Countries that allow gender self-identification, and the law in India

Syllabus Topic

Sociology: paper i: stratification and mobility: Gender

G.S paper : II: Governance: welfare scheme for vulnerable sections in society

NEWS IN SHORT

• Self-identification, or ‘self-id’, is the concept that a person should be allowed to legally identify with the gender of their choice by simply declaring so, and without facing any medical tests.
• The Spanish government on Tuesday approved the first draft of a bill that would allow anyone over the age of 14 to legally change gender without a medical diagnosis or hormone therapy.

What is gender self-identification?

• Self-identification, or ‘self-id’, is the concept that a person should be allowed to legally identify with the gender of their choice by simply declaring so, and without facing any medical tests. This has been a long held demand of trans-right groups around the world, including in India, as prejudice against trans people remains rampant.

What is the process for declaring one’s desired sex in India?

• In India, the rights of transgender persons are governed by the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019 and the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Rules, 2020.
• Under the Rules, an application to declare gender is to be made to the District Magistrate. Parents can also make an application on behalf of their child.

SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

SYLLABUS: Stratification & mobility: Gender

• Feminist forums that believe that sex is not something which can be chosen have insisted that allowing self-identification could put at risk all laws that specifically prevent discrimination against women, and have instead asked lawmakers to look at concerns that they say are more pressing, such as the gender pay gap.

Gender as a Social Construction

• If sex is a biological concept, then gender is a social concept. It refers to the social and cultural differences a society assigns to people based on their (biological) sex.
• A related concept, gender roles, refers to a society’s expectations of people’s behavior and attitudes based on whether they are females or males.
• How we think and behave as females and males is not etched in stone by our biology but rather is a result of how society expects us to think and behave based on what sex we are. As we grow up, we learn these expectations as we develop our gender identity, or our beliefs about ourselves as females or males.
• These expectations are called femininity and masculinity. Femininity refers to the cultural expectations we have of girls and women, while masculinity refers to the expectations we have of boys and men.
• The phrase “boys will be boys” is often used to justify behavior such as pushing, shoving, or other forms of aggression from young boys.
• The phrase implies that such behavior is unchangeable and something that is part of a boy’s nature.
• Aggressive behavior, when it does not inflict significant harm, is often accepted from boys and men because it is congruent with the cultural script for masculinity.
• Scripts are generally learned through a process known as socialization, which teaches people to behave according to social norms.
• Gender socialization occurs through four major agents of socialization: family, education, peer groups, and mass media. Each agent reinforces gender roles by creating and maintaining normative expectations for gender-specific behavior.
• Exposure also occurs through secondary agents such as religion and the workplace. Repeated exposure to these agents over time leads men and women into a false sense that they are acting naturally rather than following a socially constructed role.