Transgender World

Spain aims at penalizing so-called “conversion therapy” - practices that attempt to change a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.

The reform, passed by Congress on 25 June 2026, would amend the Penal Code to punish these abuses with prison sentences of six months to two years, as well as fines.

This applies even when supposed “consent” has been given, recognizing that pressure from families, institutions or religious groups can make such consent meaningless.

The measure is an important victory for LGBTQ rights campaigners and survivors, who have long argued that conversion practices are not therapy, but psychological violence. International human rights experts, including within the UN system, have described such practices as deeply harmful and potentially amounting to torture.

Spain already banned conversion therapy under its 2023 trans and LGBTQ equality law, but campaigners said administrative sanctions were not enough. Criminal penalties send a clearer message: LGBTQ identities are not illnesses, and no one should be shamed, coerced or “treated” for being who they are. The reform still has to pass through the Senate, where changes may be proposed.

El Congreso aprueba la reforma del Código Penal para penalizar con cárcel las 'terapias de conversión' para personas LGTBIQ+

Las mal llamadas terapias de conversión se castigarán con hasta dos años de prisión

New York City Announces New Support for Trans Healthcare

Gay City News reports that New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has announced three initiatives aimed at protecting and expanding access to gender-affirming care for transgender New Yorkers.

His administration will direct $15 million toward a care access fund for providers of youth gender-affirming care, create a call and text line to guide residents to services and information, and fund research to improve care access and health outcomes.

More here.

An ethics committee at the Oslo University Hospital has found three five researchers connected to Norway’s national gender incongruence treatment service guilty of serious breaches of research ethics in studies involving transgender patients.

Although Norway is known for relatively openminded attitudes towards trans people, both as far as policy making and public opinion are concerned, the global backlash has also had an effect here.

So it does not help that the public health support services for trans people remains locked into the quasi-monopoly of the National Treatment Service for Gender Incongruence (NBTK) at the Oslo University Hospital ("Riksen" or OUS).

Among Norwegian trans people the doctors there are known for their conservative gate-keeping.

They seem to think they are qualified to decide who are "real" trans people and who are not, based on rather old fashioned ideas about gender expression and "normal" sexuality.

And yes, the waiting lines for hormone treatments and surgery are long.

Unethical use of patient-data in research

Their arrogance is also reflected in their disregard for basic research ethics when it comes to using the data they gather through their handling of transgender clients.

They have been using data from medical records without getting the consent of the people involved.

An ethics committee at Oslo University Hospital has now found three five researchers guilty of serious breaches of research ethics in studies involving transgender people and young people with gender incongruence. The case concerns the use of patient records and registry data in four published articles.

[Update: The LGBTQ magazine Blikk reports that five researchers have been criticized.]

The researchers named are Anne Wæhre, Trond H. Diseth og Cecilie Bjertness Nyquist.

The Report

Redelighetsutvalget (i.e. The Committee on Research Integrity) is a joint body for the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Oslo (UiO), Oslo University Hospital Trust (OUS), and Akershus University Hospital Trust (Ahus).

According to their 164-page report (as obtained by the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten), the committee has concluded that the researchers has acted with gross negligence.

In two of the articles, the breaches were so serious that they amounted to scientific misconduct, and they should be retracted. In the two remaining articles, the committee has found that the conduct is blameworthy, though not scientific misconduct of the most serious kind.

The breaches includes lack of patient consent, missing approval from the Regional Committees for Medical and Health Research Ethics, no exemption from confidentiality rules, insufficient anonymisation, and unclear legal and ethical justification for the use of registry data.

The committee also points to systemic failures at Oslo University Hospital, including weak institutional oversight and confusion over the boundary between research and quality assurance.

The whistleblowers are the Patient Organisation for Gender Incongruence (PKI) and an expert in statistics.

The researchers may appeal the ruling.

Oslo University Hospital seems to a violated transgender rights again

Oslo University Hospital Censured for Unlawful Research on Transgender Minors

What Transphobic Norwegian Doctors can Teach Us about the Diversity of Transgender People

Norwegian doctors/gatekeepers stop transgender kids from getting the treatment they need

Aftenposten: Tre forskere felt for vitenskapelig uredelighet i forskning på transpersoner (paywall)

Jack Molay

Dr Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju is an Indian doctor, actress, content creator and transgender rights advocate.

She is widely described as Karnataka’s first transgender woman doctor, having studied medicine at Kasturba Medical College, Manipal.

She became well known online by documenting her gender transition and speaking about queer and trans rights, medical discrimination, bullying, mental health and the need for LGBTQIA+-inclusive healthcare.

As an actress, she is best known for playing Meher Chaudhry in Amazon Prime Video’s Made in Heaven season 2, a role noted for bringing a trans woman character into a major Indian streaming drama. She has also appeared in Rainbow Rishta and Kankhajura.

