I refer to the report in The Star , If gender is in doubt, state 'unclear' . There is a glaring error in the first sentence of the article:

'Parents have been asked not to register their hermaphroditic babies (having two sexual organs) as 'male' but to put down their sex as 'unclear'.

It is a commonly held misconception that hermaphrodites are people who have both male and female sexual organs. However, I would expect The Star to have checked their facts better, and not glibly make mistakes such as these. 'Hermaphrodite', although often used to describe humans, is a term more accurately used to describe certain plants and animals.

The correct term for 'hermaphroditic' humans is actually 'intersex'. No human has both male and female sexual organs. The term intersex describes people who cannot be determined as exclusively male or female - based on genitalia, gonads, chromosomes, and/or secondary sex characteristics. (Wikipedia can tell you as much)

This translates into examples such as a person with a larger-than-usual clitoris, or a person with a 'too small' penis who has both ovarian and testicular tissue or a person who has some cells with XX chromosomes, and some with XY, and so on.

I support Dr Abdullah Mohd Zin's request to state intersexed babies' sex as 'unclear' on their birth certificates, although I do not think that intersex people necessarily need to be 'cured'. Abdullah's request is a good way to deal with the issue - as opposed to practices in the US, for example, where intersex babies are routinely operated on to 'correct' the physical appearance of their genitalia. Intersex activists have compared this medial practice to female genital mutilation. Some intersexuals who were operated on as babies or young children are not able to have orgasms when they grow up.

Let us make sure that our policies steer clear of practices such as those, where 90% of intersex babies end up being assigned as 'females' and duly operated on. Why this imbalance in sex assignment? One American doctor put it this way, 'It is easier to make a hole than a pole.'

Unless intersex babies' physical makeups pose a significant health threat (which is rare), we should wait until children are old enough to make their own decision about which sex they feel more comfortable in (if they do indeed have a preference), and whether or not they wish to have their bodies surgically altered.