Told to act like a girl

**bachelor tom** · 18th-January-2008

This story has been around for a while, I didn't find it here when I searched:

Told to act like a girl
Carey Roberts
May 18, 2004

The death certificate listed suicide as the official cause of death. But the real cause of his demise was a controversial gender experiment lead by one of the most influential sex researchers of the 20th century.

Bruce Reimer was born in 1965 to a blue-collar family in Winnipeg, Canada. Eight months later, he was victimized by a botched circumcision, and baby Bruce ended up without his sex organ.

The distraught family eventually contacted John Money, a charismatic psychologist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Dr. Money was a leading advocate of the idea that sex-role identification is determined by one's environment, not one's genetic make-up.

Money recommended sex re-assignment surgery, a dubious procedure that had never been performed on a boy born with normal genitalia. Bruce would be given a vagina, his name would be changed to Brenda, and he would be raised as a girl. It would be as easy as that.

So one month before his second birthday, little Bruce was wheeled into the operating room as a boy, and came out as a girl.

But back in Winnipeg, Brenda had other plans. When her mom put a dress on her, little Brenda tried to tear it off. Later she informed her startled parents she wanted to become a garbage man when she grew up.

Enrolled in school, she was more competitive than her female classmates. When girls got into fights, they used their open hands. But Brenda used her fists. Then Brenda's girlfriends discovered that she urinated standing up.

Dr. Money was apprised of all this, and more.

But when Money released his book, Man and Woman, Boy and Girl in 1972, he portrayed Brenda's sex-change operation as a resounding success. The book reviewer at the liberal New York Times wrote approvingly: "if you tell a boy he is a girl, and raise him as one, he will want to do feminine things."

Feminists were elated. They needed to prove that women were just as determined as men to ascend the corporate ladder. Women just needed to overcome the oppressive conditioning of patriarchal society. And Money's research was just the ticket.

Meanwhile things in Winnipeg went from bad to worse. When Brenda reached puberty and her voice deepened, the folly of the charade could no longer be denied. About to undergo her annual breast exam one day, Brenda refused to disrobe. When asked by the doctor, "Do you want to be a girl or not?," she defiantly answered "No!"

Brenda's parents knew the time had come to tell her the truth.

Brenda immediately reverted to her male identity. Choosing the name David, he underwent penile reconstructive surgery. In 1990, David put the past behind him when he and Jane Anne Fontane tied the knot.

During all these years, John Money was the toast of the town. He was hailed as the world's leading expert on sex reassignment. Media interviews, professional awards, and NIH grants — all were showered on him. After all, he had proven that gender identity is a product of nurture, not nature.

He just didn't bother to tell anyone that Brenda was no longer a she.

John Money's world began to collapse in 1997 when a journal article finally revealed the truth of his ill-fated experiment. Money could only sputter, "It's part of the anti-feminist movement."

Money's demise was sealed three years later by the book, As Nature Made Him, which revealed the psychologist to be a charlatan, tireless self-promoter, and intellectual fraud.

Two years ago, David's life began to unravel when his brother unexpectedly died. Then he separated from his wife. After 38 years of indignity and torment, David Reimer took his own life on May 4 (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servl...ional/National).

The feminist dogma that gender is socially constructed is still widespread in our society. Boys receive constant messages that they should start acting more like girls. The sad tale of David Reimer should make us pause to reconsider our mass experiment in gender re-education.

http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/roberts/040518

**bobx23456** · 18th-January-2008

The real heinous criminals in this horrible story are all the baby butchering
bastards who hack up the sex organs of little boys for sordid sexual gratification and outlandish profits. Every one of them are evil baby mutilating perverts who should be caught and hung.

Blessings

Bob

**ooftus goofus** · 18th-January-2008

I cant stand that gender as social construct nonsense.I know a man whos son was being feminized at school-with dolls,feminine stories,feminine projects,etc.Let me tell you,the dad tore into that teachers ass and pulled his son from school that same day.He ended up sending him to a boys school instead.This is something parents and others need to come down hard on.No one has the right to use our children as guinea pigs in gender socialization experiments driven by pure ideology.

