What should we conclude about the David Reimer case?

Truthy

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There was a thread on him 4 years ago and he's come up in some of the circumcision threads, but I wanted to hear new OT opinions and focus on the scientific aspects of the case.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer (I believe the wiki to be mostly accurate, but it doesn't dispute the Reimers' contention that their interviews with John Money verged on abuse, which might not be true)

Biologically speaking, why exactly didn't Reimer adopt a female identity? Sexual differentiation obviously takes place during early pregnancy, but how much is known about when the formation of gender identity takes place?
 
There was a thread on him 4 years ago and he's come up in some of the circumcision threads, but I wanted to hear new OT opinions and focus on the scientific aspects of the case.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer (I believe the wiki to be mostly accurate, but it doesn't dispute the Reimers' contention that their interviews with John Money verged on abuse, which might not be true)

Biologically speaking, why exactly didn't Reimer adopt a female identity? Sexual differentiation obviously takes place during early pregnancy, but how much is known about when the formation of gender identity takes place?

So his penis was accidentally cut off when he was born? He'd still biologically identify as a man. Personal gender identity doesn't depend on your genitalia. It's not a choice. He should have been raised normally from day 1.
 
So his penis was accidentally cut off when he was born?
Well not exactly, it was like 6 months later and it was by cauterization. The doctor attempted to cauterize Reimer's foreskin, but there was some sort of electrical malfunction with the equipment.

He'd still biologically identify as a man. Personal gender identity doesn't depend on your genitalia. It's not a choice. He should have been raised normally from day 1.
Agreed, but it wasn't just that he lost his penis and they decided to raise him as a girl. At the encouragement of a famous sexologist, they also had him castrated and he received a surgically constructed vulva. He also received estrogen throughout his childhood. His parents went forward with what now seems pretty absurd, but John Money was a staunch advocate that through early intervention a male-born child could adopt a female gender identity.
 
So his penis was accidentally cut off when he was born? He'd still biologically identify as a man. Personal gender identity doesn't depend on your genitalia. It's not a choice. He should have been raised normally from day 1.

From what I've read on the subject, it's not a choice, but it's also not tied precisely to what sort of working parts you shipped with - gender is simply a matter of how you see yourself. For most people that happens to line up with what everyone else assumes from looking at you, but for some it doesn't. Caitlin (formerly Bruce) Jenner has been in the news a lot lately for taking a long time to act on the difference, but hasn't presented it as 'I chose to become a woman': instead, she says something to the effect of 'I have always been a woman, but I was born with a man's body parts, and until now I have pretended to be a man'. Whether we choose to label that as 'a man who thinks he's a woman and wants to be treated as such', or 'a woman who was born looking like a man' is, I suspect, a largely academic point, but doing the former is probably more helpful as far as the people actually affected are concerned.

Certainly, it's a complicated question, but I think we should (as a society) err on the side of whatever makes life easier for the people for whom it's of more everyday relevance.
 
Caitlin (formerly Bruce) Jenner has been in the news a lot lately for taking a long time to act on the difference, but hasn't presented it as 'I chose to become a woman': instead, she says something to the effect of 'I have always been a woman, but I was born with a man's body parts, and until now I have pretended to be a man'.
Which is probably what the vast majority of trans people will tell you. For instance, a lot of FTM trans people have reported a form of phantom limb syndrome with regard to their genitals, which strongly indicates a close link between the brain's mapping functions and gender identity. So the question is how much of our innate feelings of "maleness" or "femaleness" is socially induced and what developed during pregnancy.

What a tragic fate for that 6-month year old.

And all for an utterly useless and archaic or even barbaric procedure like circumcision.
Taking the bait, but it was done because the babies had phimosis, which was making it difficult for them to urinate. The usual reasons for circumcision were not a factor.
 
Wow. I've heard about the theoretical possibility of raising one gender as another to test theories about how gender is learned (which I think is a stupid theory myself). I thought this was universally accepted to be impossible in practice due to it being highly unethical. Looks like I was right on all counts. I hope the doctor got what he deserved, what disgusting behaviour.
 
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