October 26 is Intersex Awareness Day. Morgan Carpenter of OII Australia wrote this article in the Star Observer newspaper: People with intersex variations are born with atypical physical sex characteristics. Intersex people face a range of health and human rights issues, and deep-seated stigma, caught between two contrasting visions of who and how we should…
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Asia-Pacific
Employers’ guide to intersex inclusion
OII Australia is proud and delighted to partner with Pride in Diversity to publish the Employers’ guide to intersex inclusion. Written by Morgan Carpenter and Dawn Hough, the guide is kindly sponsored by IBM. Download the Employers’ guide to intersex inclusion (PDF). A world-first, the guide presents information about intersex for employers, including: An introduction…
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OII Australia comments on the High Court case NSW Registrar v Norrie
OII Australia has commented on the Australian High court Case New South Wales Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages v Norrie, noting that Australian regulations and legislation since 2003 have had a similar trajectory in the recognition of a third classification of sex or gender: The High Court has ruled that NSW laws do permit…
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OII Australia: Morgan Carpenter on the Australian Senate Committee Report on normalizing surgery
Morgan Carpenter’s opinion piece, “We Must Put An End to Normalizing Surgery,” explores positive developments in Australia: The clitoris is the only part of any human body that’s purely designed for pleasure. But is too much of a good thing a bad thing? Research on what constitutes “normal” genitalia, for both men and women, is…
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OII Australia testifies to Senate Inquiry on involuntary or coerced sterilisation
Australian intersex organisations OII Australia and AISSGA, together with the National LGBTI Health Alliance, participated in the country’s federal Senate Inquiry on involuntary or coerced sterilisation. The inquiry primarily focuses on people with disability, but the terms of reference specifically include the sterilisation and sexual health of intersex people as well. The oral hearing on…
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Ground-breaking Swiss report on infant surgery, a review
Earlier this month, the Swiss National Advisory Commission on Biomedical Ethics published an opinion document, On the management of differences of sex development, Ethical issues relating to “intersexuality”. Copies are available via the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health in English, French, German and Italian. This is a brief review of the key points in…
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Equality, and an end to bigotry
Our media release for Intersex Awareness Day has resulted in coverage in some LGBTI media both in Australia and overseas, for which we’re grateful. Gina Wilson, ILGA-Europe, and a media release by Transgender and Intersex Africa are quoted in this report by Gay Star News. TIA comment: ‘TIA believes that this day is a great…
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The Times of India: “Male, female and the third option”
Payoshni Mitra writes in The Times of India on the case of athlete Pinki Pramanik, arrested for rape in a case where she is alleged to have promised to marry a women “but later denied” – see “Gold medallist Pinki Pramanik accused of being male, held for ‘rape’”. Mitra, an independent researcher on gender and…
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