[lexapro]

I came across the following on CNN this evening:

Almost no transgender people ever have surgery. We don't have any idea how many do.

From here: Sonny and Cher's child transitioning from female to male - CNN.com

The issue of transgendered doesn't bother me. What does bother me is the quote. First he said that no one has surgery. Then he says they don't have any idea how many do. Well, which one is it? None? Some? All? You don't know?

Color me confused.

[Chuckit]

Probable meaning: The number of transgender people who have surgery is so vanishingly small that it's hard to find them in order to measure.

[Tiresias]

The sentence is also a quote and therefore is not a news contradiction but a Mara-Keisling-executive-director-of-the-Washington-based-National-Center-for-Transgender-Equality contradiction.

[ghporter]

Transgender does not require, or even imply, surgical intervention. Most of the transgender process is socialization rather than medical. Learning how to behave in the opposite gender's roles in a social context is no trivial thing.

Unfortunately, this particular item looks contradictory because the complications of transgender issues are far from "well understood" by just about anyone outside the transgender community or certain parts of the medical community.