Switzerland remaining neutral

On Wednesday, 28^th December 2022, the Swiss government rejected introducing a third-gender or no-gender option for official records. “The binary gender model is still strongly anchored in Swiss society,” said the governing Federal Council. “The social preconditions for the introduction of a third gender or for a general waiver of the gender entry in the civil registry currently are not there.”

The recent trend for people to seek to leave behind their biological sex and replace it with a gender identity is creating a significant level of disagreement among different groups, and, for now, Switzerland appears to be attempting to maintain a neutral stance towards gender identity theory. However, Switzerland is not entirely neutral as it has already recognised self-ID and since 1st January 2022, any individual over 16 who is not under legal guardianship can change their gender simply by visiting the civil registry office.Currently, children aged 16 and under and those under adult protection require guardian consent; however, the requirement for any medical intervention or diagnosis is no longer necessary to change a person’s legal status. Before this, people who sought to change their gender required a certificate from a medical professional who evaluated the individual and recommended that they undergo medical transition.

Currently, roughly two dozen countries seek to decouple gender identity markers from medical evaluation or extensive bureaucracy. The gender self-identification movement, however, often creates more problems than it solves. Sex-based data analysis is impossible in all countries that accept self-ID as, for example, the healthcare industry, the prison services and educational institutions will not be able to assess needs according to biological sex but instead will only have data that is collected based upon the individual’s gender identity.

There are currently no harmonised rules across Switzerland as to whether transwomen are put into female or male prisons, even though studies have shown that the proportion of male-born transwomen in the prison system who are sex offenders is significantly higher than the average population. Between 60 per cent and 61.3 per cent of transwomen in prisons are sex offenders, while roughly 18% of biological males and 3% of biological females are registered as sex offenders.

Women-only areas may now become mixed-sex as fully intact males can easily legally identify as female. The Marzili outdoor pool in the middle of Bern has a sign that reads: “Women’s section – entry for women only.” Hidden behind wooden walls, women swim and sunbathe naked. The women are mostly left alone in this so-called ‘paradiesli’, but predatory men have tried to gain access from time to time. A 66-year-old woman from Bern noted, “Some men have already climbed trees to stare. Or they stand on the Monbijou Bridge in spring, when the bushes on the right side do not yet have that much foliage and watch us through binoculars. Disgusting!”

It’s not only female-only spaces that are impacted by self-ID. Switzerland currently has compulsory military service for all able-bodied males but not for females. Anecdotally Switzerland has a higher than usual number of sleepwalkers among men compared to women as this has been a popular way to avoid military service; it will be interesting to see if men leave behind somnambulism and instead choose to identify out of conscription with a simple declaration in the civil registry office.

There are more serious implications however and, as with all westernised countries, the number of young people identifying as transgender is soaring in Switzerland. The Genspect-affiliated AMQG (Association pour une Approche Mesurée des Questionnements de Genre chez les Jeunes) point out that 16-year-old Swiss children without a significant history of gender dysphoria in childhood have been authorised hormone treatment and irreversible medical interventions such as mastectomies after fewer than five sessions with a psychiatrist. These aggressive practices are part of the highly controversial gender affirmative model that informs specific paediatric departments of Swiss public hospitals.

The Swiss government’s decision to reject a third gender suggests that it’s acceptable to identify as a different sex but not as an unknowable gender identity. Perhaps the Swiss government weren’t keen on spending money updating the civil register, passports and all the other bureaucracy involved in acknowledging different gender identities and instead chose to implement self-ID as a cheaper alternative?

Only time will tell how these radical changes in policies will play out as the rise of individualism sweeps across the world and the needs of the greater good are dismissed in favour of the desires of the individual.