To call a transgender man "he" is a political statement which obscures reality.

Men can have babies and other postmodern myths

by Holly Hamilton-Bleakley

A new study has come out in the US on what it is like to be ‘male and pregnant’.

The online journal Obstetrics and Gynecology published the research article ‘Transgender Men Who Experienced Pregnancy After Female-to-Male Gender Transitioning’. The study, which looks at 41 transgender men and their experiences in pregnancy, is seen as cutting-edge work, thought to be the first study of its kind.

There are some interesting facts which emerge from the study, which reveal a bit about the lives of women who have become transgendered males. For instance, apparently ‘prior testosterone use’ did not have an effect on the pregnancy, delivery or birth outcomes of the participants. And the ‘men in this small study had little trouble conceiving’, with the majority of the participants getting pregnant using ‘their own eggs and their partner’s sperm.’ Indeed, only seven percent of the participants had to use fertility drugs; one-third did not even plan their pregnancies.

Yet, there is something troubling about this study, and the way it has been reported. It revolves, I think, around the use of language. There is a deliberate insistence on calling the participants ‘men’, which, in the context of pregnancy and childbirth, makes for very provocative reading. For instance, ‘the men had little trouble conceiving’, or the men ‘used their own eggs’, or the men ‘were denied prenatal care’. One of the participants in the study is quoted as saying, ‘Pregnancy and childbirth were very male experiences for me. When I birthed my children, I was born into fatherhood.’

Of course, any gender theorist will tell you that ‘gender identity is a spectrum’, and that there is a fundamental distinction between one’s gender and one’s biological sex. You can be a man if you wish, or a woman if you wish. What matters is not what is in your DNA – what matters is what you want.

And so, there must be a change in language to reflect this ‘spectrum’ understanding of gender.

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