GENDER DISORDERS: Does Nurture Trump Nature for “Intersex” Kids?
M or F? For most of us, "male or female?" is the easiest question to answer on the census form or the SATs. Not so for the approximately 1 in 2,000 "intersex" children born each year with ambiguous genitalia and related disorders. California Healthline columnist Jeff Stryker looks at the latest revelations about the John/Joan case, involving a Canadian boy who was raised as a girl after losing his penis in a botched circumcision. Long cited for the proposition that nurture trumps nature, recent disclosures reveal that the original lessons gleaned from John/Joan's experience may have been exactly wrong.
More On This ColumnStryker's Corner is a regular Monday feature in California Healthline. Columnist Jeff Stryker takes readers behind the headlines, with in-depth articles, guest editorials and interviews with California newsmakers. Click here for more on Stryker and this feature.
Editor's Note
The views represented in this column are those of the columnist or guest editorialist and not of California Healthline or the National Journal Group.