Abbreviation | OII |
---|---|
Formation | 2003 |
Type | NGO |
Purpose | Intersex human rights |
Region served | worldwide |
Website | oiiinternational.com |
The Organisation Intersex International (OII) is a global advocacy and support group for people with intersex traits. [1] According to Milton Diamond, it is the world's largest organization of intersex persons. [2] [3] [4] A decentralised network, OII was founded in 2003 by Curtis Hinkle and Sarita Vincent Guillot. [5] [6] [7] Upon Hinkle's retirement, American intersex activist Hida Viloria served as Chairperson/President elect from April 2011 through November 2017, when they resigned in order to focus on OII's American affiliate, OII-USA's transition into the independent American non-profit, the Intersex Campaign for Equality. [8]
OII was established to give voice to intersex people, including those speaking languages other than just English, for people born with bodies which have atypical sexual characteristics such as gonads, chromosomes, and/or genitals. OII acknowledges intersex as a normal human biological variation, and rejects the terminology of disorder, as in DSD/Disorders of Sex Development, utilized by some other intersex groups, as well as the sexualization of intersex (as in Intersexuality). They acknowledge intersex people's own distinct sexuality, as people who may identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, trans, straight, or other, in alliance with other members of the LGBTI population. [9] [10]
Sociologist Georgiann Davis describes OII and (the now defunct) Intersex Society of North America as "activist organisations". [11] The objective of OII is to achieve equality and human rights for intersex people, and end human rights violations against them, particularly the practice of non-consensual genital surgeries on infants and minors. [12] The ethos of the group is that people will hold different views as appropriate to the individual; this often entails treating as optional socially and medically constructed categories such as binary genders and sexual identifications; the identity human being understood as the fundamental identity.
Affiliates include organisations in Chinese, French and Spanish-speaking regions, Australia, and Europe. In November 2017, the former US affiliate, OII-USA, announced that it had left OII. They include:
In 2016, OII France was established as Collectif intersexes et allié.e.s by Loé Petit and Lysandre Nury. [13]
In 2017, InterAction Suisse was established in Switzerland by Audrey Aegerter and Deborah Abate. [14] [15]
Intersex Human Rights Australia, formerly known as OII Australia, [16] is a charitable company that has achieved notable contributions to national health and human rights policies, including intersex inclusion in anti-discrimination legislation, gender recognition, healthcare access, and contributions to a Senate of Australia report on the Involuntary or coerced sterilisation of intersex people in Australia. [17] [18] [19] [20] Notable members include co-chairs Morgan Carpenter [21] and Tony Briffa, and retired president Gina Wilson.
OII Russia also known as Intersex Russia (Russian:Интерсекс Россия), [22] based in Moscow, Russia was founded in 2017. Notable representatives include Irene Kuzemko, one of the very few open intersex persons in Russia and a co-founder of OII Russia.
Founded by Sally Gross, Intersex South Africa is an autonomous affiliated organisation. Advocacy work by Sally Gross led to the first recognition of intersex in law in any country in the world. [23] [24]
Oii-Chinese (國際陰陽人組織 — 中文版) aims to end "normalising" surgeries on intersex children, promote awareness of intersex issues, and improve government recognition of gender. Chiu says that surgical "normalisation" practices began in Taiwan in 1953. As part of this mission, founder Hiker Chiu started a "free hugs with intersex" campaign at Taipei's LGBT Pride Parade in 2010. The organisation also gives lectures and lobbies government. [25] [26] [27] [28] [29]
Founded in 2012 at the Second International Intersex Forum, OII Europe is the first European intersex NGO. [30] [31] Along with ILGA-Europe, the organisation contributed to Resolution 1952 (2013) of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, on Children's Right to Physical Integrity, adopted in October 2013. [32] [33] [34] Notable representatives include executive director Dan Christian Ghattas, co-chairs Kitty Anderson and Miriam van der Have, [35] [21] and Kristian Ranđelović.
