On Intersex & Terminology

OII Australia is now a member of many LGBTI groups as an intersex representative organization and a participant in government and non-government reference and expert advisory groups.

In the past LGBTI has been referred to as the ‘sexuality and gender diverse’ community or the community of “sexual orientation and gender identity.” This was OK until OII came along.

Intersex includes people who are sexually diverse in the sense that most are in apparently standard heterosexual relationships as well as LGB relationships, some are in no relationship and some are in relationships that do not fit any current codification.

Intersex includes gender diversity in so far as many intersex are also men or women, some are also transsexual or transgender, others are also Hijra, twin-spirited, no-gendered, pan-gendered, multigendered and gendered in ways that do not fit current codification possibilities.

Intersex & biological diversity

All intersex however are physically, that is biologically, diverse. Intersex are people who have congenital hormonal physical or genetic differences that can be seen as being neither male or female, both male and female at once, somewhere between male and female or something else that escapes current paradigms for describing humanity.

Collective terms

‘Sexuality and gender diversity’ or ‘sexual orientation and gender identity’ cannot include all intersex people even if those terms are also intended to include heterosexual men and women or males and females as well as LGBT; there are intersex people who are none of those things.

The only terms that will do

The only possible collective terminology that allows for everyone is Sex, Sexuality and Gender Diversity.

The only term that should be used when referring specifically to intersex is intersex. No other will do.

Internal link:

• OII Australia – The Terminology of Intersex