Transgender people no longer required to undergo sterilization in France

[Martina]

Must admit I had no idea such laws existed and am horrified that they did and still do in so many countries; I really thought that Eugenics was a thing of the past belonging to now mostly extinct autocratic regimes.

The UN is right to oppose such laws as an affront to human rights.

[Adrian]

The map below shows the sterilization status in European countries as of May this year.

The situation may be improving in some European countries but the Trans Rights Europe Map indicates the stark differences that still exist. In 24 countries, marked in red on the map, transgender people are required to undergo genital removal surgery and sterilization before they can legally change gender.

The countries marked in blue do not require genital removal surgery and sterilization while those marked brown do not have reliable procedures in place.

With the recent news France should be coloured blue now.

[Jennifer_1]

I am not sure but I believe that the ACT is the only State/Territory in Australia that allows you to change your gender on your Birth Certificate without undergoing gender surgery (sterilisation). NSW definitely still requires you to undergo gender surgery, http://www.bdm.nsw.gov.au/Pages/amend-certificate/change-of-sex.aspx The B D & M site refers to sex affirmation surgery which is essentially sterilisation.

The other point of interest is that you cannot be married when you change your gender on your birth certificate, when I changed my birth cert. I had to provide proof that my wife had died and I was no longer married. Just imagine what would happen if you were allowed to change your gender while still married, you would have a same sex marriage, no doubt this would result in civilisation as we know it ceasing to exist, economic ruin and chaos, or so we are led to believe by very conservative members of our society. All of this because of the needs of a bureaucratic rule that has no impact on anybody apart from the individuals concerned.

Sorry for the rant, but it is something that I find to be a human rights abuse and incredibly discriminatory. Well done France for getting up to date with their laws.

[Elizabeth]

Hi Jen, I wonder just benefits from such archaic rules that are superfluous to progressive living; why the hell can’t all follow the lead of the ACT which, by the way still has a long way to go. Go well my friend.

[Adrian]

As we seem to have segued from France, Europe, Australia to the ACT perhaps I can add my view on sterilisation, gender and sex.

But first a warning to anyone reading this thread in the future that legislation is in a state of flux and steady progress is being made in a trans-friendly direction. So what you read here may not be the current situation for you.

We always seem to gravitate from a discussion of sterilisation and gender change to birth certificates. For most of the transgender community (particularly F2M) gender change is a far more significant issue than altering a birth certificate.

Let’s back-off to thinking about gender, particularly as it affects someone who is attempting to spend more of their life expressing their true gender identity.

Quote:

As of 1 July 2013, the Australian government has adopted the Australian Government Guidelines on the Recognition of Sex and Gender which standardise the evidence required to establish or change your sex or gender in all personal records held by Australian Government departments and agencies. These guidelines specifically state:

“Sex reassignment surgery and/or hormone therapy are not pre-requisites for the recognition of a change of gender in Australian Government records.”

All Australian Government departments and agencies are required to progressively align their existing and future business practices with these Guidelines by 1 July 2016.This includes Centrelink, Medicare, the Passport Office, the Australian Taxation Office (ATO), Roads and Traffic Authorities, Police and any other Australia government departments.

To correct your sex marker with any Australian Government department or agency all you need is any one of the following:

a) a statement from a Registered Medical Practitioner or a Registered Psychologist (general registration) or
b) a valid Australian Government travel document, such as a valid passport, which specifies your preferred gender or
c) a state or territory birth certificate; or recognised details of a certificate showing your preferred gender.

Please note that changing your birth certificate is only one of the three available options.

For instance, to get a passport issued in your preferred gender there is no prerequisite for sex reassignment surgery. Birth or citizenship certificates do not need to be amended for to be issued a passport in your preferred gender. The Passport office has very good advice how to do this, and once again, does not require sterilisation.
https://www.passports.gov.au/passportsexplained/theapplicationprocess/eligibilityoverview/Pages/changeofsexdoborpob.aspx

This means that in Australia you can change your gender on all the documents without having sterilization except…..
……for birth certificates.
The BMD registries are managed by state governments so the rules do differ. I personally have some sympathy with a view that says that because birth certificates record your sex – which bits you had when you were born – you need to change the physical situation to change the record. It seems to me unrealistic to expect to be able to change your sex on a birth certificate without sex-affirmation surgery (aka sterilisation) .

Which splits the community into two.

Those who don’t have surgery/sterilisation have an anatomy that is in agreement with an unaltered birth certificate. They can have every other government record corrected to show a preferred gender. And their past life is a secret till they have a strip search or try to get married. But the plus side is that any pre-existing marriages can remain (unless you choose to divorce), and you can have children.

Those who decide to have surgery are sterilised and so the issue highlighted in this forum thread is not relevant. They are able to change the sex marker on their birth certificate in every state. But the effect of this on pre-existing marriages will (until we have legal same-sex marriage) depend on individual state law.

The move by the ACT to allow birth certificates to be changed without sterilisation does seem to be a bit ambiguous. Their web site says:

Quote:

An application must be accompanied by a statutory declaration from a doctor or psychologists stating that you have received appropriate clinical treatment to change your sex or that you are intersex.

. To be honest, until there is a federal position on same-sex marriage I think it muddies the situation rather than making things better.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the update on the Australian laws.
So if a previous marriage is not effected when you change your identity from M2F then that means I can marry Sarah before I change everything (besides birth certificate) and still legally be married, and as I’ve only ever been asked to show my birth certificate twice in the 47 years that I’ve lived in Australia (both when becoming an Australian Citizen this year) then that does not pose as a problem for me. The only hiccup I have then of marrying Sarah is for her to get a divorce first.

[Jennifer_1]

To be honest, until there is a federal position on same-sex marriage I think it muddies the situation rather than making things better.

Hi Amanda, I fully agree with you the the Federal Government has made some significant changes in allowing people to live in the gender they need to live in. However for some, myself included, there is a need to affirm our true gender as fully as possible. Hence the problem of the birth certificate. Only some want or need to go down this path, but it is important to those of us who do.

The marriage equality question is something that needs to be addressed. I know of one couple in particular where they were married and had one child. After the marriage the husband underwent gender affirmation surgery and is now female. They are still together as a loving couple raising a wonderful child. However the trans partner has a choice, remain married but still officially a male or be divorced and obtain the sought after gender marker of Female on a revised birth certificate. This bureaucratic rule is unfair and needs to be changed.

I do apologise for getting off the original topic of France, still I think the whole issue is relevant,

[Anonymous]

Thankyou so much for this information, I shall be doing the passport change ASAP and then the rest can flow I think changing your name legally is also a prerequisite to ‘approval’ by a psychiatrist for sex change operations…at least in QLD. I also tend to agree with your view that Birth Certificates need to represent your physical being, as long as there is an indeterminate spot for those born with the apparatus of both genders.
Alana