Is it a boy or a girl?

One of the first things people ask expecting parents is it a boy or girl?

We live in an age where we can find out..

Hmmm... well we can find out what the doctor based on her/his experience & understanding of human anatomy believes the child's sex at birth will be. (Remember assigned sex at birth does not equal gender identity)

A question I have is:   Why do we want to know this?

Watch this video:

Notice the characteristics you started to assign at the beginning of the video.

It's my humble opinion one of the reasons we desperately want to identity the person's gender (before they even leave the womb) is so we know how to interact with them, how to think about them, what to expect of them....  Basically we want to make sure we know what well worn stereotypes should be heaped on them so we can continue to function as we always had.

Whatever would we do without the stereotypes???

Well maybe we should think about that... we are basing a lot off of ASSIGNED SEX AT BIRTH which might be very different than the individual's gender identity...

Here are some statistics snatched from Intersex Society of American (http://www.isna.org)

Bodies are unique. According to these stats 1 individual in a 100 people differ from the standard "male or female body". We're driven as a society not to deviate from the pack to the point we subject infants to surgery. 1-2 persons out of 1000 have received surgery to "normalize" their genital appearance. Now this is not to say all surgery is unnecessary but it raises the question. (We can discuss all the various issues that result from these surgeries another time.)

I leave you with this thought... instead of asking the parents if it's a boy or girl I think you should ask if they have educated themselves on issues around having a child fall outside the spectrum? Advocates for Informed Consent are helping parents and doctors to take a more measured approach: WAIT!!! Get the facts. Allow the child to be part of the conversation... after all it's their body. (http://aiclegal.org)

Hugs, Z.

Dear Future Love

Jordon Davis Speaks

Jordon's a teen who was kicked out by his mother after he came out in front of her church group. Luckily his two older brothers always have his back. He now lives with Dusty and Dusty's brother's boyfriend Justin and Zack his middle brother. Jordon lives and breathes art.

Jordon is one of the loudest (insert FAVORITE I'm her favorite shhhh not yet) persistent character that lives in my head. You might know him from The Dark Angels: Finally Fallen or Happy Holidays. He's demanded I allow him to share letters he's been writing to his future significant other for the last few years--

Since I was fifteen. I got this Z. Hi! I'm Jordon and I'm going to share not all the letters but just a few of them over through this blog. (Since Z. Allora doesn't plan on writing my story anytime soon). This was probably the first letter I'd written. Even though I don't believe I'll ever find that special someone who gets me I refuse to give up hope. This is the first letter.

Oh and I didn't address it to Future Husband out of fear of copy right infringement but because when I wrote this that song wasn't even out or because I was making a statement on rejecting a heteronormative tradition... No sadly marriage equality wasn't even thought of as a real possibility when I started writing these... and now I fully expect equality will be the law of the land soon.

Dear Future Love,

I know we haven't met yet because well I just finished up my sophomore year of high school and let's just say I've never won any popularity contests with the jackasses I went to school with... though it's really odd because I'm a great guy. Well if you're reading this you already believe that.

So I just turned sixteen and I've never been kissed. I had been sextexting some guys (don't get jealous I was hoping one of them was you)... well things got out of hand quick. It was screwed up but Zack was there to save my ass... literally. Dusty's boyfriend was the one who finally got me to speak to the police (apparently he'd not been as lucky as me). I don't think I'll attempt meeting anyone else soooooo hurry the hell up and sweep me off my feet. I'm READY for LOVE!!!

My mother tried to stop Zack and me from seeing our older brother but I couldn't handle that. We snuck around to see him but then I decided to come out. Maybe it wasn't the best time to blurt out my attraction to the boys since my mother was having a church meeting at our house but I figured I'd test her unconditional love.

She failed. Her love had conditions. Within hours I was packed me up and she let my older brother have full custody of me. It's better this way but I don't know how you kick out your own child. Zack was booted later that same night so know we are all going on tour with Dusty, his boyfriend and The Dark Angels.

Oh yeah my oldest brother Dusty's a drummer and co-founder of The Dark Angels.  Zack says he wanted to be a roadie for the band. So I'm going to do the rest of high school online, work on my art and see the world with my brothers (and search for you!).

I'm an artist. But you know that or you will because I'm going to include a drawing, painting or something with most of the letters. I love creating something exactly as it should be. You know when you like take a picture of a landmark and angle the camera so you cut out the people... that's what I do with anything I make. I don't believe I need to replicate reality but I alter it to make it pleasing. It take out the bad stuff so only the good interesting stuff is left.

I wish I could find out about you.  I wonder who you are and what you look like? But that doesn't matter only that we love each other.

Love and long lingering kisses,
Jordon



That was a good letter. Thank you Jordon for sharing it with us.

Hugs, Z.

Answering The Question Of Transgender Surgeries

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