Furthermore, as a role, it was largely the result of barbaric cultural norms, and trying to reframe it as a "third gender" is ethically bereft.

In societies where women are treated as valuable familial property, normalized abuse of male children and adolescents is also often prevalent.

The same article could be written about Afghanistan's "dancing boys"; they have unique social positions, rules, hairstyles, and forms of dress, wearing clothes "similar to those worn by unmarried young women".

We rightfully recognize it as sexual slavery and child prostitution, not a third gender.