I think this article is a very careful examination of the issue, very well written, and I am thrilled by its open-minded viewpoint. I'd like to add, though, that history has not always seen gender as a two-sided coin. The idea of gender dichotomy as "one man, one woman" in our culture has its origins in European and Christian culture. Many cultures do not see it that way. Many Native American tribes believed that there were actually three genders--and when I say gender, I mean gender identity, as opposed to sex, the physical equipment. These Native American tribes had a traditional gender role for a woman, one for a man, and a third, called a berdache in modern historical writings. The berdache was typically a physical man who felt more comfortable in a woman's role. He(she) wore woman's clothing, performed tasks commonly done by women, and married a man.

In India, people born with an indeterminate set of sexual equipment are called Hijra, and rather than trying to be one or the other, they believe themselves to be a third gender with a role in society set aside just for them.

Those are not the only examples. They are the two I am most familiar with, but anyone who is curious about varying world views on gender should check out this wikipedia article: <link>

It is therefore a fallacy to say that human beings are naturally inclined to believe in a two-gender system, a statement which I have heard before. I would just like to finish by saying that while wikipedia's credibility is questioned at every turn, they have a complicated editorial system which guarantees that untrue information does not remain on their website for long.

Hello? The dominant model in Indian and Native American culture is almost identical to ours.

We have our own minority views: medieval monastics who referred to Jesus as mother. Nuns who "married" each other. Etc., etc. These are not representative of the West.

White folks love to romanticize pre-Christian and non-Christian culture. But hijra, e.g., are not only exceedingly rare, they are almost always openly derided and abused in India and forced to live as outcasts.

Of all cultures, India is perhaps the most tradition-bound when it comes to gender and sex. You wouldn't want to live in India and be a transy. I assure you.

Actually the Hijra are more often eunuchs or transsexual men. There are far too many Hijra to all be persons born with ambiguous genitals.

While culturally intersex persons have been around since time immemorial, it has still always been the case that only genetically female persons could gestate and bear a child. That is one reason MTF transsexuality has been more culturally prevalent than FTM.

Freki

There's a big difference between people who feel more at ease with aspects of the gender role associated with the opposite sex, those whose biological sex is indeterminate, and those who are physiologically and genetically fully male or female but suffer from the delusion that their bodies are of the "wrong" sex.

I find it curious that many people regard the attempt to surgically alter babies in the second category to more closely resemble the sex to which they are "assigned" as a mutilation, but don't see the attempt to do the same with a mentally ill adult as the same. A doctor who amputated a patient's healthy legs or eyes because the patient suffered from the delusion that his "true" self was a legless or blind person would face enormous criticism and possibly lose his or her license - why should it be different for a doctor who amputates or renders inoperable the patient's genitals and/or reproductive organs for the same reason?

I think the issue at hand here is choice, Mr. Bruce. An infant cannot say whether they choose to be considered as "male" or "female" if they have ambiguous genitalia. An adult can. Many things are considered wrong if done to children, while not with adults. As for the hijra and the berdache, they are indeed rare, that is true, and gender roles are, as far as I know, indeed a large part of Indian society. However, it doesn't matter how rare they are; it's how their society at large sees them. I know that you said that hijra were looked down upon, and since I do not actually know the truth of that I shall look it up. I know, however, that the berdache were seen by their entire tribe as a normal function of gender. There were no "issues" with it, in the way that our society at large has "issues" with the idea that there might be more than two genders. In California's early history, a berdache was taken prisoner once by a group of Spanish monks. They took her into a room, undressed her, and, finding that her genitalia were male, tried to reeducate her on her gender. And yes, I am using the idea that sex and gender are different, which is the commonly held definition among physiologists and sexologists. I don't care what the majority of people think about those two words if the educated community are defining them separately. Anyway, she acted embarrassed, and the Spanish monks believed that she was embarrassed because they had revealed that she was really a man. What they failed to understand, according to historian Albert L. Hurtado, was that she was as embarrassed as any woman would be when taken into a room full of men she did not know and stripped. She, like her people, believed herself to be a woman.

And I don't think anyone can deny that religious belief has become strongly entangled with views on homosexuality, bisexuality, transgender, transsexual, etc.

SerenityRising

"An infant cannot say whether they choose to be considered as "male" or "female" if they have ambiguous genitalia."

You cannot use these cases to defend this arguement. The subject we are talking about was born a woman. She was not born a man or ambiguous, she was born a woman.

In the cases where a child is born with both male and female genitalia they should be left whole until that child grows up enough to make an educated decision.

Bruce was right when he said if a doctor blinded someone they would be outcast from the medical community. Doctors aren't allowed to mutilate bodies just because a patient wants them to, except if they think they want to be the opposite sex.

Also, just because something is socially accepted in another culture doesn't make it right. Should we start chopping the hands off of criminals like India? Should we execute people for DUI like El Salvador? Should we make women wear vails and walk 5 paces behind men like most of the middle east?

African Tribes are different cultures, if you look at all their customes I'm sure you'd find one or two that didn't make sense, should we adopt those too?