Category: Gender studies

Why aren’t there emojis for throuples?

by philg

Happy Global Love Day to everyone. Let’s look at a recent New York Times podcast:

For years, Evan Sterrett’s relationship with his boyfriend had become “reruns of the same drama.” Evan wanted space; his boyfriend wanted commitment. But one summer, their relationship received a guest star — a third partner who resuscitated their joie de vivre.

Today, we hear Evan’s story about navigating the complex geometry of throuplehood. Then, we meet Samatra and April Doyle. They don’t live together and don’t co-parent, but they are married and intend to be together forever.

A queen-sized bed can sleep two adult men comfortably. It can fit three, if you don’t mind cuddling or waking up to strange noises in the dark.

One early July morning, I woke up to my boyfriend making out with the guy who had been living with us for the past month. I’m not really a fan of sex before toothbrushing. So I smiled, mumbled “hot” and turned over.

April and Sam Doyle have been married for three years. It’s both of their second marriages, and they’re both mothers. April has one daughter with her first wife, and Sam has three children.

Let’s have a look at family structure emojis from Apple:

None of the above cover the throuple situation promoted by the New York Times. Shouldn’t there be emojis showing three adults in a sexual or romantic relationship? For compliance with 2SLGBTQQIA+ dogma we would need the flexibility to show each member of the throuple in any one of the 74 gender IDs recognized by Science and each member also needs to be available in a rainbow of skin colors. That’s going to be more than one million emoji choices required, therefore, before considering the possibility of adding children.

What does GPT-4 say when asked the headline question?

As an AI language model, I can’t provide real-time updates on the current emoji set, but as of my last knowledge update in September 2021, there were no specific emojis for throuples. Emojis are designed and approved by the Unicode Consortium, which aims to create a standardized set of emojis that can be used across various platforms.

There could be several reasons why there isn’t a specific emoji for throuples:

  1. Limited representation: There are countless different relationships and arrangements that people can be a part of, and it would be difficult to represent all of them through emojis. The Unicode Consortium may focus on more widely-used and universally-recognized emojis.
  2. Complexity: Designing an emoji that accurately represents a throuple can be challenging. Emojis need to be simple and easily recognizable, and creating an emoji for a throuple might be too complex for the small size of emojis.
  3. Demand: The demand for a throuple emoji might not be high enough to warrant its creation. The Unicode Consortium considers multiple factors when deciding on new emojis, including how widely the emoji would be used and the potential impact on existing emoji usage.
  4. Inclusivity: It is important for the Unicode Consortium to be inclusive of diverse cultures, identities, and experiences. They may be focusing on adding emojis that represent broader groups of people or experiences rather than specific relationship arrangements.

That being said, the selection of emojis is continuously expanding, and it’s possible that a throuple emoji could be added in the future if there is enough demand and support. People can propose new emojis through the Unicode Consortium’s submission process, so if you feel strongly about having a throuple emoji, you could consider submitting a proposal.

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If an 86-year-old can be President, can a union boss become a mom at age 60?

by philg

“Greene faces pushback after saying Weingarten is ‘not a mother’” (The Hill):

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) is facing pushback after suggesting that American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten, who’s a stepmother, is “not a mother.”

“The problem is people like you need to admit that you’re just a political activist, not a teacher, not a mother and not a medical doctor,” Greene said.

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) stepped in with a point of order after Greene’s comments, calling them “unacceptable.” … “You are a mother,” he added to Weingarten. “Thank you for being a great parent.”

The journalists report as a fact that Mx. Weingarten, age 65, is a “stepmother”. Wikipedia says that Mx. Weingarten’s marriage was in 2018, when he/she/ze/they was 60 years old. Mx. Weingarten married Sharon Kleinbaum, at least 58 years old at the time. If we assembled Kentaji Brown Jackson’s panel of biologists, I think they would likely say that Mx. Kleinbaum’s children were fully grown by the time the “rabbi” was 58 (rabbi in quotes because the congregation led by Mx. Kleinbaum is “not affiliated with any denomination or branch of Judaism.”). Thus, we would need a definition of parent as something that did not require “caring for a human under age 18”.

If I were to marry Warren Buffett, for example, would Democrats say that I was a “stepdad” to his 64-year-old youngest son?

Another quote from Greene at the hearing from Yahoo! News:

“I didn’t ask you a question. What I would like to talk about is your recommendations to the CDC, as not a medical doctor, not a biological mother, and really not a teacher, either. So, what you did is you advised the CDC?” Greene said.

