Not to nitpick but to me the title of this post is implying that XXY individuals are born female. Generally they’re born male.
What the comment is referring to is likely Swyer Syndrome, where the individual has an XY configuration but a dysfunctional gene in the sex-determining region of the Y chromosome. This means the embryo develops female anatomy and the resulting children tend to identify female, but they lack functional gonadal tissue. It’s estimated to occur at a rate of about 1 in a 100,000 females.
By the by, treatment for these individuals usually involves removing the dysfunctional gonadal tissue as it often becomes cancerous (which often gets misunderstood as “gender reassignment surgery”) and supplemental hormone replacement therapy. They would be affected too by any bans on hormone administration to kids often connected with trans people. One of the reasons why blanket bans should be a no-go regardless of how you feel about any other trans issue.
I think we can safely say that is nitpicking, but it’s informative and correct so I’m all for it!
From my biology lessons 20 years ago, I thought I was taught that it was the presence of a second X chromosome that made a person genetically female, but I could definitely be misremembering. Either way, XXY individuals are usually born male, and Dr Genetics Federation was likely talking about sawyer syndrome (or so google tells me). Thanks for the correction!
Not in humans, no! While in some animals sex determination is purely about X dosage (Drosophila), in humans the Y chromosome is actually sex-determining. In females the second X chromosome actually gets inactivated as a means of gene dosage compensation.
TIL, thanks!
I was having a civil and boring discussion with someone on a (non-anonymous) forum once about a highly specific technical thing, and then some random person decides to write something along the lines of “I have nothing to add to this conversation, but I just want to point out that the guy you’re talking to is actually an employee of :)”
I don’t know if that guy felt any cringe after posting that, but I sure as hell felt it for him. Neither of us really knew how to respond to that, and it kind of just killed the discussion to avoid that awkwardness.
Sometimes I still think about that guy. Is he still vicariously Pretty Woman’ing people? Did he accomplish some of his life goals? I hope so.