**Percy** · 19th-January-2008

During all these years, John Money was the toast of the town. He was hailed as the world's leading expert on sex reassignment. Media interviews, professional awards, and NIH grants — all were showered on him. After all, he had proven that gender identity is a product of nurture, not nature.

He just didn't bother to tell anyone that Brenda was no longer a she.

The story may be old now but the lessons are still relevant.

I don't agree with the 'butchers' comment bobx23456 or their actions being for sexual gratification - that is quite over the top.

People, professionals, get on a wrong track. Mistakes are made in thinking and acting. Careers are made and carry a person along like a wave. It is a test of character to admit error. So many people lack that character. Career investment is a trap, all too often.

I am not making an excuse for them, but trying to put context to them.

I think Money was a fool, personally. A bad man? Maybe not so bad in the initial instance but certainly he went a long way down that road, driving and being driven by a wicked philosophy that has caused damage.

Nevertheless, there are occasions where gender reassignment makes sense for some people. There are always false positives and false negatives at the margins.

**MikeT** · 19th-January-2008

That is just bloody sick!
This is why male circumcision is so wrong, girls would never be treated like this would they?
Mr Money and his faux-science ideas really worked didn't they?
The scary thing is the fact there are lots of other cranks like him out there.
Anyone remember the song by the Who- I'm a Boy?, that was recorded in the 60's.

**Fruit_Cake** · 19th-January-2008

thats a very tragic story, but im not sure that his suicide should automatically be related to what happend to him as a child. I think the author is trying very hard to make it look like that, but it was 40 years later.

**MikeT** · 19th-January-2008

Quote from Fruit_Cake

thats a very tragic story, but im not sure that his suicide should automatically be related to what happend to him as a child. I think the author is trying very hard to make it look like that, but it was 40 years later.

Fruitcake,
How screwed up do you reckon you would be after all that happened to you?
I mean, it is easy for a girl to be changed into a boy as far as clothes and things go, not so easy the other way around though.
A lot of these clowns that call themselves psychiatrists and psychologists are working on watered down theories from the 1800's, each person giving their own idea on it (called a thesis) doesn't help either.
It's called a bloody profession, I have no idea why.

**knight-errant** · 19th-January-2008

Quote from Fruit_Cake

thats a very tragic story, but im not sure that his suicide should automatically be related to what happend to him as a child. I think the author is trying very hard to make it look like that, but it was 40 years later.

You could be right, but it's also a good working hypothesis.

**Feminist_Scum** · 19th-January-2008

Sickening.

John Money's world began to collapse in 1997 when a journal article finally revealed the truth of his ill-fated experiment. Money could only sputter, "It's part of the anti-feminist movement."

Fuck you. There's a reason you feminist fuckers are hated.

**bobx23456** · 19th-January-2008

Quote from Fruit_Cake

thats a very tragic story, but im not sure that his suicide should automatically be related to what happend to him as a child. I think the author is trying very hard to make it look like that, but it was 40 years later.

The purpose of life is life. When his future children were taken away by the brutal baby butchers who hack up little boys every day, he had no purpose in living. It took him many years even to learn his own histroy, and a while longer to figure out that his life had never had a purpose after his body had been so badly maimed.

More than a million little boys are still sexually mutilated in the US every year. The crime of sexual mutilation outnumbers all other violent sex crimes and all other violent crimes against children combined. The brutal criminals who hacked up Mr. Reimer should be caught and hung, along with all the other violent sexual perverts who hack up defenceless little children's sex organs every day.

Blessings

Bob

**ooftus goofus** · 19th-January-2008

I`m glad that numerous studies have proven that gender is NOT a product of social construct,it is not a product of nurture vs nature.Feminists have been forced to accept that they have been wrong all along,and that innate male/female differences are real and cannot be socialized away or compensated for.You can make a boy live life as a girl and you can cut his dick off,but you cannot change his biology in doing so.

**Fruit_Cake** · 20th-January-2008

Quote from bob

More than a million little boys are still sexually mutilated in the US every year

im not sure what this means, surely such a widely spread practise as you say would be well documented? i've never heard about it, im wondering, did this happen to you bob?

