A Texas lawmaker was ridiculed after claiming there are six biological sexes during a hearing on transgender sports participation.
“The bill seems to think there are two,” state Rep. James Talarico said of the number of sexes listed in a Texas bill that would ban transgender athletes from school sports. “The one thing I want us to all be aware of is that modern science obviously recognizes that there are many more than two biological sexes.”
Talarico, a Democratic lawmaker that was educated at Harvard, then argued that there are six biological sexes.
“In fact, there are six, which, honestly, Rep. Hefner, surprised me, too,” Talarico said.
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The Democratic lawmaker elaborated that there are “six really common biological sexes” based on X and Y chromosomes that are distinct XX and XY female and male combinations, including X, XXY, XYY, and XXXY.
“The point is that, biologically speaking, scientifically speaking, sex is a spectrum, and oftentimes can be very ambiguous,” Talarico said.
But Beth Stelzer, the president of Save Women’s Sports and who testified in favor of the legislation, countered that studies prove “that the male advantage is immutable [in athletics], and there are in fact two sexes. They are dimorphic: XX, XY.”
“The other quote ‘sexes’ mentioned are disorders of sexual development that are variants of XX or XY chromosomes. They are still disorders of male or female,” Stelzer said.
Talarico’s argument also faced pushback from conservative author Dinesh D’Souza, who tweeted that the “only thing obvious here is this man’s stupidity” in reaction to the lawmaker’s comments.
According to Children’s Hospital Colorado, while “X&Y chromosome variations” do occur, they stem from problems with the formation of a parent’s sperm or egg.”
“Males with an extra X chromosome usually have small testicles and show delayed or incomplete pubertal development due to low levels of testosterone,” the hospital’s website says. “Girls with Turner syndrome [one X chromosome] can have short stature, webbing of the neck, a broad chest and shorter fourth fingers.”
Meanwhile, Stanford Medical School’s Tech Interactive project found that studies of chromosome variations do not “suggest that people who have these differences are more likely to be transgender.”
“Typically, if someone has a Y chromosome, no matter how many X’s or Y’s, they have the body parts of a boy. If someone doesn’t have a Y chromosome, they have the body parts of a girl,” said Kim Zayhowski, a genetic counselor and Stanford graduate.
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“Now, this is important: Having differences in sex chromosomes doesn’t mean that someone is transgender because remember, being transgender has more to do with how someone feels,” Zayhowski added.
