Forgetting, for the time being, the repugnance of a pregnant “man”, I have a couple of other issues with this video.
First, there’s a fantastic sound bite of a “man on the street” (“woman on the street” would have a different implication) saying that she hopes more men would give it a try. You see, that’s going to be kind of hard. This particular “man” has a vagina/uterus/ovaries. I’m pretty sure those are instrumental in getting pregnant.
I’m also pretty sure those are instrumental in determining one’s gender. Biologically speaking, if you have a uterus, you’re a woman. I’m not sure if a fetus could gestate in a ureter. It certainly doesn’t sound pleasant – it would shut up womankind once and for all at least. “Yeah, trying carrying an 8 pound baby for 9 months in a millimeter wide canal! Your back hurts, cry me a river, I haven’t taken a leak in 39 weeks!”
Of course, this brings up another question: is that manish looking woman who think she’s a man, really a man? Is it one’s perception of reality that defines reality? If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?
Now that I listen to the BBC on the way home from work, I am infinitely more cultured. Not cultured enough to be able to ascertain the background of a story that I started listening to three quarters of the way through (I don’t know where this happened, or to whom it happened), but cultured enough to get the crux of the matter.
There is a place where sometime 20+ years ago, the ruling ethnicity stole babies from their enthic minority parents (who were, to add injury to insult, murdered in the process). Apparently these two ethnicities look physically similar, because the children grew up not knowing their roots. For 20+ years, they were upper crust majority members.
So, then, what defines a person as a person? Is it the combined experiences of their entire life, or is it their genetic chemistry?
You see, I’d tend to say that the woman is still a woman, even if she has lived her life thinking she was properly a man.
But I’d also say that the child reared in her new society is a member of that society, and not the society she is genetically affliated with.
There’s a logical inconsistency there. In fact, as I try to put myself in a moral liberal’s shoes, I think that I’d reverse my assertions, being logically inconsistent on the other side.
So which way is it? As we stand, I’d say I’m wrong both ways.
Words 
I think identity is formed both from genetics and where you “came from” as well as where you grew up.
In the case of adoption, even children adopted as infants ultimately long for some connection to their birth families. Couples who undertake international adoptions realize that it is important for the children they adopt to have links to their country and their culture and for the parents to understand those things. So, it’s sort of a dual-identity or rather a larger identity that one is looking at.
To say it is one or the other is detrimental to the children, ultimately.
It’s an interesting question – how we perceive ourselves. I hereby declare you an expert in this field. Right up your alley.
But the whole issue of transgendered people is really complex. There is actually a rather astounding number of children born whose genitalia is indeterminable and the parents often make a “choice” about raising the child as a boy or a girl. There are stories of children raised as boys who then get their periods when they hit puberty. Many of these people are raised one way but always feel like they are supposed to be the opposite sex.
It definitely leaves many questions unanswered. I think this issue will continue to be a challenge for the church, for families, for schools, and for society in general.
You’d have to be strange/disturbed to raise someone who has a uterus as a boy. I mean, a period can’t possibly come as an unforeseen contingency – the plumbing is there, or else you wouldn’t have it. It’s not as though they’re like, “holy crap, where’d that vagina come from all the sudden!!”
This person was a woman, she has a uterus (where the baby is), hers wasn’t a biological toss up; it was a personal decision. Or at least a act of personal will, I’m not really trying to take a viewpoint on whether these tendencies (homosexual/transgendered) are biochemical inevitabilities.
I dunno, weird stuff.
Speaking of weird stuff, a friend and I were walking home from dinner just now. We saw a rabid raccoon walking along the sidewalk near Morningside Park. It came towards us on its hind legs, ready to strike. We ran across the street and were scared out of our minds.
I called 311 to report it to animal control, and they deemed it necessary to transfer the call to 911. I can honestly say I don’t know if I have ever been so terrified.
I live in Manhattan!!!!! How the hell do we have rabid raccoons????!!!!!
Ha ha ha… Lara, this stuff only happens to you. That is hysterical… glad you’re okay.