March 9, 2008 (in discob.multiply.com)
The title of this post comes straight from a seminar I attended this past Friday.
I have to say, it’s a super controverse subject, as not many people accept neither homosexuals/transexuals/tranvestites nor the idea that the standards in society are changing rapidly.
I have to say, I was intrigued when I was told that there was no class, and that we were to attend the seminar, as I love to learn more over this sort of topics and to leave the auditorium enlightened, as I would have just received an eye-opener line, so to speak.
So this seminar started, and the Professor started speaking about the topic. He begun by defining what transexuals, homosexuals and transvestites were. In case you wouldn’t know, a transexual is someone who feels trapped in another’s body, who feels disgust for their sexual organs; a homosexual is someone who feels sexual and emotional attraction to someone of the same sex; finally, a transvestive is someone who (in his words) is so vain and likes him/herself so much, that even likes to see him/herself dressed with the opposite sex’ clothes. That said, he continued to explain that there were four different sexes and that we should make a clear distinction between “sex” and “gender” due to this matter. The four sexes are as following:
1) the sex of the exterior sexual organs;
2) the sex of the interior sexual organs (testicles, ovaries, etc.)
3) the sex of the genes (XX / XY)
4) the sex that people percieve you as (“social sex”) – say if you are a man and have feminin mannerisms, people might say you are an absolute woman, even though you look like a man.
Up till here, he showed himself pretty much liberal and progressive. As he continued he brought up the obvious “When will they express their desire to change their sex?”. Well, usually it may occur when they are young, however, there are cases of “late transexualism”, meaning, they might even be married and/or have kids, but finally realized they couldn’t be happy being a man/woman. What could have led them to marry was the fact that they thought that “the problem” was just in their head and was nothing to worry about and that, in time, it would go away.
As I am a law student, the next issue started with marriage and parenting.
[ I don't know how it works in the Philippines (and I'm only mentioning the Philippines, because most of my readers are Filipino anyway
), but in Portugal, gay marriage is not allowed, not even common-law marriage is recognized for gay/transexual couples (common-law marriage is when two people live together as a couple but have not gotten married, however, they share the same rights and duties as a officialy married couple; this term might not be the correct term to indicate this sort of union, but at least I got the idea explained). Let me explain, common-law marriage, according to the definition on the Civil Code, is a relationship between two persons who are living together voluntarily in analogue conditions to their partners. That said, you'd be asking what does "analogue conditions to their partners" mean, it basically means that, even though you are not married you introduce your partner as your wife/husband and live your lives together, just like a married couple, I mean, a traditional couple (aka heterosexual couple) ]
Anyway, back to where I left off, lets suppose a married couple, one man, one woman. The man realizes, after getting married that he wants to be a woman. What happens to the marriage? “That’s sort of an idiotic question, Dann”, you’d probably think, “because the marriage is obviously annuled.” Not necessarily, I have to say, as in some countries the sex change is not even allowed because of the previous marriage. Weird, I’d say, I didn’t quite get it, though.
Let’s now change the situation, there’s a couple, one man and one woman, they have kids. Sex change is approved, the man becomes a woman, what happens to the kids? “Can they still see the “father” ” – the Professor inquired. I was shocked when he threw this question to the air, as I cannot understand the problem with the children having two moms, or two dads!! However, please allow me to proceed with the seminar, as I will give you my personal comment to this whole event later.
He proceeded to explain what happens in Holland after the sex change, where your gender referred in your ID card is “updated“, in contrast with what happens in Portugal, as the gender remains forever the same, meaning you will still be a man/woman, even though you look like a woman/man. Meaning that, in Portugal, transexuals could never get married as they will always remain men or women, in contrast with Holland, where, even if gay marriage was not allowed, they would still be able to get married, since they would then be considered of the opposite gender.
He then stopped talking and the moderator allowed the public to intervene and ask a few questions that we might have. We, my classmates and I, were told by our teacher to keep quiet, as this seminar was intended for 3rd and 4th year law students, as they had Family Law as a subject.
Some colleague of mine, probably 4th year asked these two questions: Can transexuals later on marry? How about adoption, can they adopt?
The answers, in my opinion, are somewhat shocking, I sort of started to shut down my whole hearing system as I was approaching my nonsense limit.
