A 9 year old's request to change his gender from girl to boy has been granted by a grammar school.
http://nsnlb.us.publicus.com/apps/pbcs.dll...002/0/FRONTPAGE
School copes well with girl turned boy
Published: Saturday, Mar. 5, 2005
KEY POINTS
BACKGROUND: A fourth-grade child left a Methuen, Mass., school before the February break as Phyllis and returned as Phillip.
CONCLUSION: Thanks to recent court decisions and a better medical understanding of this phenomenon, the school and the child are adapting well to the gender re-identification challenge.
An interesting story is unfolding just south of the state line in nearby Methuen, Mass., where school officials are grappling with a challenging situation in their attempts to meet the special needs of a child who left fourth grade before the February break as Phyllis and returned as Phillip.
There was no surgery involved, nor was this a decision by gay activist parents trying to promote the so-called gay agenda.
The articles on this issue as presented in the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune portray a loving heterosexual couple struggling to do the best they can for the child they love.
After years of working with doctors and mental health professionals in a variety of specialties, they came to the conclusion that their 9-year-old child was born with the body of a girl but the brain of a boy, and his real gender is male.
There are some people who simply cannot accept this as a medical reality, and the school officials in Methuen did receive some calls of protest. But overall, the parents have been supportive and the students are for the most part nonplussed.
To their credit, school officials have agreed to do everything they can to support the decision of the parents and the medical professionals.
For years, the parents struggled with their “tomboy,” who kept insisting “I’m a boy, I’m a boy.”
They did not come lightly to the decision to change his gender identity, including his first name, knowing the many dangers and possible adverse consequences in a society that is still confused on this issue.
Legal and medical experts quoted by the Eagle-Tribune agree that the Methuen grammar school and Philip’s parents are doing the right thing.
In 2001, a Brockton student was denied the right to wear girl’s clothing to school, but the school was ordered by the courts, in the face of medical evidence, to allow the child to express a female gender identity and to be treated as any other child in the school.
That ruling set the precedent for the legal advice. But credit goes to the school system in Methuen for understanding the psychological and social implications as well.
Andover, Mass., psychologist Larry Larsen told the Eagle-Tribune he has seen similar cases throughout his 35-year career.
“There are kids who have some gender identification issues and there are kids that have very strong and compelling gender commitment,” he told the Lawrence newspaper. “If the commitment is very strong and very compelling, it is simply unbreakable in my opinion. There are certain people with religious qualms or theological vantage points who feel you can break it. But I don’t think so.”
The issue strikes at the very core of the debate over gay rights because if sexual identity is not a choice, as this child’s parents and their medical professionals maintain, then the demand for equal treatment under the law becomes harder to ignore.
The argument was best summarized by Dr. Bet MacArthur of Cambridge, who, according to the Eagle-Tribune, has worked in the field of gender identity for more than 25 years.
MacArthur told the newspaper that cases of children changing their sexual identity are more common than people think, but have usually been hidden or frustrated.
The mother explained the condition as stemming from a birth defect during the formation of the gender in the uterus in which “the brain develops in one direction, the body in the other.”
Whatever the cause, the child certainly should not suffer as a result, and thanks to earlier court rulings and the professionalism of the Methuen school administration, that won’t be the case.
MacArthur put it this way: “The fact that the school is accommodating the child is the dawn of a whole new era of medical and social understanding.”
Time will tell.