The first-person account of a transgender man who has decided to have a baby has caused shock waves, even in the queer community. The article appeared in the national queer magazine, The Advocate, on March 26.

Thomas Beatie lives with his wife in Oregon. To all appearances, as he wrote, they are a “normal” couple. “Our desire to work hard, buy our first home, and start a family was nothing out of the ordinary,” he said.

With wife Nancy unable to bear children due to “severe endometriosis,” Thomas Beatie decided to become pregnant. Though Thomas is legally defined as male, he retains his “reproductive rights,” as he described it, meaning he still has his uterus and ovaries.

Getting pregnant wasn’t as easy as it should have been. Doctors refused Beatie as a patient because of their religious beliefs. One doctor consulted with the ethics board of his hospital and recommended therapy to determine if Beatie was fit “to bring a child into this world.” As if every straight woman is.

Nine doctors later, Thomas and Nancy finally got access to a sperm bank.

Despite the discomfort of the medical world, Beatie is now five months pregnant and showing. The baby girl is due at the beginning of July. The picture accompanying the Advocate article is extraordinary. There’s no doubt about it: He’s a pregnant man.

There are more things in heaven and earth, as Hamlet said to Horatio.

And it’s all good.

It’s hard for some people to understand, but human sexuality is much more complicated than Dr. Phil or even Dr. Ruth ever imagined. The old gay/straight dichotomy was always fiction. Many people do not fit those categories. They never have and they never will. I don’t care what country they live in or what religion they belong to. Human sexuality is still a vast uncharted area, as evidenced by straight boys who get occasional blowjobs from gay guys and lesbians who sometimes sleep with men.

Gender identity challenges us in the same way. It’s not always an either/or proposition: Male-to-female, female-to-male. There is at least one other possibility. There have always been hermaphrodites, people born with both genitals. There have always been people who don’t conform to a strict gender role or identity. I spent three or four years in the early 70s living in various forms of drag that sometimes befuddled the queens I hung out with: “Miss thing, are you trying to be a man or a woman?” “Both,” I’d say.

Even now, I sometimes get called "ma'am" on the phone and in gay circles I am assumed to be a bottom. It doesn't matter to me. I know who I am.

In an age where everything is rightfully being questioned, why shouldn’t Thomas Beatie opt to have a child, even though from all outward appearances he’s male? Why shouldn’t he retain his “reproductive rights?” Male and female are social constructs as much as they are biological roles. If someone is able to be both Mama and Papa, why not?

It won’t hurt the kid. It won’t bring down Western Civilization. It won’t incur God’s wrath.

Beatie is crossing a brave new frontier and I applaud him for it.

Tommi Avicolli Mecca is a radical southern Italian queer atheist performer and writer with a website: www.avicollimecca.com