Hungary proposes legislation to end legal recognition of trans people

Hungary seeks to end the legal recognition of transgender people by pushing legislation that will define genders as 'biological sex based on primary sex characteristics and chromosomes'. The law, if passed will make it impossible for people to change their gender, leaving an entire community at risk of fracing discrimination and humiliation. According to reports, the Hungarian right-wing government on March 31 proposed a draft bill that would end legal gender recognition for the transgender community. 

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'Discriminatory bill'

As per reports, the bill would require the Hungarian civil registry to record people's sex at birth making it impossible for them to legally change it in the future. Trans people rights activists say that the law would increase discrimination against transgender people in the country where everything from renting bikes to picking up packages requires an identification card. Activists say that it would open up the gate for transgender people to migrate to different countries, leaving those who cannot afford migration at risk of facing daily discrimination and humiliation.  

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Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was already facing criticism from the international community for introducing legislation that has allowed him to rule indefinitely until the coronavirus pandemic is continuing. According to reports, Bernadett Szél, an independent MP has opposed the proposed bill that would end legal recognition of trans people describing it as evil and a step back in time. Bernadett tried reading a letter from trans people during a committee hearing explaining how harmful the law is for the community, but was shut down by the committee's chair who called it irrelevant. 

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Legal experts have suggested that the new law, if passed, will be in violation of European human rights case law and thus will be challenged in the European court of human rights (ECHR). Tamás Dombos, a board member of the Háttér Society, a Hungarian organisation focused on LGBTQI rights while talking to the press accused the Hungarian government of becoming more hostile towards the community in the last two years, using discriminatory languages, such as comparing homosexuality to paedophilia. Dombos said that such languages have never been used in the Hungarian political discourse before and now it is going to become a policy.  

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(Image Credit: AP)