Thank you for writing this. I felt the same way when I watched the film months ago. Now, I can share your article with others when I see them say that this film is somehow pro-trans.
I also agree that more people might benefit from understanding this line in the movie as well as how you end your article:
“I am as God made me,” she explains.
Damn right. People with DSDs—as well as gender-nonconforming homosexuals—are fine just the way they are.
I am so confused by the arguments made by the two activists in the "Them" article. They seem to be claiming, all at the same time, that the state laws are bad because they are preventing trans children from having surgeries that they aren't happening anywhere and that these same laws are interfering with the surgeries on children with DSDs, but these surgeries are bad and shouldn't be happening because they are harmful and minors can't understand the long-term effects of these surgeries but they are good for trans kids and those kids do understand them, or should at least just be given what they think they want. This completely self-contradictory and nonsensical discussion should have never made it past the articles editors, much less into serious public debate and policy making.
Thank you! So clear and direct a review. I wish I could share with someone I know who is obsessed with this film for complicated reasons about trying to make sense of a young trans relative. It’s not going to make sense because the trans is a make believe religious feeling. The DSD would be real.
Feels like worse than cultural appropriation for the AGPs to claim to be the same as intersex.
You’ve done an incredibly smart, fine-tuned job of explaining some really hard-to-grasp issues, including putting forth a well-grounded basis for why children with DSDs should ALSO be left alone. That you did so through the frame of this movie (almost) makes me want to see it. Fantastic work, Ben! Thank you so much. I have restacked.
I don’t recall him saying he’s “a she” but that there was a discovery of a planned hysterectomy procedure. Presuming it’s Persistent Műllerian Duct Syndrome, it’s a MALE condition and very rare.
The absurdity of the discovery of the uterus, etc and yet he had no breasts, no vagina, cervix, menstrual cycle, etc. therefore no female hormones. I’m assuming he had male genitalia to make him believe he was a actually a male. Which he was, intersex is a bit of a misnomer because it really is a sexual development disorder not both sexes in one body. For an example https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Schinegger.
Yeah it’s fictional so they obviously took creative liberty. But Benitez did say in the film something about how, because he (or she) lived a holy and celibate life, he never realized his body was different from others’.
„And if people believe that it’s a physical condition, no different from a DSD, then they’re more likely to agree that denying trans-identified kids access to sex-trait modification (aka “gender-affirming care”) is a human rights violation, instead of what it actually is: child abuse.”
Something wrong with this sentence, like it says that denying GAC is child abuse
I was going to make the same comment. It’s safe to guess Ben would replace ‘abuse’ with ‘protection’ or similar on review. But it’s a great piece that clearly explains the central facts.
It’s my understanding that it is not implied that the character in the movie is of female sex they grow up as a normal appearing male but simply discover later in life that they also have internal female reproductive organs (which they decline to have removed)
I looked online and found this may be the DSD that would correspond to how the character is presented
Ok maybe I’m wrong then I thought it was a uterus that character could have had removed not ovaries and the description of this syndrome says an individual could have a uterus and fallopian tubes in addition to normal (male) functioning reproductive organs and gonads
I guess I’d have to rewatch the movie to see what I missed
Nice piece. Out of interest, the first “gender identity” clinic seems to have been the one at UCLA, founded in 1962 (3 years before Money’s at Johns Hopkins) by Robert Stoller (credited, along with Ralph Greenson, with having coined the term) and others. NB Money is “credited” (before he left NZ) with having encouraged Janet Frame onto the path that almost led her to being lobotomised (another great achievement of modern psychiatry…).
When I watched the movie, I was ... transfixed. The new Pope obviously had male gentalia because the (obviously nonfunctional) uterus and ovaries were only discovered in surgery. The pope should have had the surgery to reduce health risks. It is not pro trans - because the Pope never transitioned. It's amazing that people buy this stuff.
