third-gendered kitties need extra love
So I've been back in Boston for a bit, and getting ready for the start of the next academic year. Things are going well other than the weather suddenly turning for the colder. I would talk about the trip, but frankly I've put up a number of photos on facebook and each of those is worth 1000 words, so I said too much about it as it is.
Speaking of facebook, this article was linked on my home page. Now, I've had a number of discussions on here with people who hold (like the author of this article) that the notion of binary sex is mythical. I disagree, but since earlier conversation did not lead to any changed minds I figure there's no particular need to go over the same ground again. However, I am confused on one point. The article claims that one in 1500 or 2000 children require specialists to assign a child's sex (I am not sure who exactly counts as a specialist in these matters in rural Nigeria, but that's neither here nor there), assuming for a second that this number is accurate (I heard that it might be common in some areas since a practice of giving women certain hormones during pregnancy caused male children to not fully develop as male and so be genetically male but look female. I don't know enough about this topic to say anything intelligently about it) and that the matter is really not as simple as "check to see which sexual organs are present" for as much as .2% of all live births, that seems like something that would come up a whole lot for mammals with large birth numbers. How come I never hear of an animal shelter looking for good homes for cats that are neither male nor female? It just seems that there would be an organization that would want to focus on helping find homes for pets that don't fit the binary sex model. I wonder if I just haven't heard of it or if the number of such pets is so small as to make such an organization unnecessary.
Speaking of facebook, this article was linked on my home page. Now, I've had a number of discussions on here with people who hold (like the author of this article) that the notion of binary sex is mythical. I disagree, but since earlier conversation did not lead to any changed minds I figure there's no particular need to go over the same ground again. However, I am confused on one point. The article claims that one in 1500 or 2000 children require specialists to assign a child's sex (I am not sure who exactly counts as a specialist in these matters in rural Nigeria, but that's neither here nor there), assuming for a second that this number is accurate (I heard that it might be common in some areas since a practice of giving women certain hormones during pregnancy caused male children to not fully develop as male and so be genetically male but look female. I don't know enough about this topic to say anything intelligently about it) and that the matter is really not as simple as "check to see which sexual organs are present" for as much as .2% of all live births, that seems like something that would come up a whole lot for mammals with large birth numbers. How come I never hear of an animal shelter looking for good homes for cats that are neither male nor female? It just seems that there would be an organization that would want to focus on helping find homes for pets that don't fit the binary sex model. I wonder if I just haven't heard of it or if the number of such pets is so small as to make such an organization unnecessary.