While many states in America are rushing and bending over backward to recognize the “identified gender” of transgender people in legal terms, this isn’t the only country where the government is struggling to deal with this entire mess. The gender-bending fad has been showing up in many places around the world and causing all manner of issues. This week, the Associated Press highlighted the story of a guy in Singapore named Lune Loh who “transitioned” to become a female near the age of 18. The problem is that Singapore mandates two years of military service for all men when they turn 18. They recently agreed to provide exceptions for transgender individuals, but in order to qualify, you have to prove that you’ve had “gender reassignment” surgery, otherwise known as genital mutilation. Loh refused to have the surgery so he was drafted and sent off to boot camp anyway. As you might suspect, things did not go well.

She was the only woman soldier working in the guard room, surrounded by men who harassed and frightened her after she said she was transgender. She tried to ignore them as they opened up their shirts and pretended to rape each other, while beckoning her to join them.

And then one day, as Lune Loh stood under the searing Singaporean sun, one of those men took his rifle and tried to shove it between her legs.

She was a woman. She was not supposed to be here, because Singapore’s compulsory, two-year military service is required only for 18-year-old men. But under Singapore law, she was still considered a man, because she had not undergone surgery that would render her sterile.

Singapore isn’t the only place where these types of things are happening. Other countries are recognizing the medically impossible non-reality of people deciding they are the opposite of their actual gender and creating legal avenues to deal with the complications that inevitably arise. Many, like Singapore, require the person to undergo surgery before they can have their official documents changed.

Supposed human rights activists told the AP that such mandatory surgical procedures qualify as “torture” and should be outlawed. But is it really? They aren’t forcibly castrating or performing hysterectomies on anyone. They’re saying that in order to qualify as one gender or the other, you need to physically match the characteristics of that gender, or at least come as close to it as current medical science allows. (Which really isn’t very close at all.)

In terms of the specific requirements in Singapore, that brings us back to Lune Loh. He told the AP that he had begun suspecting there was something “wrong” gender-wise at the age of 8 but never understood transgenderism until he was 17. He waited to come out until age 18 to avoid a confrontation with his “conservative” father. But Loh has no interest in having the surgery done, preferring to keep the option to bear children later in life.

So what is the army supposed to do in situations like that? What’s to stop any young man who wants to avoid military service from just putting on a dress and declaring themselves to be female for two years? I’m not saying that was the case with Loh, but we also can’t say for sure that it wasn’t. Singapore’s military ranks could be depleted fairly quickly if that were the case.

We should also take another look at those accusations of “torture.” They are based on a 2013 report from the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture which urged all governments to “outlaw forced or coerced sterilization in all circumstances.” That’s something most of us would probably agree with, but you probably already know that the UN was not referring to transgender issues. They want to prevent governments from engaging in attempts at genocide by sterilizing specific portions of the population so they can’t keep reproducing. And – again – those are cases of forced sterilization. Singapore isn’t forcing anyone to undergo surgery.

So long as it isn’t being done to children, all of these adults can have whatever type of surgery they like as far as I’m concerned. But those decisions have consequences and people should be aware of that in advance and be prepared to take responsibility for their choices. That clearly wasn’t the case with Lune Loh.