In an interview with NDTV she says:

"On some level, there is this delusional child-like part of you that watches an Aaja Nachle at age 10, and just magically believes that I will grow up to be this beautiful woman. And when puberty starts happening, your body tells you, 'No, it's not going to happen.' That's when the reality of your biology starts kicking in and that intensifies the distress and discomfort significantly. Gender dysphoria kicked in very hard in my teen years."

More here.

This video has more on her journey in particular and transgender identities in general.

Lush’s Trans Tiger Sparks Backlash and Pride

A Pride display at a Lush store in Chelmsford, England, has drawn right-wing outrage over a tiger with top surgery scars, them reports.

Created by queer artist Bucky Ringsell, the mural shows a tiger striped in the pink, white and blue of the transgender flag beside the words “Proud of My Stripes.”

The artwork went viral after Chelmsford City Council highlighted Pride displays. Transphobes accused Lush of promoting surgery to young people. Ringsell, who has undergone top surgery, defended the mural as a celebration of trans people and of learning to take pride in one’s scars.

Ringsell wrote:

A new Gallup poll shows that support for LGBTQ+ rights in the United States remains historically high, but no longer appears to be rising.

According to the poll, 65 percent of US adults say same-sex marriage should be legal, down from 71 percent in 2022 and 2023. Acceptance of same-sex relationships as “morally acceptable” has also fallen, from 71 percent in 2022 to 62 percent today.

The fall is driven largely by a growing partisan divide. Democratic and independent voters remain broadly supportive, while Republican support has declined sharply.

The same pattern affects attitudes toward transgender people. About four in ten Americans now say it is morally acceptable for people to live in accordance with a gender different from the one assigned at birth, down from nearly half in 2021.

These numbers should worry anyone who cares about equality. They do not show that LGBTQ+ people have become less worthy of rights, dignity or protection. LGBTQ people and their allies will keep on fighting.

J Molay

New US poll shows downtick in support for same-sex marriage and trans people

Acceptance of same-sex marriage and relationships in the U.S. has flattened after more than two decades of steadily increasing support, with an ongoing decline among Republicans, according to a new Gallup poll.

Dreamgirl or Nia Nal, DC's transgender superhero, becomes Wonder Woman in new comic.

DC’s Pride publishing line has given one of its most important transgender heroes a striking new symbolic role. Nia Nal, better known as Dreamer, is at the centre of Justice League: Dream Girls – A DC Pride Event, where she and fellow trans heroine Galaxy awaken on Themyscira, apparently living out an Amazon fantasy in which Dreamer steps into a Wonder Woman-like origin.

Nia Nal began as a character in the TV series Supergirl, played by transgender actor and activist Nicole Maines. She later crossed into DC Comics, becoming a rare example of a trans superhero who is not only represented on the page, but also shaped by trans creators.

Maines co-writes the new miniseries with Jadzia Axelrod, while artists including Nicola Scott help bring the story to life.

The premise is more than a costume change. Dreamer is being invited into one of DC’s most mythic spaces: Themyscira, the symbolic home of sisterhood, courage and heroic destiny. For trans readers, that matters.

DC Unveils New Trans Wonder Woman, And She's Perfect

DC Comics introduces the new Wonder Woman this week, as transgender hero Dreamer (aka Nia Nal) takes up the iconic mantle in Justice League: Dream Girls – A DC Pride Event #1.

Cartoon reveals the true consequences of the British transgender bathroom ban

The British newspaper The Guardian has completely failed in its duty to deliver fact based and compassionate journalism as far as transgender people go. Instead it has contributed to the transphobic hysteria that has now caused British trans people to be excluded from gendered public spaces.

That being said, it is good to see that someone in the newspaper gets it, namely the cartoonist Ella Baron.

And shame on the British Labour Party, which has actively promoted and implemented this hateful violation of fundamental human rights!

Jack Molay

[Cartoon of a lonely young trans person sitting on a bed beneath a transgender pride flag, while a laptop shows news about EHRC rules excluding trans people from single-sex toilets and a chat invitation they decline. Text above reads: “Separate but equal…”]

The UK’s new draft EHRC Code of Practice marks a profound setback for transgender people in Great Britain. The country is facing public bathroom Apartheid for trans people.

Presented by the government as “clear” and “practical” guidance after the Supreme Court ruled that “sex” in the Equality Act means biological sex, the code would in practice make ordinary public life far more hostile for trans people.

The most alarming consequence is the treatment of single-sex spaces. According to the guidance, if a women’s service admits a trans woman, or a men’s service admits a trans man, it may no longer count as single-sex and could face legal challenge.

