Save The Date! “XXXY” Screening 1/26/12

I’ve written before about Advocates for Informed Choice, an amazing organization that advocates for the civil rights of children who are born with variations of sex anatomy. It’s estimated that 1 in 2000 children are born with reproductive or sexual anatomy and/or chromosome patterns that don’t fit the usual definitions of male or female. And in most cases, the medical response is to perform surgeries. In fact, many doctors view children born with DSD (differences in sex development) as an emergency that requires an immediate response. This often results in pressuring parents to make quick decisions about things that they might not even have heard of before. Fortunately, AIC is working to change that and there’s been some progress.

On January 26, 2012 in San Francisco, AIC is hosting a benefit and screening of XXXY, a documentary film that takes an “intimate look at the long-term emotional, psychological, and physiological effects of being born “intersex,” or with ambiguous genitalia.” The film focuses on two people who between them have undergone over two dozen surgeries to “correct” their ambiguous sex organs. They speak quite honestly about the ways in which their experiences, including ” a wide array emotional issues, including shame, secrecy, gender identity, depression, intimacy, and the feelings of disempowerment that come from having no role in the decisions made regarding their gender identity.”

Following the screening, there will be Q&A with the filmmakers Porter Gale and Laleh Soomekh, and Anne Tamar-Mattis, Executive Director of AIC. You can purchase tickets here. And here’s the Facebook event page– even if you can’t make it, please help get the word out.