Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.
Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.
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Notes -
It is an empirical fact that the list of entities which are admissible into our disease ontology changes over time.
We used to believe in medical conditions like neurasthenia and hysteria, but now we don’t. When presented with the same physical and psychological symptoms, we might just say that it’s part of normal variation, or we might just attribute it to a bad episode, or we could bring the symptoms under the heading of a different disease category altogether - either way, the old categories have been abandoned.
Merely being able to identify a clear biological antecedent to a trait is not sufficient for that trait to be conceived of as a medical condition. It’s reasonable to think that the Big Five personality traits have a substantial basis in genetics, but no one thinks that being extraverted (within reason) is a disease. Extraversion is not medicalized.
The ask is that “I’m intersex” should provoke the same social response as “I’m extraverted” - an “oh, I see” rather than a “wow that’s crazy, what’s that like?” It should be seen as part of normal human variation, rather than conceived of as a wholly distinct category.
Whether this is feasible or desirable is a separate question. But that’s how I understand the request.
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