Sex self-ID anyone? Easy, cheap, and unlimited - now on offer in New Zealand.

Sex self-ID is due to become law in New Zealand in mid-June 2023. Sex self-ID, often referred to as just self-ID, means that any man or woman can change the birth sex recorded on their birth certificate to that of the opposite sex, no questions asked.

In addition, ‘a non-binary gender’ has been added besides the female and male choices. So, people born in New Zealand can now change the record of their sex observed at birth, with a choice of three different options to have on their birth certificate instead. There is also no limit to the number of times they can make these changes. The price charged for this has not yet been revealed in the following link, but judging from previous talk, it is likely to be peanuts, or nothing. bdmreview - recognising gender on birth certificates - dia.govt.nz .

It's possible that a person may end up acquiring several birth certificates with different names and sex or gender markers on them. Although these changes will be recorded by the Dept of Internal Affairs, the physical birth certificates can be retained by the person who has made the changes. Added to this, NZ is unique in that it has what is called an ‘open registrar’ whereby another person can order someone else’s birth certificate. There are some terms and conditions, but it can be done if these are met. However, in December 2021 our parliamentarians still unanimously voted to pass sex self-ID into law, choosing, amongst other things, to believe that the illegality of fraud was enough of a deterrent to mis-using sex self-ID.

These lawful changes and acquisitions of birth certificates potentially make them vanity documents of little value other than that for self-gratification. The certificate now may simply only be a reflection of the inner feeling the possessor of it has about their ‘gender identity’, and nothing else. There is nothing measurable about a gender identity, as it is a variable and changeable personal descriptor. As a once trusted document containing a record of a person’s sex, a birth certificate may now become worthless.

Initially, the Green Party tried to sneak sex self-ID into law here in New Zealand in 2018 along with amendments to the Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registrar Act (BDMRR), using the same tactics used previously in Ireland, as one example, under the veil of the Marriage Equality Act. Fortunately, a few women here cottoned onto what the Greens were proposing to do, and managed to bring attention to it, whereby it was subsequently halted by then NZ First MP, Tracey Martin.

Those women were the women who formed Speak Up for Women NZ, amongst whom was Ani O’Brien. After the sex self-ID amendment had been halted, Ani gave a talk in Auckland outlining the issues with it. She published that talk on her Medium blog, and in it she made mention that our own government Dept for Internal Affairs did not support the changes -

The DIA said, “because a birth certificate involves core identity information, any potential law change has wide‐ranging implications. A birth certificate forms the basis for information on other official documentation, such as passports and driver licenses. Passports and driver licenses are considered “transactional” documents that involve less formal processes than s 28 [of the BDMRR Act 1995]. Unlike a registered birth record they can be revoked.”

Central to DIA concerns was the need to balance the personal interests of transgender people against the need for certainty and integrity in official documentation. The DIA noted that the medical gatekeeping under existing law had been interpreted broadly in case law, such that gender reassignment surgery is no longer required anyway. This, the DIA said, provides sufficient flexibility to address Allyson Hamblett’s concerns. They came to the conclusion that “the Department is not in a position to confirm the government’s support for [self-ID] or otherwise.”

What Speak Up for Women, their supporters, and all the other individuals and groups, including Mana Wāhine Kōrero did, though, with their activism which opposed sex self-ID, was to get a small, but important, clause added to Section 79¹ of the BDMRR Act 2021, which allowed a birth certificate to not be definitive proof of a person’s sex. This clause, 79(2)b, states that “(b) any other relevant information” can be used to ascertain a person’s sex. It means that if our eyes and ears convey information to us that a person is not the sex they claim to be, we can take that as “other relevant information”. We don’t have to inspect genitals, and we don’t have to be brow-beaten by threats of getting into trouble with the law for ‘discrimination’. Particularly worth noting, as well, is that this law uses the words ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ separately, which shows that a distinction between them is recognised. Speak Up for Women goes into this in more depth here.

Changing one’s sex marker on a birth certificate is not essential to identifying as the opposite sex, though. Our Ministry for Women and Human Rights Commission have policies which state that men who identify as women (‘transwomen’ in their vernacular) are women, no changes to their bodies or birth certificates required, and as such should not be discriminated against. This stance is an organisation-created policy, and not law. However, many of our service providers, both public and private, have taken this policy up in the manner of a decree. They use it to justify implementing their own policies of allowing men who say they’re women into women’s spaces and sports, and have erroneously cited it as a legal obligation.

