'A woman in the head' I hear you scoff. Ok, so those of you who have a problem with this definition could you offer me your cast iron deal-sealer? I doubt that anyone here is going to speak out in favour of social gender roles as the tool for identifying men from women. One could of course define a woman as a human being with the capability (at some point of her life at least) to carry a child, but to use this strict guideline would involve declassifying infertile women from the female category. But presumably those in the 'genitals dictate whether you're a man or a woman' school of though would take exception with this. The question is, what would we do with someone whose genitals have been removed in an accident? Is a man who has his penis burnt off in an accident no longer a man? But he's not a woman either. Hmm. We'll we'd have to stick 'it' in the pile with all the other people who fail to live up to the privileged, specialised, prescribed versions of gender. There are those who would pipe up that such a man was BORN with male genitalia so therefore he is a man.
But just how many male genitalia does one need in order to justify themselves as male? Caster Semenya, the 800m Olympic runner, was born with outer female genitalia and a pair of internal testes judging by all accounts. But it wouldn't be right to call her a man would it, because she was raised as a female... oh that leads us onto the children discussed in this thread who are also now being raised as female, and yet that is not enough to make them women in certain bigoted people's eyes.
This subject is constantly discussed by people with the most basic and infantile understanding of the facts about gender. Guess what? Life isn?t simple and those who seek to reduce complex issues to 'men have willy's' and 'girls have vaginas' are to be regarded with suspicion, as are people who use the term 'hermaphroditism' in relation to human beings. Such people are clearly extremely ignorant of the matters they sprout forth on.
The human body is a complex mass of tissues, all formed from the same primordial soup into a variety of shapes and permutations. This is normal. It is normal, for example, for a certain amount of men within a given population to grow breasts. It is also not uncommon for some females to have almost no growth. But aside from these secondary sexual characteristics, there is the rest for the human body to think about. Those who would accuse trans people of just 'thinking' they are in the wrong gender are actually overlooking a crucial fact within all of this - that the human brain is actually an organ in our bodies, just like other gendered organs such as... the genitals. And people who know about this sort of thing - you know, doctors - have recognised the fact that male and female brains differ and that, just like testes, a male brain is just as possible to turn up on the body of someone in possession of lady-parts downstairs. Comparisons to strawberries or people thinking themselves other items of fruit are ridiculous and childishly reactionary. People can't be fruit and they haven't been walking around trying to get everyone to see them as fruit for the pasty few thousand years at least (at great risk to themselves most of the time) - as trans people have done. Please can we have some more informed debate on this subject - it's desperately calling out for it.
As a side note, I am a trans woman and I was bullied by my father for years for not living up the gender expectations of a young boy. I was ridiculed for the way I spoke, walked and acted, in addition to being violently bullied throughout my entire school life. I told my family I was really female inside aged 4 and they did nothing to help me, in fact they actively made it hard for me, and encouraged me to attend boxing lessons, football and the like. Then I had to go through a completely unnecessary puberty, the effects of which I will never truly be able to erase (i.e. my height). Luckily I am an attractive young trans woman now who overcame all of this despite a terrible childhood. I am happy in myself.
But I am not happy about reading the comments of certain individuals who claim that loving parents, who actually take the brave step to support their child under medical supervision, are child abusers. I would have had a much happier time of it with parents like those. Abuse stems from the very sort of unpleasant ideologies expressed here, including twaddle about the rights of trans people detracting from those of 'women' - as if the two were totally discrete categories.
By the way, I never wear heels and today, as is often the case, I am wearing no eye make up (though I do confess to lip-gloss). I have had zero breast implants and facial surgery before anyone accuses me of contributing to the pernicious gender roles which are, in fact, our joint enemy. Thanks.