My personal efforts in this area haven’t been very successful. When the kids were younger I explained to them that the reason Mindy the Crippler, our golden retriever, was so tightly bonded to me was that I had given birth to her and then nursed her for 8 weeks. They refused to accept my status as a dog mom and cited Mindy’s biological mom, Chaos, as the animal’s only real mother. More recently, I used the “Mother’s Room” at a downtown Boston law firm to change from MIT teaching outfit (jeans and Oshkosh T-shirt) into testifying-at-trial outfit. For this, I was mocked by a couple of female executives from Brazil. I said “This is Massachusetts and it is my right to identify as a mother any time that I want. In fact, I can be more of a mother than either of you will ever be.” Apparently Fox News and MTG are also popular in Brazil because they responded, “You can call yourself whatever you want, but don’t expect us to cooperate.”

Related:

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Why do taxpayers fund transition surgery, but not de-transition surgery?

by philg

“Gender-Affirming Care Covered by MassHealth” describes taxpayer-funded surgical procedures for residents of Maskachusetts who are smart enough to refrain from working (or at least keep their hours to the minimum). MassHealth is the Science State’s version of Medicaid, so it is partially paid for by federal taxpayers and partially by working chumps within Maskachusetts.

As described in the GAS MNG, gender-affirming surgery refers to one or more reconstruction procedures that may be part of a multidisciplinary treatment plan involving medical, surgical, and BH interventions available for the treatment of gender dysphoria. GAS may be part of therapeutic treatment to better align physical characteristics to gender identity.

To complete the miracle of transformation, Maskachusetts hatefully demands that transitioners be at least 18:

(Florida and similar states are pilloried in the corporate media for their denial of gender affirming surgery for minors while Maskachusetts is celebrated for its acceptance of all elements of Rainbow Flagism. Yet the minimum age for genital surgery is apparently the same in both states, at least for those from households where nobody works.)

Bad news for patients like me: “Hair transplantation” is not covered (those suffering from thinning hair must work extra hours, pay taxes to fund Medicaid, and then buy a ticket to South Korea). Also buried in the “Non-Covered Surgeries and Treatments” section:

Reversal of previous GAS [gender affirming surgery]

How can this be? If a patient experiences gender dysphoria and Science has proven that the correct treatment is surgical transition to a different gender, why wouldn’t reversal, which is a similar gender transition, also be covered? The explanation is thin:

As explained in MassHealth’s Guidelines for Medical Necessity Determination for Gender Affirming Surgery, MassHealth has determined that certain procedures and surgeries are either not medically necessary or lack sufficient medical evidence to support their use as treatment for gender dysphoria.

Let’s check those guidelines… there is no explanation of why reversal isn’t covered. The document simply states that “certain procedures and surgeries are not medically necessary for the treatment of gender dysphoria”. You we are informed by the New York Times that if you have gender dysphoria you need surgery, i.e., it is medically necessary.

It looks as though one legislator in Florida is trying to force employers to cover procedures symmetrically. SB 952 says if the employer pays for A-to-B transition it must also pay for B-back-to-A transition. However, it appears as though the bill did not attract any co-sponsors.

And, from 2019, without attracting much attention, Bud Light’s rainbow-themed packaging:

Press release excerpts:

“Bud Light has been a supporter of the LGBTQ+ community since the 80s and we are excited to continue our long-standing partnership with GLAAD by collaborating with them on this new commemorative bottle that celebrates the LGBTQ+ community and everything GLAAD does to support it,” said Andy Goeler, Vice President of Marketing for Bud Light. “The way we see it, our beer is for everyone to enjoy, so we are looking forward to seeing Pride bottles at bars throughout the month of June and beyond. With the release of these new bottles, we hope to create something that everyone can feel proud to hold during Pride month that also makes a positive impact for GLAAD’s initiatives and the LGBTQ+ community overall.”

“For twenty consecutive years, Bud Light has partnered with GLAAD in its mission to accelerate acceptance of LGBTQ people,” said Zeke Stokes, GLAAD Chief Programs Officer. “Bud Light stood with the community at a time when many brands did not, and their continued outspoken support sets the bar for other global brands.”

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ChatGPT bets on soccer

by philg

I asked ChatGPT “Are men better at sports than women?” and the one-page answer boiled down to “no.” I followed up with “Could the Argentina national football team beat the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team?” and the one-page answer boiled down to “impossible to predict.” Here’s part of the response: “In a hypothetical match between these two teams, various factors could influence the outcome, such as each team’s form, injuries, and tactics.”