In his opinion, and from what I was able to deduce, he says that transexuals could marry if gay marriage was also allowed, as the update of one’s gender wasn’t allowed neither in Portugal nor in Macau. And about adoption? He does not believe that gay couples are able to raise children (otherwise he would never question the future of the kids “done” in a once “traditional” marriage; there could be kids and the kids obviously could always visit their dad/mom. They’d probably have some difficulty grasping the idea of the sex change, but I’m sure children can grasp that sort of concepts, otherwise they’d never understand separation/divorce. According to the Professor, “we have to look for what is best for the child and not makes him/her happy; that said, we should avoid discrimination in school because one of his/hers parents is transexual or he/she has two dads/moms).
And then most of the women in the public decided to thank the Professor for coming and for contributing with this topic, for this daring topic, and for having the courage to speak out about this, as not many would have the courage to do so.
I had already shut down my whole system. I was fed up about it. I did not realize that how shocked I was until 3 hours later, when I was finally able to assimilate the whole event. I was absolutely shocked and outraged for the whole speech.
The seminar ended and a classmate of mine and I went to have dinner at the cantine, and hopefully not miss the next class. That did not happen. We ended up having this argument over the topic. And let me be short on his side, because I can’t possibly give too much attention to his opinion, and you will understand why soon.
He started by saying that transexuals and homosexuals were MENTALLY DEMENTED and that homosexuality and transexuality was a PERVERSION OF THE MIND. He was more insulting when he compared homosexuality/transexuality with pedophilia, zoophilia, suicide and homicide. I called him homophobic and narrow minded. I had had enough. I missed the class and was sort of running late for the next one. I was numb.
Now my opinion over the whole matter.
I enjoyed the seminar, not because of its nonsense but for the eye-opening experience. I had always read and commented about homophobia, but had never experienced in person, not at this level at least. I had never felt that my values and moral were being put to test.
Society is witnessing some drastic changes in it’s standards and supporting pillars, and not many people are willing to accept the changes (take my Grandpa for that matter, he accepts it up to a certain point, but he can’t accept it fully). Traditional images (heterosexual couples, mom and dad, etc) are being broken down to concepts. I believe we are trying to come down to a basic concept, say, a couple is when two persons share their lives and present their loved ones as their partner and not as boyfriend/girlfriend, and not necessarily a man and a woman, sharing their lives; or even parenting, which isn’t limited to heterosexual couples, and there’s good reasoning for it: like the Professor said, there’s the “social sex”, meaning, you could be a woman but act just like a man, coming down to a father figure, and your partner, another woman would be the mum. Psicologists say children copycat their parents, it is true and that’s why adoption of children by gay couples is somewhat complicated, however, scientists have also discovered that being gay/transexual is in the genes. Meaning that, whether the parents are gay or straight, it should never influence in their sexual orientation – and next time you refer to this, please be sure to be cautious and don’t say sexual prefference, as you do not chose to be gay, straight or transexual.
[ Did you know that a transexuals brain is different from a womans and from a mans? Its shape is something between both, but is neither ]
What left me outraged in the seminar, wasn’t only the fact that the Professor was speaking nonsense, but because he was unconsistent with his speech, and please let me explain why. Not because he contradicted himself during his speech with words/thoughts, but on views: he started out as a liberal/progressive person, and ended his speech just like any other narrow-minded ultra conservative person!
There’s one more thing though, I forgot to mention that he said that transexuals would only change 2 of their sexes: the external organs and the social sex, but never the internal nor the genetic, meaning they would always be men/women, as, genetically he/she would always remain the same gender, meaning that, even if in the ID the gender was updated, if we were to be that meticulous, you’d forever remain a man or a woman. You would never be a full woman nor a full man. But then, I’d have to ask you the following: what about hermaphodites? And genetic mutation, where you can have “XXY boys“? (For those who do not know, in the XY sex-determination system, females have two of the same kind of sex chromosome (XX), while males have two distinct sex chromosomes (XY).) Those boys are still boys, but genetically it’s a mix: bioquemically they have both male and female hormones running in their blood stream. Oh, and how about mosaicism, where you can be a full male but your liver happened to be have female genes? You still look like a man, but you are not fully a man, now are you?
I love it when people bring up these topics because I do research a lot on this. I have even watched a whole sex change surgery (from man to woman). It is sort of painful to watch, but it trully is amazing. I wonder if I will ever be an activist in this sort of topic, as critical as I am, I know I would most likely want things to change.
I am probably too liberal or too progressive, but I just can’t help it. Homosexuality/transexuality is the “new” racism. The bottom line is the same: discrimination, superiority, prejudice.
I’d have to ask all of you who have the patience to read this whole post to speak out your opinion in your comments. Contradict me, criticize me, just don’t insult.
haha
Thanks so much for reading me.