Toilets, changing rooms, hospital wards, gyms, refuges and associations may therefore feel pressured to exclude trans people from spaces matching their lived gender.

The code says providers should consider alternatives, such as gender-neutral facilities, and that it is unlikely to be proportionate to leave a trans person with no toilet at all.

But this is cold comfort. Many buildings lack suitable “third spaces”, and making trans people use separate or accessible toilets risks outing them, marking them as different, and exposing them to harassment.

The government’s own equality impact assessment acknowledges potential “double exclusion”, involuntary disclosure and gender policing.

This is not merely a technical legal clarification. It tells trans people that their presence in public may be treated as a problem to be managed. A trans woman entering a women’s changing room, or a trans man using a men’s facility, could now trigger suspicion, complaint or exclusion. The result will be fear, self-censorship and withdrawal from public life.

We can call this Restroom Apartheid, because the use of restrooms for segregation and harassment was a tool used by racists to control people of color, both in South Africa and in the American South.

The "logic" is as follows: People of color and trans people are different and therefore dangerous. We cannot allow them to get close to our women and children (i.e. the property of men), and we must therefore purify all intimate spaces used by cishet white women and their children.

A humane equality law should protect dignity, safety and participation. This guidance will do the opposite.

Jack Molay

Single-sex toilets must exclude transgender people, says EHRC

How the United Kingdom’s ‘trans code’ will bar trans people from public spaces

The UK government has introduced don’t ask, don’t tell for trans people.

Toilets and changing rooms must be used on basis of biological sex, guidance confirms

UK Gov press release: Organisations receive clear, accessible guidance on how to implement equality law in updated draft Code of Practice

Nepal has taken a historic step for LGBTIQ+ inclusion by creating a new Ministry of Women, Children, Gender and Sexual Minorities and Social Security.

The move, made under Prime Minister Balendra Shah’s government as part of a wider administrative restructuring, formally places gender and sexual minorities within the mandate of a national ministry.

The new ministry is expected to work on protection, empowerment and social security for women, children, marginalized communities and LGBTIQ+ people.

Spain has overtaken Malta to take first place in ILGA-Europe’s 2026 Rainbow Map, ending Malta’s ten-year run at the top of the European ranking of LGBTI rights laws and policies.

The organization says Spain’s rise reflects a series of legal and policy advances, including the depathologization of trans identities in healthcare, stronger anti-discrimination protections, national LGBTI and trans strategies, and the creation of an independent equal treatment authority.

ILGA-Europe presents Spain’s success as an example of political courage at a time when LGBTI rights are increasingly being used as a weapon in culture wars and authoritarian politics.

But the group also stresses that legal progress does not automatically translate into safety in everyday life. In Spain, reported assaults against LGBTI people have risen, showing the continued impact of hate speech and social hostility.

The wider European picture is mixed. Some countries have made progress on trans rights, including reforms around legal gender recognition, while courts and European institutions have defended LGBTI protections. At the same time, ILGA-Europe warns of serious rollbacks in countries such as Belarus, Italy, Portugal, Slovakia, Turkey and Russia, where activists face growing legal and political risks.

ILGA press release.

The Rainbow Map here.

Volunteers and Allies Push Back Against Girlguiding’s Trans Exclusion

Campaigners across the UK are pushing back against Girlguiding’s decision to exclude trans girls, arguing that the organisation has abandoned its own promise to provide a safe and welcoming space for all girls, Sophie Molly reports.

Protests organised by Guiders Against Trans Exclusion (GATE) took place outside Girlguiding offices in London, Edinburgh, Belfast, Bath, Norwich and Birmingham.

At the Edinburgh demonstration, volunteers, parents and allies described the decision as painful, destabilising and rooted in fear rather than compassion.

Survey Links Barriers to Hormone Therapy With Higher Risk for Self Harm Among Trans Youth

Erin Reed reports on a new Trevor Project national survey showing how lack of access to gender-affirming care affects transgender and nonbinary young people in the United States.

The survey included 16,667 LGBTQ+ respondents, more than 10,000 of them trans, nonbinary or genderqueer. One of its starkest findings is that young people who wanted hormone therapy but could not get it were almost twice as likely to report a suicide attempt in the past year as those currently receiving hormones: 15 percent compared with 8 percent.

The article also challenges the political claim that trans youth are being rushed into medical treatment. Among trans and nonbinary respondents aged 13 to 17, only 10 percent said they were taking hormones, and only 3 percent reported using puberty blockers. Reed notes that many young people who do receive care fear losing it: 87 percent of those on hormones were worried about continued access.

If you are having thoughts about self-harm, do ask someone for help!

Anxiety & depression symptoms reported among LGBTQ+ young people in the US:

Read the article here!