Mark, wasn’t there some reference in the film to “modesty” in the seminary playing a part, regarding what others believed Benitez’s sex to be? Here’s what a reviewer of the book wrote, over at Goodreads (I haven’t read the book, I only saw the film):
“He's genetically female, but was born with deformed genitalia, which looked ambiguous enough for his impoverished and uneducated parents (who would have preferred a boy anyway, he implies) to assume he was male. They brought him up as a boy, and he always genuinely believed himself to be male. Since he was sequestered from a fairly early age in a seminary, an environment where his masculinity was assumed and where modesty was the norm, nobody ever got the opportunity to get a good look and inform him otherwise. And since he became a priest who adhered to his vow of chastity, the question of relationships didn't arise.
According to the story, it was only when he was injured in a car bomb - after many years as a priest, and after being promoted to a high position in the church - that a doctor attended him, and told him that his genitalia were in fact recognisably female and he was in truth a woman. He was devastated, went to the Pope, offered to resign - and the Pope arranged for him to have surgery to correct the deformation to make him look 'normal' there. At the last minute he decided not to alter the body God had given him, and decided (strangely, I think, in the context) to carry on passing as a man and working as a priest. The Pope honours his decision, makes him a secret cardinal, and - as we know - he ends up being elected Pope himself.
Whether all this is plausible (didn't he/she have periods? Wouldn't that have been a bit of a clue however naive he/she was?) is another matter. I'm not 100% sure whether the twist ending was a good idea, but it's certainly stayed in my mind since I finished the book.
Tl;dr - Benitez is intersex, not transgender - he sincerely believed himself to be a man until late middle age.”
Thank you for writing this. I felt the same way when I watched the film months ago. Now, I can share your article with others when I see them say that this film is somehow pro-trans.
I also agree that more people might benefit from understanding this line in the movie as well as how you end your article:
“I am as God made me,” she explains.
Damn right. People with DSDs—as well as gender-nonconforming homosexuals—are fine just the way they are.
Leave them kids alone.
I am so confused by the arguments made by the two activists in the "Them" article. They seem to be claiming, all at the same time, that the state laws are bad because they are preventing trans children from having surgeries that they aren't happening anywhere and that these same laws are interfering with the surgeries on children with DSDs, but these surgeries are bad and shouldn't be happening because they are harmful and minors can't understand the long-term effects of these surgeries but they are good for trans kids and those kids do understand them, or should at least just be given what they think they want. This completely self-contradictory and nonsensical discussion should have never made it past the articles editors, much less into serious public debate and policy making.
Exactly.
Thank you! So clear and direct a review. I wish I could share with someone I know who is obsessed with this film for complicated reasons about trying to make sense of a young trans relative. It’s not going to make sense because the trans is a make believe religious feeling. The DSD would be real.
Feels like worse than cultural appropriation for the AGPs to claim to be the same as intersex.
You’ve done an incredibly smart, fine-tuned job of explaining some really hard-to-grasp issues, including putting forth a well-grounded basis for why children with DSDs should ALSO be left alone. That you did so through the frame of this movie (almost) makes me want to see it. Fantastic work, Ben! Thank you so much. I have restacked.
I don’t recall him saying he’s “a she” but that there was a discovery of a planned hysterectomy procedure. Presuming it’s Persistent Műllerian Duct Syndrome, it’s a MALE condition and very rare.
Still a man.
I thought it was about CAH.
Difficult because they don’t state the condition. He’s certainly not a woman
“and a few years ago he decided to transition.”
transition or detransition?
Thank you! Fixed it.
Thank you again for your work!
Great analysis Ben. Learned a lot
Uncle Bill
The absurdity of the discovery of the uterus, etc and yet he had no breasts, no vagina, cervix, menstrual cycle, etc. therefore no female hormones. I’m assuming he had male genitalia to make him believe he was a actually a male. Which he was, intersex is a bit of a misnomer because it really is a sexual development disorder not both sexes in one body. For an example https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Schinegger.
