This is a set of observations and a few responses to Neil Whitehead's Should Transsexuality Be Freely Endorsed by Christians? I have written a rebuttal to the theological portion in Objection: Christ and the Bride.
Intersex Ethics
Whitehead is the only person I know who dares to criticize intersex people in public, namely AIS.
Most pro-binary Christians are too cowardly to oppress the same ethics
on intersex people as they do on trans people, instead they present
intersex people compassion to live their lives as best they can. In
contrast, the so-called loving approach to trans people is to implement
a monolithic law that motivates many of us to suicide. Whitehead
follows the monolithic approach, both for trans and intersex people. In
"Should Transsexuality Be Freely Endorsed by Christians?" Whitehead writes briefly about people with AIS. He dances around labeling them boys, but does not believe they are girls.
Such
children are difficult to differentiate from girls.
Not "genetic girls" or "non-intersex girls," just "girls." In every
case, a person with AIS chooses to live as a woman and that choice is
always respected, even by Christians. Whitehead also dances around
whether they should live as women or men, but he does dictate marriage.
I raise
this because it [AIS] is like a post-surgical transsexual case. . . .
Attempting a change to live as a very imperfect man is very difficult
and likely to lead to considerable emotional problems. . . . [A]mong
the Christian community, very carefully, I believe we should encourage
those with androgen insensitivity syndrome to remain unmarried.
I believe that Whitehead unspeakably
believes AIS women should live as men (he avoids saying either way) but
knows the Church has not and will not accept this and is picking his
battles, namely marriage. I believe this because he avoids saying they
should live as women and because it's consistent that if they should
not live as a woman in respect to marriage, they should not live as a
woman in other respects. Whitehead is actually more consistent than
most Christians because he treats intersex and trans people the same.
In a sense I respect that, but in another he demonstrates how
ridiculous binary gender rules are. You can read about Whitehead's
theology in
Objection: Christ and the Bride.
Science
While I won't analyze Whitehead's science deeply, a few things strike me as exceedingly disturbing. Whitehead references are overwhelmingly from his own work.
From a personal correspondence with Jerry Leach, 80% of trans people
are heterosexual (in relation to their birth gender) whereas Blanchard
found only 10% have this orientation. Whitehead sides with Jerry saying trans people are lying.
However, see Leach: Things in Common Among Transsexuals
where I note Jerry is looking at only a specific kind of transgender
person, mostly cross dressers. Also, Jerry says this comes from 80
people while Whitehead (or Jerry via Whitehead) says "hundreds." Yet
this is supposed to be more accurate than Blanchard, the biggest name
in the field? Whitehead also repeats Jerry's 80% molestation rate.
Whitehead references an article, (abstract)
and states that medication made a person's transexualism "disappears."
However, the Whitead covers up the fact that this was temporary which hardly qualifies as "disappearing" and this
has never been recorded as repeating. Note this identical confusion was made by Transsexuality A Report by the Evangelical Alliance Policy Commission.
Mis-states that the 1964 Civil Rights act only gives protections to immutable states like race. But it covers religion also which is fully chosen.
Whitehead makes the Genetic Determination error.
