The passport to gender change
More Kiwis include change on official documentation
Agrowing number of Kiwis are changing their gender on official documentation. In the past five years, almost 400 have changed their official gender identity on their passport. The number rose from 14 people in 2012 to 114 last year. In 2017, 79 people had done so by September, when the Herald submitted an Official Information Act request.
People can choose their gender marker to be male, female or X, which means “indeterminate”.
Figures released by NZTA show that licence holders defined as “indeterminate” gender went from 84 in 2014 to 107 in 2017.
Wellington transwoman Jem Traylen has been transitioning over the past two years. She has changed her gender marker from male to female on her passport and driver’s licence. When she applied for an AA card she crossed out all the usual honorifics and wrote “Mx Jem Traylen”. She was surprised but delighted when it came back with that exact wording.
“I felt validated. It was great that the business world was responding and understood what Mx meant and could make changes.
“It’s still very awkward. You’re presenting as a woman with this name but then your ID shows something else. It’s just not nice to explain ‘yes, I’m transgender that’s why my ID is different’. Some people don’t understand.”
The self-employed policy adviser has struggled with gender dysphoria all her life. It was only when Traylen turned 46 two years ago that she decided to come out and live as a woman. Using her new name and pronouns at her old workplace, the Ministry for Primary Industries, gave her proof to change her official documents. For unemployed transpeople it could be harder to change their documents because they might not have proof of their new identity, Traylen explained. But it was even harder before 2012 when requirements to change gender on passports were loosened. Transpeople had to provide proof of their gender change via New Zealand birth registration, Family Court declaration or medical evidence. Now Kiwis only need to provide a statutory declaration stating which gender they want displayed with a passport application form. Naming New Zealand is an organisation that helps transgender, gender diverse and intersex youth update their identity documents to reflect correctly their sex and gender.
Community lawyer and cofounder Kate Scarlet said it encouraged people to get their passport changed first because it was widely recognised and easier to get changed than a birth certificate.
“Legally it’s important for safety so you’re not outed and your identity is respected. Emotionally it’s important to have your gender affirmed in that way.
“The gender on your birth certificate [determines] the prison you’ll be put into. So a transwoman might be put in a men’s prison for a while. For some people that can be dangerous.”
Transitioning was hard, Traylen said.
“It’s like you wake up one day in your 40s and you don’t even know how to dress yourself, you don’t have the right clothes. I hardly knew how to present myself at all.”