Intersex rights in Mexico | |
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Protection of physical integrity and bodily autonomy | No |
Protection from discrimination | No |
Intersex topics |
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In Mexico there are no explicit rights reserved to intersex persons, no protections from non-consensual cosmetic medical interventions on intersex children and no legislative protection from discrimination. Intersex persons may have difficulties in obtaining necessary health care.
In April 2018, Latin American and Caribbean intersex activists published the San José de Costa Rica statement, defining local demands. [1]
The intersex civil society organization Brújula Intersexual calls for self-determination by intersex people. [2] It documents the health and human rights situation facing intersex people in Mexico, and in the Latin American region more broadly, including societal taboos, incomprehension, unnecessary medicalization, and discrimination. [3] [4] [5] Ricardo Baruch, writing in Animal Politico and citing Laura Inter, describes the situation on where intersex is constantly left out of discussion or policy because it is not very understood, even though it is a biological situation. [6]
In March 2017, a representative of Brújula Intersexual, testified before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on the human rights situation facing intersex people in Latin America. [7] [8]
In July 2018, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women issued concluding observations on harmful practices, recommending that Mexico "explicitly prohibiting the performance of unnecessary surgical or other medical treatment on intersex children" until they can consent. The committee also called for the provision of counselling and support to families. [9]
Brújula Intersexual has found that few doctors are trained and sensitized on intersex issues, leading to a tendency to recommend genital surgeries or hormonal treatments to create "normality" even where individuals have escaped such intersex medical interventions as children. [6] It has documented problems with medical examinations and treatments as a result of such practices. [4] Brújula Intersexual has also documented significant levels of poverty and disparities in access to health care based upon family wealth and income. [4] [5]
Laura Inter of Brújula Intersexual and Eva Alcántara of UAM Xochimilco have cited arguments that the most pressing problems facing intersex people are treatment to enforce a sex binary, and not the existence of the sex binary itself. [10] Laura Inter has imagined a society where sex or gender classifications are removed from birth certificates and other official identification documents, [4] and Brújula Intersexual has called for a right to legal documentation with no obligation to state any gender, in a submission to a review of the Yogyakarta Principles. [11]
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is an autonomous organ of the Organization of American States (OAS).
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".
Advocates for Informed Choice, dba interACT or interACT Advocates for Intersex Youth, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization advocating for the legal and human rights of children with intersex traits. The organization was founded in 2006 and formally incorporated on April 12, 2010.
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.
Mauro Cabral Grinspan, also known as Mauro Cabral, is an Argentinian intersex and trans activist, who serves as the Senior Officer for Gender Justice and Equity at the Global Philanthropy Project. Before that, he was the Executive Director of GATE. His work - as a signatory of the Yogyakarta Principles - focuses on the reform of medical protocols and law reform. In July 2015, Cabral received the inaugural Bob Hepple Equality Award.
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."
Intersex people are born with sex characteristics, such as chromosomes, gonads, or genitals that, according to the United Nations 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". "Because their bodies are seen as different, intersex children and adults are often stigmatized and subjected to multiple human rights violations".
The following is a timeline of intersex history.
Intersex people in the United States have some of the same rights as other people, but with significant gaps, particularly in protection from non-consensual cosmetic medical interventions and violence, and protection from discrimination. Actions by intersex civil society organizations aim to eliminate harmful practices, promote social acceptance, and equality. In recent years, intersex activists have also secured some forms of legal recognition. Since April 11, 2022 US Passports give the sex/gender options of male, female and X by self determination.
Intersex people in Germany have legal recognition of their rights to physical integrity and bodily autonomy, with exceptions, but no specific protections from discrimination on the basis of sex characteristics. In response to an inquiry by the German Ethics Council in 2012, the government passed legislation in 2013 designed to classify some intersex infants as a de facto third category. The legislation has been criticized by civil society and human rights organizations as misguided.
Since November 7, 2023, Chile bans unnecessary and non-consensual surgeries, procedures or medical treatments on intersex newborns, boys, girls and adolescents. Since March 15, 2022, Chile bans discrimination based on "sex characteristics" under Law 21,430 on Guarantees and Integral Protection of the Rights of Children and Adolescents. The country has the most advanced legal protection framework in Latin America.
In 1999, the Constitutional Court of Colombia became the first court to consider the human rights implications of medical interventions to alter the sex characteristics of intersex children. The Court restricted the age at which intersex children could be the subjects of surgical interventions.
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.
Brújula Intersexual is a voluntary organisation for intersex people that promotes the human rights and bodily autonomy of intersex people in Mexico, and across Latin America. Founded in 2013, Brújula Intersexual provides peer support, education and information.
Intersex people in Argentina have no recognition of their rights to physical integrity and bodily autonomy, and no specific protections from discrimination on the basis of sex characteristics. Cases also exist of children being denied access to birth certificates without their parents consenting to medical interventions. The National Institute Against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism and civil society organizations such as Justicia Intersex have called for the prohibition of unnecessary medical interventions and access to redress.
Intersex people in Switzerland have no recognition of rights to physical integrity and bodily autonomy, and no specific protections from discrimination on the basis of sex characteristics. In 2012, the Swiss National Advisory Commission on Biomedical Ethics published a report on the medical management of differences of sex development or intersex variations.
Citizens of Spain who are intersex face problems that the wider society does not encounter. Laws that provide protection against discrimination or genital mutilation for intersex people exist only in some autonomous communities rather than on a national level. The 3/2007 law is the current law in Spain which relates to legal gender change including the rights of intersex people, although a new law is about to be passed in the near future.