Selbstbestimmungsgesetz
April 13, 2024 9:04 AM Subscribe
Landmark Vote for Trans Rights Law (Human Rights Watch) – "Germany’s parliament on April 12, 2024, passed a landmark law that allows transgender and non-binary people to modify their legal documents to reflect their gender identity through an administrative procedure based on self-identification …"
Grüne (Greens), SPD and most of FDP and die Linke (the Left) voted for the new law; CDU/CSU, AfD and BSW voted against. The new law will take effect November 2024.
full text (German)
Grüne (Greens), SPD and most of FDP and die Linke (the Left) voted for the new law; CDU/CSU, AfD and BSW voted against. The new law will take effect November 2024.
full text (German)
This portion of an article about the law from Deutsche Welle stood out to me:
Gabriel Nox-Koenig, from the German transgender advocacy association Trans*, told DW that the new law meant trans people were far less likely to suffer instances of everyday discrimination.
"You have to imagine not to be able to pay with your [debit] card in a store, not to be able to go to your doctor with your insurance without being accused of fraud or, depending on the situation, having the police called on you," said Nox-Koenig. "This is something that happens to trans people very regularly in Germany now."
"With the new law, people can change their name and gender marker much more easily and these day-to-day discrimination situations will change."
posted by mdonley at 10:28 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
Gabriel Nox-Koenig, from the German transgender advocacy association Trans*, told DW that the new law meant trans people were far less likely to suffer instances of everyday discrimination.
"You have to imagine not to be able to pay with your [debit] card in a store, not to be able to go to your doctor with your insurance without being accused of fraud or, depending on the situation, having the police called on you," said Nox-Koenig. "This is something that happens to trans people very regularly in Germany now."
"With the new law, people can change their name and gender marker much more easily and these day-to-day discrimination situations will change."
posted by mdonley at 10:28 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
This portion of an article about the law from Deutsche Welle stood out to me:
Until I changed my name (which was late in the game for someone in the US because of MN law at the time, but still much easier than Germany), I paid cash everywhere except the grocery store, as it was the one place you definitely didn't hand your card to a person (I didn't have a car). It's only in this past year that I've paid for a haircut by card, which is partly about barbers sometimes not taking cards but substantially holdover from the extremely gendered nature of haircuts. I have a passport card for the sole reason that it got a changed gender marker in my wallet with minimal fuss. It's awful, but there's a huge level of comfort that comes from knowing you actually can pull out your ID if someone is hassling you. (Though I once had a very weird interaction with a bar that definitely thought my US passport card was fake but wouldn't come out and say it.)
posted by hoyland at 2:24 PM on April 13 [5 favorites]
Until I changed my name (which was late in the game for someone in the US because of MN law at the time, but still much easier than Germany), I paid cash everywhere except the grocery store, as it was the one place you definitely didn't hand your card to a person (I didn't have a car). It's only in this past year that I've paid for a haircut by card, which is partly about barbers sometimes not taking cards but substantially holdover from the extremely gendered nature of haircuts. I have a passport card for the sole reason that it got a changed gender marker in my wallet with minimal fuss. It's awful, but there's a huge level of comfort that comes from knowing you actually can pull out your ID if someone is hassling you. (Though I once had a very weird interaction with a bar that definitely thought my US passport card was fake but wouldn't come out and say it.)
posted by hoyland at 2:24 PM on April 13 [5 favorites]
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posted by Bella Donna at 9:23 AM on April 13 [4 favorites]