By Paula Gerber
Many individuals’s heads are spinning on the speedy charge that Donald Trump has been signing government orders since changing into president – 70 within the 30 days since he took workplace. That is in stark contrast to Joe Biden, who averaged 41 government orders a 12 months, and Barack Obama, who averaged 35 a 12 months.
A number of of Trump’s government orders, immediately or not directly, goal the trans neighborhood.
Take, for instance, Executive Order 14168, signed on 20 January, 2025, the primary day of Trump’s second time period. With the grandiose title of “Defending Ladies from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Organic Reality to the Federal Authorities”, it states that:
“Throughout the nation, ideologues who deny the organic actuality of intercourse have more and more used authorized and different socially coercive means to allow males to self-identify as ladies … It’s the coverage of the USA to recognise two sexes, female and male. These sexes will not be changeable, and are grounded in basic and incontrovertible actuality.”
And Executive Order 14187, entitled “Defending Kids From Chemical and Surgical Mutilation”, which asserts that:
“Throughout the nation as we speak, medical professionals are maiming and sterilising a rising variety of impressionable kids below the unconventional and false declare that adults can change a toddler’s intercourse by way of a collection of irreversible medical interventions. … Accordingly, it’s the coverage of the USA that it’s going to not fund, sponsor, promote, help, or help the so-called ‘transition’ of a kid from one intercourse to a different, and it’ll rigorously implement all legal guidelines that prohibit or restrict these damaging and life-altering procedures.”
Govt Order 14187 has been efficiently challenged in a federal district court docket with a decide issuing a temporary restraining order that prohibits federal companies from conditioning or withholding federal funding based mostly on the truth that a healthcare entity or well being skilled gives gender-affirming medical care.
One other Trump initiative is the removal of the T from the LGBTIQ+ acronym on authorities web sites, together with, for instance, the nationwide parks’ Stonewall Monument web site and the State Division’s web site offering info for folks contemplating adoption, which has been modified from “Assets for LGBTQI+ Potential Adoptive Mother and father” to “LGB Prospective Adoptive Parents”.
These adjustments not solely deny the existence of trans folks, but in addition intersex people, being these born with intercourse traits that don’t match typical definitions for male or feminine our bodies, together with sexual anatomy, reproductive organs, hormonal patterns, and/or chromosome patterns.
The Queensland authorities seems to be taking a leaf out of Trump’s playbook, issuing a directive final month that bans using puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormones for all new sufferers below the age of 18.
These actions within the US and Queensland are inflicting vital misery to the trans neighborhood in Australia, who worry they’re about to turn out to be the goal of comparable makes an attempt to erase their existence.
It’s subsequently well timed to ask: “Is Australia going to go down the identical path?”
There are three latest developments that counsel the reply to this query is a tentative no.
The primary is that federal Minister for Well being Mark Butler on 25 January announced a NHMRC review into gender-affirming take care of trans and gender-diverse kids, with a view to creating nationwide pointers for constant and applicable scientific follow for younger Australians.
The rules can be developed by specialists and be based mostly on the proof, slightly than leaving it to politicians to make choices about who can entry healthcare, and the character of that care.
The second indicator that the rights of the trans neighborhood in Australia can be protected is the Federal Court docket determination in Tickle v Giggle.
In that case, determined final 12 months, Justice Bromwich awarded damages to Roxanne Tickle, a trans girl, to compensate her for the discrimination she was subjected to when she was excluded from the Giggle for Women app, which was promoted as being for ladies solely.
The court held that the intercourse that an individual is presumed to be, and which is assigned to them at start, is changeable. In different phrases, Trump’s assertion in Govt Order 14168, that intercourse is immutable, has already been thought-about and rejected by the Australian Federal Court docket.
The third growth that implies Australia is unlikely to repeat the anti-trans strikes we’re seeing within the US is the choice of the Australian Administrative Evaluate Tribunal within the case of Lesbian Action Group v Australian Human Rights Commission, handed down on 20 January – coincidently, the day Trump was inaugurated as president.
The Lesbian Motion Group (LAG) utilized to the tribunal for a evaluation of the Australian Human Rights Fee’s determination to not grant LAG an exemption below the Intercourse Discrimination Act that may permit it to carry occasions that had been open solely to “lesbians born feminine” – that’s, occasions that excluded trans ladies.
The tribunal upheld the choice of the Australian Human Rights Fee to not present LAG with a licence to discriminate on the idea of gender id, noting it might be tantamount to “endorsing overt acts of discrimination” that was opposite to the intention of the Intercourse Discrimination Act.
Whereas these two choices upheld the rights of trans and gender-diverse people to not be discriminated towards on the idea of their gender id, the unsuccessful events in each instances – Giggle for Women and LAG – have filed appeals.
This implies there stays a level of uncertainty as to the ultimate outcomes. However for now, no less than, the legislation is obvious – intercourse is changeable, and it’s illegal to discriminate towards trans folks on the idea of their gender.
Professor Paula Gerber is a Professor within the Monash College School of Legislation and an Educational Member of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Legislation.
This text was initially printed in Monash Lens. You may learn the unique article here.