Yeah it’s fictional so they obviously took creative liberty. But Benitez did say in the film something about how, because he (or she) lived a holy and celibate life, he never realized his body was different from others’.
I had never heard of this movie. Thank you for writing about it.
I recommend it.
„And if people believe that it’s a physical condition, no different from a DSD, then they’re more likely to agree that denying trans-identified kids access to sex-trait modification (aka “gender-affirming care”) is a human rights violation, instead of what it actually is: child abuse.”
Something wrong with this sentence, like it says that denying GAC is child abuse
You're so right. I'll update.
I was going to make the same comment. It’s safe to guess Ben would replace ‘abuse’ with ‘protection’ or similar on review. But it’s a great piece that clearly explains the central facts.
Excellent article Ben. Thanks for being so informative.
It’s my understanding that it is not implied that the character in the movie is of female sex they grow up as a normal appearing male but simply discover later in life that they also have internal female reproductive organs (which they decline to have removed)
I looked online and found this may be the DSD that would correspond to how the character is presented
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistent_M%C3%BCllerian_duct_syndrome
Character has ovaries. People with PMDS have undescended testes.
I interpreted it as CAH.
Ok maybe I’m wrong then I thought it was a uterus that character could have had removed not ovaries and the description of this syndrome says an individual could have a uterus and fallopian tubes in addition to normal (male) functioning reproductive organs and gonads
I guess I’d have to rewatch the movie to see what I missed
Great way to end this very good piece.
Intersex people are born that way. Trans people are not.
Nice piece. Out of interest, the first “gender identity” clinic seems to have been the one at UCLA, founded in 1962 (3 years before Money’s at Johns Hopkins) by Robert Stoller (credited, along with Ralph Greenson, with having coined the term) and others. NB Money is “credited” (before he left NZ) with having encouraged Janet Frame onto the path that almost led her to being lobotomised (another great achievement of modern psychiatry…).
Thanks for the reference. I'll check the Frame website. I read a piece on her experience recently, which sent me off on the Money-Stoller line.
When I watched the movie, I was ... transfixed. The new Pope obviously had male gentalia because the (obviously nonfunctional) uterus and ovaries were only discovered in surgery. The pope should have had the surgery to reduce health risks. It is not pro trans - because the Pope never transitioned. It's amazing that people buy this stuff.
Benitez has a DSD. Much of this isn't plausible. Whether Benitez is male or female is unclear.
Mark, wasn’t there some reference in the film to “modesty” in the seminary playing a part, regarding what others believed Benitez’s sex to be? Here’s what a reviewer of the book wrote, over at Goodreads (I haven’t read the book, I only saw the film):
“He's genetically female, but was born with deformed genitalia, which looked ambiguous enough for his impoverished and uneducated parents (who would have preferred a boy anyway, he implies) to assume he was male. They brought him up as a boy, and he always genuinely believed himself to be male. Since he was sequestered from a fairly early age in a seminary, an environment where his masculinity was assumed and where modesty was the norm, nobody ever got the opportunity to get a good look and inform him otherwise. And since he became a priest who adhered to his vow of chastity, the question of relationships didn't arise.
According to the story, it was only when he was injured in a car bomb - after many years as a priest, and after being promoted to a high position in the church - that a doctor attended him, and told him that his genitalia were in fact recognisably female and he was in truth a woman. He was devastated, went to the Pope, offered to resign - and the Pope arranged for him to have surgery to correct the deformation to make him look 'normal' there. At the last minute he decided not to alter the body God had given him, and decided (strangely, I think, in the context) to carry on passing as a man and working as a priest. The Pope honours his decision, makes him a secret cardinal, and - as we know - he ends up being elected Pope himself.
Whether all this is plausible (didn't he/she have periods? Wouldn't that have been a bit of a clue however naive he/she was?) is another matter. I'm not 100% sure whether the twist ending was a good idea, but it's certainly stayed in my mind since I finished the book.
Tl;dr - Benitez is intersex, not transgender - he sincerely believed himself to be a man until late middle age.”