Canada passed basic rights for trans folks, but let's not congratulate ourselves too much.
Forty years after the Canadian Human Rights Act was passed by parliament, transgender individuals are finally protected by the document. At least three different incarnations of a Canadian trans rights bill have been drafted in the last 12 years, and now the most recent one has passed. Bill C-16 will amend the Human Rights Act, adding gender identity and expression to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination. It also amends the Criminal Code to include hate propaganda and hate crimes based on gender identity and expression. “Discrimination and segregation has no place in our society. It has no place in Canadian society,” says local activist Jessica Durling. She recalls the failed Bill C-279, and how she felt when it died in the senate before the 2015 election. “I remember saying very clearly, ‘Today we mourn, tomorrow we fight.’ And I think the Canadian LGBTQ community did fight.”
Nova Scotia has had provincial legislation around trans rights since 2012. The Yukon was the last place in Canada to approve a provincial bill of this kind when Bill 5 was passed on June 13, as reported by Rob Salerno in Daily Xtra. The territory is ahead of the curve, though, in allowing a gender-neutral option on birth certificates—something the other provinces have yet to do. Vancouver-based advocate Morgane Oger says it’s about time the federal government caught up to its provincial counterparts. Bill C-16 is a small step, but it provides “explicit protection which will force some things to happen, like the tracking of hate crimes against transgender people.”
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