THE TRUTH ABOUT BOOBS AND DICKS

What is the real big deal about gender? As innocently as my 3 year old daughter asked me this morning, "Mom, why am i a girl and not a boy? What is boy?” it sent me down a labyrinth of thoughts while driving her to school.

Really- what is this whole thing about girls and boys? We are marketed so distinctly since childhood that we sometimes forget we are part of the same human race. Pink burst is all a baby girl sees from her toddler cot while blue makes up boys’ clothes pretty much for his entire lifetime. Business houses seem to have given ample thought to gender type but we, as a society, have never taken this seriously.

So what is it that makes boys boys and girls girls? You must be wondering how a major in biology has missed out the obvious breasts and penis distinction. Be rest assured I do know and remember that. But is that it? Are we just a race made up of boobs and dicks?

Its a given that there are physical characteristics that define the two genders distinctly. Males have heavy musculature, facial hair and coarser voice. Females have breasts, lesser facial hair and a higher pitch voice. Such physical distinctions, called secondary sexual characteristics, are there in few other species apart from humans but not all .A female lion and male lion are physically distinguishable but you cant tell a male elephant from a female by just looking at their face. Hence, secondary sex characteristics are not the defining factors of gender. 

Of course in Disney movies, the most defining sexual features are long eyelashes. The elephant with over sized long fluttering eyelashes is the female. But lets leave Disney with a justified license to exaggerate and entertain.

So if secondary sexual characteristics are not able to define  males and females clearly, what can? Primary sex organs like penis and vagina are definitive distinctions of gender. All females have a vagina and reproductive organs like uterus and ovaries while males have penis and scrotal sacs. Compared to secondary sexual characteristics, primary characteristics are more marked.

But then what about transgenders? Or the third sex? Individuals whose secondary sexual characters do not correspond with the genitals they have. Of course this is a very broad and loose definition of transgenders/intersex individuals.

                                                Hermaphrodite by Nadar, 1860

There are a plethora of varied conditions that define various ambiguities seen in terms of gender determination. To understand anything about gender even slightly, we need to familiarize ourselves with two simple terms- phenotype and genotype.

Phenotype is outward physical traits while genotype is the genetic information. Eg: A XY genotype is an individual having X and Y sex chromosomes. His phenotype is facial hair, heavy musculature, penis, scrotal sacs etc. Similarly an individual with XX genotype has two X sex chromosomes and her phenotype is lean structure, less facial hair, vagina, breasts etc.

And the most important point here to remember is that genotype determines phenotype but phenotype can never determine genotype.

The genetic information is hard wired and defines the physical traits. Hence, XY genotype has body hair. If, hypothetically, I alter my XY genotype to XX; then my phenotype will change to less body hair.

But altering phenotype cannot change the genetic information. Hence, men who get body hair waxed are still as much male as any other XY genotype (and I hear SRK sigh in relief!!)

So we have established that the truth about boobs and dicks is in the genetic information- genotype. XX is female and XY is male. Right?

Just give me a moment to go and do my evil laughter…………

NO ITS NOT!! Or in Sheldon Cooper language- BAZINGA!

Have I been messing around with you till now? No not at all. Everything I have said till now is 100% scientifically accurate. But Nature, unlike Science, is not so simple!

Surpise surpise! Sex determination is one of the traits that is not completely defined by our genes! XX genotype may have male primary/sexual characters and vice versa.

Its not enough to be genotypically male or female!! Before you feel that your biology teacher lied to you all this while- let me clarify your dilemma.

Sex determination happens in the womb. Yes neighbor aunty, please don’t consider this blasphemous, but once your daughter in law has conceived, its impossible to change the sex of that fetus!

As I was saying, the genotype of the fetus is determined the minute sperm and ova fuse. If sperm carrying Y chromosome fuses with ova (ova always have X chromosomes) then the genotype of fetus is XY and if a sperm carrying X chromosome fuses with the ova the genotype is XX. Note that I am still not labeling the fetus as girl or boy.

Once conceived something fascinating happens to fetus between 8-12 weeks of gestation. The XY fetus starts exhibiting secondary sexual characteristics like testes and ovary formation is seen in XX fetus.

