From Radio Netherlands | Part of the RN Documentaries series | 00:29:31

A group of women talk of their experiences with a rare condition – intersexuality. They are women who have the male XY chromosome. One was forcibly raised as a boy. One only found out about her condition accidentally when she was a teenager. And one walk kept in the dark about it deliberately by doctors.
About 1 baby in 20,000 is born inetersex. Often these infants can be clearly seen to be belonging to one sex, but a small percentage of them are born with ambiguous genitalia and in the past doctors made a unilateral decision about which sex they thought the child belonged to. Sometimes they even performed surgery without ...
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Review of RN Documentary: IntersexWhen a child is born with an intersex condition (the presence of deformed or under-formed genitalia, or genitalia of both sexes), the situation is almost impossible to resolve gracefully. Often times, the condition is not obvious at birth (sometimes not obvious until the teen years) and can cause parents to have to make dire decisions that will impact the child's life in profound ways. Should the child's gender be "reassigned"? Should the child undergo surgery? Should the genitalia be removed or reconstructed? Further, the emotional impact of this condition and how one could lead a normal life is difficult for most people to fathom.
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Review of RN Documentary: IntersexThis piece handles a delicate subject very well. The use of numerous people that have had to deal with the intersex condition takes the topic and puts a human fact on it. I originally thought that the piece would be more clinical or perhaps mocking, however, the dignity of the participants is preserved. I really apprecaited the piece. |
SIG TUNE
MUSIC (priv) – Songs from Liquid Days. Tr 6 “Forgetting” comp Philip Glass
Perf: Linda Ronstadt/The Roches. SMK87972 - under teasers and intro script
Alice teaser ‘14
When I was younger I was a girlie girl..still feel like a girl (laughs)
AM teaser ‘15
I didn’t want to know about this..didn’t know it was this
M – teaser ‘20
When I was born….quite a shock
Peggy taboo ‘15
The taboo is talking about sexuality.. ….seen as freaks
Petra teaser ‘25
Intersex children are born every day.. what will it be
Peggy – prevalence The prevalence of each condition.. pretty rare
Intersex is the term but its an umbrella for many things.
Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome – AIS or AOS, hermaphrodite, transgender, transsexual, hijra, Gender dysphoria, XX, XY…gender dysphoria
DIFF VOICES READING THEM IN A JUMBLE – under music
215.737 VOI...
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Songs from Liquid Days. Tr 6 “Forgetting” comp Philip Glass
Perf: Linda Ronstadt/The Roches. SMK87972 - 4’00
215.737 VOICES. “Scat n Swing” Comp/Perf: Xavier Delisle. KOK MEDIA 2038
Todd Melby
Posted on September 01, 2004 at 09:29 AM | Permalink
Review of RN Documentary: Intersex
This subject is certainly worthy of a documentary. In the United States, journalist John Colapinto's 2001 book, "As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised A Girl," elevated awareness about the topic of intersexuality. In the book, Colapinto describes the story of a Canadian boy whose penis was severed during a botched circumcision in the late 1960s. His parents took him to the leading sexologist of the day --- Dr. John Money of Johns Hopkins University. Money recommended the boy become a girl. His tragic tale is the centerpiece of Colapinto's book.
While this documentary doesn't have the benefit of such a single, powerful story, it does a fine job of giving listeners an introduction to the intersexuality.
"For most of us, it's not about gender," says one person born with an intersex condition. "It's about shame, secrecy ... we were told by doctors not to tell other people about our coniditon. Not telling ... is more difficult than the condition itself."
By educating physicians and the public about intersex, activists are attempting to remove the condition from the shadows of secrecy. The most active group in the U.S. is the Intersex Society of North America (www.isna.org). Programmers looking to provide a full hour on this topic could air the documentary and interview Colapinto and/or an ISNA spokesperson.