An Open Letter to American Educators

Please don’t erase people like me from your classrooms.

Last week I was asked to speak at the Marana School Board, where, after the president signed a sweeping and biologically false executive order about sex and gender, a teacher had been placed on leave for teaching about the existence of intersex students. I spoke about my experience as an intersex student in the 80s, and how a teacher saved my life by showing me the rich scientific and cultural record on variations in sex and gender. I let them know that teachers who counter public misinformation — even from the president — are heroes.

Photo by Kathleen Dreier, used with permission.

After the meeting, I was asked if I’d be willing to generalize my speech for a larger audience, and I’ve now been asked to make a statement at other districts in Arizona. After some reflection, I’ve decided to write an open letter to educators in the US, many of whom are in states that are quickly moving to ban any mention of intersex people because we, by our very existence, challenge the harmful myth that there is only male and female.

Here is that letter:

Dear American Educators,

I’m Eric. I’ve always been Eric, and my birth certificate says I’m male, but I’m also intersex, which in my case means I have chromosomes that make me both male and female. I was born externally male, but inside, I have female organs too, and my body doesn’t produce testosterone at all. As a kid, I seemed like a typical boy, and I absolutely loved school, but when puberty hit, things changed. I started growing breasts and hips, and my features became more feminine.

That’s when school became a nightmare with bullying, rumors, and constant questions about what I was. I can’t even repeat the names people shouted at me in the hallways.

By tenth grade, I sat alone at lunch, feeling isolated and humiliated. But then Mrs. Lyons, a teacher at my school, noticed me being bullied and called me into her office. She saved me by giving me examples of sex variations in science, culture, nature, and history. We didn’t have terms like “intersex” back in the 80s, but she showed me that I was not some unnatural freak. She’s my hero, and in her honor, I want to ask educators everywhere to stand up for students and for science, like she did when I needed it most.

Right now there is a national effort to erase people like me with an oversimplification and distortion of science in order to promote the myth that there’s only male and female. Despite executive orders, state initiatives, and biased activists distorting facts, the truth is, intersex people make up about 1.7 percent of the population. That means almost every school in America has intersex students, and we are about as common as students with red hair or green eyes.

Denying that we exist harms these students, just as it harmed me when I was their age. This kind of erasure empowers bullies and leaves children who don’t fit neatly into the male/female binary with lifelong scars. We are not rare, nor are we defective, disordered, or unnatural. Sadly, though, since intersex is not taught, intersex students experience body shame, identity crises, misdiagnosis, and many other issues. Some do not discover they are intersex until later in life, and without exposure to intersex people in the classroom, they are unprepared when they do.

Now, because of surgical and hormonal interventions, no one would know that I’m intersex unless I told them. But I think it is important for people like me to come forward and put a face to what might be an abstract idea. There is a war against the truth, and it is the responsibility of educators to stand up to lies and misinformation. I exist, and so do millions of other people like me. Please don’t erase us from your science, your history, your literature, or your classrooms.

Sincerely,

Eric K. Carr