Constitutional bisexuality

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Constitutional bisexuality was a common term around 1900. He stated that in every person both “female” and “male” sexual characteristics are initially present, but only one of the two traits would develop completely, but the other would not be completely lost. Some representatives went so far as to state that all people, even in adulthood, had both “female” and “male” sexual characteristics. The so-called intermediate level theory also connects with these views .

history

A tradition can be traced back to antiquity in which the mix of the sexes is discussed. In his Dialog Symposion, Plato tells a myth that there were once spherical people , some of whom, the androgynoi , had a female and a male half. The gods decided to divide the globe people into two parts. This is how today's people emerged, each of whom is now in search of their lost other half.

In other societies, too, ideas were worked out in which “female” and “male” always appear together - for example in Chinese descriptions of yin and yang . These ancient traditions lived on, often associated with terms such as androgyny and hermaphroditism .

Around 1800 ideas arose in developing biology that the sexual disposition in the embryo initially had the potential to develop “female” and “male”. Most people would only develop one of the sexes clearly during development; in other cases - in people who are same-sex desired (today grouped with homosexuality , however, until the mid-19th century, same-sex desire and sex were not associated with an identitarian concept, but only an act) and hermaphroditism - mixtures of sexual characters would remain. Some authors saw these mixtures in all people, just to varying degrees.

Around 1900 such views were predominantly attached. It even relaxes priority disputes between different scientists, that is, disputes about who would have described this theory first. These disputes took place between: Wilhelm Fließ , Otto Weininger , Hermann Swoboda and Sigmund Freud . Magnus Hirschfeld , among others , pointed out, however, that this is by no means a new "discovery", but that such views have a tradition.

Representatives and examples

Karl Heinrich Ulrichs : In the 1860s he worked out very clearly that every adult person would represent a gender mixture. In the case of same-sex desiring people and hermaphrodites, only a more balanced ratio of female and male proportions would result, whereas in other people one of the sexes would be more dominant. Among other things, he wrote: “The sexual dualism, which without exception is present in the germ in every human individual, is expressed in hermaphrodites and Uranians only to a higher degree than in common men and women. In the Uranian it is only expressed in a different way than in the hermaphrodite. "

Magnus Hirschfeld: “It cannot be repeated often enough that, according to the inheritance laws, these basic types are basically only fictions and that, if a sentence is right, it is that man is not man or woman but man and woman . "( Yearbook for sexual intermediate stages , 1923)" Gender differences are degree differences. It is always a question of something more or less, a smaller or larger, stronger or weaker one, always only something relatively, not absolutely different, never something that only belongs to one sex, but not to the opposite sex. […] Whoever comes from both sexes contains both sexes united ”Compare with Hirschfeld also Herzer (1998) and Bauer (2002).

Relation to developmental biology and topicality

The named representatives also followed descriptions of biology, medicine and developing developmental biology. Here it was shown by numerous scientists of the 19th century that every human being has both the potential for female and male development. Various models have been proposed that speak of a “ bipotent ”, “indifferent” or “hermaphroditic” sexual disposition. Only a few representatives like Theodor von Bischoff assumed that the system had to differ in terms of binary gender, that is, that every embryo would already be “female” or “male”.

This conception is made clear by Ignaz Döllinger, among others : “9) […] Just as the embryo can only be human, not female and not male, its germinating genitals also have no sexual character. This indifference is fixed in the hermaphrodite. 10) The human genitals are not absolutely masculine, but masculine-feminine, and not absolutely feminine, but feminine-masculine, hence the harmony of their structure, and the possibility of a transition. 11) The genitals of the man are the prostate and testicles, those of the woman the uterus and ovaries. […] That the prostate is parallel to the uterus and the testicle to the ovary is clear in itself; [...]. "

These explicitly biological views are also easy to understand from the following quote from Heinrich Wilhelm Waldeyer : “But another point, which is also not unimportant for teratology, follows with certainty from what has been observed, namely that the uranium system of the individual individuals even in the highest vertebrates a hermaphroditic one. Up to now one has often tried to interpret the peculiar behavior of the genital organs during the first development in such a way that a neutral common, to a certain extent indifferent, original state is present, from which the development advances either to one side or the other, so that soon a male, soon a female individual emerges. But one has relied too much on the behavior of more minor things, for example that of the external genital organs. Here there is indeed an indifferent, to a certain extent neutral, original state, which is then further developed either on the male or the female side. But this is not surprising, since in the external genitals of both men and women we have in fact anatomically the same structures before us, which are only developed in different directions in different individuals. [...] But if one goes into the development of those structures that make up the essence of the two sexes, the two sex glands, an indifferent, as it were neutral uranium plant is difficult to imagine. [...]; in other words, every individual is at some stage of his development a true hermaphrodite. "

