#tw: IGM

[ipso-faculty]

This is a rant about the Scientific American diagram on intersex

This diagram makes the rounds periodically as an illustration of how sex development is complicated. Unfortunately, I don't think people really give it a close look, because it is incredibly intersexist.

The first thing to know about this diagram is it advocates for intersex genital mutilation. Here are actual boxes in the diagram:

"Genitals can be modified to look more typically female" is written in the part about how CAH looks at birth. "Dysgenic gonad and testis can be removed and genitals modified to look female" is under MGD at birth. "Dysgenic gonad can be removed and genitals modified to look male" is ALSO under MGD at birth and under PAIS.

Let's be clear here. This diagram is advocating that *babies* should be put through genital mutilation that causes permanent nerve damage, just so the babies can look "normal". 🤬

It also advocates removing gonads from babies, because they're the "wrong" ones. 🤬

The same diagram also advocates putting intersex youths on HRT to "promote (male/female) characteristics" or "regulate effects of [one's natural but apparently incorrect] male hormones". Again, coercive medical shit used to try and make our bodies conform to perinormativity without regard for our bodily autonomy, gender identity, goals, etc. 👀

Speaking of gender. The text that looks like the title of the diagram is the infobox on "the gender spectrum", which visually makes this seem about gender rather than sex. 🤨 This infobox also sucks: it defines trans, cis, and nonbinary, without any regard for how intersex people identify. I assume it's there to try explain to ignorant people that intersex is not gender, but in doing so it totally forgets that intersex people have gender and we often don't fit into these definitions of trans/nb/cis! It really reflects a view that intersex people aren't people with experiences and identities, we are just anatomical oddities. 🙃

The descriptions in the diagram are also gratuitously gendered. Like, "male hormones" are used rather than androgens, "female hormones" are used rather than estrogens, and there's vague shit like "male characteristics" (which ones?). 👀

Unsurprisingly, intersex variations are referred to by their pathologizing names, and they're called "intersex conditions" rather than variations. Language in the diagram throws around loaded shit like "biological male" (as in, intersex people are not). 🙃

Altogether this is an intersexist diagram, and it's upsetting every time I see it make the rounds. This is not the pro-intersex diagram people seem to think it is. 😩

[gillyeowalters]

To this day, many intersex people are mutilated as infants or toddlers.

From malevolent attempts to make their bodies more visually appealing to completely forcing them into a male/female binary.

Please do not just use our suffering as a 'gotcha' moment to own TERFS and other fascists. Please do not forget about us.

Edit: Also, not all parents know what is done to their child. Sometimes, they are lied to, and they are told that the surgery is necessary or even life-saving. Sometimes they are left completely oblivious, like in my case.

Having your child under the care of female staff/doctors does NOT matter. The surgeon who decided to operate on me was female.

For better readability:

Sometimes they can't wait to clip your wings.

I was two days old.

I was supposed to be a moth.

Instead I had to be pretty.

I seek healing.

I denied the false cocoon.

I'd rather be a clipped moth than a forced butterfly.

I sadly do not know how to properly ID something. Other users have reblogged with IDs however, thank you for your work.

[gillyeowalters]

I do not wish to derail this, but I also want to point out that there are still intersex people who are even surgically being forced into femininity/'womanhood'.

Please do not take this as a 'but we have it worse'. It is just not talked about enough.

This includes masc/fem and non-binary intersex people, who are forced into a gender or whose genitalia are altered because they do not fit into the ideal of the 'pretty, feminine vagina'.

Big CW/TW for mutilation:

I was surgically mutilated when I was an infant. My parents were lied to. I was assigned female at birth, and my family and I only began to suspect something was off when I did not enter female puberty. But most gynecologists were not trained to understand intersex anatomy, so I was sent from unnecessary and unsuccessful treatment to treatment.

I had and have urinary issues and can't undergo any genital checkup without local anesthesia.

The sad irony is that my parents never tried to force me into femininity. They wanted a happy child, not a female child. When they learned what happened, much later in my life, they felt like they had failed to protect me.

Femininity and womanhood are vicious things when forced onto someone. They are harmful when used as an excuse for cruelty.

And I am proud to be the man I am. Because they tried their hardest to shape me into their image. And they failed.

