Man Raised As a Girl Commits Suicide(DR recommended raising as girl for experimental purposes)

AP via Yahoo News ^ | 5/12/04 | AP

[Diddle E. Squat]

TORONTO - David Reimer, a Canadian who was born as a boy but raised as a girl after a botched circumcision, has committed suicide after failed investments drove him into poverty. He was 38.

Reimer died in Winnipeg, Manitoba on May 4, according to Canadian media reports. The family has not released the cause of death.

Friends said an anguished Reimer had told them he had lost at least $47,500 last year in a shady pro golf shop investment.

Reimer gained fame in the mid-1990s when he went public with his ordeal. It was published in the book "As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised a Girl" by John Colapinto.

The boy's experiences prompted medical experts in recent years to rethink once accepted wisdom on treating sexual identity cases.

When he was eight months old in 1965, a routine circumcision at a Winnipeg hospital went horribly wrong when a general practitioner filled in for the regular surgeon and seared the boy's penis with an electric cauterizing machine.

His penis was so badly burnt that it eventually fell off. His parents sought advice from Dr. John Money, a sex researcher at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore, Md.

Attempting to prove that gender depends on how a child is raised rather than genetics, Money advocated removing the rest of the male genitalia and prescribing female hormones.

Brenda, as he was known, was 15 when he found out about the mishap and rejected further treatment as a girl. He underwent surgery to remove his breasts and to construct a penis from muscle tissue and cartilage.

Changing his name to David, he eventually married and led a quiet life working at low-paying jobs in Winnipeg.

Colapinto's book brought in money but acquaintances said Reimer was always struggling to make ends meet. Members of the Transcona Golf Club where he had worked once collected several hundred dollars so he could feed his family and staff gave him leftovers from the club restaurant.

The final misfortune was losing his savings last year in the golf shop deal, friends said.

The Manitoba Securities Commission warned potential investors last November that "your money may be at risk" if it was placed with shop owner Gary Perch.

Reimer is survived by his wife, Jane, and two adopted children.

[Diddle E. Squat]

Sad story, and ultimately only one person is responsible for suicide. However the following stood out:

His parents sought advice from Dr. John Money, a sex researcher at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore, Md.

Attempting to prove that gender depends on how a child is raised rather than genetics, Money advocated removing the rest of the male genitalia and prescribing female hormones.

Please understand, I am not in any way advocating for the nature excuse pushed by homosexual groups. But altering something so fundamental to a person for experimental purposes just strikes me as horribly wrong, no matter which side does it, no matter how noble the goals.

[beaversmom]

I had seen this guy's story on TV a few years back--documentary. I e-mailed the story to Dennis Prager as Dennis had mentioned this story on his show before.

[beaversmom]

no matter how noble the goals

From what I remember, the doctor involved didn't have noble goals. David Reimer was his guinea pig. He was trying to alter David's gender. He was still an XY no matter how many dresses they put on him. Seems like the parents were too young and ignorant and just went along with the doctor's advice. I believe he had a twin brother as well. This Dr. Money would have probably fit in real well in Germany during the 30's. The book about his life sounds interesting.

[beaversmom]

Boys will be Boys: nature vs nurture

May 7, 2000
Reporter - Jeff McMullen. Producer - Julian Cress.

David Reimer is a victim of what started as an experiment but has become routine medical procedure around the world.

When a circumcision operation went horribly wrong, doctors decided to turn the then eight-month-old David Reimer into a girl. It was argued that reassigning sex was easy. Nurturing, not nature, determined psychological make-up.

Well, David Reimer, now aged 34, is the angry, living proof of how wrong that assumption was.

He tells Jeff McMullen of a tortured childhood trying to be something he was not, of the bizarre therapy sessions with his twin brother where he was encouraged to adopt attitudes of sexual intercourse.

And he tells 60 Minutes of his eventual struggle to win back his manhood, a struggle involving countless operations, including a double mastectomy.

As McMullen reports, Reimer's story should sound alarm bells about sexual reassignment. Instead, 60 Minutes has been told that several of Australia's leading hospitals still routinely turn boys into girls.

[BykrBayb]

My heart goes out to him and his family. It looks to me like his parents were given a situation that was beyond their ability to comprehend, so they turned to an "expert" who duped them and used their beloved son for his sick experiment.

[beaversmom]

This is from a glowing biography about the doctor's work that I just found on the internet. Notice how they make those questioning the practices of this doctor sound like closed minded prudes. Also, he's a head doctor as I thought--not the one who performed the surgery--he just recommends it.

