New Podcast Intersex Gets Legit, with Sara Kelly Keenan!
It’s up! We are so happy to announce our new podcast Intersex Gets Legit, featuring a conversation (39 minutes) between intersex activist and third gender recognition pioneer Sara Kelly Keenan and our founding director Hida Viloria.
“At a time when things look dark federally, wonderful flowers are blooming in the progressive states, and the germination will spread, as with marriage equality, the germination will spread nationally, it’s just a matter of time. I’m thoroughly optimistic about that.” – Sara Kelly Keenan, Intersex Gets Legit
The interview was recorded on Intersex Awareness Day, Oct 26, 2017, and we couldn’t have hoped for a better guest for our podcast launch! Keenan is California’s first non-binary citizen, and the first American to receive an intersex birth certificate. She worked in solidarity with non-binary, trans and gender nonconforming community members in pushing forward and attaining third gender legislation in California which supports the entire LGBTQIA community.
Our host spoke with Keenan about what being intersex means to her, and how third gender recognition supports intersex human rights and an end to IGM, as well as equality for all non-binary people. Keenan’s words and work are a testament to the power of working in solidarity, and we thank her for this beautiful, inspiring interview–enjoy!
Episode 1
What a wonderful interview! I’m one of the many, many intersex people who know I am intersex and who was never mutilated physically. I would love to have an intersex marker on my birth certificate but heck, I’d be happy to just get the right name/sex. One of the things that absolutely must happen in the future is to get rid of the 48hour rule for sexing a baby. In the face of intersex reality let alone trans reality there is no way that a doctor can sex a baby without intersex as an option within 48hrs. And then to treat that sexing as if it is carved in stone and can not – must not be modified in anyway unless the child’s body has been modified in some way? It’s not a joke. It’s legal and medical malpractice and abusive. As an adult it means that some of us have lived a whole life as if we’re a man or woman with all the documents and life experiences of that sex but with a birth certificate that doesn’t match any of it. As Sara knows as a legal assistant, that is a legal limbo that doesn’t even measure up to 2nd class. Let’s hope there is an end to that soon.