Barely inaugurated in his new position, US President Donald Trump announced Monday that he would sign executive orders rolling back protections granted to transgender people, a decision that is considered worrying north of the border.
Posted at 9:00 p.m.
Audrey Sanikopoulos
The Canadian Press
One of the executive orders will stipulate that the federal government will recognize only two sexes – man and woman – the definition of which will be based on whether people are born with eggs or sperm, rather than their chromosomes.
“It’s discouraging, I don’t see how so many people in the population can rally behind this type of policy which has no impact on their own lives,” reacted Martin Blais, full professor in the Department of Sexology at the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM) and holder of the Research Chair on Sexual Diversity and Gender Plurality.
“I am very saddened to see what lesbian, gay, trans, queer and non-binary people in America are experiencing today. We can only send them a lot of solidarity,” testified the president of the Émergence Foundation, Patrick Desmarais.
However, the two men were not surprised by this announcement which had already been looming for some time.
“At the level of rights [de la personne]”, we see setbacks coming as much from the Supreme Court of the United States as from the decrees of Mr. Trump on his first day in office,” explained Mr. Desmarais.
For his part, Mr. Blais fears that the speech conveyed by the American president will have direct consequences on transgender people, “who end up being very afraid of losing rights, of losing access to health care, of losing also their employment because we open the door to all kinds of discrimination which will no longer be punished.”
-He also indicated that several studies carried out in the United States have shown that the questioning of this legal protection is associated with an increase in symptoms of distress, depression and anxiety.
The 47e The president also plans to end federal agency programs that aim to promote diversity, equity and inclusion, a decision that risks affecting much more than transgender people, according to Mr. Desmarais.
“Not only LGBTQ+ people, but many other people will be affected by this important change. People who are underrepresented in our society,” he recalled.
Not safe in Canada
If Canada can count on protections guaranteed by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, this does not mean that members of the LGBTQ+ communities are safe, warned the two men.
“We must not assume that our charters of law in Quebec and Canada protect us in the face of change,” underlined the president of Fondation Émergence.
“We have seen that there are supreme courts in other countries which have changed direction and which are now much more conservative and have been able in certain ways to interpret the law to take away rights,” a- he clarified.
For Mr. Blais, it is clear that “we must remain vigilant, because the fight for rights is an ongoing struggle.”
“When a right-wing wind blows on a country, we should not be surprised that we have collateral damage in other countries,” concluded Mr. Desmarais.