Quote from mike

Fruitcake,
How screwed up do you reckon you would be after all that happened to you?

i have no idea how i would feel if something like that happend to me mike, probably i would feel alone, and would find it difficult to relate to anybody well. It might fill me with bitterness and resentment.

the only thing is, is that we don't know the full story, im sure it was a part in his suicide, but who knows, maybe he had got into drugs, or crime, or whatever. There are lots of other reasons why he might have commited suicide, surely we should consider everything before casting judgements?

and im not a believer that the two sexes are the same, i think we are quite different from each other. Gender is the subject that i was most interested in when i was studying, but i also came to the conclusion at the end that the differences between each individual woman or man are far more apparent still, than those between the sexes.

perhaps a member of the same sex has more similar circumstances, but not neccesarily the same personality.

**knight-errant** · 20th-January-2008

Quote from Fruit_Cake

i also came to the conclusion at the end that the differences between each individual woman or man are far more apparent still, than those between the sexes.

How is that relevant?

**bobx23456** · 20th-January-2008

Quote from Fruit_Cake

Quote from bobx23456

More than a million little boys are still sexually mutilated in the US every year. The crime of sexual mutilation outnumbers all other violent sex crimes and all other violent crimes against children combined. The brutal criminals who hacked up Mr. Reimer should be caught and hung, along with all the other violent sexual perverts who hack up defenceless little children's sex organs every day.
BlessingsBob

im not sure what this means, surely such a widely spread practise as you say would be well documented? i've never heard about it, im wondering, did this happen to you bob?

Your ignorance does not reduce the pervasive sexual violence being done to helpless little children. Mothers mutilate their sons and never talk about it. Sexual mutilation is a horrible sex crime against little children done to a million little boys in the US every year. It outnumbers all other violent sex crimes and all other violent crimes against children comined. Feminists whine about female mutilatations done to girls in other coutnries while they brutally hack up the sex organs of their own boys.

i have no idea how i would feel if something like that happend to me mike, probably i would feel alone, and would find it difficult to relate to anybody well. It might fill me with bitterness and resentment.

Indeed. There are many, many bitter resentful men in the United States.

the only thing is, is that we don't know the full story, im sure it was a part in his suicide, but who knows, maybe he had got into drugs, or crime, or whatever. There are lots of other reasons why he might have commited suicide, surely we should consider everything before casting judgements?

His parents and their doctor intended only to mutilate his sex organs like they do to so many other helpless little boys. Instead they accidentally cut it off entirely. Unlike female sexual mutilation the critical parts are external as well as the sensitive pleasurable part they intend to hack off.

His tragedy was more severe than most. The baby butchering doctors tried to hide their horrror by pretending he was female. They should all be caught and hung.

Blessings

Bob

**MAUS** · 20th-January-2008

Quote from ooftus goofus

I`m glad that numerous studies have proven that gender is NOT a product of social construct,it is not a product of nurture vs nature.Feminists have been forced to accept that they have been wrong all along,and that innate male/female differences are real and cannot be socialized away or compensated for.You can make a boy live life as a girl and you can cut his dick off,but you cannot change his biology in doing so.

I was aware of this tragic story from the time it occurred. I did a photojornalism study on transgenderism and transvestism inthe 1970's and my photos were used in a National Film Board documentary.

Something I noticed as a point of commonality in all of these gender confused men was the statement "mother wanted a girl".

The whole use of the term "construct" as a perjorative is absolutely absurd.....if it is not forest IT IS PATRIARCHAL CONSTRUCT.....even the effort to clear the woods is patriarchal construct....without patriarchal construct all you would have is woods....so if you don't like patriarchal construct....go live in the woods.

The sort of doublethink that accomodates that cutting off somebody's penis and turning it inside out is not a construct...but it makes this person a "real woman" or that fabricating a pseudopenis from a toe and some skin is not a construct but makes someone a "real man" however gender...and in particular the masculin gender is a "construct"...

But I do understand the underlying agenda of this doublethink.....our patriarchal construct obstructs the lesbian gay right to male bash therefore the patriarchal construct MUST be deconstructed so that the lesbian gay right to male bash may proceed unobstructed.....

I hope that made things clear and free of the obstruction of patriarchal social constructs...