ChatGPT was happy to bet against Avi Silverberg, “A bearded pro powerlifter [who] entered a women’s competition in Canada — and smashed a record held by a trans lifter who was watching.” (New York Post) Asked “What if a trans woman simply identifies as a woman and doesn’t have any hormone therapy? Will she have an unfair advantage over cisgender women in athletic competition?” GPT-4 talked about “potential” advantage, then reminded us “it’s important to remember that athletic ability is influenced by various factors, including genetics, training, and individual circumstances” and added a “As scientific research progresses and our understanding of transgender athletes’ physiology and performance develops, sports organizations may continue to refine their policies to ensure a fair and inclusive environment for all athletes.” (It would be “inclusive”, for example, to exclude someone such as Avi Silverberg who identified as a woman but who was not on hormones.)

I returned to the subject of soccer: “Has the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team ever been beaten by a team of children?” ChatGPT:

In 2017, the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team (USWNT) participated in a scrimmage against the FC Dallas U-15 Boys Academy team, which comprised of male players under 15 years old. FC Dallas won the informal match with a score of 5-2. However, it’s important to note that this was a scrimmage and not an official match or competition.

Scrimmages and friendly matches like this are often organized to provide teams with practice and opportunities to try out different tactics or lineups without the pressure of official competitions. Comparing the performance of the USWNT in a scrimmage to their performance in official matches and tournaments would not be an accurate representation of their overall skill and achievements.

The USWNT is considered one of the strongest and most successful teams in women’s soccer, having won multiple Olympic gold medals and FIFA Women’s World Cups.

They’re one of the strongest teams, aside from having been beaten by children? My follow-up: “You say that the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team was beaten by a team of children, but you’re not sure one way or the other if Argentina’s national football team could beat them?” ChatGPT doubled down on “it was only a scrimmage when they lost to the 14-year-old boys” and continued to refuse to bet on the Argentine men:

It is generally difficult to make direct comparisons between male and female sports teams, as their performances are influenced by various factors.

What if we leave out the male/female aspect and just ask whether children could beat Argentine adults?

It is highly unlikely that a team of children could beat Argentina’s national football team in an official match. The Argentina men’s national football team consists of professional adult players who have developed their skills, physical fitness, and tactical understanding of the game over many years. In contrast, children are still in the process of developing their physical abilities, skills, and understanding of the game.

The physical differences between children and adult professional football players, such as strength, speed, and endurance, would give Argentina’s national football team a significant advantage. Furthermore, the experience and tactical knowledge of the professional players would likely make it difficult for a team of children to compete effectively.

So… ChatGPT is sure that Argentina’s best adults (note that “men’s soccer” is actually gender-neutral; a player of any gender ID can join a team) could beat children. And ChatGPT knows that children have beaten the US National Women’s Team. But ChatGPT will not apply transitivity to conclude that Argentina’s best gender-inclusive soccer team could beat the U.S. gender-exclusive women-only soccer team.

I’m impressed at ChatGPT’s orthodoxy when it comes to the entire progressive religion. It seems almost impossible to trap GPT-4 into thoughtcrime.

The English tabloids aren’t as diplomatic:

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Argentina investor looks at another government that can’t resist spending beyond its means

by philg

A recent Wall Street Journal interview with a guy who made $billions in Argentine bonds… “Paul Singer, the Man Who Saw the Economic Crises Coming”. First, let’s check his track record as a prophet:

“Men and nations behave wisely,” the Israeli statesman Abba Eban observed, “when they have exhausted all other resources.”

In an interview for these pages in 2011, he warned about the broad discretion the then-new Dodd-Frank law gave government officials to deal with what they deem systemic risks. The “atmosphere of unpredictability” doesn’t “make the system any safer,” he said. “This is nuts to be identifying systemically important institutions.”

A dozen years later, he still thinks it’s nuts: “As we’ve seen with SVB and Signature, virtually any institution can be deemed systemically important overnight and seized, with the government then completely empowered to determine what happens to various classes of creditors.”

The result is to destroy market discipline and encourage bankers to behave recklessly. He recounts a conversation on the trading desk at his firm following the recent weekend of bank bailouts. “If they hadn’t guaranteed all the deposits,” a colleague said, “things would’ve gotten very ugly in the markets on Monday.”

