Discrimination towards non-binary gender persons

Discrimination towards gender variant persons who fall outside of the gender binary is prejudice towards individuals whose gender identity does not fit the gender binary as strictly male or female. It is a type of transphobia[1] and sexism.[2][3] It affects third gender, genderqueer, and other non-binary identified people. Cisgender and binary transgender people can both display prejudice against non-binary people, and there is discrimination of this sort in the transgender community much like there is transphobia in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) communities.[4][5]

In the binary sex/gender system, genderqueerness is unintelligible and abjected.[6] A 2008 study in the National Transgender Discrimination Survey showed that genderqueer and other non-binary individuals were more likely to suffer physical assaults (32% vs. 25%), experience police brutality and harassment (31% vs. 21%), and opt out of medical treatment due to discrimination (36% vs. 27%) compared to transgender individuals who identified within the gender binary (i.e., trans men and trans women). This study also found that they were more likely to be people of color (30% vs. 23%) and younger (under 45) than binary transgender people (89% vs. 68%).[7] In another study conducted by the National LGBTQ Task Force, responders who identified as neither male nor female were less likely to be white and more likely to be multi racial, Black, or Asian, but less likely to be Latino/a compared to those who identified as male or female. 20% of non-binary individuals lived in the lowest household income category.[8]

Legal discrimination

United States

Despite being more likely to receive higher levels of education when compared to the general public, 90% of non-binary individuals face discrimination, such as verbal harassment, in the workplace. 19% of genderqueer individuals report job loss as a result of their identities.[9] Because identifying as non binary is an emergent and lesser-known identity, anti-discrimination laws that outline prohibition of discrimination for non binary individuals specifically does not exist. However, Title VII and the current proposed version of the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act use such terms as "gender identity" and "gender expression," categories under which non binary individuals fall due to the fact that their gender expression cannot be defined as male or female.[9]

Twelve states currently have legislation which bars discrimination based on gender identity.[10] Despite these efforts, non-binary individuals have higher rates of physical and sexual assault and police harassment than those who identify as men or women, likely due to their gender expression or presentation.[11]

There is currently no way for non binary individuals to acquire a federal license with an accurate gender identity, as the only options are currently male or female. Therefore, non binary individuals are inaccurately regarded as their sex, and not their gender, in legal matters.[9] The origin of these legal restrictions is the classification of gender identity into only two distinct genders, male and female, is known as the gender binary; however there are those who believe in the social construction of gender difference, which would refute the need for such legal restrictions.

Health discrimination

United states

14% reported discrimination in medical care, but were "more likely to avoid care altogether when sick or injured because of the fear of discrimination."[8]

United Kingdom

In a similar survey conducted by UK Trans Info, the vast majority of non-binary responders reported "fear of treatment being denied" as the main deterrent for not seeking healthcare. Many reported anxiety over having to deny their identities or "pretend to be someone [they are] not" in order to receive treatment. As a result, 20% reported self-medicating as an alternative to seeking healthcare.[12]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Norton, Jody (1997). ""Brain Says You're a Girl, But I Think You're a Sissy Boy": Cultural Origins of Transphobia". International Journal of Sexuality and Gender Studies. 2, Number 2 (2): 139–164. doi:10.1023/A:1026320611878.
  2. ↑ Roger J.R. Levesque (5 September 2011). Encyclopedia of Adolescence. Springer. p. 2641. ISBN 978-1-4419-1694-5. Retrieved 20 September 2012.
  3. ↑ Frederick T.L. Leong; Wade E. Pickren; Mark M. Leach; Anthony J. Marsella (1 November 2011). Internationalizing the Psychology Curriculum in the United States. Springer. p. 163. ISBN 978-1-4614-0072-1. Retrieved 20 September 2012.
  4. ↑ When Being Trans is Not Trans Enough - Kelsie Brynn Jones
  5. ↑ Preves, Sharon Elaine (July 2000). "Negotiating the Constraints of Gender Binarism: Intersexuals' Challenge to Gender Categorization". Current Sociology 48 (3): 27–50. doi:10.1177/0011392100048003004.
  6. ↑ Hale, J.C. (1998) "...[O]ur embodiments and our subjectivities are abjected from social ontology: we cannot fit ourselves into extant categories without denying, eliding, erasing, or otherwise abjecting personally significant aspects of ourselves ... When we choose to live with and in our dislocatedness, fractured from social ontology, we choose to forgo intelligibility: lost in language and in social life, we become virtually unintelligible, even to ourselves..." from Consuming the Living, Dis(Re)Membering the Dead in the Butch/FtM Borderlands in the Gay and Lesbian Quarterly 4:311, 336 (1998). Retrieved on 2007-04-07.
  7. ↑ Jack Harrison, Jaime Grant, Jody L. Herman (2011–2012). "A Gender Not Listed Here: Genderqueers, Gender Rebels, and Otherwise in the National Transgender Discrimination Survey" (PDF). LGBTQ Policy Journal (Harvard Kennedy School) 2: 22.
  8. 1 2 "A Gender Not Listed Here: Genderqueers, Gender Rebels, and OtherWise in the National Transgender Discrimination Survey - The Task Force". The Task Force. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
  9. 1 2 3 "Non-Binary Identities & the Law | Transgender Law Center". transgenderlawcenter.org. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
  10. ↑ "State Laws That Prohibit Discrimination Against Transgender People - National Center for Lesbian Rights". www.nclrights.org. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
  11. ↑ "10 Myths About Non-Binary People It's Time to Unlearn". Everyday Feminism. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
  12. ↑ "Experiences of non-binary people accessing healthcare". UK Trans Info. Retrieved 2015-10-21.


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