Abbreviation | IPSA |
---|---|
Formation | 1985 |
Type | NGO |
Purpose | Intersex peer and family support |
Region served | Australia |
President | Bonnie Hart |
Website | isupport.org.au |
Intersex Peer Support Australia (IPSA), also known as the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome Support Group Australia, is possibly the oldest known intersex organization, established in 1985. [1] It provides peer and family support, information and advocacy. The group is run by volunteers, for people with intersex variations such as androgen insensitivity syndrome. [2] [1] It changed name from the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome Support Group Australia (AISSGA) to Intersex Peer Support Australia in 2019. [3]
IPSA may be the oldest intersex organization, established in 1985, [1] prior to the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome Support Group (UK), established in 1988, [4] and the Intersex Society of North America (ISNA) in 1993. [5]
IPSA was founded by Dr Garry Warne, then the Director of Paediatric Endocrinology at the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne. [1] It is now run by a board of people with intersex variations, and parents. Notable members include Bonnie Hart, Phoebe Hart and Tony Briffa. Many members of the group took part in Phoebe Hart's 2010 autobiographical road movie, Orchids, My Intersex Adventure .
The organisation changed name in 2019. [6]
The core activity of the Group is to provide peer and family support, information and advocacy. [2] It produces regular newsletters, known as dAISy, an annual conference, and regular meetings in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney. [2]
The group has advocated on intersex human rights issues since at least the turn of the century, with submissions on discrimination and prenatal terminations dating back to 2003. [1] Tony Briffa was published in Nature in April 2004, calling for an end to irreversible sex assignment treatments in infancy. [7] The group has also made a similar submission to a 2013 Australian Senate inquiry on involuntary or coerced sterilisation of people with disabilities. [8] [9] [10]
In March 2017, representatives of IPSA participated in an Australian and Aotearoa/New Zealand consensus "Darlington Statement" by intersex community organizations and others. [11] The statement calls for legal reform, including the criminalization of deferrable intersex medical interventions on children, an end to legal classification of sex, and improved access to peer support. [11] [12] [13] [14] [15]
Andie Hider, then president of IPSA, took part in the ABC television program Four Corners in July 2005. [16] Current president Bonnie Hart appeared on Australian television with Intersex Human Rights Australia president Morgan Carpenter in March 2015, [17] and in a short video for the National LGBTI Health Alliance QLife project, later that year. [18]
IPSA is a member of LGBTIQ+ Health Australia.
Disorders of sex development (DSDs), also known as differences in sex development, diverse sex development and variations in sex characteristics (VSC), are congenital conditions affecting the reproductive system, in which development of chromosomal, gonadal, or anatomical sex is atypical.
Intersex people are individuals born with any of several sex characteristics including chromosome patterns, gonads, or genitals that, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies".
The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) is one of Australia's leading jurisdictions with respect to the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex (LGBTQI) people. The ACT has made a number of reforms to territory law designed to prevent discrimination of LGBT people; it was the only state or territory jurisdiction in Australia to pass a law for same-sex marriage, which was later overturned by the High Court of Australia. The Australian Capital Territory, Victoria and Queensland are the only jurisdictions within Australia to legally ban conversion therapy on children. The ACT's laws also apply to the smaller Jervis Bay Territory.
Tony Briffa is a Maltese-Australian politician who is notable for being the world's first known intersex mayor and public officeholder.
Intersex Human Rights Australia (IHRA) is a voluntary organisation for intersex people that promotes the human rights and bodily autonomy of intersex people in Australia, and provides education and information services. Established in 2009 and incorporated as a charitable company in 2010, it was formerly known as Organisation Intersex International Australia, or OII Australia. It is recognised as a Public Benevolent Institution.
Intersex civil society organizations have existed since at least the mid-1980s. They include peer support groups and advocacy organizations active on health and medical issues, human rights, legal recognition, and peer and family support. Some groups, including the earliest, were open to people with specific intersex traits, while others are open to people with many different kinds of intersex traits.
