What I Learned from the Pregnant Man

With all the stories recently of Thomas Beatie being the first man to get pregnant, I was reminded of another pregnant man who was genetically a man and pregnant.

Lee Mingwei was brought to my attention about a year ago from a colleague who thought he might interest me since I was pregnant at the time. My co-worker showed me a web site showcasing Mingwei, and I was dumbfounded. Many thoughts ran through my head, like "how is that possible? Men do not have a uterus." This question and others were answered on the website.

The rest of that day was spent pouring over that web site and just how ridiculous science has become. Cloning animals, impregnating men what will be next?

For the next week I showed anyone who would look Mingwei's web site. Every day that week was spent checking for any updates. I began thinking how cool it would be if my husband and I ever decided to have another child that he could be the one to carry it.

After that week my curiosity faded and Lee Mingwei was forgotten.

Then Thomas Beatie a man from Ohio who claims to be the first pregnant man stepped into the discovery channel spotlight. I thought "wait a minute he's not the first!" Once again I began to share the story of Lee Mingwei.

Now lets take a little break here to let readers know I have a built in bull-shit detector. I am not easily fooled and I always question everything.

For some reason the validity of Lee Mingwei was never questioned, just instantly accepted as truth.

So a few nights ago on one of my favorite websites there was a post about Thomas Beatie. After reading it I left a comment about Lee Mingwei and the address for his web site. My next thought was, "he must have delivered by now" so began my search for information on his child. On you tube a search for his name lead to a seven minute preview of his upcoming documentary. Imagine my surprise when the showed it had been posted two years ago! The baby has got to be about a year and a half now!

Now it was time to ask Jeeves "did Lee Mingwei have his baby?" Then guess what, all the response to my question where links to sites saying Mingwei was a hoax.

What?! Why did I never see through this? Why did my bull-shit detector not go off? A second inspection of the bogus website about Mingwei solidified that it was a hoax. All the silly things that were there, like the first mouse with human intelligence, designer babies and nanobots.

The little journalism teacher in me is shaking her head and pointer her finger at me in disgust.

So what have I learned from the pregnant man? Never take ANYTHING at face value. Question everything; never accept anything as truth unless you have researched it first. A lesson we all should learn and follow.

The bogus pregnant man web site is www.malepregnancy.com

Lee Mingwei is an artist living in New York his web site is www.leemingwei.com

For more information on Thomas Beatie go to dsc.discovery.com and search Thomas Beatie