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Tags:: 🗞️Articles, Sociology, Biology, Ideología de género
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Highlights:
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Complex process of sex determination, in which the identity of the gonad emerges from a contest between two opposing networks of gene activity. Changes in the activity or amounts of molecules (such as WNT4) in the networks can tip the balance towards or away from the sex seemingly spelled out by the chromosomes. id:: 4c3756bf-8cf6-4bb7-a5f5-6a21907df5ff
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According to some scientists,** that balance can shift long after development is over. **Studies in mice suggest that the gonad teeters between being male and female throughout life, its identity requiring constant maintenance. In 2009, researchers reported7 deactivating an ovarian gene called Foxl2 in adult female mice; they found that the granulosa cells that support the development of eggs transformed into Sertoli cells, which support sperm development. Two years later, a separate team showed8 the opposite: that inactivating a gene called Dmrt1 could turn adult testicular cells into ovarian ones. “That was the big shock, the fact that it was going on post-natally,” id:: be8e9a11-5528-46da-b324-90d307f8ae07
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But beyond this, there could be even more variation. Since the 1990s, researchers have identified more than 25 genes involved in DSDs, and next-generation DNA sequencing in the past few years has uncovered a wide range of variations in these genes that have mild effects on individuals, rather than causing DSDs. “Biologically, it’s a spectrum,” says Vilain.
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- The most inclusive definitions point to the figure of **1 in 100** people having some form of DSD.
- Doctors and scientists are sympathetic to these concerns, but the MC case also makes some uneasy — because they know how much is still to be learned about the biology of sex19. They think that changing medical practice by legal ruling is not ideal, and would like to see more data collected on outcomes such as quality of life and sexual function to help decide the best course of action for people with DSDs — something that researchers are starting to do.
- This usually involves raising a child as male or female even if no surgery is done. Scientists and advocacy groups mostly agree on this, says Vilain: **“It might be difficult for children to be raised in a gender that just does not exist out there.” **In most countries, it is legally impossible to be anything but male or female.
- Yet if biologists continue to show that sex is a spectrum, then **society and state will have to grapple with the consequences, and work out where and how to draw the line.** Many transgender and intersex activists dream of a world where a person's sex or gender is irrelevant. Although some governments are moving in this direction, Greenberg is pessimistic about the prospects of realizing this dream — in the United States, at least. “I think to get rid of gender markers altogether or to allow a third, indeterminate marker, is going to be difficult.”
- So if the law requires that a person is male or female, should that sex be assigned by anatomy, hormones, cells or chromosomes, and what should be done if they clash? “My feeling is that since there is not one biological parameter that takes over every other parameter, at the end of the day, gender identity seems to be the most reasonable parameter,” says Vilain. In other words, **if you want to know whether someone is male or female, it may be best just to ask**.
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