We believe that our biology – manifest in our bodies – really determines our gender.”

yes, and as such, some people who were born male, still carry that privilege with them even after they transition to female, and therefore can still father (or have fathered) children, without being seen as “truly male”.

on the other hand, people born as female, have no privilege, including when it comes to defining who they are, and as such, cannot engage in reproduction without being seen as “truly female”.

while that’s certainly not universal (i.e., many people will never accept any transpeople as their target gender), it’s something i’ve noticed.

I knew an FtM who was pregnant back in the 90s. I think his name was Matt Rice. He had a son (who, if memory serves, was autistic). I thought then, and I think now, that it was marvelous. He would send me photos of himself as he began to show. I thought it was pretty cool to see a balding, bearded pregnant man. He drew an incredible amount of flack for his pregnancy. He was dating Pat Califia, I think. Forgive me, my memory is sometimes like swiss cheese. In any event, he and I kept up with each other for many years. He even sent me his resume once when he was job hunting and I was CFOing. I was sorry when we finally lost touch.

I also think that some have put forth the idea that biology is socially constructed, certainly as it relates to sex. Again, my memory fails me, but I thought it was Judith Butler. In the end, I think that I — at least at a conscious thinking level — DON’T believe that my biology is real. I don’t think that surgery made me a woman. I’m not even clear there is such a thing AS woman. That said, I play along, more often than not.

Great post.

people feel threatened by those of us whose bodies move outside of what they have decided are these narrow narratives that have been constructed for what it means to be trans, and as such i have seen a lot of the bigoted hatred that he referenced on the Oprah show, and have been disheartened to say the least, although i know better i would have hoped we would have moved beyond such a fear of those who embody being trans differently.

p.s.
i’m excited to read more of your thoughts on the constructed nature of science!

Thanks for the pointer to your blog.

I think people like Mr. Beattie, who choose a “radical” stance with regard to their body, will, for quite some time, elicit reactions of all kinds.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Beattie’s pregnancy has elicited a wide variety of reactions in the gay/lesbian community (check out links from my post on it to other places), but it has also served as a platform to do a little education and to provide an opening for some discussions about sex, gender and sexuality and their independence and simultaneous interrelationship.

Good to hear from you.

I like your discussion of fuzzy categorization and platypuses. This example is exactly what I’m getting at – or trying to anyway – in this, and future, post(s).

Too, I understand about wanting to embody masculinity yet finding “man” and “maleness” odd. Today I’m okay with man as term of self-organization (gee, isn’t that a title of a book!?), but that may change.

What intrigues most about Mr. Beattie’s situation is a lack of thoughtful reflection on such categories as “science.”

I admire him for following his heart. My heart led me down a different path, but our world needs more people with heart.

I’ve been on T for a few months now, and while I can’t see myself ever wanting to be pregnant, I’m wondering if I even want the categories of “man” and “woman” to apply to me. It’s completely impossible to strictly define “man” or “woman” and that’s actually, fine as all categories are more or less like that – they ALL have fuzzy edges. Platypuses nurse their young which hatch from eggs. That doesn’t mean there can’t be such a thing as mammal, that just means it’s not always cut and dry. Anyway, for me, I want to embody masculinity. Do I want to embody maleness? I don’t even know what it means!

There’s a really interesting book on Ontology called “Women, Fire and Dangerous Things” and talks about the inherently subjective nature of categorization systems. It’s a really good book – and probably the source of my platypus analogy. From it and from feminist thought, I got the notion that categories might be a good way to describe the world, but that they’re nothing but trouble when they become prescriptive.