Japan allows transgender man to change official status without undergoing sterilisation in historic move

A request made by a transgender man for changing his gender in official records without undergoing sterilisation surgery was approved by a court in western Japan.

This is the first such ruling given by a court since the country’s top court removed a surgery requirement for making suchchanges in the records.

50-year-old Tacaquito Usui can now change his gender to male in his family registry, said the Okayama family court’s Tsuyama branch in its ruling on Wednesday (Feb 7). The original application of Usui for the revision was rejected by the court five years ago.

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“It’s like I’m standing at the start line of my new life,” Usui saidin a televised press conference after the ruling came out. “I’m so excited," he said.

The Supreme Court of Japan in October ruled that a provision of a 20-year-old law which made the reproductive organs' removal a precondition for a new gender's legal recognition was unconstitutional.

However, the ruling was also applicable only to the sterilisation provision and did not speak about the constitutionality of needing other procedures.

The Okayama court discovered that Usui was eligible for gender affirmation because of the hormone therapy given to him.

Transgender man welcomes court's ruling

Welcoming the recognition, Usui said that he believed the law in Japan may be evolving faster in comparison to public awareness.

In Japan, a lot of LGBTQ+ people have been hiding their gender identities and sexual orientations because of fear of discrimination at work and schools. The country is the only one in the Group of Seven(G7) to not permit same-sex marriage.

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The activists have been demanding greater rights and protections for LGBTQ+ people. However, change has slowly been creeping in a country being led by a conservative government which is reluctant to accept gender, sexual and family diversity and sticks to traditional paternalistic values.

The law, which was addressed in the Supreme Court's ruling, came into effect in 2004.

The court stated that the individuals who wish to register a gender change need to get their reproductive organs, including testes or ovaries, removed.

The individuals also need to have a body that “appears to have parts that resemble the genital organs” of their expressed gender.

(With inputs from agencies)