[extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural!

[spike]

> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of ben
> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural!
> 
> Anna said:
> 
>  > I feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the
>  > union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a
>  > heterosexual female.
...
> Does a couple consisting of an XY male
> who is anatomically female (with an official sex of female) and another
> XY male who is anatomically male, need a different term for their
> marriage?

I know of an example of this, two XYs, both anatomically ambiguous, one
raised male, the other raised female, the state of Oregon asked no
questions.

> What about some future couple who are both hermaphrodites, or both
> neuters, who want to live together as a married couple with all the same
> legal rights? Would you propose creating yet more new terms for them?
> What about a couple where one is human and the other a machine? A neuter
> and a male? Two people who can change their sex at will?... ben zaiboc


Good questions all, ben.

Since there has been talk of a constitutional amendment to define marriage
as a contract between a man and a woman, let us see what that amendment
would actually look like.

During the time my wife and I were doing fertility treatments, the medics
had us study up on all the things that can go wrong with the spawning
process, perhaps so we would not automatically blame IVF if something did go
wrong.  One such error is trisomy, where instead of getting the usual
chromosome pairs, there are three.  In some rare cases a single chromosome
results in a survivable configuration, which is called a monosomy.

In all the debates on same sex marriage, seldom is mentioned anything about
those who have a trisomy on 23, resulting in something other than the two
common arrangements, XX (female) and XY (male).  Genetically there are five
genders, with XXX (or monosomy X), XXY and XYY in addition to the common
two.  Granted the trisomies are rare; I do not expect to see public
buildings with five restrooms any time soon.  

If one ignores the three trisomies, there are three possible pairings of two
persons, XX and XX, XY and XY, XX and XY.  We say the last of these three
possibilities may marry, but not the other two. 

If we do not ignore the trisomies, then there are 15 possible pairings of
two humans.  Do we allow some of those possible pairs to marry?  Actually
current law does allow many of those pairs.  The XXX trisomy is considered
indistinguishable from the common female XX, and the XYY is considered
unambiguously male.  Those with the ambiguous gender XXY are generally
ignored by current law.

Let us list the possibilities.  For simplicity, even if not rigorous
accuracy, let us lump together the trisomy XXX and monosomy X and call that
F*.  The trisomy XYY let us call M*, and the XXY let us call K for
Klinefelter syndrome.  This reduces the alphabet soup a bit.  There are
fifteen possible combinations:

1. 	M	F
2.	M	M
3.	M	M*
4.	M	K
5.	M	F*
6.	F	F
7.	F	M*
8.	F	K
9.	F	F*
10.	M*	M*
11.	M*	K
12.	M*	F*
13.	K	K
14.	K	F*
15.	F*	F*

This is only the possible genetic combinations, still ignoring the many
(possibly more common than genetic non bisome) gestational gender
ambiguities.  The genetic trisomy can prove he or she is the way he or she
is because of nature, and so cannot ethically be the victim of
discrimination.

One would think the amendment would list the above and then claim that only
combination 1 is legal, but that is not the case.  Since neither F* nor M*
are considered ambiguous gender, combinations 1, 5, 7, 12 are currently
legal and presumably unchallenged.  The anti-gay-marriage crowd would then
presumably object to combinations 2, 3, 6, 9, 10, 15 but not necessarily
combinations 4, 8, 11, and 14 but possibly combination 13, since two
ambiguous-gender persons would fit the definition of the dreaded "same sex."

So the 13s status hangs on the wording of the marriage amendment.  If it
defines marriage between a man and a woman, the 13s are good to go since
they can be defined as either.  If it specifically bans same sex marriage,
the 13s are out of luck.

Since law must be defined, the amendment must also exactly define the status
of gender-reassigned persons, before, during and after the actual surgeries.
If all the necessary details are covered, including monosomies, trisomies,
gestational ambiguous gender, transgender etc, that amendment would be
longer than the rest of the US constitution with all the other amendments
combined.  Its teaching would appropriately be moved from the civics class
to the biology class.

I predict that the saner lawmakers will prevail and they will leave the
constitution alone.  Eventually society will accept a person as whatever
gender that person says they are.

spike