In what may be the very first case of its kind, Argentina has officially recognized the gender of a six-year-girl who was born a boy. England’s The Telegraph reported Friday that Luana, aka Lulu, was born as Manuel but, according to her parents, behaved as and identified as a girl. “By accepting that my son was not the son I gave birth to, but a girl, I accepted her identity and put myself at her side,” Lulu’s mother Gabriela said.
What allowed this all to transpire is Argentina’s groundbreaking Gender Identity Law which was passed by the legislature in May of 2012. It states, in part, that individuals are entitled to identify their genders. According to the law, individuals have the right “to the recognition of their gender identity.” Individuals are also entitled to “the free development of their person according to their gender identity” and “to be treated according to their gender identity and, particularly, to be identified in that way in the documents proving their identity in terms of the first name/s, image and sex recorded there.”
Initially, however, Lulu was denied a government-sponsored ID which recognized her new identity; it is known by its Spanish acronym DNI. The state argued that she was too young. But the children, youth and family secretary ruled children under 14 were capable of giving consent and cited international human rights in overturning the decision. Alfredo Grande, one of the psychologists involved in the case, told Folha de Sao Paulo, an online news service: “The DNI is like a mirror. If a person doesn’t identify themselves there, it’s not good. It was an important fight that we won.”
Eventually, Gabriela appealed to Daniel Scioli, the governor of the state of Buenos Aries and Cristina Kirchner, the country’s president, and her application was accepted. ““The government of the province of Buenos Aires has decided to provide a solution to this particular case raised by the family,” said Alberto Perez, Scioli’s chief of staff.
According to the American Psychological Association, transgender “is an umbrella term for persons whose gender identity, gender expression, or behavior does not conform to that typically associated with the sex to which they were assigned at birth.”
