Have you guys heard the story about the pregnant man?
Advocate - Labor of Love
Last night on Inside Edition, they did a story on him and his wife. The baby is due in July. They went through countless doctors that said they were sick for doing this. Beatie is a transgendered male who chose to keep his female reproductive organs after he went through transition. He is married. Has a job, a home, and friends just like all of us. And he is carrying their baby. By looking at him, he is your normal nice looking guy. He and his wife, Nancy, look just the same as any other couple. But he is due to have their baby in July. Inside Edition covered the story very well without a lot of prejudice.
Letterman, on the other hand, did not. Tuesday night in his infamous top 10, he listed the following:
Top Ten Messages Left On The Pregnant Man's Answering Machine
10. "I thought you said you were using protection"
9. "It's Angelina Jolie. I'd like to adopt the baby"
8. "This is your wife -- can I borrow your Gillette Mach 3 razor?"
7. "It's Maury. I'd love to test to see if you're the mother and/or the father"
6. "Ralph Nader here. I've had sex with myself for years and never got pregnant"
5. "It's Maury. Again, seriously, how fast can you get here?"
4. No number 4 -- writer still stuck on JetBlue flight -- what's it been, like a year?
3. "Michael Moore here. People ask me if I'm pregnant too"
2. "This is Dr. Phil. We should talk"
1. "Michael Jackson here -- just wanted to reach out to another androgynous freak show"
Maybe it is just me? Maybe I am one of those people who are out of the norm? I think what Letterman did was crude and uncalled for. Granted the man doesn't have a lot of couth sometimes when it comes to subjects of sensitive nature, but come on, Beatie is having this baby because his wife cannot conceive. What is wrong with that? Maybe it is the fact that more men on the planet would be horrified and view women differently if they were able to get pregnant and go through childbirth. I have given birth, I know what it is like. I have many transgendered male friends and to me they are men - period. They have the mentality of a man, the patience of a man, and are the prime existence of a man. Why should this couple be stricken down and told they are sick for bringing a child into this world? They are doing what G-d gave us the right to do.
Beatie appeared on Oprah today and was quoted, "It's not a male or female desire to have a child. It's a human desire," a thinly bearded Thomas Beatie said. "I have a very stable male identity," he added, saying that pregnancy neither defines him nor makes him feel feminine.
His wife Nancy has said that that their role as parents will not be different. He will still be the father and she will be the mother. Their little girl will be loved and cherished as any child should be. Their child wasn't an "oops sorry honey, I'm pregnant!" It was carefully planned out, researched, and tried multiple times before they were successfully able to carry. In fact his first pregnancy was ectopic triplets that caused him to go through a painful surgery. This alone tells me that this couple isn't doing it for the media attention. Of course it would get out into the media. Our society can't handle anything that is beyond their idea of norm.
So what do you think? Were they right in creating this child? What are the pros and cons? How will this child differ from any other child out there? What did Oprah say? She called it "a new definition of what diversity means for everybody."