The Dept of Internal Affairs makes it clear in ‘Questions about the implications of self-identification for service providers’ that it’s still legally allowable to provide a sex-segregated service after sex self-ID becomes law. However, to date, when this is pointed out to service providers, instead of changing their policies, they also take the liberty of changing the meaning of the word ‘woman’ to be anyone who identifies as one, in order to fit those policies. The loose concept of self-ID, or gender identity, as the measure of eligibility for their services is increasingly replacing the biological reality of sex.

There is pressure from neo-rainbow lobbyists to make gender identity a legally protected characteristic, even though it’s undefinable in a consistent way. Some in our Public Service are keen to comply, and on our own government website about Human rights and freedoms, gender identity has erroneously been included as unlawful discrimination, as seen in the screenshot below. Gender identity is not listed as unlawful discrimination in either Human rights in legislation, nor in the Human Rights Act 1993. They have been advised of this error, so we wait to see if it will be removed.

Going back to the passing of the sex self-ID bill, at one stage it sounded as though the Hon Jan Tinetti, who is the Minister for Women, and was the Minister of Internal Affairs at that time, promised a review of “unintended consequences” of the law five years after it came into effect, when she made this statement in August 2021 –

“We are also not alone in making these changes. Since 2012, 15 other countries have adopted a self-identification process, as well as the Australian states of Tasmania and Victoria. There has been no substantial evidence found on any serious or unmanageable consequences of introducing a self-identification process. However, if any unintended consequences do arise, we have built in a statutory review of the self-identification provisions five years after the commencement of this bill, as per the 2018 select committee's recommendations.” Tinetti, Jan - New Zealand Parliament (www.parliament.nz)

It appears we were duped, though. A later conversation with a Dept of Internal Affairs employee working on the sex self-ID legislation confirmed that the only review which would take place would be a review of the processes to see if they were working satisfactorily, and not for any consequences, or impacts.

Like many, Minister Tinetti also points out how no evidence has been found to prove that self-ID has negative impacts on women and girls. This is a disingenuous statement, because no country which has implemented self-ID has appointed an official agency to collect any data, or anecdata, about the impacts of it on women and girls. Although anecdata makes up a substantial portion of the case for self-ID, it’s somehow not deemed worthy of officially collecting for a review of the impacts of self-ID.

A similarly disingenuous statement is made about “no complaints” received by service providers regarding men who say they’re women being in women’s spaces. Complaints are not accepted or lodged about this if their policies allow it, ergo, no complaints. Over and above this, there are several reasons why women don’t complain to a service provider every time we’re discomforted or distressed by a man’s behaviour, or report worse incidents to the police. These have been well documented, and which a Minister for Women would certainly not be unaware of - we would hope.

The only evidence I’ve seen produced, on more than one occasion by different people, to back-up the statement that there is apparently no problem with men who say they’re women having free and unfettered access to all women’s and girls’ spaces and sports, is in a Springer.com article dated July 2018. Data from public records in Massacheusetts, USA, was analysed, and from that analysis it was concluded that fears of increased safety and privacy violations were unfounded.

In addition to the creep of self-ID dismantling single-sex spaces and services for women and girls, even before the sex self-ID law is officially in place, Resist Gender Education NZ writes about the implications on children and students when they are allowed to change their sex recorded at birth on their birth certificates. Like everywhere, no record is kept of how many are already changing their gender identity, and no data collected about the impacts of this on them or those around them. I expect this will get the “no evidence” treatment, too, if questioned.

There is much to be concerned about how self-ID is being inserted into all aspects of society. But my experience with MPs and councils in speaking and/or writing to them about gender ideology is that even the most well-presented case has little effect on them. Their stances have all the hallmarks of being directed by neo-rainbow groups and lobbyists, with an emphasis on trans and queer agendas. It now appears to be the global modus operandi whereby susceptible people in positions of power are targeted to pass policies and laws on the quiet in favour of transpeople, after which the PR machine goes into overdrive to bring fellow citizens on board with the done deal. At no stage is consideration given to how the continuous and taxing uncertainty of not knowing if there will be men in our spaces when we go into them, or not, might affect women’s and girls’ mental health and wellbeing.

What will make MPs and councils begin to give women and girls some consideration and respect, too, rather than flicking us off with the “she’ll be right” Kiwi attitude, either before or after implementing laws and policies that impact on us?  I suspect it may only be when not doing it will bring more trouble to them than ignoring us.

¹Section 79  of the Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Act 2021 says this about birth certificates as evidence -

(1) A certificate issued under this Act is admissible as evidence in any legal proceedings and is presumed, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, to be an accurate record of the information recorded in the registry as at the date of issue.

(2) Any individual, private sector agency, or public sector agency authorised or required to ascertain an individual’s sex or gender for a particular purpose may take into account either or both of the following:

(a)  the information contained in a certificate issued under this Act:

(b)  any other relevant information.