A friend who is a police officer, I’ll call him Jim, also works part-time doing security in an office building. Jim is required to check visitor’s IDs and have them sign in. He told me that recently, a very tall, professionally-dressed woman came into the building and when Jim asked her (we’ll call her Casey) for ID, Casey presented a driver’s license. The photo on the permit revealed a man with a five o’clock shadow, and the gender identification showed M.
“This ID indicates that you are a male,” Jim said politely to Casey. Casey replied cheerfully, “Actually, I was born a male, but I am in the process of transitioning to female.” Although there was some resemblance in facial features, Jim felt that the person pictured on the ID and the one standing before him might — or might not — be the same person. So, what’s a person to do when that happens? The issue is not only a quandary for people like Jim, but others are also concerned about how to handle this kind of situation, now and in the future.
When we are born, our gender is recorded on our birth certificate. Do transgenders receive an altered birth certificate to reflect their sex change? Will birth certificates eventually be revised to include a blank line following the word sex or gender with a check-box “To be determined.” Or will sex be presented as a multiple choice option? Please check one: __male, __female, __ both, __ other.
I am not trying to be funny or mean-spirited. It’s a fact that things are changing in this world at warp speed and many changes are beyond the scope of imagination, or to put another way — stranger than fiction.