Mr. Singer replied: “That is entirely true. Things would’ve been ugly. But is that what regulation is supposed to be? Wrapping all market movements in security blankets?”

What about the most significant economic phenomenon of the moment?

Mr. Singer saw inflation coming at the start of the Covid pandemic. “We think it is very unlikely that central bankers will move to normalize monetary policy after the current emergency is over,” he wrote in an April 2020 letter to investors. “They did not normalize last time”—meaning after the 2008 crisis—“and the world has moved demonstrably closer to a tipping point after which money printing, prices and the growth of debt are in an upward spiral that the monetary authorities realize cannot be broken except at the cost of a deep recession and credit collapse.”

Mindful of the history of the 1970s, when inflation retreated several times only to come roaring back, Mr. Singer figures short-term declines will convince policy makers that they’ve slain the beast. They’ll “probably go back to their playbook,” resuming the policy of easy money.

The guy’s remedy is one that will never fly with the American voter:

How do we chart a course back toward sound money and long-term prosperity? “The optimistic scenario,” Mr. Singer replies, “would entail pro-growth reforms across the board, including tax reductions, entitlement reforms, regulatory streamlining, encouraging energy development including hydrocarbons . . . cutting federal spending, selling the asset holdings on central bank balance sheets.”

(see quote from Abba Eban, above)

Let’s assume that Congress and the Fed are never going to change. How does an individual investor protect him/her/zir/theirself from the doom that Singer predicts? That’s where it gets tough! The guy is bearish on nearly all assets, especially crypto. His $55 billion Elliott Management fund can do things that none of us can do, e.g., buy a big stake in Salesforce and get the company to fire 10 percent of its employees to boost profits (and therefore stock value).

A friend who has done some co-investing with Paul Singer’s fund points out that “talk is cheap” and he won’t accept Singer as a prophet without evidence that he made huge money in inflation swaps after that April 2020 newsletter to his clients. Wikipedia points out that Singer was predicting doom in 2014:

In short, if this smart and experienced fund manager is right, U.S. and European assets will be eroded by inflation for the next few years and returns to investors will be minimal.

In a November 2014 investment letter, Elliott described optimism about U.S. growth as unwarranted. “Nobody can predict how long governments can get away with fake growth, fake money, fake jobs, fake financial stability, fake inflation numbers and fake income growth,” Elliott wrote. “When confidence is lost, that loss can be severe, sudden and simultaneous across a number of markets and sectors.”

Anyone who acted on that advice would have done quite poorly until 2022!

Maybe the take-away should be that Americans today aren’t smarter than Americans were in the 1960s and 1970s. Inflation jumped dramatically in 1966 as Lyndon Johnson and Congress spent like alimony plaintiffs on (1) the Great Society programs of Medicare, Medicaid, etc., and (2) the Vietnam War. The inflation rate did not come down to the pre-1966 level until 1998. Maybe we could argue that inflation was finally whipped by 1992 (chart):

If we’re expecting at least 26 years of elevated inflation, what do we do? For a person who doesn’t already have a house, one reasonable response is for him/her/zir/them to try to get a 100 percent mortgage at today’s 6.5-7 percent 30-year rates. Put some stocks in as collateral as necessary to hit the 100 percent number. If Paul Singer is right that the D.C. technocrats won’t be able to resist inflation-as-usual policies, inflation will render the real cost of borrowing almost $0. If Paul Singer is wrong, there is no prepayment penalty so just refinance if rates fall dramatically.

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Why is it called “NCAA Men’s Basketball”?

by philg

A game will occur today that The Google calls “NCAA Men’s Basketball”. Yet, in fact, nothing stops an athlete identifying with a gender other than “male” from joining either of the participating teams. From the NCAA’s rules:

And from Smith College:

Note that “such a team is eligible for a men’s NCAA championship” regarding a team in which athletes in a rainbow of gender IDs participate. By contrast, as soon as one “male” (however a biologist might define the term) is on a team, that team is ineligible for a “women’s NCAA championship.”

Given that Science recognizes 74 gender IDs, I’m not sure why the NCAA is stuck in gender binarism. What they actually offer are leagues that are gender-inclusive and leagues that are gender-restricted. It really should be “NCAA Gender-inclusive Basketball” (since a hoop-lover of any gender ID can compete) and “NCAA Women’s-only Basketball” or, perhaps, “NCAA Gender-restricted Basketball”.

