In 1966, eight-month old David Reimer was circumcised at a Winnipeg hospital. During the procedure, a general practitioner filling in for the regular surgeon seared the boy’s penis with an electric cauterizing machine. His penis was so badly burned that it eventually fell off.1 Reconstructive genital surgery at the time was rudimentary so the parents of David were left with little optimism.
A couple of years later, David’s parents sought advice from Dr. John Money, a sex researcher at John Hopkins University in Baltimore. Dr. Money had been credited with coining the term “gender identity” and had persuaded John Hopkins to become the first hospital in the United States to perform sex reassignment surgeries in 1965. Dr. Money strongly believed that parental influences and society formed sexual identity and that the sense of being male or female would be created “in the course of the various stages of growing up.”2
Dr. Money would see David as an experiment to prove his theories. When David was two-years-old, Dr. Money convinced David’s parents to allow him to undergo sex reassignment surgery and to be raised as a girl instead of a boy. His parents would agree and in 1967, David underwent surgery and was prescribed female hormones. He was fully castrated and the remaining skin was used to forge a “cosmetic vaginal cleft.” He would be brought up as a girl. His name would be changed from David to Brenda and his progress would be compared with that of his identical twin brother, Brian.
A number of scientists would cite the success of the case as proof of Dr. Money’s theory and would hail it as a great leap forward. In fact, in 1973, Time magazine ran an article which said the “dramatic case provides strong support for a major contention of women’s liberationists: that conventional patterns of masculine and feminine behaviour can be altered.” However, while publications were hailing Dr. Money’s experiment, it wasn’t working with David. As David grew up, his differences with his twin brother diminished. “I tried really hard to rear her as a gentle lady but it didn’t work,” said David’s mother.3
Despite the fact that David would be dressed in girl’s clothing, wore his hair long, and would be sent to counselling and therapy, he insisted that he was a boy. While growing up, his parents had given him dolls to play with but he much preferred playing with his brother’s trucks. In school, he was mocked by girls for going to the bathroom while standing up but he was excluded from the boy’s bathroom as well. “He had to go in the back alley,” his mother recollected. At just nine-years-old, David suffered a mental breakdown.4
Then when David turned 15-years-old, his parents told him about the botched surgery. From that point onward, he rejected further treatment, including an operation that was planned to create a vagina. David underwent surgery to remove his breasts and to construct a penis. He changed his name back to David and eventually went on to get married. He was never able to father children himself but became an outstanding stepfather and went on to adopt his wife’s three children.
Years later, David would state that once a year as part of his treatment, he and his brother would be sent to Dr. Money’s clinic where they would be forced to take part in “sexual rehearsal play.” David had suffered from mental health problems and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. A supporter of Dr. Money would claim that the allegations he had made were false and ever suggested he was a victim of “false memory syndrome” which stemmed from his schizophrenia.
However, in the past, Dr. Money had made statements which appeared to endorse incest and paedophilia. When David and Brian went to his clinic, they would be shown sexually explicit photographs which were apparently central on his theories on gender reassignment. David recollected how on one occasion, Dr. Money ordered him to take off his clothing and on another occasion, he had forced him to assume a position on all fours on his office sofa and then ordered Brian to come up behind him and place his crotch “against her buttocks.”
His case created an upheaval in theories on sexual identity and would force medical experts to rethink once accepted wisdom when it came to treating sexual identity cases. “It’s challenged a lot of the notions that I just accepted growing up in the 1970s,” said John Colapinto, a journalist for Rolling Stone, who wrote the book: “As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised As a Girl.” The case would also teach a disturbing lesson on how harmful scientific arrogance can be. As Colapinto said: “John Money was going to play God.”
Tragically, on the 4th of May, 2004, David ended his own life by shooting himself in the head while sitting in his car in Winnipeg, Manitoba; he was just 38-years-old. He had attempted suicide at least three times in the past. When he had spoken about his childhood in the past, he had said: “I’d give just about anything to go to a hypnotize to black out my whole past, because it’s torture. What they do to you in the body is sometimes not near as bad as what they did to you in the mind.”
As news of his suicide swept throughout the community, his mother said: “He managed to have so much courage. I think he felt he had no options. It just kept building up and building up.”5 David’s suicide had come just two years after his brother Brian ended his own life by overdosing on anti-depressants. David had felt responsible for his brother’s suicide and would visit his grave daily.6
Dr. Money refused to ever speak publicly about the case. He passed away in 2006.
Footnotes:
- Sun Sentinel, 13 May, 2004 – “David Reimer, Male Raised as a Girl”
- The Washington Times, 10 March, 2000 – “Man Raised as a Girl Challenges Theories on Sexual Identities”
- The Seattle Times, 13 May, 2004 – “Canadian Who Was Born a Boy, Raised as Girl, Commits Suicide”
- The Daily Telegraph, 13 May, 2004 – “David Reimer”
- The Standard, 10 May, 2004 – “Winnipeg Man Who was the Victim of Nature Vs. Nurture Experiment Commits Suicide”
- The Guardian, 12 May, 2004 – “Being Brenda”
Comments:
Honestly this helps the case that children can *know* what gender they’re supposed to be despite being told otherwise. Ironically this supports gender identity.
