Report
Legal Gender Recogniton: Abolishing the Medical Model
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Outright Team
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Legal gender recognition is a fundamental human right rooted in personal autonomy, dignity, and non-discrimination. This policy brief provides jey tools to advocate for the universal adoption of self-determined legal gender recognition.
Key Points in Outright International's Legal Gender Recognition Policy Brief:
- Legal gender recognition refers to the process through which a person’s gender identity is formally acknowledged by the state in official documents.
- When people can update their legal documents to reflect who they are, they are less likely to face discrimination, danger, or disrespect. This is especially important for trans, nonbinary, gender-diverse people, and some intersex people.
- Human rights standards call for states to ensure that legal gender recognition procedures are quick, transparent, accessible, and based on self-determination.
- Several countries implement a “medical model,” which conditions gender marker changes on requirements such as surgery, sterilization, or psychiatric diagnosis. This violates human rights and undermines bodily autonomy.
- Good practices affirm that legal gender recognition should not depend on a person’s medical history, medical or mental health treatment, or appearance, and must be accessible regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, sex characteristics, marital status, or parental status.
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