Being forcefully raised as a woman is not any less traumatic and emotionally repressive as being forcefully raised as a man. Femininity is not inherently pure and safe. Coercing someone to perform femininity is not any less toxic than coerced masculinity. Being dysphoric around femininity or having trauma from women doesn’t make you a misogynist.

[intersexbunny]

people really fail to see the physical violence behind the hyperinvisibility of intersex people.

we are erased in legislation and society broadly but we are also victims of an extermination campaign.

our invisibility doesn't come from people just failing to recognize us it comes from the fact that we are mutilated at birth and if we are not mutilated at birth we are mutilated at puberty. people without variations that can be changed by surgery are put on hormones against their will. it is rare to find an intersex person who hasn't experienced medical violence!

so many intersex people don't even know that they, themselves are intersex! some people have their intersex variation hidden from them, being outright lied to by parents and doctors about their own body. other people are never given the word intersex, they are told they have a DSD (disorder of sexual development), that they have a medical problem. almost no intersex person is told that they are intersex by a doctor.

our lack of visibility is written in literal blood. so when someone tries to say "well, intersex people don't have it that bad, no one is thinking about them" they're saying that all this "isn't so bad" that an effective extermination campaign "isn't that bad" because they can't see it happening.

[wtchgrrl]

intersex person: yeah my parents agreed to put me under surgery as a baby because my doctor thought my genitals made me ugly. they feel numb half the time. sometimes i can’t tell if it’s blood, discharge or piss down there. i feel violated in every sense of the word. i can’t look below the waist without wanting to throw up

person you thought was safe: lmao imagine being so privileged you complain about getting surgery that some would die to have lollll #cis privilege

[genderkoolaid]

medical literature about intersex people be like "there are problems that can be caused by forcing surgery on babies. luckily we are solving this by forcing surgery on even younger babies. it is vital that this baby CANNOT be left alone to develop normally. here is our 36 step guide on which surgeries you should force on which babies. also some people who were forced to have surgery as babies are saying that forcing surgeries on babies might be "harmful" so consider that too I guess"

[intertransstuff]

"the sex is binary, it's biological reality"

and then you need to enforce it's reality by mutilating infants' bodies without their knowledge and consent with mostly cosmetic goals*

and then you need to enforce it's reality by having gender mark in every possible document

and then you need to change this mark back and forth if the intersex person "falls away" of their assignment too much and it's more convenient to push them in other box

and then you need to enforce it reality by pushing childrens and adults on "treatments" of their intersex variations by fearmongering, coercion, and/or blatant lie (or without their knowledge at all)

and then you need to enforce it's reality by hiding their own medical history from intersex people

and then you need to enforce it's reality by artificially lowering the statistics of intersex variations' frequency

and then you need to enforce it's reality by selective abortions of intersex fetuses

and then you need to enforce it's reality by giving people no opt-out of it

and then you need to enforce it's reality by gatekeeping transition as much as possible

and then you need to enforce it's reality by refusing to add any way of opting-out a bit, like neutral gender marks, ban of unnecessary surgeries on infants and using active monitoring instead, etc.

if you need to ban back and forth to protect "reality," you aren't protecting reality. you're just trying to push people in your wrong narrative.

*some variations cause things that require immediate intervention, but 1) not all variations, only some; 2) immediate intervention should solve acute problem, and not focus on cosmetic part and tries to create binary-looking genitals

[osokasstuff]

the part of intersex experience that is rarely discussed is all the difficulties with urinating and sexual/related activities. some of which may be caused by variations themselves and some may be caused by igm.

anatomy and physiology of variations itself, nerve damage from igm, poor results of igm because doctors care more about creating typical look than about quality of life, ptsd and its psychosomatic effects, and more stuff.

also co-occuring conditions! because some intersex variations have increased rates of kidney & urinal tract anomalies.

but we can't talk about it because 1) the topics themselves are stigmatized; 2) intersex bodies are seen as gross and weird and "too much"; 3) every our word can be twisted in "that's why intersex variations are actually always medical problems and should be 'corrected'."

like for me these issues are the part of intersexness that is constantly on my nose but i can't even talk about it without extreme shame and fear. and i spend years thinking that it's all my fault.

