Secrecy, shame and unethical experimentation are a few of the key issues that have historically surrounded intersex.
Elizabeth Reis, a University history and gender studies professor, discussed the controversies and history of intersex in the U.S. at a lecture in light of the University Women’s Center hosting Intersex Awareness Week.
Intersex is defined as “an incongruence between external genitals, internal reproductive anatomy, sex chromosomes and hormones,” Reis said.
Reis primarily argued in the lecture against the newly adopted label of Disorder of Sex Development (DSD), which has widely replaced the term intersex in the medical world and beyond.
“It’s too pathologizing,” she said.
Reis said around 1 in 2,000 births have some kind of atypical sex development.
“Secrecy has been the primary way of dealing with intersex,” Reis said.
In the past, doctors have performed experimental procedures on intersex individuals. In the 1920s, doctors would sometimes try to convince people to switch genders, Reis said. If a patient refused, the doctor would note that the patient was stubborn. Since the 1990s, there has been an outpour of activists who have aimed to inform the public about intersex issues and prejudices.
Alex Esparza, a University graduate student studying anthropology, said the topic of intersex is important because our society tends to categorize people by physical attributes.
“Anatomy is just anatomy and it shouldn’t dictate difference all that much,” he said.
Reis engaged the audience by asking them to consider how important it is to be normal. She argued that doctors and parents should wait until a child is old enough to make the decision on his or her own before jumping to surgically alter their genitals.
Fetal dexamethasone was one of the controversial topics Reis mentioned. She explained that doctors have prescribed fetal dex to pregnant women to decrease the risk of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), a syndrome that causes masculinity of the genitals in females. Reis argued that not only is this medicine not approved for this purpose, but people should not be so concerned with the enlargement of female genitals.
Reis said the use of fetal dex to prevent CAH has also been linked with ‘reducing lesbianism’ and avoiding a ‘lack of maternal feeling’ that could be associated with CAH. She said the message behind this is homosexuality is something that can or should be prevented.
“I think it’s important to have discourse on marginalized communities, and for other marginalized communities to get together and talk about things,” Tiff Wong, a University senior majoring in psychology and women’s and gender issues, said.
As a member of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning and Intersex (LGBTQQI) community, Wong said these people can feel isolated, so it’s important to advocate for each other and spread awareness.
The Issues Coordinator at the Women’s Center, third-year-student Lindsey Holman, said the intersex population is often ignored.
“We live in a society where people have to fit into our bionaries,” she said, “and when you have people who fall outside of those bionaries, or people who are othered, we need to know how to represent those marginalized individuals.”
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