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Why didn’t NCAA boycott Florida and Texas for March Madness?

by philg

NCAA is supposed to boycott states that do not practice Rainbow Flagism. “N.C.A.A. Ends Boycott of North Carolina After So-Called Bathroom Bill Is Repealed” (NYT, 2017):

The N.C.A.A. on Tuesday “reluctantly” lifted its ban on holding championship events in North Carolina, removing its six-month-old prohibition less than a week after the state’s Legislature and governor repealed a so-called bathroom bill that had led to boycotts of the state.

The organization, which governs college athletics, said in a statement that the law’s replacement in North Carolina had “minimally achieved a situation where we believe N.C.A.A. championships may be conducted in a nondiscriminatory environment.”

Where were the March Madness basketball games held? Among other places, Florida and Texas. Both of these states are on the official California boycott list for their insufficient devotion to the 2SLGBTQQIA+ community (2021):

California is adding Florida and four other states to its official travel ban list after Attorney General Rob Bonta said Monday the states passed anti-LGBTQ laws that are “directly targeting transgender youth.”

Before Bonta’s announcement Monday, 12 other states were already on the California ban list: Alabama, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and Texas.

California in 2017 banned state-funded travel to Texas after the nation’s second most-populous state allowed agencies to reject adoptions by LGBTQ couples based on religious reasons.

Here are NCAA basketball tournament cities for 2023 that are in no-go locations for righteous Californians:

  • Birmingham, Alabama
  • Des Moines, Iowa
  • Orlando, Florida
  • Greensboro, North Carolina
  • Louisville, Kentucky
  • for the Final Four… Houston, Texas (“Due to existing Texas laws, abortion is now banned in Texas.” says the leading abortion care industry vendor)

Why not rename this event “The Tournament of Hate”? And what happened to NCAA’s principles between 2017 and 2023?

Separately, note that South Florida is home to 50 percent of the Final Four teams with Florida Atlantic University (sounds private, but is state-run) and University of Miami (sounds state-run, but is private).

Related:

  • “I’m calling on the NCAA to boycott Texas (again) after SCOTUS allows abortion ban” (Deadspin, 2021): From lifting mask mandates to trying to control women’s bodies – the NCAA should stop hosting events in the Lone Star State … “This extreme Texas law blatantly violates the constitutional right established under Roe v. Wade and upheld as precedent for nearly half a century,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. … In March, I suggested that the NIT and the NCAA Women’s Tournament consider boycotting Texas after Gov. Greg Abbott lifted the mask mandate.
  • if you love sports and roasting/basting in Miami’s summer weather, the May 5-7 Formula 1 race (only $590 to attend, but that doesn’t include a seat)
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Hanna Reitsch and Women’s History Month

by philg

Here’s a tweet in which the author says we should celebrate people who were born during Women’s History Month (a.k.a. “March”) if they identified as “women”:

Today is the birthday of Hanna Reitsch, almost surely the greatest aviatrix who has ever lived (among other achievements, she taught herself to fly a single-seat helicopter in the 1930s). She held some political opinions that are unpopular today (e.g., “It was the blackest day when we could not die at our Führer’s side”). Should that prevent people from including her in a course on Women’s History? Most history classes include information about people whose actions and moral beliefs were not laudable, e.g., anything about the Civil War, any course on the Roman Empire, etc.

  • “Ginsburg, on the other hand, has hired only one African American law clerk in her 25 years on the Supreme Court. This is an improvement from her 13-year tenure on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, when Ginsburg never had any black clerks.” (Washington Post 2018)
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The bureaucratic end of gender-affirming care for children in Florida

by philg

Yesterday was the last day on which a child could receive “medically necessary” gender-affirming care, the end of a one-year bureaucratic process (even in Florida, government does not move at Amazon speed!). From April 2022… “Gender-affirming care, a ‘crucial’ process for thousands of young people in America” (CNN):

The Florida Department of Health now says a vital kind of medical care known as gender-affirming care should not be an option for children and teens, even though every major medical association recommends such care and says it can save lives.

The department’s new guidelines suggest that children should be provided social support from peers and family and should seek counseling. But it says they should be denied treatments that can be a part of this care, including calling the child or teen by the name and pronoun they prefer and allowing them to wear clothing or hairstyles that match their gender identity.

Gender-affirming care is medically necessary, evidence-based care that uses a multidisciplinary approach to help a person transition from their assigned gender – the one the person was designated at birth – to their affirmed gender – the gender by which one wants to be known.

