Intersex to defy Census
An intersex advocate is urging the intersex community to include their intersex status when filling in the Census on August 9.
In protest against the Census’ limited option of nominating as only male and female, Organisation Intersex International (OII) Australia president Gina Wilson said intersex people should record their identity in the ‘religion’ section — which allows an optional response — to point to the intersex community’s lack of inclusion.
“It’s kind of a backdoor way of tickling them along a little bit, but there are people out there who want this to be taken seriously and want it to be counted so we can even get a slight indication of the numbers,” she told the Star Observer.
Wilson said the call was inspired by a global movement in English-speaking countries for citizens to record Jedi Knight as their religion in national censuses.Wilson said there is a serious side to intersex people being excluded from the Census.
“It means, again, we’re operating in a data-free zone. Intersex is pretty much in a data-free zone anyway. There’s almost no long-term research, no follow-ups on any of the medical treatments they give us,” she said.
Other sections of the sex and gender diverse community have called on people to mark ‘no gender’ next to the question on sex. However, only marks on the Census form denoting male or female will be officially recorded.
When a person has not nominated a sex, they are allocated one using other information in the Census form and other data averages.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics was due to review the 2011 Census, including looking at references to sex, in 2007, but the review was shelved due to a lack of funding.
Transgender advocate Sally Goldner said using the religion section to record sex or gender diversity may be a wake-up call.
“If it sends a message that hey, we’re here and why aren’t these things being counted, then it’s a good thing,” she told the Star Observer.
Goldner said the issue of recording sex and gender can also be a difficult one.
“You can’t force someone to disclose, and many post-transition people don’t see themselves as transgender or sex and gender diverse any more, they see themselves as male or female anyway,” she said. “A third option of other, or a non-specified, would be a good start.”
“In the utopian world we could have two questions, your physical sex and then one about gender identity which could really wake up the whole general population but it would also give people a way of possibly recording things.”
Australian Coalition for Equality spokesman Corey Irlam said all eyes will be on the 2016 Census to include both sex and gender diverse people and to record sexuality.
“We saw $1.1 million go to LGBTI mental health this week as a direct result of a 2007 mental health survey that included sexual orientation indicators in the questions so they could see the health disparities between GLBT people and the rest of the population,” Irlam said.
“Without that information it can be very challenging for governments to make informed decisions.”
The census has already passed, but I thought I’d still post a reply as someone might stumble upon it 5 years from now when the next census rolls around.
Having worked on processing the census for 2011, I can recommend that the best course of action is to WRITE “transgendered”, “intersex” etc next to the sex field. Yes, either a male or female will be assigned to you, BUT there are investigations that count the number of people who write one of the above comments next to the sex box and it is the only way you will be recognised/counted as such. Writing Intersex in the religion field will have absolutely zero impact, as anything that is not a recognised religion is simply coded to “not stated”.
Hopefully in a census some time in the not too distant future we will see options for Intersex and LGBT community for various questions on the form, and the above advice will become redundant!
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Write intersex or indeterminate next to the sex question and they will in this census what they have done in the previous one, ignore what you have written and randomly allocate you to male or female.
Isn’t that what the doctors do when they decide to cut up the genitals of intersex newborns in a vain attempt to make them into whatever sex is desired?
Write intersex into the religion text box and they are required to count us.
Do what that person suggested and you have thrown away the chance to let them know we exist and in far greater numbers than is commonly believed.
I just spoke to ABS and they said;
“Just write intersex or indeterminate next to the sex question”
That would be a logical answer and will allow people to state their religion.
I have a feeling that there are more gender questions we have no knowledge of in this census. There may be some sexuality and same sex relationship questions.
I think those who are Intersexed, Transgendered or of indeterminate gender should tick both boxes. I am awaiting a reply from the the Census Department as to why they exclude us by making the male/female fields exclusive. They should accept the response of both ticked.
My recommendation is to tick both boxes. Will it make your census form invalid, maybe, will they ignore us, maybe. Should we lie on our Census form by ticking only one box when we feel we fit into both catagories? NO…….
Robyn
With hindsight, I add one further point/flipside to my comments as recorded in the article…
Faith/spirituality can be just as much an important facet of a person’s life as their sex/gender identity. That trans/SGD persons may be unable to disclose their faith as Christian, Wiccan or anything else on the census because of the idea of stating transgender or other is another form of discrimination in that we are being treated differently on the basis of an attribute.
Yet another reason for comprehensive Federal Equal Opportunity Law.
I apologise, particularly to SGD/Trans people of faith, for not mentioning in this in my original comments to Andie Noonan.