Lindsy Danzinger recently published a sobering, yet disturbing, commentary in The Epoch Times about an encounter of her mother with a naked man in the change room of her local public pool in Ottawa. Reading the commentary, one can only be disgusted by the hideous nature of the incident, not so much because a woman encountered a naked man in her change room, but because it is a visible manifestation of the decline of Western Civilisation.
The incident recounted in Danzinger’s piece flags potential problems caused by gender self-identification laws that allow people to change their gender on their birth certificate. If a biological man identifies as female, he would presumably be allowed to access women-only spaces.
In the incident recounted, the naked man allegedly merely leered at the mother and then went away. Not so long ago, behaviour such as this would have been treated as a case involving indecent exposure – a criminal offense. Now, the law is firmly on the side of men who may self-identify as female accessing women-only facilities – an unfortunate consequence of the practice of allowing people to change their birth certificate, even without first have undergone sex reassignment surgery. Although it is commendable that the law supports people who suffer from gender dysphoria – an affliction capable of diminishing the lives of its sufferers – it is legitimate to question whether an appropriate response should include potentially dangerous practices, such as gender self-identification and sex reassignment surgery.
Gender self-identification surely is an absurd idea which, however, is gaining traction and has the capacity to fatally undermine our Western Civilisation. Indeed, our civilisation is based on the irrefutable fact that there are only two biological sexes: male and female. ‘Where there is no truth, there is absurdity,’ Danzinger writes in her commentary. Indeed, we are in the midst of a gender-fluidity epidemic, where politicians are confused about sexual identity and are stumped by the question: ‘What is a woman?’ This is nicely illustrated by President Joe Biden’s successful nominee to the American Supreme Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson who, during her Senate confirmation hearings, disingenuously and incoherently indicated that she did not know the definition of a ‘woman’. The Prime Minister of New Zealand, Chris Hipkins, likewise refused to define a ‘woman’, arguing that people make up their own mind.
An example of the destructive effect of self-identification laws is provided by the Victorian Parliament that passed legislation in late August 2019 allowing transgender people to change the sex on their birth certificate without first having to submit to sex reassignment surgery. Section 30A of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996, as amended, now allows a person to change their sex provided they are 18 years or older and have not made an application to change their sex on their birth certificate ‘within the 12 months preceding the date of making the application’.
Specifically, the legislation grants people the freedom to select the sex descriptor of their choice – male, female, or any other sex. The sex on the birth certificate simply reflects the applicant’s personal choice of gender. Thus, under the legislation, gender identity, rather than biological sex, defines whether a person is male, female, or transgender.
Although the Victorian legislation requires that the application be made in good faith, it is nevertheless potentially odious and dangerous because predatory men or women could potentially use it to gain access to facilities, which not so long ago, were respectively women-only or men-only, such as bathrooms, change rooms, and toilets. Who would want to investigate conflicts within these space given the era of gender self-identification?
In Queensland, the Palaszczuk Labor government has joined the attack on Western Civilisation by adopting its own version of gender self-identification. According to section 39(1)-(2) of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act, 2003, as amended, a person who is 16 years or older ‘may apply to alter the record of sex of the person in the relevant child register’ and nominate a sex descriptor. The applicant must include ‘a statement, verified by statutory declaration, that the person identifies as the sex stated in the application; and lives, or seeks to live, as a person identified by that sex’.
Commenting on this Queensland legislation, Lyle Shelton, writing in The Spectator Australia, quoted the former Minister for Women and now Health Minister, Shannon Fentiman, who reportedly told Parliament: ‘The Queensland government defines a woman as someone who identifies as a woman.’ Hence, a woman in Queensland ‘can have a penis’. Surely, this view is patently disingenuous and verges on foolishness? Shelton also disclosed that the Liberal-Nationals (LNP) Opposition only reluctantly opposed the proposal, allowing for gender self-identification on the ground that children should not be allowed to change their sex.
However, the Shadow Attorney-General, Tim Nicholls, expressed the LNP’s view that it was safe for transgender women to access women-only facilities and spaces because the Parliamentary committee, dominated by Labor and Greens, found there was no evidence of harm. He is quoted as saying, ‘I completely endorse the findings of the committee that there is no evidence whatsoever that transwomen are any more likely to commit offenses than other women are.’ He went on to add that the ‘issue of men seeking to take advantage of the laws, while a concern of many groups, is not supported by the evidence’. Of course, there is no evidence because the legislation has only just been passed in Queensland and similar laws in other jurisdictions have not been in operation long enough to verify the veracity of this claim. In any event, how many assaults need to happen to be satisfied there is enough ‘evidence’? Unfortunately, the cavalier treatment of the LNP of this issue demonstrates that politicians, including those belonging to the ‘conservative’ Opposition, tend to facilitate a rapid decline in our civilisation by naively adopting, even condoning, Labor-Greens self-identification and gender transitioning policies.
