7 global news stories on transgender rights right now
Trump’s ban on transgender people in the military was big, bad news, but there’s a lot going on for transgender rights around the world — some much more positive. At the moment, one person is fighting for her rights as a transgender woman in the workplace, on CrowdJustice. Here’s a roundup of what’s happening elsewhere in the world:
1. India has accepted its first transgender police officer, with three more now in training. The judge involved in the ruling to allow this said: “the social impact of such recruitment cannot be lost sight of”, whilst the station inspector to have gained the new inspector says her ‘presence will be an advantage.”
2. After his gender identity led to Stiles Zuschlag being asked to leave Tri-City Christian Academy in Somersworth, the transgender teen’s new school has elected him homecoming king.
3. Despite contention from the orthodox church and the national-conservative Independent Greeks party, Greece has passed a new law that says its citizens can change the gender on their ID papers at will from age 15 and over. All Greeks over age 12 must carry an ID card, and having one’s gender listed different to one’s appearance has made life hard for transgender Greeks — from getting a job, to renting a home, to taking a train, things are complicated if not impossible. New legislation will ease this, as well as contribute to a more accepting societal standard.
4. Transgender woman Stephanie Peckham of Indiana seeks compensation for being fired after filing a complaint regarding abuse and threats at work based on her gender identity. Peckham, who worked in the US army and as a prison guard, argues she was fired in retaliation for filing her complaint, which is illegal. Her Indiana case, which you can support at CrowdJustice, is brave in a state that prohibits same sex marriage, and her lawyer Leslie Barnes argues that a positive ruling will “serve as a legal guide for employment discrimination cases.”
5. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has decided that the civil rights law banning discrimination in the workplace based on ‘sex’ does not include gender identity, and has ordered the Justice Department to judge cases accordingly, reversing protection of transgender employees put into place by Eric H. Holder Jr. in 2014.
6. Nepal has its first official transgender bride. The country has some of the most progressive views on sexuality and gender identity in South Asia, as well as no official laws on transgender marriage. Monika Shahi Nath says “I never dreamed that one day I would be someone’s wife, that I would be loved as a daughter-in-law.”
7. Transgender plantiffs and two LGBT rights groups have challenged the Trump Administration’s transgender military ban, which has responded by asking the federal court to dismiss the lawsuit. The future of an estimated 15,000 transgender people currently serving in the military is to be decided by Defense Secretary James Mattis in February 2018. This follows Trump’s order to dismiss transgender troops due to “tremendous medical costs”. Healthcare is in fact an estimated $700 per year per trans service member, and around $21,500 for gender reassignment surgery, which is required for an unknown fraction of trans service members. This is in comparison to an estimated $75,000 to train each replacement. One of the named plaintiffs, Regan Kibby, has pointed out the army’s history of inclusion, saying “I think history is on our side.”
