Canadian baby Searlyn Atli may be the first baby in the world without an ‘assigned’ gender on their health card. According to BBC, the baby’s parent, Kori Doty, a non-binary transgender person who identifies as neither male nor female aims to allow the child to discover their own gender.
If you’re wondering, there is a “U” in place of the usual ‘M’ or ‘F’ [for male or female] that represents “undetermined” or “unassigned”.
Kori, who prefers to use the pronoun ‘they’ wants to keep the child’s sex off records to allow them to discover their own gender, and avoid going through the difficulties of changing their documents in the future.
“When I was born, doctors looked at my genitals and made assumptions about who I would be, and those assignments followed me and followed
my identification throughout my life,” Kori said. “Those assumptions were incorrect, and I ended up having to do a lot of adjustments since then.”
“I’m raising Searyl in in such a way that until they have the sense of self and command of vocabulary to tell me who they are, I’m recognizing them as a baby and trying to give them all the love and support to be the most whole person that they can be outside of the restrictions that come with the boy box and the girl box,” they said.
Via CNN:
In the case of Searyl Atli, the parent said that the authorities have refused to issue the birth certificate without a gender designation and so the
parent has applied for a judicial review of the case. The family’s lawyer, barbara findlay, who chooses to spell her name without capital letters, told
Global News: “The assignment of sex in this culture is done when a medical person lifts up the legs and looks at the baby’s genitals. But we know that
the baby’s own gender identity will not develop for some years until after they’re born.”
Canadian media reported that the baby’s health card could be the first in the world to not have a gender designation.
