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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>From: Micha Berger <A href="mailto:micha@aishdas.org">micha@aishdas.org</A><BR><BR><BR>RMB: The
first teshuvah, the one I cited (vol 10, shaar 25, pereq 26, os 6),<BR>was a
hypothetical case of a transexual who wouldn't give a get. REW<BR>pasqened none
was needed, the qiddushin had no man-woman couple on which<BR>to be chal
anymore....You're describing a second teshuvah, written by a doctor who read
the<BR>first one.<BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>TK: If it was a "hypothetical case" then it wasn't
actually a psak at all. As for a teshuvah written by a doctor, that's not
a teshuvah written by R' Waldenberg.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>RMB: I'd be interested to see statistics that the reality
actually has changed<BR>in a way that would make the first pesaq. As I said,
your assumptions<BR>aren't enough for overturning a pesaq.... Particularly
when speaking about ruling out a safeiq piquach<BR>nefesh.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>TK: According to what you and others have written, R'
Waldenberg's concern in his first article (can't call it "psak" because it
was hypothetical) was with finding ways to free an agunah.
There is no mention there of pikuach nefesh. And the second psak had
to do with a specific case in which the person's organs were already
ambiguous. Again I see no mention of suicide or pikuach
nefesh.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>I would like to add that the TE's contention that, after the
fact, a surgically created female is halachically to be considered female
in no way suggests that such surgery is actually permitted.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>I would like to know how he dealt with the following very
grave issues -- if indeed he ever discussed them at all:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>1. A person is not allowed to mutilate himself or others --
chabalah.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>2. In addition, there is a separate issur of castration and
surgically causing sterility.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>3. A man is not allowed to wear women's clothing. In the
lead-up to surgery, a man is usually told to dress as a woman and try to behave
like a woman for a while, to get used to it. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>4. The prohibition of mishkav zachar is so grave that if there is even the
slightest doubt that this "woman" may in fact be a man -- he/she should
not engage in such activity. Of course he/she now only has the
ability to be the passive and not the active partner in M'Z. I don't
know if that is less of a sin but I doubt it. It also raises the question
of whether the man who sleeps with him/her is engaged in a terrible sin.
The surgically created woman may be involving not only "herself" but "her"
partner is a terrible aveirah.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I would like to add further that unless a male is castrated before
puberty (like the Italian opera castrati -- now thankfully outlawed), he
will continue to have secondary male characteristics after castration -- facial
hair, body hair, a deep voice, male muscles and so on. In addition to
surgery, this person who wants to be female must take female hormones for the
rest of his life, and even then most such "women" will always look like men in
drag and will always elicit stares and doubting questions.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>When REW wrote in 1971, it was not yet known that life-long hormone
"therapy" would be required to keep a man looking somewhat female. At that
time such surgery was exceedingly rare and there weren't men/women around who
had been "surgically created women" for very long.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>In practice these former-men always wear dresses and skirts, high heels,
makeup and jewelry because -- unlike regular women who can wear pants and
sneakers and can go without makeup -- these "women" look masculine and have
to go out of their way to do things that make them appear more feminine.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>There are so many terribly grave shailos involved that I can't believe any
rav today would permit this type of sex change, except in the rare case of a
child born with abnormal, ambiguous genitals -- in which case it is not "gender
reassignment" surgery but "gender assignment" surgery.</DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial><BR> </DIV></FONT></FONT>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 color=#0000ff size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><B>--Toby Katz<BR>==========<BR><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"></B>--------------------</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
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