David Reimer: The Development Of Gender Identity

There is a 1 to 1500-2000 chance a child will be born with intersex genitalia and about 2 out of 1000 will go get surgery to normalize their gender. The practice to perform surgery on intersex children is considered to be a standard practice in our society. Parents often decide whether they should take the next step to “normalize” their child so that society may find them fit. Surgery should not be performed on children with intersex genitalia because it can harm them not only physically, but mentally as well. No child, regardless of how successful the surgery is, can be able to be surgically changed to another gender nor can they be socially changed into another gender by the parents choosing.
The experience of David Reimer tell us about the development of gender identity when someone has their sex changed surgically. It shows us that gender identity of a child born with a male body can't be changed by socialization or any type of surgery. In 1965 David Reimer was
Money is best thought of as a person who believes that “the theory that a child’s gender identity develops primarily through culture and experiences rather than genetics… gender was a socially constructed phenomenon” (Colapinto). Basically the idea is that children will learn to identify themselves with the certain assigned new gender depending on their social influence during early life. His study on David was known across the world due the success of changing a boy into a girl claiming that David is now happy living as a girl. In 1997, David was interviewed and it was discovered that the therapy was not successful and David was never happy and resumed his life as how he was genetically born, a boy and not as a girl. David suffered from depression, angry break outs, insecurities, and bullying. As he grew older, he soon realized he was not meant to be a girl but a boy and later told by his parents of the truth. Years later, in 2002 David committed suicide by a shot to the head with a