Intersex legislation considered in South Africa.A law on corrective surgery for children with ambiguous genitals--intersex children--is under consideration, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the SA Human Rights Commission. "We are looking at the practice of surgery; do we need legislation to regulate this area, who should decide, when must the decision be taken," said Judith Cohen cohen or kohen (Hebrew: “priest”) Jewish priest descended from Zadok (a descendant of Aaron), priest at the First Temple of Jerusalem. The biblical priesthood was hereditary and male. , parliamentary officer for the commission. The commission hosted a seminar on intersex intersex /in·ter·sex/ (in´ter-seks) 1. hermaphrodite. 2. pseudohermaphrodite. 3. intersexuality. female intersex a female pseudohermaphrodite. children in November 2004, asking whether gender "normalisation 1. (data processing) normalisation - A transformation applied uniformly to each element in a set of data so that the set has some specific statistical property. For example, monthly measurements of the rainfall in London might be normalised by dividing each one by the total " surgery was in the best interests of the child. Cohen told Sapa the Department of Justice was also considering amendments to the equality legislation, so that it included the definition of intersex within the definition of sex. She said debate about intersex children should take place within a human rights framework, particularly when these children challenged the worldview world·view n. In both senses also called Weltanschauung. 1. The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world. 2. A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group. of society, which almost exclusively recognised male and female gender. Dr Ariane Spitaels, a paediatrician at the University of Stellenbosch's faculty of health sciences, said it was necessary to reconsider surgery performed shortly after birth. "The cut is final and irreversible," she said, adding that doctors and parents usually did not know before birth if a child was intersex. She said parents faced huge societal pressure. They usually worried about what would happen when the child reached puberty, what their child's sexual orientation sexual orientation n. The direction of one's sexual interest toward members of the same, opposite, or both sexes, especially a direction seen to be dictated by physiologic rather than sociologic forces. would be, and whether the child could have children of its own one day. Sally Gross, founder of the Intersex Society of South Africa South Africa, Afrikaans Suid-Afrika, officially Republic of South Africa, republic (2005 est. pop. 44,344,000), 471,442 sq mi (1,221,037 sq km), S Africa. , who was classified as male at birth and known as Selwyn, said the issue concerned human diversity and human rights. "My struggle ... is quite simply to be seen as a human being and not as a walking, talking pathological specimen," she said. Gross said South Africa had possibly the world's highest prevalence of intersex children, with uncorroborated figures suggesting a national population ratio of 1:500, or about 90 thousand individuals. Source: Sapa, 2 December 2004, Cape Town |
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