David Reimer was a boy who'se penis was burned off during the circumcision process. His parents then decided that instead of telling david what had happened, they would change his sex. This was decided with the help of psychologist John Money, who'se intentions were to conduct a study about how "nurture, not nature, determined gender identity." After davids sex change, to his knowledge he was a girl. A girl struggling through life, very confused about why her interests were that of a boys. Her family was falling apart, not knowing why, but the parents finally told her what had happened. David decided to get another sex change, and a reconstructed penis. Dr. Money had debriefed the study a success. David committed suicide at 38 for obvious reasons.
This experiment is unbelievably unethical. Not only did it take over david's entire life, causing his entire family to lie to him, on top of gender identity and sexuality issues. Which are a struggle enough by itself, but he had lived many years of his life 100 percent believing he was a girl and then to be informed that you were originally a male would be shocking life changing news. To know that your own parents know is unforgivable, and unbareable. No wonder david committed suicide at 38, he had experienced a exceptional amount of trauma physically, mentally, emotionally, socially and individually. This experiment is absolutely apalling, on top of keeping no confidentiality and for the sake of just knowing that a person can just take on the traits of a gender by thinking they are that gender. WHICH by the way this experiment proves was UNSUCCESSFUL.
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