Loading...
Transgender inclusion and Australia's failed Sexuality Discrimination Bill
Riseman, Noah
Riseman, Noah
Author
Abstract
In 2013, one of the final acts of the Gillard government was to amend Australia's Sex Discrimination Act to add sexuality, gender identity and intersex variations as protected categories. This was not the first time the Commonwealth had considered anti‐discrimination legislation protecting LGBTI people. The most prominent example was the Democrats‐sponsored Sexuality Discrimination Bill, introduced to Parliament in November 1995, which included provisions to protect transgender people as well as gays, lesbians and bisexuals. The Senate referred the bill to an inquiry by the Senate Legal and Constitutional References Committee, which received 436 submissions. Approximately 100 of these submissions specifically addressed transgender discrimination, some advocating for the rights of transgender Australians, and others focusing their attacks against the bill based on the transgender provisions. This article draws on the concept of transgender citizenship to examine the transgender‐related aspects of the inquiry and the debates in parliament, to understand the ways that the public and politicians framed transgender rights in the mid‐1990s. These debates are telling in how transgender issues and anxieties over gender fluidity have consistently become an easy target in wider debates about equality for sexual and gender minorities.
Keywords
Date
2019
Type
Journal article
Journal
Australian Journal of Politics and History
Book
Volume
65
Issue
2
Page Range
259-277
Article Number
ACU Department
School of Arts and Humanities
Faculty of Education and Arts
Faculty of Education and Arts
Collections
Files
Riseman_2019_Transgender_inclusion_and_Australia_s_failed_sexuality.pdf
Adobe PDF, 171.68 KB
- Embargoed until 9999-12-31
AM_Riseman_2019_Transgender_inclusion_and_Australia_s_failed_sexuality.pdf
Adobe PDF, 261.38 KB
- Embargoed until 9999-12-31
Relation URI
Source URL
Event URL
Open Access Status
Published as green open access
License
File Access
Controlled
Controlled
Controlled