Global Roundup: Thailand Trans Woman MP, Poland Abortion Law Protest, Mauritania Women Celebrating Divorce, Indonesia Trans Parents, Los Angeles LGBTQ+ Joy
Global Roundup: Thailand Trans Woman MP, Poland Abortion Law Protest, Mauritania Women Celebrating Divorce, Indonesia Trans Parents, Los Angeles LGBTQ+ Joy
Curated by FG Contributor Samiha Hossain
Photo from Prachatai
A watershed moment for the LGBTQ+ community in Thailand came in the last election when three LGBTQ+ people won seats in parliament. Last month, another win for the Thai LGBTQ+ community was chalked up when Move Forward’s Paramee “Juang” Waichongcharoen, a trans woman and party list Member of Parliament (MP) candidate, was elected. Having spent most of her life working in education, the MP designate is tasked with steering the party’s education policy. She will also work with other LGBTQ+ MP designates to advocate for gender-inclusive policies.
Growing up in a run-down neighborhood, Paramee realized from a young age the importance of education as a tool for betterment in life. She enrolled in university with the dream of becoming a teacher. There, transgender students had to dress and act according to the sex they were assigned at birth. Although the university has relaxed many of its strict rules in recent years, a conservative agenda prevails, especially in some faculties that attach themselves to institutionalism. These include the Faculty of Education, where Paramee studied. The rule was recently repealed in 2020 after a transgender student filed an appeal to the Faculty's governing body.
As much as Paramee wanted to be a teacher, she also wanted to live true to who she was. She couldn’t bear wearing short hair and men’s clothes. In 1993, when she graduated with a Bachelor of Education degree, and most of her peers went on to become career teachers, she chose to reject the traditional route and instead became a tutor and private teacher. For 27 years now, she has made a living teaching social science to high school students around Thailand. Having lived through the painful experience of hiding who she was, she hopes she can advocate for a more tolerant education system in which people of all genders can live according to their authentic selves without being discriminated against.
I will push with other MPs for equality. Not just in the state sector, the private sector sometimes does not dare give LGBT in big conservative organizations the ability to display the gender they choose. - Paramee “Juang” Waichongcharoe
The Move Forward Party tasked Paramee, along with two other MPs, with overseeing education policies. She stated that she is adamant about advocating for a more equal education where people can receive quality education no matter where they are. In her role as an MP, she will also help steer gender-inclusive policies with other MPs from the LGBTQ+ community. Besides the same-sex marriage bill, she aims to advocate for trans people to be able to use titles according to their gender. Paramee believes LGBTQ+ participation in politics is key to making society more inclusive. She encourages LGBTQ+ people who wish to participate in politics to do so.
I want to create understanding. Don’t stereotype. I want to come out and speak up to create an understanding of gender diversity. -Paramee “Juang” Waichongcharoe
People protest Poland's restrictive abortion law in Warsaw, Poland, on Wednesday June 14, 2023 [Czarek Sokolowski/AP Photo]
Women’s rights advocates called for protests in dozens of Polish cities after a woman in her fifth month of pregnancy died of sepsis – the latest such death since a tightening of the law. Protesters chanted, “Stop killing us” on Wednesday as they marched through the capital Warsaw towards the health ministry headquarters, some carrying placards that said, “We want doctors, not missionaries” and “Hell for women,” a common slogan used to convey how the measure affects those who are carrying an unwanted or dangerous pregnancy.
Poland’s abortion laws, among the strictest in Europe, have provoked mass protests in recent years and the death of the 33-year-old named Dorota Lalik in May has stoked anti-government sentiment among many liberal Poles in advance of elections due later this year. In 2021, the nationalist government of Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki put into effect a constitutional court decision banning terminations of pregnancies with fetal defects, as conservative policies have increasingly taken root in one of Europe’s most devoutly Catholic countries. Abortion rights activists have said that there were at least five cases of pregnant women dying whose families came out to the media, blaming the restrictions on abortion for their deaths.
Women’s rights advocates have argued that the current law and the overall conservative climate have had a chilling effect. They have said another problem has been doctors refusing to perform abortions on grounds of their moral conscience. Prosecutors have opened an investigation into Lalik’s death. They are already looking at two similar cases of pregnant women who died in hospital after the death of the fetus they were carrying.
Photograph by Laura Boushnak
Divorce in many cultures is seen as shameful and carries a deep stigma, but in Mauritania, it is not just normal, but even seen as a reason to celebrate and spread the word that the woman is available once more for marriage. For centuries, women have been coming together to eat, sing and dance at each others’ divorce parties. Now, the custom is being updated for the selfie generation, with inscribed cakes and social media montages, as well as the traditional food and music.
Some scholars say the country has the highest divorce rate in the world. Divorce in the country is so common, according to Nejwa El Kettab, a sociologist who studies women in Mauritian society, partly because the majority Maure community inherited strong “matriarchal tendencies” from their Indigenous ancestors. Divorce parties were a way for the country’s nomadic communities to spread the word of a woman’s status. Compared with other Muslim countries, women in Mauritania are quite free, she said, and can even pursue what she called a “matrimonial career.”
