This YouTube video is from the producers of GenderTalk radio and GenderTalk.com, GenderVision continues the ground-breaking work of challenging and expanding our vision of gender and progressive politics. Discussions will range from the basics of sex and gender to all things masculine, feminine, and transgender, including GLBT, feminist, women's and men's issues.

Nancy Nangeroni and Gordene O. MacKenzie, PhD. produce and co-host GenderVision, which is taped at BevCam cable access studio in Beverly, MA.

First of all I am not a lawyer nor a constitution expert; but, I have been an activist for many years fighting for trans rights. However, having lived nearly 30 years as a transsexual, it has shown the minute amount of rights that I have. This is perhaps the reason for stressing the importance of improving your image and that is such a sad statement to make. To some that is just girly stuff. It is my belief, when you pass in public, it allows you to have less verbal or physical abuse by morons in public.

The times that I have been dragged out of a washroom in complete humiliation just because I needed to pee goes to show the lack of rights that transsexuals and cross dressers have. Not to mention being called by my given name by police officers long after the name change. The lists of offenses go on and on as it has for countless other transgendered people.

The following list was found in a copy of Xtra west. It pertains to gay folk but it could be very useful if you get stopped by a police officer.

• I can refuse to talk to the police or answer their questions.
• I can insist on my right to speak with a lawyer as quickly as possible. (Even if you don't personally have a lawyer, you have an absolute and inviolable right to call duty counsel and get legal advice. Police are required to dial the number for you once you are at the station.)
• I can ask a police officer to tell me his name or badge number.
• Before the police search my house, my car, my belongings or my body, I can insist that they show me a search warrant, or explain clearly why they are searching me and what they are looking for.
• I can insist that I be searched by someone of the same sex. ( If you are a transgendered M-F on hormones, a female must search your upper body and a male officer must search the bottom half your body).
• I can leave unless I am being arrested or detained.

The Supreme Court will not hear arguments about whether a women's service organization erred in excluding a trans person from working with the Vancouver-based group.

The Feb 1 decision denying "leave to appeal" to the Supreme Court Of Canada leaves Kimberly Nixon without further recourse for her exclusion from Vancouver Rape Relief.

The battle began a decade ago when Nixon filed a human rights complaint against the organization over her treatment.

The BC Human Rights Tribunal found that Nixon had been discriminated against on the basis of her trans identity and ordered Rape Relief to pay her $7,500 in damages.

But the victory was short-lived. Rape Relief appealed to the BC Supreme Court, where the tribunal's decision was overturned. At that time, Rape Relief did not dispute the allegation that it rejected Nixon because she is trans, but argued it was allowed to do so. Nixon appealed to the BC Court Of Appeal, who upheld the province's Supreme Court decision in 2005.

Karen Busby, an Egale Canada board member and professor of constitutional law at the University Of Manitoba, says that regardless of the outcome today, the Nixon case has been ground breaking for trans rights.

When it started its appeal, Vancouver Rape Relief could have raised the question of whether gender identity could be used as grounds for a human rights complaint, and it didn't, says Busby.

"It's fair to say that most human rights tribunals hear cases about [gender identity], even though there is only one jurisdiction that explicitly protects from discrimination on the basis of gender identity, so that's actually huge, coming out of the Nixon case," says Busby.

Northwest Territories is the only jurisdiction in Canada where discrimination on the basis of gender identity is prohibited by law.

But Busby says that the Nixon case gives only a "very, very rare exception" to prohibitions on discrimination. The BC Court Of Appeal decision was based on a "very unusual set of facts" because the centre deals with the comfort level of abused women.

"I can't imagine any other business where that argument can be made," says Busby, noting that most organizations of this type make no objection to utilizing trans employees or volunteers.

"There are problems with the BC Court Of Appeal decision but I don't want to overestimate it," says Busby.

Nixon's lawyer, barbara findlay, was not immediately available for comment.

OTTAWA –NDP MP Bill Siksay (Burnaby-Douglas) introduced a bill in the House of Commons today that would include gender identity or gender expression as a prohibited grounds of discrimination in the Canadian Human Rights Act.

This Bill is essential as it addresses the lack of protections against discrimination and harassment provided for Transsexual and Transgender people in the Canadian Human Rights Act. “Transgender and Transsexual people are often victims of violence and face discrimination on a daily basis”, said Siksay, “this is unacceptable and the inequity in protections for trans people must be immediately addressed by Canadian laws.”

“It is my hope that the inclusion of this ground would send a strong message that people should not be discriminated against because of their gender identity or gender expression. Such discrimination is wrong and this intolerance must end.” said Siksay

Siksay conducted national email consultations and in person consultations in Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa on trans legislative needs.

The Bill follows the lead of the Northwest Territories, which was the first region in Canada to prohibit discrimination on the grounds of gender identity in November of 2002. The Bill also fulfills the NDP’s commitment in the 2004 election platform to ensure equality for transgender and transsexual people.

YELLOWKNIFE, Northwest Territories - November 5, 2002 - The Northwest Territories has become the first region in Canada to prohibit discrimination on the grounds of gender identity.

As part of the territory's new Human Rights Act, a person cannot be discriminated against because of their gender identity.

Brendan Bell, the member of the legislative assembly who headed the committee that drafted the bill, said it seemed only logical to include gender identity in the new law.

"We can't keep our heads in the sand and we felt it was the right thing to do," he said.

"The courts certainly are deciding that it falls under the discrimination bounds and if the courts are saying it then it was our inkling to put it in."

The legislation defines gender identity as anyone born one gender, but feels they are of the other gender. This includes people who have had a sex-change operation and those who live their lives as the opposite sex without surgical changes.

Bell said to his knowledge, the community [of] transgendered people is small in the NWT and there was no outcry during public consultation.

Still the law needed to be written, he added.

Zoe Raemer, a spokeswoman for OutNorth, the Territories' gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered rights group, said she is happy with the new legislation.

"I think it's a very positive step, and the government of the Northwest Territories is showing real leadership in this area," Raemer said.

"We didn't have to argue to get sexual orientation or transgendered included in the list of prohibited grounds."

John Fisher, executive director of EGALE, Canada's national rights group for gender identity, hopes the NWT law passed last week will lead other provinces to take action.

"The inclusion of this ground sends a message loud and clear: discrimination against transgendered people is just plain wrong, and must end," Fisher said.

"Hopefully, this initiative by the Northwest Territories will encourage other jurisdictions to follow suit."

While most members of the legislature were in favor of the change, North Slave member Leon Lafferty wondered if the law would give a transgendered women the right to use a men's washroom.

"I sort of have a problem," Lafferty said. "How we can protect people and their privacy."

But Katherine Peterson, the legislature's legal counsel, dismissed Lafferty's question.

"I would think that it's appropriate for the employer to require that you use the facilities appropriate to your biology," Peterson said. "And until that biology changes through the miracles of science that's a reasonable requirement."

The Canadian Human Rights Commission and the British Columbia Human Rights Commission have both recommended that discrimination on the grounds of gender identity be prohibited.

The Ontario Human Rights Commission has implemented a policy to accept complaints based on gender identity, although it has not been incorporated into law.

In addition to extending rights to transgendered people, the new bill bans publication of hate materials and extends protection from discrimination to grounds of social condition, political belief, political association and family affiliation.

The next step in the NWT, Bell said, is to set up a human rights commission - a task he expects to take at least a year to complete.

Source: Canadian Press

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