I wonder why Brian committed suicide first, tho.
This was a biological boy being forced to believe he was a girl. This does not support gender identity. This was not of his choosing, he was being manipulated into believing he was of a different gender.
Just like all the kids today being manipulated into believing they are different genders…
He identified with his sex at birth.what money outside and beyond the parents “based on doctors opinion wad just wrong and destroyed twice lives Brian had to deal with what David ,they were twins and it was traumatic for them both.
This doesn’t support gender identity in the least. The lesson in this story should be—- ‘when you have a male baby born with ambiguous genitalia, before making hasty decisions as to surgical procedures being performed.. it’s a great idea to allow the child to tell the parents who he (or she) is via how the child conducts him/herself and which toys the child gravitates toward. OR you can make a quick call.. perform a surgery and hope for the best…. as these parents did. Only, they made the WRONG CALL.
You misunderstand. Elle was referring to the fact that David did not know he was born a boy. He was a told he was a girl and yet continued insisting he was a boy. Also what do you mean “they tell you who they are by gravitating towards certain toys”???? Girls can’t play with trucks?? Boys can’t play with dolls??
Cheryl and Missy seem to be missing the point. David Remier knew he was a boy from birth, just like trans boys (FTMs) know they are boys and trans girls (MTFs) know they are girls. Trying to force someone to be a gender they are not, whether or not the person is trans, results in outcomes like David’s.
In the article it stated he was forced to see the same things David was forced to see, and was forced into being a part of disgusting sexual scenarios. There’s probably even more that we don’t know about
An episode of Law & Order SVU called “Identity” was partly based on David’s tragic story. The kids who played the twins were very good actors.
A lot more intersex kids or non standard boys were surgically turned into baby girls because of Money’s theories, which is why Big Medicine supports the focus on Reimer.
Doctor Money: what a vile man. People who supported him should be ashamed of themselves. “False memory” indeed! Interestingly certain presentations of schizophrenia has been in some studies correlated to child sexual abuse. Or at the very least a worst outcome is.
What also disgusts me is when proffessionals use a patients diagnosis against them to dismiss and rubbish any complaints of wrong doing. I’ve seen it happen myself, albeit in less tragic situations.
Never a better word said Jessica. The medical profession always think that they are right, even though it is impossible for them to know what the patient is feeling! They say “We are acting in your interests”…….No you”re not, you’re acting in your best interests ie. “Let us use this person for research, take medical photographs, persuade the family that we are looking after their interests!” The worst thing about it is that they stick together even though some of them disagree with another doctor’s opinion, but getting them to write it down is impossible. I had a surgeon who… Read more »
Dr. Money = major buffoon and garden-variety POS.
And it all started with a circumcision. Jfc.
I will never ever understand how anybody could mutilate their baby’s penis.
Forced circumcision on kids is a physical assault. Whether you agree or not. Let them choose..!
I know of two young boys whom weren’t circumcised. Both of them ended up with very similar issues of extreme pain of enclosed foreskin and constant infections. They have both had to be circumcised one at age 8 and the other at age 14. All though not all males experience this many do.
My son was born 5 weeks premature and had some health issues because of it. He was so fragile, I didn’t want to do anything that would cause him more pain. So he was not circumcised at birth. He thrived and was a happy, healthy little boy. But when he was three years old, he stopped urinating and was in a lot of pain. I had to have him circumcised then. It broke my heart to put him thru it, but it immediately fixed the problem, and he hasn’t had any issues since.
The parents of this male child were ignorant, stupid and uneducated, sickening demons. Because David WAS born as a boy, even though his penis was mutilated in a botched circumcision, he should’ve still been raised as a boy no matter what.
The hospital and the incompetent doctor should have been sued for David’s genital complication. His parents were incredibly irresponsible in their decisions to raise David as a girl. David’s suicide was a direct result of him being forced to live a lie when the truth of his sex should have been celebtated!
The case of David Reimer is a case involving serious child abuse. Doctors should generally not be mutilating the genitals of any children, or teaching them how to be sexual in any way. Doctors need to work on their ethics, standard and practices. The health care community has a long, long way to go to reduce fraud, over-treatment, mistreatment and malpractice.
More people should know about this. Also about the disgusting tests Money carried out on children. Those tests were of sexual nature. Look it up. And this man is considered the father of “gender ideology”. Absolutely shameful to be pushing a narrative of a pedo-psychopath! I cannot find any better title for him and whoever else was inolved in this shite
“David had suffered from mental health problems and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia” <— This is wrong btw. It was Davids brother that was diagnosed with schizophrenia….he also had massive drug problems (schizophrenia is a pretty loose diagnosis at times).
You should probably correct it.
There is no such thing as “gender”. John Money was a sick pervert, why isn’t this story taught in public school? Because there is a huge profit in maiming children/ a lifelong customer has been created- Millstones for everyone that pushes this evil