The European Parliament is calling on the World Health Organisation (WHO) to remove gender identity issues from its list of medical disorders.As part of the Parliament’s strategy towards defending ‘gender diversity’ in the years 2016-2020, MEPs debated the ‘EU Strategy for equality between women and men post-2015’ report which was compiled by the EU’s Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality. A subsequent vote, 341-281, saw the Parliament accept the report’s recommendations, which include the call on the WHO to “withdraw gender identity disorders from the list of mental and behavioral disorders”.
Specifically, the adopted report calls for the EU Parliament to “ensure the full legal recognition of a person’s preferred gender, which is vital for trans and intersex persons and to work towards full depathologisation of trans identities, including in childhood”.
The report goes on to critique the impact of “traditional gender roles” on “the division of labour in the home, in education, in careers, in the workplace”, leading to its demand that “as the composition and definition of families change over time, family and work legislation be made more comprehensive with regard to single-parent families and LGBT parenting.”
One family advocacy group, European Dignity Watch, warned that the report stood as an “all-in-one-package that pushes a controversial and ideological agenda”.
“It rejects common sense and ignores the voice of the vast majority of European families,” the group said. The ‘EU Strategy for equality between women and men post-2015’ report also contains sections on sexual and reproductive rights including ‘safe, legal, and easily accessible’ contraception and abortion, together with sex education programmes for schools.
