From November 1, Germany will offer parents three options to fill in the birth certificate of their babies: "masculine", "feminine" and "blank".
"It is a legal revolution of enormous social significance," said Heribert Prantl, a prestigious political commentator at Süddeutsche Zeitung, echoing the new law. "In the future there will be a new sex in Germany ... Indeterminate sex and, de facto, a third sex”.
The law that was passed last May arises as a response to the legal vacuum in which are found those babies born having both sexes, that is, the so-called hemaphrodite babies.
To be able to benefit from this measure, a doctor must certify the hermaphroditism of the baby. Only then can their parents leave the sex box blank, which may be modified in the future if it is the case that the person feels identified with a certain gender, although they can continue to live their entire lives without officially determining their sex.
As is the case in Spain, in Germany parents were until now obliged to register the sex of the newborn as male or female. The law also eliminates the classification of hermaphrodite or intersexual from birth certificates.
A respite for the baby and his parents
This law will prevent the baby from having operations to adapt the baby's sex to the chosen one or vice versa, and allows us to see how secondary sexual characteristics will develop, as well as to see with which sex the person is best identified.
Types of hermaphroditism
Intersexuality 46, XX (Female Pseudohermaphroditism): The baby has a woman's chromosomes, ovaries, but the external genitals with male appearance. It is usually a result of the exposure of a female fetus to an excess of male hormones.
Intersexuality 46, XY (Male Pseudohermaphroditism): A baby with XY chromosomes (child), can be born with ambiguous or clearly female genitals, internally the testicles can be normal, small or absent. The cause in 90% of cases is due to the absence of receptors for male hormones which alters the formation of the external genitalia that require a balance between male and female hormones. Upon reaching puberty there is a masculinization of the genitals, the voice is aggravated and a muscular increase appears. Pubic and axillary hair appears but not facial.
True gonadal intersexuality (True Hermaphroditism): It is the rarest case of all and babies have male and female genitals in the same body and in 90% of cases they have ambiguous genitalia. They can have a normal sex chromosome XX or XY or combinations of the type XXX or XXY, that is, they have an additional sex chromosome. The causes of this type of intersexuality are unknown.
International experts estimate that some of the variants of intersexuality happens in 0.018% of people.
Currently doctors use in their diagnosis techniques such as: chromosome analysis, electrolyte tests, endoscopic examination and ultrasound.
Some famous hemaphrodites
María José Martínez Patiño In 1986 he was a record holder in 60 meters fence. They detected Y chromosomes in genetic sex tests, tests that have already been removed.
Cheryl Chase He was born with ambiguous genitals, and at 18 months his clitoris was removed. He founded the Intersex Society of North America, and is one of the leading activists against genital surgery.
Caster Semenya His case questions whether sex tests should continue to be practiced among athletes. On the one hand, those who consider them humiliating; on the other, who believe that Semenya has advantages in a competition with women.
Sarah Gronert The German tennis player is ranked 619 in the world ranking. He is 22 years old. He was born with male and female genitals. Three years ago, she underwent a surgical intervention that removed the male genitals and made her biologically and legally into a woman. He decided to compete in the women's circuit; Despite this, his condition is constantly discussed in professional tennis circuits.
Stella Walsh Polish She was the first woman to lose 12 seconds in the 100 m, at the Los Angeles Olympics (1932). He was killed by a lost bullet in a robbery. The autopsy revealed his male genitals.
Intersex in culture
The novel "Middlesex"by Jeffrey Eugenides, winner of a Pulitzer Prize, tells the story and social problems that Calliope Stephanides has to face for being intersex.
The movies: "XXY", directed by Lucía Puenzo, whose protagonist is Alex, a teenage girl diagnosed as "female pseudo-hermaphrodite" and "My dear lady" Jaime de Armiñán who also portrays the life of an intersexual, although in the key of tragicomedy.
The stories of the manga IS, published through Kiss magazine, portrays the problems of various intersexes, from sterility to social acceptance. For this, its author Chiyo Rokuhana was based on interviews with intersex people.
The right to sexual anonymity
Article 2 of the Declaration of Human Rights says so, "Every person has all the rights and freedoms proclaimed in this Declaration, without distinction of race, color, sex, language, religion, political opinion or of any other nature, national or social origin, economic position, birth or any other condition."
Therefore, I still don't understand why a person's gender is requested in 99% of the forms we fill out, regardless of whether or not that information is relevant. This new German law should be applied universally, we should educate our children so that the sex with which each one decides to be characterized is respected and admitted without being subject to mockery and contempt.
