Pronouns
I'm 72. When I was a kid, and well into my twenties, if not beyond, almost no one was out of the closet because it was too risky--and probably still is--to be known as a homosexual, or anything other than "the usual." The Stonewall Riots helped change some of that, but we still have a long way to go.
One thing that I haven't seen discussed, though, is the way in which denying differences in sexual orientation and/or gender identity left many of us ignorant. I was literally in my early twenties before I first heard the word "bisexual." I was probably in my forties or fifties before I first heard the word "transsexual." And I first heard the term "gender non-binary" so recently that I can actually tell you exactly when and where I first heard it--it was in the course of this discussion, "What Feminist Torah Needs to Look Like," at which one of the panelists was Laynie Soloman. Check the date on that--it took place in the summer of 2018. Which means that I was 69 years old.
I'm trying very hard to get used to the fact that there are circumstances in which trusting one's eyes and/or ears can result in serious misunderstandings. A person with long hair, wearing make-up, women's jewelry, and a dress may be a female despite appearing to have a body that was labeled "male" at birth, having a male-sounding voice, and even using a male name. Similarly, a person dressed as a male may be a male in spite of appearing to have a body that was labeled "female" at birth, having a female-sounding voice, and even using a female name. Or they might be neither of the aforementioned genders, but rather, might identify themselves using a term that, as far as I know, didn't exist 30 years ago. It's a lot to get used to at 72. But I'm doing my best.
P.S. Speaking of terms that, as far as I know, didn't exist 30 years ago, here's a story to amuse you. A few years ago, I was at a Salute to Israel Parade when I saw a banner that said "Bears for Israel." Well, obviously, they weren't talking about polar bears! I had to look it up. :)
posted by Shira Salamone at 2:10 PM
16 Comments:
Here's an article about one specific type of non-binary people:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4721041/#:~:text=This%20report%20describes%20a%20patient,of%20toxins%20in%20the%20testicles.
But being non-binary is a large spectrum and is not only limited to eunuchs and nullos--though I do think that in terms of their bodies, eunuchs and nullos are as non-binary as you can get, wanting to get rid of their male primary sex characteristics but without actually replacing them with female ones.
As a side note, in regards to transgender issues, I wonder just how exactly Judaism is going to determine the Jewish status of someone who, in the future, will be gestated in a womb that would have been transplanted inside of a transgender woman. Heck, this transgender woman's own DNA (for instance, from her very own skin cells) could even eventually be used to produce artificial eggs. So, you are going to have regular sperm from a man, artificial eggs produced from a transgender woman's own, personal skin cells, and a uterus that will originally belong to some cisgender woman but that will later be transplanted into a transgender woman. Just how exactly is the Jewish status of any resulting children actually going to be determined? Serious question, by the way.
Let's start from your initial assumption, that " a uterus that will originally belong to some cisgender woman . . . will later be transplanted into a transgender woman." This isn't comparable to a kidney transplant using one of two of someone's kidneys--a woman has only one uterus. So the first question I must ask is this: How on earth one can transplant a uterus from one person to another ethically? Will there be a black market in uteri?
That said, whatever method is used to create babies for transgender woman would create questions that are going to be a challenge for poskim (halachic decisors, those who make decisions regarding Jewish religious law). I have absolutely no expertise in this area, and have no idea "how exactly is the Jewish status of any resulting children actually going to be determined." Stay tuned to the experts.
"So the first question I must ask is this: How on earth one can transplant a uterus from one person to another ethically? Will there be a black market in uteri?"
One possible way might be to get such uteruses from women who will die young, assuming that their consent was actually obtained beforehand, that is. Another possible way might be to get them from trans men who got elective hysterectomies done.
For the first transplanted uterus for a cis woman in history, the transplant apparently came from a deceased cis woman donor:
https://health.clevelandclinic.org/for-the-first-time-in-north-america-woman-gives-birth-after-uterus-transplant-from-deceased-donor/
But Yeah, ultimately, if it would be fair game for a Jewish genetic male to pass on their Jewish status to their children by gestating them inside of their transplanted womb and/or by having them be created from artificial eggs made from their own skin cells or whatever, why exactly would it (or should it) be unacceptable for a Jewish genetic male to likewise pass on their Jewish status to their children by creating them from their own sperm? What exactly makes either gestation or eggs superior to sperm?
Similarly, if there will be a cisgender lesbian couple and one will provide the eggs and gestate the child to term whereas the other one will have artificial sperm be produced from their own DNA, how exactly is the Jewish status of the resulting child actually going to be determined? Is the sperm now going to matter because it came from a (genetic) female, or what? Or would the provider of the sperm still be viewed as being completely irrelevant in regards to determining Jewish status regardless of whether or not they are a (genetic) male or a (genetic) female?
And ultimately this gets back to my point about why exactly Conservative Judaism believes that literally EVERY SINGLE THING in Jewish law (halakha) is capable of changing and evolving other than, bizarrely, both patrilineal descent and intermarriage. Anything else can change--gay rights, gay marriage, polyamorous marriage, women in minyans, women rabbis, et cetera--but these two things can NEVER, EVER change even though there is NO principled basis for this distinction and even though the Conservative Jewish movement already has NO problem dividing the Jewish people by performing conversions to Judaism that are not universally recognized, thus creating a class of people whom they consider to be Jews but some other Jews and Jewish movements don't actually consider to be Jews.
As a former rabbi of mine used to say, I'm now "confused on a higher level." I'm leaving this to rabbis to figure out.