Vilified, Revered

His work at Johns Hopkins, most notably his involvement in gender assignment surgery for children who have been born with birth defects of their sex organs or adults who wanted gender reassignment, has made him a controversial figure. He has been vilified by the Moral Majority and some sectors of the media in the most highly coloured of terms as a mutilator of babies, a pervert and a champion of open marriage, nudism, pederasty and pornography, an irresponsible mutilator and a pervert masquerading as a surgeon. In fact, he does not have a medical degree and has never performed surgery on a patient. He holds a Ph.D. in social relations from the Psychological Clinic at Harvard University.

[beaversmom]

The book about his life sounds interesting.

Clarification--the book about the victim's life--not anything about that quack from John Hopkins.

[3catsanadog]

If this quack had dealings with the Kinsey Institute or SEICUS, I wouldn't be surprised.

[beaversmom]

Sorry for the many posts. The story has peeked my interest again. Here's a review of the book from Amazon. The end of the review says the story has an uplifting ending. Very sad.

Amazon.com

Once you begin reading As Nature Made Him, a mesmerizing story of a medical tragedy and its traumatic results, you absolutely won't want to put it down. Following a botched circumcision, a family is convinced to raise their infant son, Bruce, as a girl. They rename the child Brenda and spend the next 14 years trying to transform him into a her. Brenda's childhood reads as one filled with anxiety and loneliness, and her fear and confusion are present on nearly every page concerning her early childhood. Much of her pain is caused by Dr. Money, who is presented as a villainous medical man attempting to coerce an unwilling child to submit to numerous unpleasant treatments.

Reading over interviews and reports of decisions made by this doctor, it's difficult to contain anger at the widespread results of his insistence that natural-born gender can be altered with little more than willpower and hormone treatments. The attempts of his parents, twin brother, and extended family to assist Brenda to be happily female are touching--the sense is overwhelmingly of a family wanting to do "right" while being terribly mislead as to what "right" is for her. As Brenda makes the decision to live life as a male (at age 14), she takes the name David and begins the process of reversing the effects of estrogen treatments. David's ultimately successful life--a solid marriage, honest and close family relationships, and his bravery in making his childhood public--bring an uplifting end to his story. Equally fascinating is the latest segment of the longtime nature/nurture controversy, and the interviews of various psychological researchers and practitioners form a larger framework around David's struggle to live as the gender he was meant to be. --Jill Lightner

[beaversmom]

From the glowing biography:

http://www.nzedge.com/heroes/money.html

"A pioneer in the science of human sexuality, John Money is routinely described as "the world's leading sexologist", "one of the foremost investigators of human sexuality" and "the world's leading successor to the mantles of Freud, Kinsey and Masters and Johnson."

[T'wit]

>> ... a mutilator of babies, a pervert and a champion of open marriage, nudism, pederasty and pornography, an irresponsible mutilator and a pervert masquerading as a surgeon.

Another bleeping Democrat.

[The Scourge of Yazid]

The sad thing is that this man wasn't the only person whose life was ruined due to the imbecilic social engineering experiments that gained a foothold in the United States during the 1960s.

The whole idea of someone's sex being mutable is a by-product of the twisted logic that came out of that decade.

If this quack's theories had been rejected for the nonsense that they were and still are, and if his medical license had been revoked-as it should have been-this poor fellow would never have had to face the catastrophic choices that ultimately led to his untimely death.

[texasflower]

I saw that documentary also. But I saw it fairly recently, like 8 months or so ago.

I thought it was so tragic when I saw it and now this...

[texasflower]

A major hospital in Houston has a pediatric sex change clinic.

[Dec31,1999]

Friends said an anguished Reimer had told them he had lost at least $47,500 last year in a shady pro golf shop investment.

People really commit suicide over financial issues, mostly. But there are other things that factor in, though.

[WaterDragon]

The doctor who mutilated the baby boy should have spent many years in prison. And the psychologist who recommended experimenting with the boy's sexual identity should be in prison, too. The wonder is the man survived such brutal 'adults', including his stupid parents, for so long.

[bigcat00]

Speaking of prison, open up your checkbooks, folks. You're already paying for hormone therapy for "transgendered" inmates who started the switch before they went into prison, and paying for sex change surgery is surely on the way, if not already here.

[My Dog Likes Me]

You're right.

I read this and kept thinking, "This poor man."

Go straight to heaven. God bless him.

[skinkinthegrass]

The sad thing is that this man wasn't the only person whose life was ruined due to the imbecilic social engineering experiments that gained a foothold in the United States during the 1960s.

Hmm...look up, Lysekoism (sp?)...explains much in the Pop-Culture scientific community today...and Calling John Stossell, Calling John..

[weegee]

Kinsey Quack BUMP