Its a FF thing. it was in FFXI too the devs felt thats it was anti-rpg to be able to change race/sex because it would be impossible in RL so why should it be possible ingame.

the offering of this item was because they added new races/sex into the game and wanted to give the 1.0 fans a chance to pick the new races/sex if they wished.

doubt they'll even sell this item for real money like wow but only time will tell