" . . . polyamorous marriage." ? I haven't anything about approval of this by the (Conservative) Rabbinical Assembly's Committee on Law and Standards. I think we haven't heard the end of discussions regarding Patrilineal descent. Intermarriage creates a different problem--how does one deal with a congregation of which perhaps a quarter of their members aren't Jewish by *anyone's* definition? Here's a story I read in a book within the past two years or so--a person attended a synagogue committee meeting with an ash cross (from a Catholic observance of Ash Wednesday)on their forehead, and no one said a word. This is going to happen when non-Jews are welcomed as full members of synagogues.
"" . . . polyamorous marriage." ? I haven't anything about approval of this by the (Conservative) Rabbinical Assembly's Committee on Law and Standards."
They will. Not now, but possibly 10, 20, 50, or 100 years down the line. It's only a matter of time considering that consensual polyamory is harmless and considering that some people are quite literally wired to be polyamorous, so the choices for them would either be engaging in a consensual polyamorous lifestyle, being depressed, or committing adultery without the prior consent of their spouse and thus causing their spouse to feel severely hurt and disrespected. Out of these three options, CLEARLY the first option is BY FAR superior. No doubt about that!
"I think we haven't heard the end of discussions regarding Patrilineal descent."
One would really hope so, but it's already almost been 40 years since the Reform Movement made its own decision in regards to this and Conservative Judaism still isn't following suit. Now, I'm not saying that they automatically MUST follow suit, but an acknowledgement that the pro-change side has the superior argument(s) here would certainly be nice! ;)
"Intermarriage creates a different problem--how does one deal with a congregation of which perhaps a quarter of their members aren't Jewish by *anyone's* definition? Here's a story I read in a book within the past two years or so--a person attended a synagogue committee meeting with an ash cross (from a Catholic observance of Ash Wednesday)on their forehead, and no one said a word. This is going to happen when non-Jews are welcomed as full members of synagogues."
Do you think that the Conservative Jewish movement should abandon its recent policy of allowing non-Jews to become synagogue members?
And Yes, that ash cross was (unintentionally) disrespectful in a synagogue. That I completely agree with you on.
"Do you think that the Conservative Jewish movement should abandon its recent policy of allowing non-Jews to become synagogue members?"
Our small no-rabbi congregation hasn't even heard about that. And yes, I think that there *should* be some distinctions between Jewish and non-Jewish participants in a synagogue. If the Conservative Movement goes the rest of the way and allows rabbis to perform weddings of Jews to non-Jews, what incentive will be left for conversion, given that it won't make much difference?
https://religionnews.com/2017/03/07/conservative-synagogues-can-now-officially-accept-non-jews-as-members/
As for incentives for conversion, what incentives are there for a non-Jewish male spouse of a Jewish woman to convert to Judaism when their children will already be considered Jewish either way?
Coyote, thanks for the link, and touche.
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Donne G. Kampel
Very articulate and thoughtfully written.
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Shira Salamone
Donne G. Kampel , thank you!
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I don't think I've ever done this before, but I'm copying from my e-mail:
Mon, Jun 21, 11:00 PM (6 days ago)
to [a former colleague, from before I retired]:
Sorry to overload your inbox, but I couldn't get the Private Message window in Facebook to cooperate.
I just want to thank you for commenting that my Sunday, June 20, 2021 post, "Pronouns," was "Very articulate and thoughtfully written." I have been writing blog posts since August 2, 2004, and Facebook posts since about April 2019, and I can probably count on less than one hand the number of times that anyone has complimented me on my writing. That means a lot to me. Thank you again.
Fri, Jun 25, 10:18 PM (2 days ago)
to me
Dear . . .:
I have always found you intelligent, articulate, and funny! I am so glad that we connected after our retirements. Take care.
End of shameless self-promotion. :) ("Resistance is futile" when it's so good for my ego.) We now return you to our regularly-scheduled blog. :)
"Coyote, thanks for the link, and touche."
Yeah, when Conservative Jewish synagogues already accept non-Jews as members AND already automatically consider children of intermarriage to be Jewish if the intermarried parent is the mother, exactly what incentive is there for non-Jewish men married to Jewish women to ever actually convert to Judaism when, in the long(er)-run, it simply doesn't really matter?
BTW, this is also sexist: As in, the expectation that non-Jewish female spouses of Jewish men should convert to Judaism but not the non-Jewish male spouses of Jewish women.
And Yeah, once it will become acceptable to significantly deviate from tradition by giving uterus transplants to genetic males (which includes trans women) as well as by creating artificial sperm from women's DNA and artificial eggs from men's DNA, one is going to seriously wonder why exactly some other aspects of Jewish tradition cannot be reconsidered as well. A religion that can't evolve doesn't sound like it has all that much value. It's like a Muslim saying "Oh, I personally object to the part of our religious doctrine that says that apostates should be given the death penalty, but this is for God to decide and not for me and thus I cannot change it, unfortunately!"
"If the Conservative Movement goes the rest of the way and allows rabbis to perform weddings of Jews to non-Jews, what incentive will be left for conversion, given that it won't make much difference?"
Also, I thought that Jews have historically *discouraged* conversions, especially insincere ones? If so, why exactly would they want to deviate from centuries or even millenniums of tradition in regards to this? Is getting insincere converts to Judaism really superior to endorsing intermarriage?
BTW, as a side note, the children of intermarriage only need to identify as Jewish 50% of the time in order to break even. With the children of two Jewish parents, they need to identify as Jewish 100% of the time in order to break even. So, this data needs to be kept in mind in regards to studying the effects of intermarriage on Jewish continuity. If children with two Jewish parents (hypothetically) identify as Jewish 90% of the time while children with one Jewish parent (hypothetically) identify as Jewish 60% of the time, then the children with one Jewish parent are in a stronger position here since 60% - 50% = 10% whereas 90% - 100% = -10%, and 10% > -10%.
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