BUENOS AIRES — Under the glare of rainbow-colored strobe lights, a disc jockey spun Grace Jones’s disco version of “La Vie en Rose” one night last week as couples clinked beer bottles to celebrate passage of a new law that Argentina’s transgender community describes as groundbreaking.
Argentina has put in place some of the most liberal rules on changing gender in the world, allowing people to alter their gender on official documents without first having to receive a psychiatric diagnosis or surgery.
The measure, which won unanimous support in the Senate this month, would also require public and private medical practitioners to provide free hormone therapy or gender reassignment surgery for those who want it — including those under the age of 18.
Argentina’s law goes well beyond those passed in Britain in 2004 and in Spain in 2007 that allow individuals to change their name and sex after receiving diagnoses of persistent gender dysphoria, a condition in which individuals feel trapped in the body of the wrong sex.
“There have been a lot of changes to the laws on gender all over the world, but Argentina is cutting edge,” said Harper Jean Tobin, the policy counsel for the National Center for Transgender Equality in Washington. “All the other laws have burdensome requirements with unwanted medical procedures forced on people or denied when they’re needed.”
The move comes two years after Argentina became the first country in Latin America to legalize gay marriage. It is the latest in a spate of liberal rulings on civil rights issues, including a law that decriminalizes abortion in rape cases and gives the terminally ill the right to die.