cross-posted from: https://ibbit.at/post/70458
The Canadian Department of Global Affairs has updated its travel advice for people planning to travel to the United States, specifically warning people who have the gender marker “X” on their passports that they may face obstacles or restrictions while traveling abroad. The X marker is specifically granted to transgender or nonbinary individuals who do not want to place a “male” or “female”…
From Truthout via this RSS feed
It is obviously based on an outdated concept of gender, but it actually is pretty useful to help match people to passports. If someone identifies as male but is dressed like a woman, it raises red flags. The answer to that might be as simple as “This is a 90s sitcom and I lost a transphobic bet” but it is there. Same with hair color.
Which, funny enough, is an argument for people to actually write down the gender they identify as. But it is also a lot like hair color or facial hair in that it is just too cost and time prohibitive to update a passport every time someone tries a new look. Because… genderfluid people exist.