Even today, developmental biology continues to assume that in the early stages of embryonic development there is the potential for human sexual characteristics to develop as “female” and “male”. Only through chromosomal, genetic, hormonal and other influences (for example from the cell, from the maternal organism, chemical influences from the environment) would the sexual characteristics develop, often clearly “female” or “male”, in other cases mixed .

literature

  • Bauer, J. Edgar (first 2002): Magnus Hirschfeld: per scientiam ad justitiam. A second clarification. Originally published in Mitteilungen der Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft, number 33/34 (2002): pages 68–90. Online at: http://www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology
  • Herzer, Manfred (first 1998): Hirschfeld's utopia, Hirschfeld's religion and the third gender of romanticism. Originally published in Mitteilungen der Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft, number 28 (1998). Online at: http://www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology
  • Mehlmann, Sabine (2008): The sexu (alis) ated individual - On the paradoxical construction logic of modern masculinity. In: Brunotte, U., Herrn, R. (editor): Masculinity and modernity. Gender in the cultures of knowledge around 1900. transcript Verlag, Bielefeld, pages 37–55.
  • Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (1986): Androgynous - Longing for Perfection (exhibition catalog). Dietrich Reimer Verlag, Berlin.
  • Römer, LSAM v. (1903): On the androgynical idea of ​​life. Yearbook for Sexual Intermediate Levels, 5 (2): Pages 709–939.
  • Waldeyer, Heinrich Wilhelm Gottfried (1870): Ovary and egg: a contribution to the anatomy and development history of the sexual organs. W. Engelmann, Leipzig.
  • Weininger, Otto (1905 [first edition 1903]): Gender and character. A principal investigation (6th edition). W. Braumüller, Vienna, Leipzig.
  • Voss, Heinz-Jürgen (2010): Making sex revisited: Deconstruction of sex from a biological-medical perspective. Transcript, Bielefeld. (Review: http://dasendedessex.blogsport.de/images/Gigi66RezensionMildenbergerVossMakingSexRevisited.pdf )
  • Voss, Heinz-Jürgen (2011): Gender: Against naturalness. Butterfly, Stuttgart. (Review: http://www.dkp-queer.de/download/raq_19_2011.pdf )

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ LSAM v. Römer (1903): About the androgynical idea of ​​life. Yearbook for Sexual Intermediate Levels, 5 (2): pp. 709–939.
  2. ^ Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (1986): Androgyn - Longing for Perfection (exhibition catalog). Dietrich Reimer Verlag, Berlin.
  3. ↑ a b c d Voss, Heinz-Jürgen (2010): Making sex revisited: Deconstruction of sex from a biological-medical perspective. Transcript, Bielefeld.
  4. ↑ a b Voß, Heinz-Jürgen (2011): Gender: Against the naturalness. Butterfly, Stuttgart.
  5. ↑ Ulrichs, KH (1994 [written 1862, published 1899]): Four letters from Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (Numa Numantius) to his relatives. In: Kennedy, H. (1994): Research on the riddle of male-male love , in 4 volumes. Volume 1. Verlag rosa Winkel, Berlin.
  6. ↑ Hirschfeld, M. (1984 [first published 1923]): The intersexual constitution. Extension of a lecture given on March 16, 1923 at the Hygienic Institute of the University of Berlin (abridged version of the original article published in writing in 1923). In: Schmidt, WJ (editor): Yearbook for sexual intermediate stages: a selection from the years 1899–1923. Qumran Verlag, Frankfurt / Main, Paris, Volume 2, pages 9-26.
  7. ↑ Hirschfeld, M. (1926–1930): Sexology. Volume I to V. Julius Püttmann, Stuttgart; Part 1.
  8. ↑ Herzer, Manfred (first 1998): Hirschfeld's Utopia, Hirschfeld's Religion and the Third Sex of Romanticism. Originally published in Mitteilungen der Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft , number 28 (1998). Online at: Archived copy ( Memento of the original from March 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www2.hu-berlin.de
  9. ^ Bauer, J. Edgar (first 2002): Magnus Hirschfeld: per scientiam ad justitiam. A second clarification. Originally published in Mitteilungen der Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft, number 33/34 (2002): pages 68–90. Online at: Archived copy ( Memento of the original from March 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www2.hu-berlin.de
  10. ^ Döllinger, I. (1816): Attempt at a history of human generation. German Archives for Physiology, 2 (3): Pages 388–402.
  11. ^ Waldeyer, Heinrich Wilhelm Gottfried (1870): Ovary and egg: a contribution to the anatomy and development history of the sexual organs. W. Engelmann, Leipzig.