Eunuchs in India

[Glenn]

An odd ruling affecting eunuchs in India, most of whom consider themselves women, but were just ruled to be legally male.

"http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/south/02/04/india.eunuchs.ap/index.html"

Sounds like some of the eunuchs are IS: "Most of the country's tens of thousands of eunuchs are castrated as babies or children, though a few are born without male genitalia. "

Glenn

[RGMCjim]

Glenn,
I have an intersexed friend who is originally from New Zealand but has been living in India for years and runs an ashram for orphaned children. Her intersex is caused by pre-natal progestin exposure like me, but unlike me she was assigned female and went through multiple childhood surgeries to alter her genitals. Like many of us who were "assigned" a gender hers doesn't really fit and the surgeries were a disaster.

The local Hijra have adopted her as one of their own and she's learned a lot about them, and how intersexed people are treated in India. The Hijra are a caste of transsexual, transgendered, eunuch, and/or intersexed people who have exsisted as a group for thousands of years. They've had a lot of professions in the past but currently most of them survive through prostitution. It's pretty interesting.

Jim

[Betsy]

Here's a interesting article about eunuchs/hijra in India. It was sent by one the med students who attended our presentation to the Med School of NJ earlier this week.

http://www.bmezine.com/ritual/970101/hijra.html

Betsy