From: Disturbnce [Disturbnce@aol.com] Sent: Friday, 22 May, 1998 9:55 To: blue_planet@MPGN.COM Subject: [BLUE PLANET] - Gender Identity Just a stray thought: Page 233, Body Sculpting. "An ugly white man can become a beautiful oriental woman..." This strongly implies that gender has become a matter of choice in the BP world, at least for those with the cash for the treatments. A couple of questions are raised. Is a full transgender conversion available, with fertility? What has this capability done to social conventions, cultural mores, religious views? Considering the storm Diva International has stirred up in Israel, at our current level of technology, how much bigger a firestorm are we talking about here, or has humanity matured just a tiny little bit? Also, what are the social repercussions of a major body rebuild, that has nothing to do with gender? How often do people cross racial boundaries in their choice of features, skin tone, and the like? Can we hope that humanity has grown up a little in that department also, since apparent race may have nothing to do with birth? Andrew *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Max Kalus [max.kalus@student.uni-augsburg.de] Sent: Friday, 22 May, 1998 4:47 To: blue_planet@MPGN.COM Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - Provincialism Auberon wrote: > Someone's recent comment about hand signs reminded me -- some friends of mine > went to China recently. Apparently, dfferent languages and dialects are such > a problem there, that they've got hand signs for numbers, so that while it's > hard to order in a restaurant (for instance), they can at least tell you how > much you have to pay. I travel a good deal, and have experienced the same. Hand signs and pidgin language are very helpful everywhere. Yes, and there are some international words, like "soup" whicvh are helpful almost everywhere :-) Max Kalus. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Jason A Werner [c577200@showme.missouri.edu] Sent: Friday, 22 May, 1998 18:17 To: blue_planet@MPGN.COM Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - Gender Identity Disturbnce wrote: > Just a stray thought: > > Page 233, Body Sculpting. "An ugly white man can become a beautiful oriental > woman..." This strongly implies that gender has become a matter of choice in > the BP world, at least for those with the cash for the treatments. A couple of > questions are raised. Is a full transgender conversion available, with > fertility? What has this capability done to social conventions, cultural > mores, religious views? Considering the storm Diva International has stirred > up in Israel, at our current level of technology, how much bigger a firestorm > are we talking about here, or has humanity matured just a tiny little bit? Again, I'm going to have to defer upstairs for the canonical answer on this one. However, speaking as a health care professional, here's my thoughts... Right now, there are places in the world where you can go and have your gender "re-assigned." In the United States, there are currently four (that I know about) centers that do this. At all of them, you are required to undergo a lengthy evaluation, both physically and psychologically. Rejection, rather than acceptance, is the norm. However, once you've been accepted into the program, the "re-assignment" is quite thorough. At least one program includes not only the "cosmetic" aspects of the surgery, but a kind of "gender rehabilitation" as well (I'm using way to many quotes in this, I know), where patients are taught the basics of how to act in their new role. For example, how many males out there really know about the mechanics behind moving in a tea-length skirt? Having interviewed one of the graduates of one of these programs myself, I'd have to admit that they do a remarkable job. I'd have had a hard time telling for sure. If you're sufficiently wealthy and you don't pass the screens for the more discriminating programs, there are groups in various places that will perform the essentials of the surgery on anyone who can pay. To the best of my knowledge, none of these are in the US, Canada, the FRG, the UK, France, or Brazil. It's my understanding that health regulatory organizations tend to take a dim view of these procedures when not psychologically warranted. I'd be doubtful about the whole fertility thing. Women simply don't have the Sex-determing Region of the Y chromosome (SRY). By the same token, although men do have 1 X chromosome, even females who have only a single X are not typically fertile (e.g. Turner's Syndrome pts whose genotype is 45 X0). It would be possible to transplant functional ovaries, fallopian tubes, and a uterus into a host male or testes, an epididymis, a vas, a prostate etc. into a host female. The external genitalia can be manufactured out of existing tissue. However, it seems that you can't necessarily ensure a complete gender equity between people seeking reassignment, so exchange of gonadal tissue is more or less out. SO...after all that, I'd say that the only way to achieve fertility would be to clone the appropriate gonads from donor tissue, wait a year or so for the thing to grow, and then do the transplant. You'd probably have to do some hefty hormone manipulation in the early stages until you can "prime the system" so to speak. Additionally, if you didn't want to make sure the donor tissue had the right HLA spectrum, you'd also have to put the recipient on some pretty hefty immune-supressing drugs so that they don't wind up rejecting their new ovaries. "Guess you oughta stay outta the water, boss. Wouldn't wanna get a fast fungus infection in your...eye." Like so much else of biotech, it's available. The question is, how much have you got? And remember...you get what you pay for. As for the social repercussions of body sculpting, I'll leave that to others better qualified than I. -- -Jason Werner Biohazard Games ------------------------------------------------ I lacked the courage to investigate the weaknesses of the wicked, because I discovered they are the same as the weaknesses of the saintly. - Wm. of Baskerville -------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: John M. Kahane [jkahane@comnet.ca] Sent: Friday, 22 May, 1998 15:19 To: blue_planet@MPGN.COM Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - Countries in Space (was: A Few Comments) On Thu, 21 May 1998 16:51:46 -0400, R. Stefko wrote: >Since we're on the topic of nations in space . . . A few months ago I >created a political framework for post-Blight Earth, based on information >gleaned from BP, as well as my own speculations. The framework is >essentially a list of nations, Incorporates, and GEO administrative regions, >organized by continent, and accompanied by the names of their capital >cities. If anyone is interested in seeing this list, send email to >stefko@westol.com. I'll be happy to send a copy as a file attachment (it's >formatted for Wordperfect, but I could always send it in ASCII). And please, >once you've read it, tell me what you think. I can use some comments and >corrections. I'd love to see this file, if I might. I can handle it in WordPerfect, if necessary, but if it;'s got formatting and the like, although I would prefer to receive it in ASCII. Would you consider letting someone post this up to their BLUE PLANET pages? (I'm going to be putting up my BP web pages hopefully by the end of the weekend.) ... OS/2: Drag me, drop me, make me feel like an object! JohnK jkahane@comnet.ca http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Hilarion [rhogan@mnsi.net] Sent: Friday, 22 May, 1998 17:41 To: blue_planet@MPGN.COM Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - Countries in Space (was: A Few Comments) On 23-May-98 John M. Kahane playfully chanted: | On Thu, 21 May 1998 16:51:46 -0400, R. Stefko wrote: | |>Since we're on the topic of nations in space . . . A few months ago I |>created a political framework for post-Blight Earth, based on information |>gleaned from BP, as well as my own speculations. | | I'd love to see this file, if I might. I can handle it in | WordPerfect, if necessary, but if it;'s got formatting and the like, | although I would prefer to receive it in ASCII. Would you consider | letting someone post this up to their BLUE PLANET pages? (I'm going | to be putting up my BP web pages hopefully by the end of the | weekend.) Yah, I'd like to see it too. HTML preferably, ASCII secondarily. I can easily translate it if you wish, even into SGML, PDF, or PS. (That way we Lynx users can read it without following around blindly and/or not getting any.) --- rhogan@mnsi.net Do we chase our tail or the moon when we follow the path of self-modification with out objectivity? *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message.