My Take | Whatever the pronoun, Canada is now the world’s ‘wokest’ country
- From gender transition to hard drugs and ending it all, this is the place to be as long as you don’t drink too much and mind the slippery slope
Canada is now the “wokest” country. For a while, Scotland under First Minister Nicola Sturgeon enjoyed that moniker. But then, London went out of its way – the first time in the 24-year history of Scotland’s devolved jurisdiction or home rule – to veto her government’s gender reform bill that would have made it easier for people to make their gender transition legally and medically.
And then Sturgeon had to make an embarrassing U-turn by transferring a trans “woman” out of a women’s prison after it was revealed that the person was convicted of rape twice (against biological women) previously as a man.
Canada has had such laws for years. As a Canadian, I am currently identified as a man. But if I so wish, I could easily change my gender, as with my passport application and driving licence renewal.
If I become a convict, though, it’s debatable where the law as currently stated would lock me up as a trans.
In government offices and pharmacies, some restaurants, hotels and other places, employees who have to wear a name tag now usually put their preferred pronouns in brackets such as (she, her) and (they, them). The latter means you want to be identified as gender-neutral – and singular.
Outsiders reading Canadian news reports may sometimes be confused when “they” and “them” can sometimes refer to a single person.