The International Intersex Forum is an annual event organised, then later supported, by the ILGA and ILGA-Europe that and organisations from multiple regions of the world, and it is believed to be the first and only such intersex event.
Phoebe Hart is an Australian filmmaker, lecturer and intersex rights activist, born with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome. Hart lectures in film, television and digital media at the Queensland University of Technology, and is principal of Hartflicker, a video and film production company. She is known particularly for her autobiographical road trip movie, Orchids, My Intersex Adventure.
Intersex Aotearoa is a nonprofit organisation based in New Zealand, and is a national advocacy and peer support organisation for intersex people. The organisation was founded in 1996 by Mani Mitchell, and has previously been known as the Intersex Trust Aotearoa New Zealand and Intersex Awareness New Zealand.
Intersex, in humans and other animals, describes variations in sex characteristics including chromosomes, gonads, sex hormones, or genitals that, according to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies".
Intersex people are born with sex characteristics, such as chromosomes, gonads, or genitals, that, according to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies."
The Quigley scale is a descriptive, visual system of phenotypic grading that defines seven classes between "fully masculinized" and "fully feminized" genitalia. It was proposed by pediatric endocrinologist Charmian A. Quigley et al. in 1995. It is similar in function to the Prader scale and is used to describe genitalia in cases of androgen insensitivity syndrome, including complete androgen insensitivity syndrome, partial androgen insensitivity syndrome and mild androgen insensitivity syndrome.
Bonnie Hart is an Australian artist, film maker, and intersex human rights activist, born with androgen insensitivity syndrome and president of Intersex Peer Support Australia. Hart performs nationally and internationally, and speaks on intersex issues nationally and internationally. In 2016, Australia's Gay News Network included her in their "25 LGBTI people to watch in 2017".
Intersex people are born with sex characteristics that "do not fit the typical definitions for male or female bodies". They are substantially more likely to identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) than the non-intersex population, with an estimated 52% identifying as non-heterosexual and 8.5% to 20% experiencing gender dysphoria. Although many intersex people are heterosexual and cisgender, this overlap and "shared experiences of harm arising from dominant societal sex and gender norms" has led to intersex people often being included under the LGBT umbrella, with the acronym sometimes expanded to LGBTI. Some intersex activists and organisations have criticised this inclusion as distracting from intersex-specific issues such as involuntary medical interventions.
The following is a timeline of intersex history.
Intersex rights in New Zealand are protections and rights afforded to intersex people. Protection from discrimination is implied by the Human Rights Act and the Bill of Rights Act, but remains untested. The New Zealand Human Rights Commission states that there has seemingly been a "lack of political will to address issues involved in current practices of genital normalisation on intersex children".
Intersex rights in Australia are protections and rights afforded to intersex people through statutes, regulations, and international human rights treaties, including through the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) which makes it unlawful to discriminate against a person based upon that person's intersex status in contexts such as work, education, provision of services, and accommodation.
The Malta declaration is the statement of the Third International Intersex Forum, which took place in Valletta, Malta, in 2013. The event was supported by the ILGA and ILGA-Europe and brought together 34 people representing 30 organisations from multiple regions of the world.
Intersex people in the United Kingdom face significant gaps in legal protections, particularly in protection from non-consensual medical interventions, and protection from discrimination. Actions by intersex civil society organisations aim to eliminate unnecessary medical interventions and harmful practices, promote social acceptance, and equality in line with Council of Europe and United Nations demands. Intersex civil society organisations campaign for greater social acceptance, understanding of issues of bodily autonomy, and recognition of the human rights of intersex people.
Intersex people are born with sex characteristics, such as chromosomes, gonads, hormones, or genitals that, according to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit the typical definitions for male or female bodies". Such variations may involve genital ambiguity, and combinations of chromosomal genotype and sexual phenotype other than XY-male and XX-female.