[yourfaveisintersex]

Elphaba Thropp from The Wizard of Oz series is canonically intersex in the novel Wicked (1995)! Her exact variation and traits aren't specified, but it can be inferred she has ambiguous genitalia, and may have experienced IGM.

[ipso-faculty]

Proposing some intersex gender modality & transition terms

So there are a whole bunch of different ways that intersex people can be/identify as trans. I've been thinking about what names would be useful for articulating these differences and in this post I'll list what I've got so far. 🧑‍🔬

I'm hoping to get feedback on these, so if you have feedback let me know! 💛 I expect to edit this post, to incorporate feedback and further ideas.

CW: mention of IGM and forced HRT

Types of transitions

Distransition: a medical transition forced upon an intersex person, such as through IGM or forced HRT. Dis- to indicate the negative aspect of the transition being coercive, as well as to connote disability since this process is so frequently traumatic and/or disability-causing. In disability studies language it's a form of debility (disability caused through systemic violence).

Mistransition: a distransition (forced transition) that is not in alignment with a person's gender identity. Mis- to indicate the incorrectness of the alignment as well as to maintain a negative connotation because this is a coercive transition.

Entransition: a consensual transition done by an intersex person. Contrast to distransition. En- acts as an opposite to dis- and also to me indicates a level of intent (e.g. envision, enact, enliven). It also serves to indicate that transition is different for intersex bodies than for perisex bodies.

Retransition: an entransition done by an intersex person who previously had been distransitioned. I.e. when an intersex person does a second transition to undo, alter, or improve a forced transition. Re- to indicate a second transition, but also that it's a revision of the first one. EDIT #1: This term is not intersex exclusive, and may also be used by perisex trans people who have transitioned multiple times. EDIT #2: For an intersex-exclusive version, I suggest "re-entransition", combining re- and en-.

Retrotransition: a retransition that is done to undo the effects of forced transition. So an intersex person who, after being forced into a binary gender, then transitions their body towards a best approximation of what their body's natural state would have been without forced transition. Retro- for backwards to indicate undoing that is worth differentiating from detransitioning.

Laterotransition: a retransition done by an intersex person to a gender that is neither the gender externally imposed by a distransition nor what their body's "natural state" would be. For example, an AFAB AIS person who was coercively transitioned female, who then later transitioned male. Latero- as contrast to retro- (latero- is to the side, antero- is forward) as well as to indicate the turn away from the path set forth externally by parents/doctors.

Anterotransition: a retransition done by an intersex person that continues the direction set forth by previous forced transition. So additional transitioning done by somebody whose gender is in alignment with what was externally imposed. While this will probably be somebody's AGAB, it doesn't have to be - some times intersex people are forcibly transitioned to a different gender than their AGAB.

All of these transitions would have an analogous gender modality. So an entransgender person is somebody who has/is undergoing/intends to entransition. And a retrotransgender person likewise has/is undergoing/intends to retrotransition.

I see distransition and mistransition as potentially useful for intersex people talking about trauma and structural intersexism. I think entransition might be useful for talking about how being intersex and transitioning is frequently different than for perisex people, especially if it is a retransition. And perhaps distransition and anterotransition may be of use to exparium folks.

Personally: I was distransitioned as an adolescent and have recently started a process of medically retrotransitioning.

Feedback welcome! A list of revisions will go at the bottom of this post. Will make flags for terms once I feel satisfied with them.

Edits

2024-01-16: I've been informed by @chipbutbetter that retrans is already used by some perisex folks with complicated transition patterns, so I have edited to say this term should not be intersex exclusive. Thanks! 🏳️‍⚧️

2024-01-16: thought about an intersex-specific version of retransition and landed on "re-entransition". A little awkward but combines both retransition and entransition! Flexible on whether to include a hyphen (reentransition).

