![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ginalangridgeWhen a baby is born one of the first things anyone says is “it’s a girl” or “it’s a boy", based on the baby's external genitalia. Soon afterwards, the birth is registered as that of a male or a female based on the same criterion.
The reason it's called “assigning” a gender to the baby not “recognising” the gender of the baby is because it’s not as simple as people think.
Some babies are intersex or have ambiguous genitalia and the doctors and nurses choose which gender the baby looks most like. Later, at puberty, they may turn out to have been wrong.
Some babies have brains that don’t match their external genitalia and this is invisible at birth, so the gender they are assigned doesn’t match who they really are.
"Assigning” a gender is deciding what gender the adults think a baby is and they don’t always choose the right one.
The reason it's called “assigning” a gender to the baby not “recognising” the gender of the baby is because it’s not as simple as people think.
Some babies are intersex or have ambiguous genitalia and the doctors and nurses choose which gender the baby looks most like. Later, at puberty, they may turn out to have been wrong.
Some babies have brains that don’t match their external genitalia and this is invisible at birth, so the gender they are assigned doesn’t match who they really are.
"Assigning” a gender is deciding what gender the adults think a baby is and they don’t always choose the right one.
