Transgendered Youth
• Gender Outsiders: Transgendered & Others
Benowitz said that two years ago -- at a Broward high school she declined to name -- she was called in after a group of boys beat up another student, whom they believed to be an effeminate boy. In fact, the victim was transgendered -- a biological female who looked, dressed and behaved like a male. Benowitz was brought in to counsel the administrators, the students and the victim.
''People have an understanding of what it means to be gay or lesbian -- but when they hear that a person is genetically one gender but lives as another gender, that threatens a number of people because they don't understand what that means,'' Benowitz said. ``And that misunderstanding can make lives very difficult for transgendered children and their parents.''
''In addition to behaving like the opposite sex, a person with gender dysphoria naturally relates to the opposite sex,'' Volker said. ``They also have a persistent and recurring discomfort with their own external body parts and genitalia because it does not match their internal gender identity. Simply said, they were born into the wrong body.''