The UN Human Rights Committee has made a powerful call to recognise the human rights of intersex people, including through ending irreversible medical treatment that is not absolutely medically necessary, and that takes place before a child can comprehend and provide informed consent.
In November 2017, SBS Insight screened a program on the medicalisation of intersex people. Several IHRA members and directors participated, as well as parents and clinicians. The full episode is available to view online.
Tony Briffa has written for the Intersex Day Project on becoming the world’s first openly intersex elected public official. In 2009 and 2010 I was elected to the position of Deputy Mayor, and in 2011 I was elected Mayor. I am currently an elected Councillor. This all means that I became the first publicly ‘out’…
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Intersex Awareness Day events will take place across multiple capital cities in Australia this year, including Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, and Sydney. They include music, film screenings, talks and discussions.
OII Australia was pleased to participate alongside the AIS Support Group Australia held a breakfast and panel at Australia’s federal Parliament House in Canberra on 19 October. The event took place on the last joint (House and Senate) Parliamentary sitting day before Intersex Awareness Day on 26 October. Around 20 Senators and Members of the…
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Intersex people are diverse: some of us are married, or able to marry legally in Australia, while others of us are not. OII Australia supports a YES vote. We encourage our members, supporters and broader constituency to vote YES for marriage equality, and we encourage you to talk with your family, friends and colleagues about…
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In November 2016, a diverse group of people with intersex variations participated in a parliamentary briefing, including intersex women, intersex men and people with other gender identities, talking about the issues that concerned us: of isolation, unnecessary medicalisation, and lack of bodily autonomy. In March 2017, more than twenty current and future leaders of the…
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OII Australia has participated in a joint NGO submission to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The resulting document is the first joint Australian NGO submission to a UN committee to call for criminalisation of forced and coerced medical practices on intersex children.
In mid 2016, OII Australia made a submission to the United Nations Committee against Torture documenting human rights violations against intersex people in Australia. Since around that date, the Department of Health and Human Services in Victoria has systematically removed evidence of human rights violations, including psychosocial justifications for surgeries such as “marriage” prospects, and…
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The Darlington Statement is a joint consensus statement by Australian and Aotearoa/New Zealand intersex organisations and independent advocates, agreed in March 2017. It sets out the priorities and calls to action by the intersex human rights movement in our countries.
On 22 February 2017, co-executive director Morgan Carpenter spoke at an Australian Human Rights Commission RightsTalk, on “Creating Equality – The Role of Law in Protecting SOGII Rights”. The event was hosted by Human Rights Commissioner Ed Santow, with Anna Brown, Director of Advocacy and Strategic Litigation, Human Right Law Centre and Imam Nur Warsame,…
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Thank you to Alex David and reporter Caroline Overington for this article in The Australian on 8 December 2016.
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