The joy of (inter)sex

This article examines the question of what produces happiness for intersex people, with a particular focus on sexuality. During the mid-20th century, bodies of intermediate sex were medicalized as disordered and in need of treatment via surgery, hormones and other interventions in order to produce conformity with binary sex/gender expectations. However, this ‘cure’, involving medically enforced secrecy and unconsented-to infant sex reassignment surgeries, generated misery instead of happiness, impelling the birth of intersex advocacy seeking to put an end to these practices. A central claim of this advocacy has been that infant genital reconstructions tragically impair or destroy capacity for sexual sensation, and thus capacity for happy relationships. This article examines the question of whether and how intersex people are able to find joy under these circumstances, both generally and sexually, analysing data from semi-structured interviews with intersex individuals (N = 38) conducted in the online setting of Second Life. Interviewees revealed that they found satisfaction in their embodied lives and relations by rejecting shame, secrecy and binary sex/gender ideology; finding support by coming out; and queering ideas of how sexuality and bodies should work so that they might find atypical routes to pleasure. These findings align with and expand upon frameworks of joy presented by intersectional feminist and queer theories.