Cheers to Thomas Beatie!

In case you haven’t heard (which I highly doubt), the “pregnant man” has given birth.  Natural birth to a healthy baby girl.  A few details here.

The man, named Thomas Beatie, is actually transgender, and he maintained his female reproductive organs despite becoming hormonally, and legally, and for all appearances on the outside – male.

What interests me more than this medical “oddity/miracle”, is the public outcry, and Thomas’s own family’s outcry about such a pregnancy and birth being “immoral” or “perverse”.  Thomas has been called a “monster” by his very own relatives…

Though Beatie’s doctor judged that the pregnancy would be safe and the risk to the baby minimal, people in most of the world it seems find this issue very disconcerting.  I suppose that it challenges their notions about gender and sexuality, even spirituality for some.  It’s an interesting case.  I guess some might say that Thomas is still to some extent a female – at least reproductively–(in which case I say, why the hell not let him/her have a baby?)  Or you might say he’s all man – which physically and socially is true as well.

Regardless of your stance, it’s an interesting case because whatever our opinions, they are definitely influenced by our own ideas of what gender is.  Is a man a man because he has a penis?  What about a woman with an extraordinarily large clitoris?  Is a man a man because of his chromosomes?  Or is it his hormones?  What makes a woman a woman?  Large breasts? (Because I know guys who have those too…)  Makeup?  And what about those people who straddle the line?  Either because they are born ambiguous physically, or because they choose to change themselves physically, or through clothing or through hormonal treatments?

I think that we in the West for a long time now have had pretty strict attitudes about what’s appropriate for a man and what’s appropriate for a woman.  I for one applaud Thomas and his wife, and all those folks who make a difficult choice to do what feels right for them – regardless of societal sanctions.  Congrats Thomas!