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Is "gender identity disorder" an intersex condition? The short answer is no--at least under the current definition. "Intersex" refers to "congenital anomaly of the reproductive system" (National Institute of Health) and does not include "gender identity disorder" (GID) or transsexuality. Some people have said that GID is a "brain intersex" condition, but it makes no more sense than calling headache a "stomachache in the head."
More importantly, why do some people want GID to be considered intersex? There are a couple of reasons. First, the fact GID is treated as a "psychiatric condition" makes some people feel like they are being told that "it's all in your head." Many transsexual people feel that their gender identity is more than just "in their head," that is, they feel that gender identity is something as biologically concrete and "hard-wired" as our body parts.
Two responses can be made to this sentiment: first, many "psychiatric" conditions are indeed biologically based but we still consider them "psychiatric" as long as the biological events take place within a brain; and second, something being biologically rooted is not the same thing as being intersex. One could even argue that intersex is not biological but social, since it is not how large someone's clitoris is that qualifies it as an intersex condition, but how large the society thinks it should be, for example.
Second, some people believe that being re-classified as intersex would lead to greater acceptance of transsexual people and more services being offered to them. Indeed, sometimes intersex individuals who transition from one gender to another as adults are treated more favorably than a non-intersex individual doing the same, which is unfair.
But at the same time, being categorized as intersex comes with its own stigma and barriers. For example, a transwoman who discovered her intersex status during her transitioning from male to female was told by a doctor that she needed testosterone, not estrogen which she requested, because the only reason she did not feel like a guy was because she did not have enough testosterone in her blood. Being intersex in this society too often means that your right to self-determination is routinely neglected and violated--which is the last thing a trans person needs.
Also, the vast majority of people born with intersex conditions identify with the gender in which they were raised, with only small (but noticeable) minority electing to transition to another gender or otherwise live as trans or genderqueer. Activists oppose non-consensual genital "normalizing" surgeries on intersex children primarily because they are harmful physically, emotionally and sexually, and not necessarily because they might get the gender of the child "wrong."
In general, issues faced by intersex people are very different from those faced by transgender and transsexual people (although there are people who are both intersex and trans). One of the misperceptions that plague the young intersex movement is the notion that intersex is all about gender. It is not. For many intersex people, the problems they face are shame, secrecy, isolation, and the history of sexual trauma within medical settings. When some trans people and their advocates conflate intersex and trans, it sends the wrong message about what intersex is all about and what intersex activists are fighting for.
Of course, when the medical community begins diagnosing GID at birth and "fixing" and eliminating them through invasive brain surgeries on transsexual infants, perhaps our issues are similar enough that we would come together to form a unified movement. We certainly hope that this will not become reality though--trans people and intersex people both deserve to be accepted fully into the society without shame, secrecy, or attempts at eugenicist elimination.
This material is provided to you by:
Intersex Initiative
PO Box 40570, Portland OR 97240
Email: info@ipdx.org