A British expat who became the first person in the world to be officially recognised as genderless has lost his no-gender status.
Norrie May-Welby, who moved to Australia when he was seven, is a man but chose to undergo a sex change operation 20 years ago.
However, Mr May-Welby wasn’t happy with his new body and chose to stop taking female hormones to become a “neuter”.
Gender
When Australian doctors examined Mr May-Welby they claimed to be unable to determine his gender, and officials eventually agreed to alter his birth certificate to a new no-gender classification.
But Australian officials have now withdrawn Mr May-Welby’s no-gender status after legal advice suggested they didn’t have the power to issue a genderless classification.
Discrimination
Mr May-Welby has responded by lodging an official complaint under the Sex Discrimination Act.
Earlier this year it was revealed that a 16-year-old boy is to become the nation’s youngest sex change patient after the NHS approved his surgery.
Currently the youngest Britain to have undergone sex change surgery is Oliver Wheadon, now known as Angel Paris-Jordan, who had his sex change operation shortly before turning 18.
Psychiatric
Critics of sex change operations have previously warned that gender dysphoria is a psychiatric problem, not a physical one, and radical physical surgery does more harm than good.
In 2002 doctors from the NHS Portman Clinic – an internationally acclaimed centre – stated, “what many patients find is that they are left with a mutilated body, but the internal conflicts remain”.
Many transsexuals regret their decision to live in the opposite sex. A Home Office report on transsexualism, released in April 2000, said: “Many people revert to their biological sex after living for some time in the opposite sex”.