Susan's Place Transgender Resources

The Dex Diaries, Part 9: The Real Silent Majority
A legal advocate speaks out about the real silent majority in the dex story.
Published on October 30, 2012 by Alice Dreger, Ph.D. in Fetishes I Don't Get

The entry of the Dex Diaries is written by Anne Tamar-Mattis, JD, Executive Director of Advocates for Informed Choice, and co-author of our recent paper on prenatal dexametahsone for CAH. AIC advocates for the civil rights of those born with bodies other than the standard male or female, and has been a key player in our joint work to secure the rights of pregnant women offered dexamethasone for CAH.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201210/the-dex-diaries-part-9-the-real-silent-majority (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201210/the-dex-diaries-part-9-the-real-silent-majority)

There's a theory floating around the world of medicine that goes like this: while it is widely known that patients with disorders of sex development (DSD) are unhappy with the treatment they have received – cosmetic genital surgery, unwanted hormone treatment, and humiliating genital exams top the list – they can be safely ignored because there is actually a "silent majority" of patients out there who are doing just fine. This is a comforting idea. It justifies the mistakes of the past, and it allows current practice to continue without all the discomfort of change.

Those of us who work in DSD advocacy hear the theory of the satisfied silent majority all the time. But no one can find them. After almost two decades of patient advocacy and active debate, decades in which hundreds of affected people have spoken out against the treatment they received, not one person with a DSD has spoken out publicly to say that normalizing treatment is just great. Not one.

But there is a silent majority out there in the world of DSD treatment. And I have found them. They are the clinicians, the researchers, the junior practitioners, the social workers, the nurses, the psychologists who know or suspect that there is something very wrong with current treatment models, but keep their thoughts to themselves.