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The Dutch Institute for Human Rights has ruled that a transgender woman was discriminated against when she was banned from entering the women’s locker rooms in an unnamed fitness center.
The center said it did not want other women and girls in the locker rooms to be exposed to the transgender woman’s male reproductive organs and asked them to use the men’s changing area, women’s restrooms or staff changing area instead.
The transgender woman, who had not undergone sex reassignment surgery, refused and complained to the human rights institute.
In its judgment, the institute stated that under Dutch law, “sex reassignment surgery is (no longer) necessary in order to be recognized by the opposite sex”.
According to the institute, this means “one cannot distinguish between ciswomen (a woman who was born with the gender characteristics of a woman and who also feels feminine) and a transgender woman, or grant one woman more rights than the other. They both belong to the same category: woman. ‘
The Netherlands introduced new legislation in 2014 that allows transgender people to officially register their gender change without having to undergo rigorous medical procedures, including sterilization.
The Human Rights Institute has an advisory role and its results are not binding.
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