The issue of transgender rights has now been firmly and enthusiastically embraced by the illiberal political class and left-wing activists. Proponents of transgenderism claim that there is a human right to transition to another sex different from their biological sex and that the view that people are born either male or female constitutes an odious example of rampant discrimination and homophobia. These activists believe ‘in a post-modernist version of constructed truth that negates sex and biology’. They ‘have the news and entertainment media, most of academia, and more and more of the state apparatus on their side’. Their claim is taken seriously by legislators throughout the Western world, including in Australia.
An example is Victoria’s Change or Suppression (Conversion) Practices Prohibition Act 2021, which criminalises behaviour that frustrates people’s desire to transition to another sex. The Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, commenting on the criminalising of conversion practices, explains: ‘Practices that seek to change or hide someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity are harmful and unlawful’ and that this law ‘bans these change or suppression practices and provides a range of options for preventing and responding to them’. Similarly, the American Psychiatric Association notes that, while support for people ‘with gender dysphoria may include open-ended exploration of their feelings and experiences of gender identity and expression,’ psychological attempts ‘to force a transgender person to be cisgender … are considered unethical’.
The right to change a person’s sex on their birth register, and the right to seek sex reassignment surgery, spearheaded by the prohibition of gender identity conversion strategies to treat gender dysphoria, are thus promoted as the next human rights. To that effect, comments, which do not toe the official line might be criticised severely as ‘homophobic’. For example, the renowned author, J. K. Rowling, was censored for indicating that the scientifically observable biological difference between men and women is both real and a valuable distinction. Transgender activists immediately discredited her views, destroying the author’s reputation in the process. However, these transgender activists fail to understand the obvious, namely that the concept of ‘woman’ becomes meaningless if it is extended to include a biological man who transitions to a woman. In denying the obvious biological differences between men and women, gender activists facilitate, and even promote, the philosophy of gender fluidity, thereby making persons’ biological sex into a trivial concept.
The dangers associated with the increased use of gender reassignment surgery are well-documented. For example, Peter A. McCullough, writing in Courageous Discourse, reports on failed surgical creations of phalli in women, which he described as ‘an elusive fantasy’. He reported on 129 women who underwent attempted surgery to create a penis or ‘make a sensitive phallus structure for sexual pleasure’. Patients reported 281 complications that required 142 revisions. He concluded that, ‘Genital reconstruction surgery in women attempting to create phalli and take on the appearance of a man should be abandoned.’
The reality is that gender self-identification and gender reassignment surgery practices have already spawned many social problems, prominently the participation of transwomen in women-only sporting events. Very recently, Tennis Australia called on the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) to adopt rules regarding the participation of transgender athletes in women’s competitions. In this context, the CEO of Tennis Australia told the Sydney Morning Herald that, ‘We are an organisation that believes absolutely in inclusivity, in diversity, in equality, so any decision made will need to be aligned with our core values.’ Relevantly, the Transgender Inclusion Guidelines for Community Tennis specifically state that, ‘Players who identify as women should be allowed to play as women; players identifying as men should be allowed to play as men.’
But there is some pushback. For example, in March 2020, Idaho Governor, Brad Little, signed a law, which prohibits transgender athletes from competing in sports against athletes of the other biological sex. And, in June 2021, Florida enacted a law barring transgender female athletes from participating in competitions intended for student athletes born as girls. The International Swimming Federation (FINA) also decided to exclude transgender female athletes from women’s elite swimming competitions. FINA foreshadowed the establishment of a separate competition for transgender athletes.
Gender self-identification and sex reassignment surgeries are, in my opinion, dangerous practices which are not based on, or supported by, rigid scientific analysis, but rely on ‘feelings’ and vague ideas of ‘compassion’ and ‘justice’, thereby endangering the stability and truth built up over thousands of years.
Nevertheless, nowadays, any adverse commentary and views expressed on the propriety of these social engineering developments are dismissed as irrelevant. Hence, more needs to be done to push back the inexorable march to undermine the rich civilisation of which the West is a beneficiary and keeper.
It fails to be seen whether people are willing to jeopardise their comfortable existence to write about, and agitate against, the West’s licentiousness. The West appears to have lost its moral compass and the claim that its civilisation is experiencing an existential crisis is to be taken seriously.
Of course, the philosophy of transgenderism is merely one manifestation of the decline of Western Civilisation because legislators around the world are implementing a whole swath of dystopian social engineering laws: abortion on demand, same-sex marriage, euthanasia, demonisation of Western Civilisation, adoption of affirmative action and preferential treatment policies, suppression of free speech, facial recognition technology, denigration of the role of religion in society, imposition of compulsory Critical Race studies in schools and universities, and the distribution of burdens and benefits on the ground of a person’s race, a characteristic over which people have no control, among others.
In this context, Danziger aptly writes: ‘A society that is divided on whether or not there is objective truth cannot set laws or policies that work for the broadest range of people.’
When will common sense prevail?
Gabriël A. Moens AM is an emeritus professor of law at the University of Queensland. He also served as pro vice-chancellor and dean at Murdoch University. In 2003, Moens was awarded the Australian Centenary Medal by the prime minister for services to education. He has taught extensively across Australia, Asia, Europe, and the United States.