[stage-system]

i'm sick and tired of AGAB language. this was originally the medical community's terminology to describe which way they mutilated intersex infants which was then reclaimed by the intersex community, which was then appropriated and wildly misued by the queer community at large (this ship has pretty much sailed although perisex people are still trying to steal replacement terms such as CAGAB, VASAB, and SABAB). people these days are straight-up using it as a substitute for asking what's in people's pants. instead of AGAB, people should say what they fucking mean in a way that's relevant to the conversation at hand. talking about people mostly percieved as male growing up? say that! talking about people who get periods? say that! talking about people with a specific body part (who may or may not have other "matching" body parts)? say that! i don't get the aversion to using specific, relevant, and inclusive language, especially when the alternative is to create another goddamn binary.

yes i'm angry, yes i know this is aggressive, but i think i have every damn right to be

[the-life-of-a-herm]

To say that somebody who's body was coercively changed into being more female/male is now "too much of a woman/man" to be trans, you are upholding the oppression and mutilation of intersex people. There truly is no way around it.

[identitty-dickruption]

to be clear. the problem with the dyadic/perisex desire to bring up genital mutilation any time they see the word "intersex" is Not "they shouldn't talk about this". the problem is that the way it is discussed is incredibly fetishistic and dehumanising, and often not relevant to what is actually being discussed by a given intersex person at the time. it is an act of fetishisation to marvel at the kinds of trauma we experience in the same way you might marvel at a gross historical artefact. and it is also quite simply impolite to bring up a common source of trauma for intersex people as if that source of trauma is strange or weird

also. at the end of the day, bringing up igm every time you see an intersex person talking about being intersex Still comes down to bringing up intersex genitals constantly. it is still a way of signalling to us that you don't see us as real human people beyond what happens to be in our pants. particularly gross because, again, this is a traumatic experience you're talking about here. please just be wary about how you talk about igm and the contexts you talk about it in

[satellites-halo]

I know people are gonna get mad at me for this but whatever. It's a bit isolating seeing all the big intersex bloggers on here be undiagnosed or have variations that only show up in puberty. No hate to any of them, they're just as intersex as me, but it leaves people with variations that were present from birth without the same level of community and it's hard to talk about struggles specific to people who went through IGM, invasive testing, etc etc as children and the trauma that comes with that whenever people who did not experience that until their teen years tend to be the loudest about it. Some of us were mutilated as infants, and it doesn't feel good to see so many people who were not victims of IGM trying to speak for us or thinking they fully understand our experiences because they went through medical intervention around puberty Which is still awful, don't get me wrong, but there is a difference and I feel generally unsafe and uncomfortable talking about my experiences because someone who didn't go through anything like that tends to hijack the post on accident, not realizing that's what they're doing

[dhddmods]

So while doing more research on intersex variations, we found that - although there's very limited discussion of it - it seems that persistent cloacas don't always require surgery. Its just that nobody examines or tests the strength of the pelvic floor muscles, or the internal appearance of the cloaca, before shoving kids into surgery.

You can be a healthy adult with an unaltered persistent cloaca. It is possible.

And also, surgery for persistent cloaca are far more cosmetic then it should be. There's way too much focus on making three separate canals, when - if surgery is necessary - the focus should be on making a functional separated anus, not making a "normal urethra & vagina." There's no need to make them as perisex-looking as possible!

As far as we've seen in our research, the only intersex variation that 100% always needs surgery is urethral agenesis, because they have no way to urinate. And even then, the focus of doctors is to make it as perisex-appearing as possible.

For example, a person with a penis & urethral agenesis should usually be given a perineal urethrostomy, not a urethroplasty that reconstructs the penis, because that damages an infants penile tissue unnecessarily, and can cause sexual dysfunction, scarring, desensitization, or chronic pain later in life (since they are young, and their genitals are not developed enough for such complex procedures yet.) Theres only a few cases where opening the urethra through the penis itself would be more ethical - specifically, in the scenario where the urethra is still mostly formed but there's just a small part that is undeveloped, and all it would take to open it is to push a tool into the existing urethra and break through the undeveloped part. And even that avoids cutting open the penis itself, which saves the erectile tissue from getting scarred.

Doctors need to stop giving surgery to intersex children unless its absolutely necessary. And when it is necessary, they should thoroughly investigate the best course of action, and shouldn't prioritize appearance over functionality!

[ur-fav-pet]

omg do u see how easy it is to NOT use a slur that encourages the oppression of a minority and the mutilation of infants!!!!!!!!

edit to clarify: this is an edited screenshot. vrelnir and purityguy are still very much intersex with no plans to change this even tho it would be easy as hell and cause no issues.