[AGTRT-BF17] Very little can be found about the new transgender law in election manifestos

Jan Bergstra & Laurens Buijs
Amsterdam Gender Theory Research Team

Until recently, a new transgender law was based on co-essentialism, or the idea that biology plays no role in determining gender, and the even stronger assertion that everyone gets to determine their own gender.

We wondered about the fate of the transgender bill in current party manifestos. The situation is as follows:

1. Supporters of the existing gender transition bill are BIJ1 and VOLT. BIJ1 believes that gender (sex) should disappear from the basic registration, and that as an interim measure one should be able to enter X and everyone should be allowed to mutate their own healer as often as they wish (with the three options: male, female and X).
2. VOLT claims to be a supporter of the proposed transgender law.
3. NSC does believe that new legislation is desirable (even though non-binary is not discussed) but wants to stick with expert testimony when transitioning gender.
4. SP, D66, BBB and PvdD have general texts indicating that transgender persons exist and need better protection and access to care.
5. FVD wants gender transition in education to be off limits.
6. The others do not mention the notion of transgender, nor does neutral (non-binary) gender.

The public discussion about a widening of the transgender law has virtually ground to a halt at this point: the topic is hardly an issue anymore. We would be surprised if in the next 4 years a broadening of the transgender law came about.

That’s not good news for everyone. The current legislation can certainly be improved, and there is room for some broadening of it, in our opinion. An academic discussion in the Netherlands about the possibilities and impossibilities (desirabilities and undesirabilities) of transgendering could have helped to highlight public weaknesses of existing transgender law. Thus, a cogent national discussion about possibilities of and need for broadening that law could have emerged. Renewal of this law would then undoubtedly have been much higher on the agenda.

Professionals in Dutch gender studies have collectively fallen short by not openly and honestly thematizing the issues involved. The all-or-nothing mentality that only ultimate co-essentialism is a step forward and all other conceptions of gender transition would not even be worth the time of academically-advanced specialists has achieved very little. Evading the debate, it seems, was counterproductive. But there is also a failure of necessary academic reflection on an important topic through this deliberate avoidance of debate, and that avoidance mechanism also deserves explicit attention for that reason.

Read more about the importance of open debate in gender studies:
Diversity of views: not redundant for gender studies in the Netherlands either

A liberalization of transgender law is in order, as long as it does not open the door to what we in AGTRT-7 call gender erosion . And such liberalization is certainly possible.

Searching on Google for the currently valid transgender law hardly succeeds; by the looks of it, one has to be a lawyer to find that information. Such transparency does need public debate. In 2014, the old transgender law was amended and new rules apply from then on. For example, mandatory sterilization no longer plays a role. The possibilities for further broadening, or otherwise modifying, the rules in place since 2014 should be the subject of debate.