In an essay published over at Crossdreamers I argue that transphobic trolls online should not be treated as sincere participants in a debate. Their aim is rarely truth-seeking - it is to dominate, exhaust and silence trans people and their allies.

The article links trolling to broader patterns of bullying, where aggression is used to enforce status, police gender norms and win approval from like-minded people.

Understanding the fears, shame or internal conflicts that motivate bullies is not the same as excusing them.

I recommend that you support the person being targeted, avoid direct debate, provide factual information only for the benefit of undecided observers, and block or ban persistent abusers early.

Above all, protect your mental health and refuse trolls the recognition they crave.

Read the article here!

By the way, if you want to keep up with recent transgender news, visit Transgender Report.

Ukraine’s parliament has taken a step backward on LGBTQ rights by approving draft Civil Code No. 15150 in its first reading on April 28 2026.

The bill passed with 254 votes and is now being prepared for a second reading, meaning it is not yet law.

Rights groups warn that, unless amended, it would hard-wire discrimination into the country’s core private-law framework at the very moment Ukraine says it wants to move closer to Europe.

The draft still defines family and unions in heterosexual terms, excluding same-sex couples from recognition and from related protections in areas such as inheritance and family status.

Even more alarming for trans people, the revised text keeps a provision that would automatically invalidate a marriage if one spouse legally transitions.

Ukraine cannot credibly present itself as a European democracy while advancing a code that leaves same-sex couples outside the law and threatens trans people’s family security. The second reading will show whether lawmakers intend to modernize civil law - or weaponize it.

Jack Molay

Проект Цивільного кодексу України

Оновлений проєкт Цивільного кодексу виносять на термінове голосування з порушенням регламенту

Everyone was outraged that the draft Civil Code allows marriage at the age of 14. This norm was removed, but problems with same-sex partnerships remained. What are they?

American voters do not trust Republicans on trans issues

A new Fox News poll undercuts the claim that supporting transgender rights is an electoral liability for Democrats. Erin Reed reports that voters say Democrats would handle transgender issues better than Republicans by 56 to 43 percent, a 13-point advantage and the second Fox poll this year to show a clear Democratic lead on the issue.

Trumps transphobic policies have limited reach beyond the conservative base. Democrats lead among Black, Hispanic and white voters, among all age groups, among moderates, Catholics, suburban voters and even military voters.

“Wokeness/transgender issues” barely registers when voters are asked to name the country’s most important problem.

The new chair of the UK LGBTQ organization Stonewall displays a dangerous naiveté in her defense of JK Rowling and British transphobic TERFs in an interview with The Guardian. She must resign now.

Jack Molay

Kezia Dugdale, the former leader of Scottish Labour, says she is now “quite scared” as a lesbian in Britain. She has reason to be afraid, because the current anti-transgender activism is very likely only the start of the long war against diversity, lesbian and gay people included.

But she demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of the mechanisms of evil bigotry in her defense of JK Rowling and TERFs (trans exclusionary radical feminists).

Sympathy for Rowling

The Guardian reports that when asked if she understood why many trans people feel that Rowling’s approach has become cruel and dehumanizing (which it is), and contributes to them feeling unwelcome and unaccepted (which it does), Dugdale answers:

“I understand that and I’ve also heard JK Rowling and other people who hold a different position on these issues to me describe with a similar rawness how they’ve experienced being opposed for their views. And I just think, the days of these culture wars, about sitting in polar extremes from each other, should be behind us now.”

No, the ethical choice is not always in the middle

She goes into the trap of centrist moderation, where the truth is always seen as lying somewhere between what is seen as the extremes.

But trans people who defend their right to live their lives as themselves, do not represents one extreme in opposition to another extreme. The right wing transphobes and the "gender critical" TERFs are the oppressors here, trans people are the victims.

Dugdale's approach would be like to try to find a sensible compromise between the Nazis and the Jews back in the 1930's. A representative of an LGBTQ organization must never, ever, give in to evil in this way.

Respect for Rowling

Apparently Dugdale wants to try and find common ground with the transphobic bullies as this is "the only path through this and it’s one that I’m committed to.”

What she says to the Guardian is mind-boggling:

“I have a huge respect for JK Rowling. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting her before and I think her story and how she came to be this prolific, incredible children’s writer in this city as a single mum writing in a cafe is phenomenal and an inspiration to so many women across the world. “I think she’s been a really powerful political advocate [for] improving the lot of single mums, making a case for tackling poverty and inequality in all its forms, and there is absolutely a place for her in public life to share her experiences and tell her story and make a difference.”

If a single mum like JK Rowling uses her huge fortune to force trans people out of public life, that is what any representative of any LGBTQ organization has to focus on. Rowling having written some books people might have found helpful in the past does not change this.

Dugdale cannot continue as chair of Stonewall after this.