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Alice Dreger - Activist on Behalf of Intersexuals
By Kristina Latham
Transgenderism and intersexuality networked at Michigan State University when Alice Dreger gave an on-campus presentation entitled "Listening to Hermaphrodites." Dr. Dreger is an Assistant Professor of Science and Technology Studies at Michigan State University and an advocate on behalf of intersexuals. Dr. Dreger delivered a one-hour brown bag presentation, informing listeners about intersexuals and using slides to show variations of intersexuality. After her presentation, campus transgenders contacted Dr. Dreger to establish networking.
Dr. Dreger arranged for transgenders to speak before her discussion-based course entitled "Science, Medicine, and Sex" - a class which explores how culture influences science and medicine, and how science and medicine shape culture. The class further explores the historical development of, and scientific treatment of homosexuality, and how the gay rights movement succeeded in convincing doctors to stop classifying homosexuality as a disease or disorder. Students also examine the present-day forming of the intersexual/hermaphrodite movement, listening to the voices of those affected by biomedical treatments of gender: lesbians, gays, intersexuals, and transgenders. Transgender speakers were Lisa Lees and Kristina Latham.
Speaking before the class, Lisa and Kristina defined what transgenderism means to them, explaining they were labeled male at birth, but both identified with being female to a greater or lesser extent. Students showed interest in the subject matter, listening carefully, and asking good questions. One student was unconvinced that Lisa and Kristina had sexual orientations towards women; appearing confused, she asked if they are gay. Dr. Dreger emphasized that gender and sexual orientation may be thought of as separate entities. Another student stated that, by asking for less duality in gender roles, transgenders are "pushing the envelope." Kristina answered that expanding a dichotomy can produce contradictory and paradoxical concepts. When a student asked what being transgendered is like, Lisa shared her experiences raising a son and daughter in a same-sex marriage, which has broadened her insight in to how gender identity develops. Dreger added that the biological spectrum of gender, that is, "the fact of hermaphrodites," further demonstrates that gender is a social construct, and performing operations on intersexuals enforces gender conformity. A few weeks later, Dr. Dreger spoke before the Michigan State University Transgender Support Group, explaining how she became an advocate for the community, and showing a video on intersexuality entitled "Hermaphrodites Speak."
Dr. Dreger's research on intersexuality began as a graduate student at Indiana University. She was interested in gender studies and European history and therefore did her dissertation on the biomedical treatment of human hermaphroditism in France and Britain during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She found a large amount of information on this topic, information that was largely unexplored. Published in 1995, her Ph.D. thesis was entitled "Doubtful Sex: Cases and Concepts of Hermaphroditism in France and Britain 1868-1915." She also wrote two articles, "Doubtful Sex: The Fate of the Hermaphrodite in Victorian Medicine" (1995), and "Hermaphrodites in Love: the Truth of the Gonads (1996)."
Her research drew a startling conclusion - the biomedical treatment of intersexuality has been imbued with sexism and heterosexism, and intersexuals have essentially been "disappeared" in an effort to disappear all questions about sexual identity variation. Publishing her writings swept her into a political firestorm. The force created by a growing movement of intersexuals pulled her in one direction, and the ways medicine treats intersexuals pulled her in another. Consequently, she found herself receiving degrees of criticism from both sides. This heated political atmosphere made her wary about increasing her involvement. Finally, after meeting with Cheryl Chase of the Intersex Society of North America - and spending time reflecting about political history, objectivity, and responsibility - she decided to become an activist of behalf of intersexuals.
"The transgender and intersexual movements are similar because they both attempt to make people understand gender and sex as fluid," Dreger explains. "People need to think more carefully about their bodies and their naive and convenient myths about gender." She states, "intersexuals get surgeries they don't ask for, transgenders often cannot get the surgeries they do ask for. They have the same problems, but different manifestations." She adds that surgeons often act in patriarchal ways, as if they have total authority over genitals.
Dr. Dreger states that intersex surgeries strengthen a myth that flesh proves destiny. Surgeons are, in effect, enforcing their view of normality; they are inadvertently stating that desires themselves require fleshy proof to be respected, and that grounding all behaviors (identities) in the flesh (anatomy) feeds the myth that biology is destiny. Feeding this myth leads to sexism and racism. She uses the example, "If you looked at my genome, would you find evidence that I can fly? - No. Well, I fly every month on airlines. My point is that human culture, human experience, and humanity are more than mere flesh would lead one to believe." She adds that women and men are products of their culture, and can play with their flesh or culture to change their identities, just like they can fly.
The greatest difficulty intersexuals face is being subjected to (and mutilated by) surgery they don't ask for, Dreger states. An intersexual may be subjected to multiple surgeries through-out childhood, most of which are unconsented and the effects of which can be traumatic. Other difficulties intersexuals face are similar to difficulties faced by transgenders. These include:
- Finding psychological counselors to handle their problem in a way specific to and respectful of them.
- Sex, gender, and sexuality stereotypes which cause confusion and oppression.
- Being harassed by people who see them as curiosities or side shows, and being harassed by people who want to have sex with them.
- Being theorized to death.
- Feeling freakish.
- Surgical effects sometimes include disfigurement, pain, infections, added feeling of freakishness.
Dr. Dreger hopes to convince physicians and other medical practitioners to take seriously what intersexual activists are saying - that current treatment protocols add to their problems. Intersexuals feel surgeries are wiping them out, and spirited activism can prevent new surgeries from occurring, surgeries estimated at more than five a day in the United States alone. Dr. Dreger hopes to reduce the number of unconsented surgeries and help everyone understand ways that gender is socially constructed. She sees a bright future for both groups and believes that time will drastically change the way both intersexuals and transgenders are treated.
Vist the author's home page at Kristina Latham
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