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Some people have suggested to me that being used as the butt of the joke is better than no publicity at all, especially when so few people are even aware that intersex people exist. But just how far can we take this conventional wisdom?
The thanksgiving episode (Nov. 22, 2001) of NBC's popular sitcom Friends featured a story revolving around a high school rumor other students spread about Rachel, one of the main characters. The rumor suggested that she was born with "both male and female reproductive parts," and her parents "flipped a coin" before deciding to raise her as a girl. However, she still had a "hit of a penis," the rumor went.
The rest of the show consisted of everyone making fun of her, calling her "the hermaphrodite cheerleader from Long Island", staring at her crotch asking for "proof" that the rumor wasn't true, and Rachel crying "you told people that I was half and half!" At the end, another character resolves the situation by declaring "even with that rumour, you were the most popular girl in school," as if it would be so suprising.
While nobody is actually born with two complete sets of genitals, about one in 2,000 babies are born with reproductive organs that are visibly different from most boys or girls. This condition is called intersex; "hermaphrodite" is an older, misleadig term. The standard "treatment" for intersex conditions involves surgeries that modify the appearance of the genital so as to make it conform to what is considered socially acceptable, although they generally do not address any particular health issues.
There is a growing movement among intersex people and allies to halt these medically unnecessary surgeries until the child is old enough to decide for herself or himself whether or not such a surgery would be desirable.
The "flipping a coin" method, followed by the surgery, is very close to what intersex children actually go through when they are found to have a "hint of a penis." However, this very sensitive topic is treated not as a real-life experience, but simply as a bad rumor--something that is not true, further mythologizing the existence of intersex people.
I wonder which is better or worse: being explicitly made invisible inside the show, or being just plain invisible in the first place?
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