Incredible TED X by Intersex Youth Ori & Their Mom!

As an unfunded intersex advocacy organization operating entirely on donations and volunteer assistance, without unpaid staff, we are not always able to update our site as frequently as we’d like. This is the only reason that we have not shared this incredible TED X talk before today!

Intersex is Awesome” is a TED X by intersex youth Ori Turner, who uses they/them pronouns, and their mother Kristina Turner, a board member of InterACT Advocates for Intersex Youth, and the talk is perhaps the most beautiful, concise and straightforward piece of intersex advocacy we have ever seen. Ori’s parents, as Kristina shares, decided to raise Ori without the medically unnecessary cosmetic gential surgeries (a.k.a. IGM) that were recommended, as they often are to parents of intersex children. It has always been our goal to help parents realize that loving their intersex children exactly as they are, and supporting them to grow up as whoever they are, is the best way to raise intersex children, and we commend the Turner’s for having the wisdom and heart to do so with Ori! As you’ll see from the video, the results have been amazing. <3 Kristina Kay has shared with us that their decision was enabled in great part by the work of intersex activists. These activists include Lynelle Stephani-Long, Vice-President of the Board of Directors of InterACT, who has been educating and creating visibility about intersex issues for over fifteen years, with appearances in the 2006 intersex documentary One in 2000, The Oprah Winfrey Show‘s groundbreaking show about intersex in 2007, which reached 40 million viewers around the world each time it aired, Hida Viloria, our founding E.D. and former Chair of the Organization Intersex International (OII), whose statements on the 2007 Oprah Show about loving he/r intersex body and feeling blessed that s/he was not subjected to IGM because of he/r genital variance speak directly to parental concerns about what life might be like for a child that is allowed to grow up with such intersex traits intact, and, most significantly, intersex activist Jane Goto. Goto, who has been working with parents of intersex children directly since 2003, met the Turners in person to educate them about there harms of IGM, and helped them attend conferences to connect with others, all of which was enormously beneficial.

Please enjoy and share this video widely–especially with parents, doctors or other stakeholders who may be wondering about the best way to raise an intersex child. Obviously, as we have always contended, it is loving them as they were born and supporting them to become whoever they truly are. The Turners have created more amazing videos, which we will be sharing in the near future.