Karyotypes

[foxgrrl]

People frequently ask me whether I have XX or XY [sex] chromosomes. I honestly don't know. I've never been tested. What chromosomes do you have? I mean they test everyone don't they? It sure seems like they tested everyone but me…

Comments

[faerie-gift.livejournal.com]

I agree.

I don't know and haven't let it matter.

I've seen too many people obsess over it (especially online) and try and use it as a justification of their situation, saying they were "more this" or "more that" than other people because of it.

It just seems silly.

[varaviksne.livejournal.com]

It is possible to be XY and female and able to bear children. Of course 1/4 of these pregnancies will miscarry (the YY's), another 1/4 will be XX females, and the remaining half will be XY. The XY's will be males unless they have the same genetic anomaly that made their mother female.

It is possible to be XX and male and be able to father children. All these children will be girls unless the mother was one of the XY's mentioned above, or they have the same genetic anomaly that made their father male.

[ff00ff.livejournal.com]

1/4 of these pregnancies will miscarry

I wonder where you found this factoid. It sounds weirdly incomparable to the number, 2/3, of fertilized zygotes in an XX woman which simply self abort. Unless the study doesn't count that baseline of self-aborting zygotes as miscarriages... I'm just saying it's a weird number, and I wonder where it comes from. The 2/3's figure is something I use against the pro-lifers when I want to smear their face in the fact that nature, or G-d if you will, is the greatest abortionist of all.

[ff00ff.livejournal.com]

Ah, Mendel Squares, yes I hadn't thought of it that way.

[varaviksne.livejournal.com]

Um, yeah. I don't know what really would happen to a YY embryo but it clearly isn't viable given that X chromosomes carry lots of important genes.

This diversion is probably not quite what perlandria had in mind...

[varaviksne.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XX_male_syndrome , XX males are infertile, and according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swyer_syndrome , XY females are too. See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRY

However, someplace I read that the SRY gene works via a long sequence of other sex determining genes. It seems plausible that a problem elsewhere in that sequence could result in the affects I wrote above.

[spider88.livejournal.com]

There's no such thing as a Y ovum. YY isn't just unviable, but impossible.

[spider88.livejournal.com]

I thought XY females didn't have functional uteri nor ovum.

[alcira.livejournal.com]

I humbly apologize for the stupid intolerance and bigotry that affects humanity. The stupidity that makes people not know the difference between affect and effect. The stupidity that makes me wish I could walk around beating up stupid people all day. But I can't. Sigh.

[ff00ff.livejournal.com]

I haven't got a clue and have never been tested. The tone of your post is correct, who in gods name has ever been tested for that? My parents thought I would be a girl, the doctor said so, I don't think that back in 83 they determined that with a genetic test, they just squinted at the ultrasound, maybe I was just tucking it back then. Then again they did miss a twin brother as well so I imagine they weren't looking too hard at that ultrasound.

[anaisdjuna.livejournal.com]

I don't think they routinely test (for reasons of expense) esp. the age range of people you're asking here (for reasons of when some of us were born esp. those of us who will be ancient in a matter of days...)
;-).

Would be interesting to check out in your situation.

[kengr]

Not only are most people never tested, but there area *lot* more possibilities than XX or XY. I think there are something like 16 different *viable* possibilities for that chromosome "pair" (pair in quotes because some of them are triplets).

Add in stuff like Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (full or partial) which are controlled by genes on other chromosomes and simple "sex" (in the biological sense) is a lot more complicated than most folks are willing to deal with.

Throw gender and orientation into the mix and it's a real mess. Not that these idiots would sit still long enough to be told about all of it.

And, alas, if they did listen, most of them would refuse to *believe* it.
Even the parts dealing with pure biology.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

I've got a friend who could honestly answer that "yes" -- Klinefelter's Mosaic; which genes turn up depends on where you take the sample, or so I understand it.

[bluegodjanus.livejournal.com]

I didn't realise there were multiple options. Being boy-typed, I always assumed I was XY.

[kengr]

Having a male type body is *usually* XY. But it can also be XYY and several other things.

Female looking boding can be a lot of things, including XY (with any of several "defects" on other chromosome pairs).

[yetanotherbob.livejournal.com]

Same here, being non-trans. (Token completely normal white guy*, at your service!) So it's mostly assumed a 1:1 situation. Oversimplistic given the other possibilities given, but as a model, it's a useful when there's little to override it: "Got equipment that allows you to easily use a urinal? Okay, don't use the door with the picture of someone in a skirt, consider yourself an XY, and become the target of advertisements of blue pills. Next!"

*Token completely normal white guy might not be normal and/or white.

[hasufin.livejournal.com]

Makes me wonder what will turn up once gene assays become common practice.

Of course, bearing in mind that people don't actually expect that such checking to have been performed, the basic question is some variant of "Are you trans?". And what is the polite way to ask that? I imagine most transgendered folks are likely inured to such questions, but I can easily see someone who is cisgendered taking offense.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

*snerk*

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

Actually, in birds, Lepidopterans, and other animals in which females are the heterogametic sex, the sex chromosomes are called W and Z instead of X and Y.

(Heterogametic meaning one individual having two different sex chromosomes, which in humans is XY. Homogametic = XX)

/nerdery

[tlttlotd.livejournal.com]

Speaking of, are you heading out with the rest of us in four years' time? P)

[oygevalte.livejournal.com]

How third dimensional of you. The rest of us just come up flat...

Thank you, thank you, we hope you enjoyed tonight's Cartesian humor. The 9 pm show is completely different from the 7 pm show, and have a great night, folks!

*hides* :D

[robocoon.livejournal.com]

You could always do what I do-- when I get "the question", I just look them dead in the eye and say "Neither. I'm a robot."

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

Negative. I am a meat popsicle.

[oygevalte.livejournal.com]

Just arrested for uranium smuggling, were you? :D

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

If someone had amniocentesis while in the womb to be checked for Down Syndrome or other chromosomal disorders, they'd have had their karyotype tested. Or perhaps later in life if they were infertile or showing signs of a known chromosomal disorder they'd have their karyotype done. Otherwise, um yeah, no need to pay a doctor to check that your genes match your junk.

I second what someone else said, that these people are just struggling to find a polite way to ask you if you're trans.

[mayamaia.livejournal.com]

And of course there are other options. XXY and X, XX but with the gene that causes male development...

[criollo.livejournal.com]

Ugh, I can't believe the audacity of people. I'm sorry they are so rude. It's none of their business.

[shizouka.livejournal.com]

Till the next great enlightenment, we'll still get people asking this stuff. All for the same reason that they want people to slide into these neat little slots of either A or B.

[tlttlotd.livejournal.com]

When I participated in a medical research study some years ago, they sampled my blood a number of times for hormonal assay as well as genetic research. I don't know what, if anything they found because they never saw fit to get back to me.

[kitten-goddess.livejournal.com]

Why do people even ask? That is extremely rude. *swats nearest asshole upside the head with a heavy object*

[oygevalte.livejournal.com]

Heh, I suppose thinking of gender as a wave function makes a lot of sense, rather than it being "granualr". :D

[tastyeagle.livejournal.com]

I would love to have mine tested. I actually would love frequent testing of all sorts of internal chemical and biological variables and constants. It satisfies the scientist in me to keep track of what I am made of and how things change over time.

Of course, what stops me from doing that is the high costs of all these tests.