52.

Where does the blame lie for this fiasco? I had sought my own happiness, a happiness that could harm no other living person; and I had been stopped by the bigoted and the self-righteous; my freedom had been denied. Not very much can be said in extenuation of the particular hospital involved, for they had admitted me and charged me under an agreement which they dishonored; and the gen- try who voted not to allow the operation were manifestly false to their oath to be governed in their treatment 'by the needs of the sufferer'--they were governed by bigotry and timidity and my needs were not considered. But other hospitals, though less dishonor- able, are as timid. What lies behind their unwillingness to ner- mit an operation that, in the considered judgment of nearly a dozen doctors, is necessary? There are, it seems to me, three elements of their timidity: legality, religion, and disrespect for freedom.

The law is not lucid in matters of this sort. The common law and certain ancient statutes forbid mayhem. Mayhem is depriv- ing someone of limbs necessary for self-defense--a sword arm or ́a trigger finger. It is somewhat difficult to regard sexual organs as being useful in self-defense. Moreover, such laws had in view, of course, maiming by force, without consent. In short, the law of mayhem is not (like the law on theft) automatically applicable, if at all, to the removal of sexual organs with the patient's con- sent. Especially since the courts themselves castrate certain criminals. Nevertheless, a prejudiced district attorney might drag out this law and attempt to apply it to a hospital which was a party to the operation. Whether there could be a conviction and, particularly, whether any higher court would sustain such convic- tion, is perhaps doubtful. The surgeons were willing to risk it, if their consciences approved. It is difficult to believe that the hospital refused me because of this law.

Religion, not necessarily genuine religion, is the force be- hind the hospital attitude; indeed, it would be the force behind the public opinion that might persuade a district attorney to in- voke the law of mayhem. Public opinion is undoubtedly hostile to this operation, as witness the covert sneers surrounding the re- cent celebrated case of an American soldier who became a woman; people are shocked at femininity in a man and at castration (far more so than at the removal of a woman s ovaries). Undoubtedly this attitude is based on ideas of the inferiority of women, ideas