When we hear about gender reassignment surgery, from a man to a woman, it will feel incredible at the first time.
But what is even more incredible is that a transgender person can be promoted to the rank of admiral.
This legendary resume took place in the United States, and its transgender general is represented by The Assistant Secretary of Health and four-star Admiral Rachel Levine of the U.S. Public Health Service Officer Corps.
Speaking of Levin, in fact, she did not have too outstanding achievements, only because the transgender experience has become the focus of the world's attention.
Rachel Levine
Born in October 1957 in Wakefield, Massachusetts, Rachel Levine was a Jew who, before she changed sex, was a man named Richard Levine. According to Levin himself, as early as he was five or six years old, he began to doubt his gender identity and always wanted to be a woman.
Even when Levin married and had children as an adult, it didn't change his desire to become a woman. After decades of ideological struggle, the 54-year-old Levin officially took the first step of gender reassignment in 2011 and underwent sex reassignment surgery in the hospital, but the process was quite long, took 2 years, and finally completed all the transformations, successfully changed from man to woman, and changed his name to Rachel Levine.
In the early part of the last century, when medical technology was not developed, sex reassignment surgery was still a relatively complex technology, and no one thought of gender reassignment. Later, with the rapid development of medicine, gradually some people began to pursue transgender and complete transgender, whether it was from men to women, or from women to men.
For example, the famous Korean actor model Ha Li Xiu, when he was 20 years old, in order to pursue her boyfriend in Japan, she underwent sex reassignment surgery and became a woman; Ha Li Xiu, who has now completed her daughter's body, has two marriages and romances. There is also the famous British journalist Jane Morris who underwent 2 sex reassignment surgeries at the age of 48, and before becoming a woman, he had five children with his wife Elizabeth.
So how did Levin, as a transgender man, get involved with a four-star admiral in the U.S. military?
This is inseparable from Levin's own two major "advantages":
One is that Levin mastered superb medical technology; Levin studied medicine and graduated from two famous medical schools in the United States, Harvard Medical School and Tulane University School of Medicine. After completing her studies, she worked as a pediatrician and professor at pennsylvania State School of Medicine, and was nominated by the Governor of Pennsylvania to be appointed Minister of Health.
After the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, as the highest health official in Pennsylvania, Levin led the admission and treatment of confirmed cases in Pennsylvania and became the spokesman for the prevention and control of the epidemic in Pennsylvania.
In a sense, Levin's experience at the grassroots level, her teaching history in colleges and universities, and her management ability in government departments have laid the foundation for her appointment as a senior general by Biden.
The second is the inclusiveness shown by Levin's transgender experience; there are different opinions in the United States, among which the Democratic Party has a positive attitude and a positive and tolerant attitude towards homosexuality, transgender and other issues, while the conservative forces led by the Republican Party have strongly rejected transgenderism, such as the Republican President Trump once ordered the Department of Defense to ban transgender people from serving on August 25, 2017, at the beginning of his term of office, which means that Trump overturned the Policy of the Democratic Party's Oba President Ma allow transgender people to openly serve in the US military before leaving office.
So much so that during the 4 years of Trump's administration, almost no new transgender people have entered the US military.
He Jinli, the first African-American vice president of the United States
After Biden took office, in order to show inclusiveness and gain widespread support, the Obama policy of serving transgender people was resumed. Vice President He Jinli, who nominated Vice President He Jinli of Indian-African descent, and Austin, who nominated the first black defense minister, are all part of Biden's creation of a pluralistic and inclusive society.
Based on this, biden's nomination of a transgender person as a four-star general is understandable.
But then again, Rachel Levine was never a soldier at all, and Biden hastily pushed Levin to the position of four-star admiral, which may be confusing to many.
In fact, this is quite normal in the U.S. government system, and if we know the troops Levin served in, we may not have any doubts about her rank as general.
Levin's unit, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and its public health service officer corps, is one of the eight "uniformed units" of the U.S. government, with a strength of about 6,700 people. I think that when you see the word "troops", I think everyone will think that the public health service officer corps is under the leadership of the US Department of Defense.
U.S. Public Health Service Officer Corps
In fact, although the public health service officer corps enjoys the salaries and ranks of the army and navy, and the personnel are all active military personnel, they are outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. Department of Defense, but are part of the Department of Health and Human Services, one of the U.S. Cabinet departments, and the composition of the personnel includes doctors, veterinarians, dentists, engineers, pharmacists, nurses, optometrists, environmental health experts, scientists, nutritionists, clinical and rehabilitation physiotherapists, physician assistants, etc., a bit like the professional and technical officers in our army, who do not undertake combat tasks. Their primary responsibility is to provide public health services and disease prevention.
Emergencies such as the spread of the Ebola virus in West Africa, Hurricane Katrina, the Earthquake in Haiti, the Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico, and the COVID-19 Pandemic have all been represented by the Public Health Service Officer Corps, who can act as an emergency force.
In view of the fact that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Public Health Service Officer Corps is an active military officer, and the head of the officer corps is also the director of the Public Health Bureau, and the rank of lieutenant general is the rank of lieutenant general, it has become a mandatory rule that the assistant secretary of health in charge of the department is awarded the rank of general, and it is impossible to make the assistant secretary of health and the rank of lieutenant general of the subordinate officer corps head.
In this way, whoever is nominated for the position of assistant secretary of health and human services will be awarded the rank of four-star admiral even if he or she has not been a soldier.
So when President Biden nominated Levin, a 63-year-old transgender man, to the position of assistant secretary of health, it was inevitable to rise to the rank of admiral, and she also became the first transgender four-star admiral in the history of the United States and the world.
Admiral Levin's former assistant health minister, Brett Girol, for example, was also a four-star admiral.