I still boggle at why you would so freely surrender to the “sex reassignment surgery” terminology if you are (if I comprehend you correctly) convinced that the operation is NOT a “sex change” but at least a partial correction of a part of the anatomy that developed incorrectly (not following norms).
Because with these guys, in a legal sense it
is sex reassignment surgery.
They are currently legally female, and cannot have that designation changed until the surgery is performed.
In cases of severe intersex, such as mine, the exact same operation can be regarded as sex reassignment or genital reconstruction, depending upon the proportion of the cells with 46xx, 46xy, 47xxy, and 45x chromosomes, and no other factor. Disregarding the neuro-anatomy, the same person can be considered more biologically male, or more biologically female, depending entirely on whether they’ve had a blood transfusion or not!
Which is why I use neuro-anatomy, and the consequent sense of self as male or female, as the touchstone. This just minimises, but doesn’t prevent, the problem. Because neurology can also be ambiguous. In that case, the kindest thing to do is what was done by the Church in the Middle Ages: you ask them what sex they are.
One difference - I’d extend that principle, so that whenever the neuro-anatomy is obviously male, or obviously female, you disregard the rest of the criteria. Because the sex identity, the neuro-anatomically caused sense of self, is invariant, even in the face of somatic changes such as in this case. All the rest (yes, even chromosomes - as in a bone marrow transplant, or cell turnover in the case of mosaics and chimerae with multiple cell lines) can change due to entirely natural causes.
The Church is right when it says that such external changes are superficial. They’re incorrect when they use arbitrary criteria, such as a coin-toss, to decide what sex someone is. And that happens to intersexed people - they get assigned a gender depending on superficial appearance at birth, or quite literally in cases of severe ambiguity by a coin-toss, or what the parents would most like, or which technique the available surgeon has most experience in.
Transsexuals are an extreme form of this. They appear to be normal, but the exact opposite of the gender dictated by their neurology. This contradiction causes severe distress, so bad it’s usually fatal in the long term unless the body is made congruent with the neurology.
5 years ago, I was to all intents and purposes a transsexual woman. One with a mild intersex condition, as many transsexual women have. Chromosomally, psychologically, and in every respect but one (a minor genetic glitch - we think) the same as all other transsexual women.
Yet just because I had an ill-understood syndrome that caused a female puberty, and so forced me to transition, I’m supposed to get a moral “pass” for my condition, while other women are condemned for getting it treated voluntarily rather than dying from it.
Sorry, but that condemnation is wrong. It’s not just incorrect, it’s cruel. Either condemn all, or condemn none. I refuse to let my peculiar situation excuse my state, and if I’d had the courage, I would have voluntarily sought treatment long ago. Rather than being in a morally superior position to transsexuals, I am morally their inferior.
I still haven’t worked out why someone so as unworthy as I, even more unworthy than others, got a miracle cure, when those who deserved it far more, who prayed to all the saints in heaven, did not. I’m not even Christian, let alone Catholic!
Why me, Oh Lord? Why was I blessed, and why does everyone congratulate me for “carrying a cross” while others with real crosses to bear get no sympathy, only contempt?
So I do what I can to help, out of a sense of moral outrage at the injustice of it all.
And that brings me back to the original post that started this thread.