And this is where our key players of sex determination enter- HORMONES.

All fetuses (XX or XY) have something called a Mullerian duct. In normal female fetus, the Mullerian duct system develops into the uterus etc. However in XY fetus, to prevent this duct to form into uterus a hormone called  Müllerian duct-inhibiting hormone (MIH)is secreted around 12^th week of gestation and that causes this duct system to regress.

Similarly hormones called Androgens cause the development of the Wolffian duct system in fetus later in gestation, which goes on to develop into male sexual organs.

It is very clear that XY fetus that lack MIH will not be able to prevent the Mullerian duct system to differentiate into  female sex organs and will thus have uterus, ovaries etc. On the other hand, excessive secretion of androgens and male hormones called virilising hormones in a XX fetus can lead to formation of male sex organs.

These are extensively studied and documented conditions.

CAH (Congential Adrenal Hyperplasia): An XX fetus that has excess of virilising hormones develops sexual organs of a male.

AIS (Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome): An XY fetus does not respond to androgen and hence fails to develop the male sexual organs in the womb fully.

These are of course just two of the many conditions related to sex determination and they too have been explained extremely simply. There are ranges and spectrums of each condition and need detailed research to understand each.

We have boiled the whole mystery down to genotype, hormones and phenotypes. All of these have to be “in sync” to give rise to the socially accepted male and females. Any one of the players go wary and we have intersex conditions.

So again Neighbour Aunty, doing all the puja and mantras in the sixth month of pregnancy on your daughter in law as the priest has suggested will not change the sex of your grandchild. At the most you will have a very hairy grand-daughter or an effeminate grandson. Im sure you want neither!

Ignorant to the complex interplay of genes and chemicals, a huge chunk of society in Asia is still biased towards the male child. And this attitude is the root cause of all the gender inequality we see that finally leads us to be subjugated to non-tasteful Deepika Padukone videos.

All my posts earlier point out that all our societal evils arise from the minor ignorance of the fact that we are nothing but biochemical entities. We tend to give ourselves too much of credit, I think. What is a male? XY chromosome with Androgen and testosterone. Why is that more coveted than XX chromosome with Estrogen and Progesterone is a question that even Nature must be puzzled at! Iam not even going into ethics and consequences. Iam talking of plain biochemistry. We are humans. The fact that we carry 26 chromosomes should any day hold more value than the constitution of just one of its chromosomes.

A very cute creature called Meerkats seem to have come up with a ingenious solution to this gender debate actually. Though males and females are marked out clearly, their duties are not. Everyday some male stay back to babysit with the females while some go for food hunting. Research have shown that males who decide to stay back are those that have woken up with higher level of a hormone called “prolactin” while those with lower level go to forage for food. Even pup feeding roles are determined on the spot depending on hormones level.

So simple! You wake up each morning and go for roles as per the blood hormone levels. That is one evolved society I must say. Because they know that they are slaves to their hormones.

The Meerkats have the “balls” to accept what humans cant. If only we accept ourselves as nothing but mere hormones, suddenly this chauvinism and empowerment debate will seem redundant. Because then we will realize that being male or female is a fascinating tale of genetic information being decoded, hormones being released, protein being formed and a phenotype being developed in the nine months of gestation. Both processes (of determining male or female sex )-so complex and intricate, yet the point is that they are not the same. If one process fails to be different than the other it leads to intersex conditions. So what is this big fight about equality? Males and females are different. Biologically they are as incomparable as apples and oranges. Why cant we celebrate their uniqueness instead of fighting for equality? 

 A child does not choose its genotype. Similarly it doesn’t choose for its hormones to switch off or on. Nature does it at its own course and we are nowhere near unfolding the mystery of how this complex interplay of genotype, hormones and phenotype comes into place so accurately and correctly most of the time in the developing embryo. When we don’t control what makes us boys and girls, then who are we to decide which is “Superior”?

So Dear Deepika and Vogue, its really not our choice after all! When it comes to being a boy or girl or intersex, I would be  proud of my uniqueness and go with Lady Gaga on this one- I WAS BORN THIS WAY!