Richard Green (sexologist)

Education and career

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Green was born in

During his medical studies at Johns Hopkins, Green met John Money, who was an assistant professor there, and started collaborating with him on research, initially on boys displaying substantial cross-gender behavior. In 1960, they published the paper "Incongruous Gender Role: Nongenital Manifestations in Prepubertal Boys," detailing their observations of 5 male children who "showed incongruities in gender role", ranging from preferring to play with girls to praying God would change them into a girl. Citing that adult gay men and transgender women recollect gender incongruity in childhood, they later concluded early intervention is best in cases of gender incongruity and that "part of the successful rearing of a child is orienting him, from birth to his biologically and culturally acceptable gender role. This, as far as we know, is best achieved by providing a relationship between husband and wife exemplifying these respective roles."^[6]

In 1961, they published a paper titled “Effeminacy in Prepubertal Boys,” which looked at eleven young boys who were referred for their “excessive and persistent attempts to dress in the clothes of the opposite gender, constant display of gestures and mannerisms of the opposite sex, preference for play and other activities of the opposite sex, or a stated desire to be a member of the opposite sex.”^[7] They recommended that parents "Look for insidious and irrational ways in which parents may be unwittingly encouraging girlishness and penalizing their son for developing boyishly. [...] Both [parents] should convey to their son their whole-hearted approval of his present and future masculine behavior and sexuality."^[8] The paper conflated gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation, viewing effeminacy in boys as a problem to be fixed so as not to lead to adult "homosexuality and transvestism."^[7][9]

In 1968, Green published "Childhood Cross-Gender Identification", a paper reviewing the therapy of nine young male children who were younger than 8 and "clearly prepubertal". The first six were from the collaborative papers between Green and Money, the last 3 were from Robert Stoller. Citing the failure of attempts to "cure" adult trans women, he reported early diagnosis and treatment may be effective in preventing manifestations of adulthood cross-gender identification. The stated goals of family therapy are "for the husband and wife to gain some perspective on the second-class citizen of the husband and of the significance of their unbalanced roles in shaping their son's personality. Additional focus is on the masculinity-inhibiting of mother's anxiety over her son's healthy aggression and her greater comfort with what to her is his less threatening behavior."^[10]

In Money's obituary, Green acknowledges Money and Robert Stoller, as well as his father, Leo H. Green, for having set the course for his life and career. In the mid-1960s, Money introduced Green to Harry Benjamin, whom Green acknowledges as having "further honed" his career.^[11] In 1969 Green and Money co-edited "Transsexualism and Sex Reassignment", published by Johns Hopkins Press.^{[citation needed]}

In 1972, Green coauthored a paper with Lawrence Newman and Stoller titled "Treatment of Boyhood Transsexualism: An Interim Report of Four Years' Experience," which held reports and comments from their psychiatric experiences. Believing family disturbance to be the cause of gender incongruity, they stated "General principles of therapy are aimed at accomplishing four objectives: (1) Development of a relationship of trust and affection between the male therapist and the boy. (2) Heightening parental concern about the problem so that parents begin to disapprove of feminine interests and no longer covertly encourage them. (3) Promotion of the father's, or a father-substitute's involvement in the boy's life. (4) Sensitization of the parents to the interpersonal difficulties which underlay the tendency of the mother to be overly close with the son and for the father to emotionally divorce himself from family activities." Newman treated a family and tried to inspire aggressiveness in the child, insisting to the mother it was a success that the child struck their sister and mother. In addition, behaviors like dressing femininely were actively disapproved of. In another case treated by Newman he stated he established a warm and friendly relationship to explain feminine behavior was "not right" for a little boy and that he should give it up. In this case, he explains the parents were worried their child "was destined to be a homosexual and felt helpless to do anything about it," but responded quickly when they learned they could do a great deal for the child. In another case treated by Newman, he explained to the patient they'd have to stop feminine behavior now before it's too late, and in a few weeks, the child announced they wanted to "become normal like the other boys," motivated by strong religious commitment. While the patient attempted to develop in a masculine way, Newman continually challenged the "pessimism about becoming masculine and his secret belief that he was destined to live as a feminine person" (216). In a case treated by Green, he made an effort to establish paternal control of the family to shift the child's perception of gender roles. Their final comments included "Some boys reveal their feminine identifications through physical gestures. By the time they are seen in consultation much of this display is unconscious or automatic. In order to bring it under volitional control, the child must be sensitized to when he is walking, sitting, or using his hands "like a girl." Parents should be instructed to consistently point out to the boy when such behavior occurs. In his contact with the boy, the therapist does the same. The boy may also need actual instruction in modifying these gestures" (217). They countered the point they were ascribing an inherently higher value to masculine over feminine behavior by saying it would be easier to modify the behavior of a child rather than the attitude of society towards them.^[12]

Green was the founding editor of

During the APA's heated debate in the early 1970s about the declassification of homosexuality as a mental illness, Green argued forcefully in favor of declassification.[21] He argued that the grounds for deciding the issue should be the "historical and cross-cultural groundings in homosexual expression, associated psychiatric features accompanying a homosexual orientation, the emotional consequences to the homosexual of societal condemnation, and behaviors of other species".^[21] Green applauded the eventual APA decision while strongly criticizing the fact that the administration put it to a vote, saying that such "a shotgun marriage between science and democracy" was "ludicrous".^[21]

In his work, on gender identity in children, Green used common English expressions like "sissy boy" and "tomboy" in the titles of some of his publications. His choice of terminology was criticized as offensive.^[22]

In 2002, he initiated a debate in a special issue of the