New State Department Envoy for LGBT Rights

Normally, I am skeptical when the government--or, for that matter, any other organization--creates a new post with an impressive-sounding title.  But on the matter of which I'm going to write, I'll give the Obama administration the benefit of the doubt.

On Monday, the Department of State named Randy Berry its first-ever envoy charged with advocating globally for the human rights of LGBT people.

In this new role, Berry is responsible for advancing government initiatives to reduce violence and discrimination against LGBT people around the world.  In that capacity, he will also be able to use the State Department's Global Equity Fund, created in 2011 to provide short- and long-term help in protecting and advancing the human rights of LGBT communities in countries where there are particularly severe laws and sanctions against them.

Even if I weren't trans, I would think (or, at least, I would like to think that I would think) that the new position makes sense, given that such issues as women's rights have been getting more attention and that, really, you can't talk about gender equality without LGBT equality.

He Would Have Had An Easier Time In Georgia

The State of Georgia actually makes one aspect of life for transgender people easier than the City of New York does.

Yes, you read that right.

How did I learn that?  Experience.

You see, I was born in Georgia.  I spent only the first seven months of my life there and have only been there once, for a few hours, since then.

After I had my surgery, I had to send my birth certificate, a certified letter from Dr. Bowers and a certified copy of the court order for my name change, along with $35.  Within two weeks, a new birth certificate with my new name and true gender arrived in the mail.

Compare that with what happened to Louis Birney, right here in New York City. Around the same time I had my surgery, he had his.  He is nearly two decades older than I am.

He sent the letter from his surgeon to the City's Department of Health, which issues birth certificate.  (In Georgia, they're issued by the Department of Public Records.)  In response, the DoH demanded a psychiatric report and detailed surgical records in order to turn the "F" to an "M" on his birth certificate.

Manhattan State Supreme Court Justice Paul G.Feinman has ruled that the Health Department should re-evaluate Birney's case.  The judge also questioned the Department's understanding of "the lives and experience of transgender people," noting that "It does not seem likely that an individual would go through all the required years of preparation for surgical transition, including psychotherapy, undergo major surgery, assume life under his or her new gender, and then decide it was all a mistake and change back."

Feinman faulted the Department had provided a "clear, straightforward list" of requirements for changing his birth certificate.  To their credit, the Georgia officials provided such a document for me.  So did the State Department before I applied for a new passport. 

It's about time for the city to catch up to Georgia and the State Department.