Photo/Illutration A transgender woman, left, and her wife enter the Kyoto Family Court on July 16. (Yuki Chai)

KYOTO--A transgender woman in her 50s has filed a petition with the Kyoto Family Court to change her gender from male to female in the family register.

According to the July 16 petition and other documents, the Kyoto resident married her wife in 2015. 

She began transitioning afterward, and as their marriage remains on good terms, the two have no intention of divorcing.

But why does her relationship status matter?

A provision of the special law regarding gender identity disorder does not allow married individuals to update their gender in the family register.

The couple faced a choice—legally separate or give up on the gender change. 

The trans woman stated in her petition that the provision is unconstitutional and invalid because it violates the right to self-determination, among others, guaranteed by Article 13 of the Constitution.

She said every time she submits documentation with her registered gender, such as a prescription or her My Number card, it is mistaken as a family member's or another person's.

This has resulted in her having to explain her entire situation numerous times.

“I am being forced to ‘come out,’ which I do not want,” she said. “I want the documents to match reality.”

The special law stipulates five requirements for changing one’s gender in the family register.

One is the now-defunct “sterility requirement.” The Supreme Court ruled in October 2023 that it is unconstitutional and invalid to require individuals to remove their reproductive organs to qualify.

Another is the “appearance requirement.” In June this year, the Hiroshima High Court ruled that a mandatory change in the appearance of one's genitalia “may be unconstitutional if surgery is required.”

The Kyoto resident's case disputes the constitutionality and validity of the law's “non-marriage requirement.”

The reasoning behind this particular stipulation is if someone changes their gender after getting married, they and their spouse would be officially registered as a same-sex couple as a result. This remains illegal under current law.

For gender reassignment, the applicant must be legally single.

This is not the first time someone has challenged this requirement.

In February 2019, a married company owner in Kyoto diagnosed with gender identity disorder transitioned and filed a petition for a gender change in the family register.

The Kyoto Family Court rejected it and the person lost an appeal to the Osaka High Court. The Supreme Court also dismissed the special appeal in March 2020.

The Supreme Court then ruled that the non-marriage requirement was “reasonable because it was based on the consideration that allowing married people to change their gender could cause confusion in the current order, which recognizes only opposite-sex marriages.”

Since then, there have been a number of lawsuits asserting that the refusal to recognize same-sex marriages violates the Constitution. The resulting rulings of courts across the country agreed, declaring the provision “unconstitutional” or of an “unconstitutional status.”

In March this year, the Sapporo High Court ruled that the current situation is unconstitutional, stating that “the Constitution also guarantees same-sex marriage.”

(This article was written by Yuki Chai and Yumin Seki.)

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