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giveth/taketh: hong kong govt
seems like we here in oz are way off the beaten track when it comes to transgender support. look at the benefits you get in hong kong (although there are some disavantages too … but hey, nothing’s perfect, right, and like i said – seems way better than our lot here).
Quote:A Transgender Woman Fights for Straight Marriage Rights in Hong Kong
by Jordan Rubenstein August 10, 2010In Hong Kong, transgender individuals can undergo hormone therapy and a sex change operation subsidized by the government. It sounds like a dream to trans folks in other countries, where expensive sex change operations are not even included in most health insurance plans.
But while eliminating some barriers that trans people face, Hong Kong has yet to give transgender citizens equal rights to marriage — specifically, straight marriage.
One trans woman underwent sex change surgery in a Hong Kong public hospital and had her sex altered on her identity card. But last year, the city’s Registrar of Marriages ruled that she couldn’t marry her boyfriend because her birth certificate says she’s a man. The gender on her birth certificate can’t be changed under Hong Kong law, and the city’s “Marriage Ordinance” only allows marriage between one man and one woman.
Now, she’s suing the Hong Kong government for the right to marry in her new gender. Her lawyers argue that preventing her from marrying her boyfriend is unconstitutional and violates her basic rights. The Hong Kong Bill of Rights and the Basic Law, Hong Kong’s constitution, state that every resident should have the freedom to marry.
Hong Kong lags behind other nearby countries, including mainland China, Singapore, Malaysia, and Japan, which all allow trans people to marry the opposite gender once they’ve transitioned.
Ironically, laws designed to prevent gay marriage permit transgender people to have “gay” marriages but not “straight” marriages. Not only are Hong Kong’s current laws discriminatory against transgender people but they fail at their purpose — preventing same-sex marriages.
In this case, it seems pretty clear: Marriage laws should recognize a person’s true gender, not their sex at birth.
do you think either of the leading political parties in australia would advocate changes of this magnitude?
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1 Reply
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Hi Virginia
I saw this article as well.
In Australia the discrimination against same sex marriage in fact does not extend to most TG relationships, where a TG person seeks to marry according to their affirmed gender. In 2002 Justice Chisholm of the Family Court decided that we could marry in our affirmed gender. See:
Re Kevin (validity of marriage of transsexual) [2001] FamCA 1074
http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rn/2001-02/02rn16.htmThe decision is not all encompassing, as it still reinforces the concept of marriage being between a man and a woman, but does not require gender identity to be that of one’s birth.
The issue of same sex marriage has previously been discussed in a forum and there was some disagreement. I don’t want repeat some of the discussion, but it was quite an interesting and lively debate on the issue of same sex marriage and well worth looking at.
See:
TR Forum Index -> Serious Stuff -> Gender and Sexuality ->Is same sex marriage an issue for the T community?
In summary, under the Family Court decision, in identifying as a woman, though not my birth gender, my marriage to a man would be recognised under the Commonwealth Marriage Act.
