanised" would indeed be a strange word if she had used it, but of course she didn't, because "masculanised" is not a word at all.

Having now found the whole paper with free access, I was able to see where she used the word I think you meant to type.

The-XY-Female-Exploring-Care-for-Adolescent-Girls-with-Complete-Androgen-Insensitivity-Syndrome.pdf

The word is only used in one of the introductory paragraphs, where she is defining what is meant by a 46 XY DSD with reference to another paper.

abnormalities of karyotype, formation of gonads, androgen synthesis and androgen action are the principle causes that result in under-virilization—that is, under masculinization of ‘biological’ XY individuals (Massanyi, Dicarlo, Migeon, & Gearhart, 2013).

She consistently refers to people with CAIS as "XY females" or girls or women throughout the paper, so I'm not sure why you seem to think that she thinks that they are male.

In this paper which she cites in her conclusion, the authors recommend that those with CAIS should be raised as female, since their genitalia are unambiguously female.

(PDF) A model of delivering multi-disciplinary care to people with 46 XY DSD

Yes I'm aware me and this paediatric nurse have a difference of opinion, yet we agree they should be raised as girls and women. She can call them XY females all she wants, when she has to describe who she's referring to she still has to reference they're biologically male although she's trying as carefully as possible to not offend but it comes down to XY females are biologically XY individuals who are under masculanised which is a lot of words to skirt around using the terms biological male. You're welcome to skirt around it too, but you still haven't provided me anything that convinces me a dot that they're "biologically female"

Nobody is denying the male chromosomes.

Well you are when you take offense that DSDs affect those that are either male or female. Before you were going down the road that there is no biological difference between a biological female and someone with a DSD raised as one

You're very welcome to look for a quote from one of my posts where I say categorically there is no difference between a biological female without a DSD and someone with a DSD raised as a biological female, but you won't find one.

At least you’re admitting now she didn’t say they were biological males and that was simply your own (biased) interpretation of what was said 😂

It will be my pleasure, although you wouldn't need to ask if you'd bothered to read the case law I linked to upthread.

That concerned a PAIS individual who was registered male at birth, developed a female gender identity, had feminising treatments, and was permitted to correct her birth registration on presentation of medical evidence. Her husband attempted to annul their marriage on the basis that she was not biologically female, but failed. The court held that determination of biological sex in cases like this can only be done by balancing all available factors and cannot be based only on karyotype, or even gonadal sex.

It was a pragmatic decision, but really important for sex-based rights.

It's a circular discussion because we categorically disagree. You believe sex is binary while defining it on a spectrum and I believe it's binary. You also think there's no discussion to be had here and I disagree.

But that individual was permitted to change their biological sex, no? And someone not previously categorised as female with PAIS can legally change their biological sex from birth to male as well. I don't really care what affect they had from a point of marriage law.

No I said what she said - that they're biologically XY and they're under- mascualised. Which is the same as say biologically male. You can go on to read the literature of why they're skirting their language and why, which is basically that "people don't like to hear the word male so fluff it up a bit". It's not a medical condition of any biological female to be unmasculine is it ?

It's not a medical condition of any biological female to be unmasculine is it ?

If you’re talking about under-masculinization then we disagree (again).

Well.....yes!

The upshot is that people with certain DSDs do actually get to choose what biological sex they are.

And you should care about what the affect was on her marriage, because, at the time, the right to marry a man was a sex-based right. Sex-based rights are why the SC ruling was necessary.

There is no practical difficulty in distinguishing biological sex from certificated sex, and only TRAs pretend that there is.

Believing that sex is binary, does not mean that everyone can be neatly categorised - and both the law and clinicians working with DSD, recognise that for a tiny number of people sex is more complex.

Endlessly debating the bodies of this tiny number of people, is really grim - and I wonder if you do similar for people with other complex medical conditions or disabilities.

If this impacts your daughter, niece or granddaughter, I hope you can be a little bit more sensitive and flexible in your thinking

This is also a good overview of the complexity by a paediatric endocrinologist

Sadly, the never ending debates about DSD have led to a decline in public understanding, which is really sad to see

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20161019042435/www.aissg.org/debates/letters/QUIGLEY.HTM" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Paediatric Endocrinologist

Apologies if link above doesn’t work or takes you to the wrong place, but couldn’t get the archived page to link correctly above

I don't think those with swyers should be in women's sports for example, because there could be a biological advantage.

What would that biological advantage be, exactly? You need to do a little better than "could be"?

Women with CAIS will likely be at a disadvantage for many sport, due to the complete lack of testosterone, which makes it hard to gain muscle mass - and results in low bone density and often a small frame with larger than average breast development

I'm disappointed in Greer. Surely the message of The Female Eunuch is that women are oppressed by the patriarchy on the basis of their physiology, which CAIS women largely share and which they are even more powerless to escape than the rest of us.

The letter writer gives a lot of weight to gender identity, perhaps because, for her patients, it's a useful tool for weighing treatment options. So TRAs approvingly quote people like her, ignoring the fact that GI is irrelevant in the 99.98 % of us for whom karyotype, gonads, anatomy, and secondary sex characteristics are all perfectly aligned.

Exactly- and if anything, DSD proves that gender identity is often fluid and depends on how you are seen and viewed in the world - and for many with the most complex DSD, it can often be a pragmatic decision that is based on the easiest way for them to live their lives

Although some of them seem to choose to identify in the exact opposite way to how they are seen in the world. Which I guess they are at liberty to do, but always appears somewhat perverse to me.