Spain sparks feminist backlash with plan to allow transgender people to easily select official gender

A person wearing a protective face mask waves a transgender pride flag (file photo)

Credit: REUTERS/Juan Medina/File Photo

A planned Spanish reform on rights for transgender people has been rebuked by feminists, who claim that easily allowing people to easily change their gender on legal documents is an affront to women’s rights.

The draft reform was leaked to Spanish media, and states that any person aged 16 or over has the “right to the recognition of their gender identity”, with the change in the civil registry “only requiring an express declaration” from the individual.

Under-16s will also be able to request that their name and gender is changed on paperwork with parental consent or through a legal representative if there is no family consent.

Currently, adults who wish to change their ID from the gender they were assigned at birth need to show medical evidence of gender dysphoria and have undergone hormone treatment for at least two years.

The reform is championed by Irene Montero, the equality minister and a member of the hard-Left Podemos party, which is a government coalition partner. However, sources from the senior party in Spain’s government, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist party, have poured cold water on the plan, and claim the draft is “not a government text”.

“The so-called right to sexual self-determination lacks legal rationality", the Socialist party said in a policy document.

Feminist organisations have questioned the implications of allowing men to legally self-identify as women without any official verification of gender dysphoria.

Several Spanish feminist organisations have formed the Alliance Against the Erasure of Women in protest against the plan, saying they fear that the elimination of sex as a biological category “renders invisible the main element on which structural inequality against women is based” and makes social policies aimed at women potentially useless.

In an increasingly bitter debate over transgender rights, several well-known feminists have received abuse on social media for questioning the freedom to legally change gender.

Writer and media personality Lucía Etxeberria said she had made a police complaint about “the thousands of threats” she had received after highlighting claims of a high rate of suicide among young people who undergo gender reassignment.

The draft law also defends the right of transgender people to receive reproductive treatment, and compete in sporting events according to the gender they identify as.