{"id":165030,"date":"2018-05-26T06:58:48","date_gmt":"2018-05-26T10:58:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=165030"},"modified":"2018-05-26T06:58:48","modified_gmt":"2018-05-26T10:58:48","slug":"saskatchewan-to-allow-people-to-remove-gender-designation-from-birth-certificate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/05\/26\/saskatchewan-to-allow-people-to-remove-gender-designation-from-birth-certificate\/","title":{"rendered":"Saskatchewan to allow people to remove gender designation from birth certificate"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Icelanders<\/a>
Earlier this week, the provinial government agree to the change and a judge in Regina ordered the moe, opening the door for changes to all government identification in Saskatchewan (Shutterstock photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SASKATOON — A Saskatchewan mother hopes a court decision ordering the province to allow gender markers to be removed from birth certificates when requested — even for children — will help to further change people’s attitudes.<\/p>\n

Fran Forsberg of Saskatoon filed a human rights complaint four years ago on behalf of her now 10-year-old daughter Renn to have the gender box on her birth certificate that was marked with an ‘M’ changed to an ‘F.’<\/p>\n

She further asked that the box be removed all together.<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, the provincial government agreed to the change and a judge in Regina ordered the move, opening the door for changes to all government identification in Saskatchewan and setting a legal precedent in Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m just so glad it’s over and I am so happy for other children, as well as other non-binary people,\u201d Forsberg said Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cHopefully this will start the ball rolling for people educating and opening their minds and hearts for the rest of the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s no reason to have gender on government ID or birth certificates. No reason at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

A second youth, 17-year-old Jordyn Dyck of Regina, joined the complaint last year. Jordyn’s father, Dustin Dyck, said they were overjoyed by the decision.<\/p>\n

He said Jordyn has been bullied for being non-binary and hopes being able to show proof with new ID will stop most of it.<\/p>\n

Saskatchewan is not the first to make the change. Earlier this month, Ontario started allowing residents to opt out of displaying a gender designation on their birth certificates.<\/p>\n

But the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission says Saskatchewan is the first to be ordered by a court to allow the removal of gender boxes on the documents. The commission took the two complaints to court and, although there was supposed to be a hearing, the government agreed beforehand that its Vital Statistics Act violates its Human Rights Code.<\/p>\n

Justice Lana Krogan then ordered that Renn and Jordyn receive new birth certificates in the coming days and that the province amend its legislation within 45 days.<\/p>\n

Lawyer Larry Kowalchuk, who represented the two youths, said the decision forces the government to fix the problem for others.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will allow everyone in Saskatchewan who has a case or who is about to have a case to have their marker changed, regardless of age, from ‘F’ to ‘M’ or ‘M’ to ‘F’ or to have no marker at all,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He added that the judge’s ruling will likely apply to other forms of identification in Saskatchewan — driver’s licences and health cards — and can act as precedent in other provinces.<\/p>\n

The Saskatchewan Ministry of Justice did not respond for a request to comment on the decision.<\/p>\n

But David Arnot, chief commissioner of the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission, said the province has indicated it will comply.<\/p>\n

He said the ruling will take care of eight other complaints currently before the commission.<\/p>\n

Alberta, the Northwest Territories and Newfoundland allow for non-binary markers, such as an ‘X’, on their birth certificates.<\/p>\n

But Arnot said an ‘X’ can still mark some people for discrimination.<\/p>\n

\u201cCertainly we know that trans and fluid people face discrimination with housing and employment and in some cases travel. So this is seen as an important step forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

The federal government introduced gender-neutral passports last August, allowing people to mark gender boxes with an ‘X.’ Ottawa also now offers a gender-neutral option on applications for social insurance numbers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SASKATOON — A Saskatchewan mother hopes a court decision ordering the province to allow gender markers to be removed from …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":138508,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[51270,20695,1139],"class_list":["post-165030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-fran-forsberg","tag-gender","tag-saskatchewan","mauthors-chris-purdy","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}