Hi there visitor since 6 August 1998.
Transnational Spansexual Foundation presents
Bi-Gendered
by 
The theorists who inform transsexual and intersexual medical intervention presume that everyone has one real gender identity at the core of their being, whether or not this is congruent with their anatomy. Even children biologically hermaphrodite are supposed to be "really" of one gender, with the surgically discarded sex declared the "false" one. Unsurprisingly, many intersexual children are traumatised by the obliteration of their sexual duality. Many as adults seek transsexual procedures to restore their discarded sex, but at the expense of the surviving sex. This is just one tragic result of our society's belief in mutually exclusive genders.
Not all human societies see the genders as mutually exclusive. Transgender people are seen in India as "half half" , in the Phillippines as "lady-boys" , and in indigenous American cultures as "two spirited." People seen by our society as having a gender opposite to the one sex they were born with are seen by other societies as simply having two genders. Bi-gendered. In this light, the permanent removal of the characteristics of one sex to allow the expression of the other seems a total waste.
I wonder if we in Western culture would have more options for happiness if we too had permission not simply to be of one gender or the other, but also to be of both genders, if such was our nature.
I certainly think thatís the case for myself. My inner being has aspects that are of female gender, and need to be recognised and expressed as such, but I also have aspects that are male. Sometimes I feel completely one hundred percent female, and sometimes I feel completely one hundred percent male, and sometimes I am a blend of the two, a girly boy, or a tomboy girl. These arenít separate personalities, but different facets of one jewel, if you like.
Accepting all these aspects of myself, I am oppressed if forced to choose between being male and female. It ís as if I had a Koori father and a Jewish mother; I'm not half one and half the other, I'm ALL Koori, and I'm ALL Jewish. Similarly, all of me is a man, and all of me is a woman, (although sometimes I will express one aspect, sometimes another).
"Bi-gendered" makes more sense to me than "gender
dysphoria" or "gender identity disorder". (Indeed, the idea that we can
only have one core gender seems itself to be a disorder, causing the butchering
of intersexual children). I find much more order in accepting reality as
it presents itself. Spiritually I may well be hermaphrodite, although (thanks
to transsexual medicine) physically neuter.
Are there any other bi-gendered (or poly-gendered) people out there?
Readers who identify with (or take issue with) this are invited to write to Polare. the bi-monthly magazine of The Gender Centre Inc, PO Box 266 Petersham NSW 2049 AUSTRALIA.
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