OII-Francophonie was the original OII, based in Quebec and Paris, from where the French title Organisation Intersex International derived, and founded by Curtis Hinckle, Andre Lorek and Vincent Guillot (amongst others) between 2003 and 2004. OII-Canada was the first OII-affiliate to become legally incorporated in 2004. OII-Francophonie hosted a summer school in Paris in 2006, with representatives from Canada, France, Belgium and the UK including Vincent Guillot, Cynthia Krauss and Paula Machado. [36] [37] [38]
OII Germany, also known as Internationale Vereinigung Intergeschlechtlicher Menschen, participates in national and European action promoting human rights and bodily autonomy. [39] In September 2013, the Heinrich Böll Foundation published Human Rights between the Sexes , an analysis of the human rights of intersex people in 12 countries, written by Dan Christian Ghattas of OII-Germany. [40] [41] [42] [43]
OII-UK was established between 2004 and 2005 by Tina Livingstone, Michelle O'Brien and Sophia Siedlberg. OII-UK was active in representing the interests of intersex people at UK and European conferences, meetings and forums between 2005 and 2010. After a brief hiatus from 2010 due to members stepping down for health or migration reasons, [44] OII-UK was again active, led by Leslie Jaye.
The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) is a LGBTQ+ rights organization.
The Intersex Campaign for Equality (IC4E) is a non-governmental organization that advocates for the human rights of intersex people. It was formerly the US affiliate of Organisation Intersex International.
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.
Hida Viloria is a Latine American writer, author, producer, and human rights activist. Viloria is intersex, nonbinary, and genderfluid, using they/them pronouns. They are known for their writing, their intersex and non-binary human rights activism, and as one of the first people to come out in national and international media as a nonbinary intersex person. Viloria is Founding Director of the Intersex Campaign for Equality.
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.
OII Europe is the umbrella organisation of European human rights-based intersex organisations. It is a non-governmental organization (NGO) which is working for the protection and full implementation of intersex people's human rights in Europe.
Oii-Chinese is an intersex advocacy and support group and the Chinese-language affiliate of Organisation Intersex International. Oii-Chinese, founded by Hiker Chiu in 2008, is active in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other areas in East Asia.
Human Rights between the Sexes is an analysis of the human rights of intersex people in 12 countries. It was written by Dan Christian Ghattas of the Internationalen Vereinigung Intergeschlechtlicher Menschen and published in October 2013 by the Heinrich Böll Foundation. The countries studied were Australia, Belgium, France, Germany, New Zealand, Serbia, South Africa, Taiwan, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine and Uruguay.
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".
Dan Christian Ghattas is an intersex activist, university lecturer and author who co-founded OII Europe in 2012 and is now executive director. In 2013, he authored Human Rights between the Sexes, a first comparative international analysis of the human rights situation of intersex people.
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 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 rights in Malta since 2015 are among the most progressive in the world. Intersex children in Malta have world-first protections from non-consensual cosmetic medical interventions, following the passing into law of the Gender Identity, Gender Expression and Sex Characteristics Act in 2015. All Maltese intersex persons have protection from discrimination. Individuals who seek it can access simple administrative methods of changing sex assignment, with binary and non-binary forms of identification available.
Intersex people in France face significant gaps in protection from non-consensual medical interventions and protection from discrimination. The birth of Abel Barbin, a nineteenth-century intersex woman, is marked in Intersex Day of Remembrance. Barbin may have been the first intersex person to write a memoir, later published by Michel Foucault.
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.
Irene Kuzemko, also transcribed from Ukrainian and Russian as Irina Kuzemko, is a Russian-Ukrainian intersex woman and intersex human rights activist. She co-founded Intersex Russia in 2017, is a youth member of interACT, and an executive board member of OII Europe. She have started her human rights advocacy as a member of Association of the Russian Speaking Intersex.
InterAction is a Swiss organization for intersex people, parents, friends and allies to educate, provide peer support and address human rights issues.