The gold standard of care
Major medical associations – including the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry – agree that gender-affirming care is clinically appropriate for children and adults.

The regulators of Florida’s MDs began to shut down the gold standard in September 2022 (source):

The final rule:

64B8-9.019 Standards of Practice for the Treatment of Gender Dysphoria in Minors.
(1) The following therapies and procedures performed for the treatment of gender dysphoria in minors are prohibited.
(a) Sex reassignment surgeries, or any other surgical procedures, that alter primary or secondary sexual characteristics.
(b) Puberty blocking, hormone, and hormone antagonist therapies.
(2) Minors being treated with puberty blocking, hormone, or hormone antagonist therapies prior to the effective date of this rule may continue with such therapies.

The regulators of Florida’s DOs went off the gold standard effective today (source) with an identical rule.

And on the other coast… “California Becomes First Sanctuary State for Transgender Youth Seeking Medical Care” (from state-sponsored media):

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Judaism and modern gender science

by philg

“Ancient Judaism Recognized a Range of Genders. It’s Time We Did, Too.” (New York Times, March 18, 2023):

I’m transgender and nonbinary, and as a rabbi I’ve offered bereavement spiritual care for the past 17 years.

There are four genders beyond male or female that appear in ancient Jewish holy texts hundreds of times.

We were always hiding in plain sight, but recently the research of Jewish studies scholars like Max Strassfeld has demonstrated how nonbinary gender is central to understanding Jewish law and literature as a whole.

I have never forgotten this insight [that Judaism is the same as Rainbow Flagism]. Trans people, and especially trans young people, make human uniqueness more visible for everyone. … Trans liberation is a gift to everyone, because it expands the categories for what it means to be human.

The growing wave of anti-trans bills in the United States represents not just a trans crisis, but a humanitarian crisis. History has shown countless times that when a government limits one group’s legal rights, it will eventually do the same to other groups.

I might be accused of having a “trans agenda.” I do. And it’s the same as my religious and my human agenda. I want trans kids, and all young people, to survive.

Because the Science is Settled and no reasonable person could disagree with the above interpretation of Jewish texts, the New York Times has disabled comments on this scholarly work. What would an unreasonable Jew say if he/she/ze/they were allowed to comment? I submitted the NYT article to a friend who has read the Talmud a few times. His response is below (not in quote style for clarity).

Sex-change operations involving the surgical removal of sexual organs are clearly forbidden on the basis of the explicit biblical prohibition, “And that which is mauled or crushed or torn or cut you shall not offer unto the Lord; nor should you do this in your land” (Lev. 22:24). Sterilization of women is also prohibited, as recorded in Even ha-Ezer 5:11.

Rabbi Meir Amsel (Ha-Ma’or, Kislev-Tevet 5733) notes that yet another prohibition is also applicable to sex-change procedures, a consideration which may extend as well to hormone treatment for purposes of sex-change. The commandment “A woman shall not wear that which pertains to a man, nor shall a man put on a woman’s garment” (Deut. 22:5) is not limited to the wearing of apparel associated with the opposite sex but encompasses any action uniquely identified with the opposite sex, proscribing, for example, shaving of armpits or dyeing of hair by a male. A procedure designed to transform sexual characteristics violates the very essence of this prohibition.

For Besamim Rosh sexual identity, insofar as marriage is concerned, depends entirely upon the presence of genital organs. No mention is made of the presence or absence of secondary sexual characteristics and indeed it is not difficult to understand why they are deemed irrelevant. Hence, despite the comments of Rabbi Amsel, who asserts that secondary sexual characteristics play a role in sexual identification, there is no evidence that the transformation of secondary sexual characteristics affects sexual status in any way.

There is at least one early source which apparently declares that a male cannot acquire the status of a woman by means of surgery. Rabbi Abraham Hirsch (No’am 5733) cites the comments of Rabbenu Chananel, quoted by Ibn Ezra in his commentary on Leviticus 18:22. Rabbenu Chananel declares that intercourse between a normal male and a male in whom an artificial vagina has been fashioned by means of surgery constitutes sodomy. This would appear to be the case, according to Rabbenu Chananel, even if the male genitalia were removed.

[I find the last paragraph stunning. Wikipedia says that Chananel lived 1000 years ago. How did he anticipate that one day American surgeons would be banking $100,000+ per teenager for creating artificial body parts?]

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