It’s been reported in several places, not least of all the BBC, that the Russian government is instituting new laws to prevent certain groups of people from being allowed to drive in Russia, among those groups the transgendered.
I’m here to tell you right now, that’s nothing more than clickbait.
The original BBC article was written in response to a news-release by an American publication called “Human Rights First.” This being their primary source, their backs are covered if someone calls out on the clickbait-style spin they’ve put on this.
(Pausing for a second to acknowledge that determined Anti-Russian propaganda in America is a thing at the moment… And done….we don’t really need to dwell on that any further.)
A little further investigation reveals that it is referring to a set of conditions established by the World Health Organization. The restrictions are contained within a document designated ICD-10. It establishes certain classifications for certain diseases and disorders.
You can download ICD-10 if you wish to read it yourself. Here is the link; http://ift.tt/QM0w0s
There is a *lot* I could say about this document, but it’s not relevant. The important parts are that;
A) This is not a Russian Document. This is an International Document providing a readily-available set of universal definitions for local governments and medical agencies to refer to.
B) ID-10s definitions aren’t intended as all-purpose and, because of that, using it is a full and complete reference is unwise. Because I don’t read Russian, I am unable to read the legal proposal itself. But considering that it’s not even law yet, I would remind people that our own government proposed a bill which technically made lesbianism illegal before they realized this would be its indirect effect and (as the whole process is designed to do) edited and fixed it before it went any further.
C) The ID-10 and, by proxy, the Russian law (if we assume it does actually exist in the form suggested by the BBC article which, given the absence of other sources, is questionable) only considers change in gender identity to fall into the category of ‘personality disorder’ where it is CAUSED by other disorders. The easiest illustration of this would be a biological male suffering from schizophrenic personality disorder, one of whom is a female persona. Again, the ID-10 definitions aren’t designed to be perfectly clear on the matter – they are guidelines.
What the Russian government has done is referred to an Internationally recognized, multicultural and impartial agency (the World Health Organisation) when considering what amounts to a sufficiently severe mental disorder worthy of preventing someone from driving.
They have not singled out transgenderism. They have not even included transgenderism. But the BBC has apparently learned what ‘clickbait’ is and the fact that a ‘change of gender identity’ is included, even within a perfectly reasonable context, on the list is sufficient justification for them to spin it and get *you* to do their advertising for them, making it viral.
Which is not to say there aren’t other reasons to question this kind of legislation. But saying that it seeks to prevent transgender people driving is an outright *lie*.
Given that the original article quoting it in this context was American, I will let you draw any further connections yourself.
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