How Trans Rights Are Changing Argentina – OZY

In 2012, a pioneering law was passed in Argentina that allows people to choose their gender by filling out a form and “without the need to undergo a medical procedure”. This law also made access to hormone treatments and sex reassignment surgery available through the public health system. Such legal developments paved the way for Argentina’s emergence as a regional leader in progress on raise gender issues in public life.

One of the most popular high schools in Buenos Aires, Mariano Acosta, has endorsed the use of gender neutral language, as does the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Buenos Aires. The city is also home to Mocha Celis, the world’s first high school specifically for transgender peoplewhich opened in 2012. Argentina’s Congress is debating a bill to mandate gender-neutral language in parliamentary debates. Also, major hospitals are creating separate wards for trans people.

Lizy Tagliani and Florencia Trinidad, two prominent television presenters in Argentina, are transgender. And in 2018, Argentina’s most popular soap opera, “100 días para enamorse” (“100 days to fall in love”), focused on the story of a transitioning transgender teenager.

Although statistics on the overall population are not available, official figures show that, since 2012, approximately 16 minors in Argentina change sex every year. In 2013, a 6-year-old child called Lourdes became the first miner in the world whose sex change was formally accepted on her national identity card without her having to undergo surgery. But the gains for Argentina’s trans community extend beyond those who have changed their gender.

Only Belgium, Ireland, Malta, Norway and Portugal have trans identity laws as extensive as Argentina’s. Since 2012, Bolivia, Uruguay and Venezuela have allowed people to change gender after physical and psychological evaluations. In Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, adults now have the right to a gender reassignment. In 2018, Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court ruled that a transgender person has the right to change their official name and gender without the need for surgery or professional evaluation, simply by self-declaring their identity. psychosocial..

In one of the largest public hospitals in Buenos Aires, eight women sit in a circle. With the sound of birds in the background heralding the arrival of summer, each woman reads a short essay aloud. Masilla begins by emphasizing the key words while looking around the circle, as if gauging the reactions of others. When she is finished, the other women applaud and congratulate her. She then returns to the hospital room she shares with a dozen patients, all trans women.

Before the 2012 law was passed, hospitalized trans women were forced to share rooms with men. Many say they were mistreated and discriminated against by other patients and by medical professionals who called them by their birth name rather than the name they had chosen. In a 2014 study40% of trans Argentines surveyed said they avoided seeking treatment for fear of abuse.

Just before the passage of the crucial 2012 law, Jesica Gómez and other trans women who had faced similar problems in hospitals decided to change things. They visited trans patients, bathed them, and brought them clothes, makeup, and magazines. They have also trained doctors and nurses on how to treat trans patients.

Masilla dropped out of high school because she was abused and bullied by her classmates and teachers. But today, she sees changes happening all around her. “I see more trans women working in fields that were previously unthinkable – assistants, teachers, nurses,” Masilla says. “This world looks more and more like the one I always imagined [it] should be.” She feels there is less discrimination on the streets today.

Masilla says the next battle is to tackle entrenched biases in the job market. “Today, a trans woman doesn’t need to be a sex worker or a stylist. Today we can be anything,” she tells me as she folds up her handwritten essay. “We just need a chance.”

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