There could be some 35,000 transgender Singaporeans, based on international studies that estimate that 1% of any population is transgender. According to sociology, there exists a cognitive limit that humans can only form meaningful connections with about 150 other individuals. If the 1 in 100 people are transgender estimate is true, that means on average, all of us must have known at least one transgender person in our lifetime. To drive the point home, there’s at least one transgender person in the same MRT train as you at any one time.
But where are they? They only exist in Netflix shows, right, I never saw one in real life. But that’s the thing. Transgender people do exist, and in lieu of 31st March being the International Transgender Day of Visibility, it is about acknowledging transgender people’s existence and the reasons why it is still so hard for transgender people to exist and show up, especially in the workplace.
In Singapore, transgender people go through painful yet invisible pains of discrimination, starting from the non-transparent standards to change our documents’ legal sex marker, which trickle down to every other aspect of everyday life, such as housing, healthcare rights, institutionalised bullying in schools and the workplace, and many more. The main reason why so few people know a transgender person or say they have seen one is because many transgender individuals feel unsafe to come out (declaring that they’re transgender others).
A survey done by TransgenderSG stated that about half of transgender people report how general transphobia and discrimination towards trans and non-binary people was a major barrier to finding employment. A quarter had someone at work spread rumours about their gender, sexual orientation or sex life, and 20.8% reported that they had been repeatedly and intentionally misgendered in the workplace by their colleagues.
Despite enormous strides in equality and human rights, It is clear that the system still egregiously fails these tens of thousands of people, individuals who are eager to be productive and contribute to society. It is not a question of caring about transgender people only when one shows up; they are already there. We are already here, hiding our pain when bosses and colleagues unknowingly use the wrong name, because we fear unfair treatment at best if people know, and getting terminated from work at worst.
As a workplace, do not wait and be on the wrong side of history. Everyone benefits when doors of opportunity open wider to admit more people. It is our professional and fundamentally human obligation to make the workplace a space where all persons feel safe to be productive and perform to the best of their ability, without fear of biased treatment and a hostile environment. What benefits us, what benefits them, also benefits you.
This article is written by Denada Permatasari, a transmale volunteer with The T Project Singapore.