Australian group calls for trans Facebook option
An Australian lobby group has said that Facebook users should be given the option of listing themselves as trans because the ‘male’ and ‘female’ options are too narrow.
Brisbane’s Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays Association told the Courier-Mail that lots of trans people wanted another option.
Group spokeswoman Shelley Argent said: “They should definitely do it and they’d be quite surprised by how many people there are in the community who are transgender that do use Facebook.”
However, some of those commenting on the article argued that the majority of trans people preferred to describe themselves as their acquired gender.
One wrote: “Being a transgender person myself, why the hell would I select transgender, when I know what sex I identify as?”
Facebook product manager Naomi Gleit said users had the choice of removing references to their gender entirely from their accounts and profiles.
In January, a Canadian trans man had his Facebook account suspended after posting photos of his bare chest.
Calgary resident Dominic Scaia posted the images after his chest reconstruction, which showed light, well-healed scarring.
He eventually persuaded Facebook to reinstate his account, arguing that he should be treated as a man and that images of his scars were not gratuitous.
