Source: theaustralian.com.au
A law put up by Victoria’s Andrews government could expose women offering intimate services such as pubic waxing or underwear fitting to discrimination complaints if they reject trans women customers who still have penises, veteran human rights lawyer Moira Rayner has warned.
The new law would allow self-declared trans women, who possess a penis and have not undergone any sex-reassignment treatment, to change the sex that appears on their birth certificate, giving them access as women to equal opportunity protection.
Ms Rayner, a former state and federal human rights commissioner, said that, if enacted, the legislation could allow a Down Under version of Canada’s Jessica Yaniv case, in which a trans woman has lodged anti-discrimination complaints against 16 beauticians who did not want to handle her penis and testicles in order to grant her wish for a brazilian wax.
Ms Rayner said a female sole trader could come under pressure from a Yaniv-style action.
The Labor government said the current state law demanding surgery before any change to a birth certificate “sends a painful and false message that there is something wrong with being trans or gender diverse that needs to be ‘fixed’ ”.
Victorian Attorney-General Jill Hennessy said: “Everyone deserves to live their life as they choose, and that includes having a birth certificate that reflects their true identity.”
Critics of the new bill complain of a lack of robust debate, and Ms Rayner said Ms Hennessy “should be asked to make sure she is given proper advice” on its possible unintended effects.
The bill returns to parliament next month.
University of Melbourne philosopher Holly Lawford-Smith agreed a Yaniv-style anti-discrimination complaint would be possible in Victoria — “exclusion from being hired to fit clothing to women in a shop, or from admission to a girls’ school, or to a women’s room in a dormitory, or hospital ward … you name it, if it’s women-only, there could be a case”.
She urged outright rejection of the bill, which makes a statutory declaration sufficient proof of official sex status, and allows birth sex to be changed every 12 months.
“Sex should not be a matter of belief,” Dr Lawford-Smith said. “If progressives want to disincentivise sex-reassignment surgery, they should protect gender expression, or gender identity, or trans status, separately — rather than trying to shoehorn it into sex.”