Salka Bilale divorced young, became a pharmacist and never remarried. Now, she’s running to become the first ever female member of the national legislature for Ouadane, her hilltop town of a few thousand. Divorce was the reason Bilale was able to do all this. She had been married young, before she could pursue her dream of becoming a doctor, and divorced when she said she realized her husband was seeing other women. Her former husband had wanted her back, but she refused, so he cut her off financially, initially giving her nothing, and then only $30 a month to raise their five children, she said. In dire need of money, Bilale opened a store, and eventually made enough to put herself through school. Last year, a new hospital opened in Ouadane, and, in her early 60s, she finally got a job in the medical field.
Many women find that divorce affords them freedoms they never dreamed of before or during marriage, especially a first marriage. Mauritanians’ openness to divorce coexists with very traditional practices around first marriages. It is common for parents to choose the groom themselves and marry daughters off when they are still young — more than a third of girls are married by the time they are 18 — allowing the women little choice in their partners. However, women can legally initiate divorce in Mauritania under certain circumstances, and although it is usually men who technically do so, it is often at the women’s insistence.
Ultimately, women cannot experience full freedom until all choices are available to them, including the choice to not get married in the first place. Nonetheless, it is powerful to see women in Mauritania challenge the patriarchy by subverting the perceptions surrounding women getting divorced and showing solidarity with the divorce parties.
Lenny is a trans Indonesian woman currently working at a Jakarta-based non-profit called Yayasan Srikandi Sejati, which provides mentoring services for trans women. She married back in 1988 for the sake of her family. Shortly after the birth of Lenny's son, Rhino Septaviandra, in September 1989, her wife left them, prompting Lenny to raise him as a single parent.
While her son was in elementary and middle school, Lenny had to hide her gender transition, cease taking hormones and conceal her breasts in order to pass as a "normal" dad by their community. After her son's high school graduation, Lenny resumed her transition. Though Rhino admits to struggling with getting bullied about his mother, he is now able to accept Lenny and appreciate her role in fighting for the rights of trans women in Indonesia.
I'm amazed at how she [Lenny] contributes back to the community, how she educates fellow trans women in the community through various activities, such as conducting discussions about sexual health, safety and health at work, among many others. -Rhino Septaviandra
In addition to the ups and downs of parenthood, transgender parents typically face extra challenges, including mending the bonds of their strained relationships or confronting prejudice from others. LGBTQ+ people in Indonesia are also prone to legal discrimination. In 2022, the Indonesian parliament passed a new Penal Code that criminalises extra-marital sex. Although the new law does not take effect until 2025, its clauses may nonetheless be utilised to discriminate against queer people. Trans Indonesians may be prosecuted under Article 281 of Penal Code 1999, which criminalises "offences against decency." Under these statutes, the maximum penalty is eight years in prison and 100 lashings.
Lenny, who is fighting against the stigma surrounding the transgender community, emphasised the importance of shattering society’s misconceptions about trans people’s level of education and highlighted the need for societal acceptance to eliminate such stigma. Within her non-profit organisation, Yayasan Srikandi Sejati, Lenny actively represents trans women who have experienced sexual abuse while providing education to the LGBTQ+ community on sexual health, specifically emphasising HIV/AIDS screenings.
As members of society, [queer people] show our concern for the well-being of those around us. -Lenny
(Samanta Helou Hernandez/LAist)
Mallery Jenna Robinson’s joy is found in building a sisterhood in the Black transgender community. She sits on L.A. city’s transgender advisory council and just wrapped a term on West Hollywood’s transgender advisory board — groups that are charged with reviewing and providing feedback on policies and improving relationships. Part of her goals are to break down anti-Blackness and to end HIV and sex work stigmatization.
Robinson also hosts a true crime podcast called A Hateful Homicide to document trans deaths and conducts transgender empathy trainings to help organizations connect better with gender-expansive people. Along the way, she even found time to help organize Long Beach’s Trans Pride.
I've always been very outspoken. My maternal grandfather walked alongside Malcolm X, so I come from a family of activists and advocates. -Mallery Jenna Robinson
Advocacy is time consuming, but she says connecting with other Black trans women is a vital way she experiences joy. And that’s a necessary emotion to indulge in because in the midst of her work is the wave of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation that targets her existence. She hopes that her presence and voice can be a point of belonging and strength for future generations.
In Johnny Gentleman’s world, being a drag king and creating space for Black and brown kings to perform is what brings him joy. Gentlemen runs Dapper Puss Entertainment, a producing company where he focuses on the inclusion of Black, Indigenous and trans performers of color in events.
Gentleman grew up in Chino without seeing any trans people around him, likening it to “Latino misogyny,” where the community stayed away from LGBTQ+ people. This backdrop, coupled with a white and cisgender-dominated drag field, informs his view.
Gentleman pushes back on the notion that drag performers need to be ultra-pretty and put together, or do more dangerous moves like death drops (when someone throws their leg in the air and falls to the floor). Drag kings, he says, can be just as entertaining without all the wigs and dresses. He credits drag for helping him see his heritage and trans-masculine and nonbinary identities.
I made it my goal to just fight for visibility for BIPOC folks and for trans folks. We have just as much talent. -Johnny Gentleman
Samiha Hossain (she/her) is a student at the University of Ottawa. She has experience working with survivors of sexual violence in her community, as well as conducting research on gender-based violence. A lot of her time is spent learning about and critically engaging with intersectional feminism, transformative justice and disability justice.
Samiha firmly believes in the power of connecting with people and listening to their stories to create solidarity and heal as a community. She refuses to let anyone thwart her imagination when it comes to envisioning a radically different future full of care webs, nurturance and collective liberation.