CONNECTIONS to identifying as a transgender non-binary person for KL Joy were slow. Joy was 49 years old when their nibling (a non-gendered term for a sibling's child) formally confirmed they were non-binary. This was the key turning point for Joy to be more open and aware about their gender identity.
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Tuesday marked Joy's first time celebrating International Day of Transgender Visibility with City of Ballarat raising the transgender flag before the town hall, also for the first time on Tuesday morning.
Awareness and visibility is important for Joy, now aged 51, for acceptance and inclusion but also for people in the LGBTIQ+ community, and particularly the transgender community, to know they were not alone.
This come after a year in which Joy started their medical transition to masculinity just before the pandemic hit. The transition was not to become male, Joy said, but to help create gender fluidity, as a non-binary person.
"Everyone says the first year is the hardest and it certainly was not as good to try and seek advice and support on Zoom from people who had experience," Joy said.
"This is the first time I can gather with my community and do this...It's important. If youth can't imagine their future past a post-apocalyptic climate change world as being anything positive, particularly imagine how this might be for a transgender youth when there is not transvisibility."
Joy was proud to have their mum and biggest supporter, Lynda Genser, at the flag raising.
People who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and asexual make up almost 10 per cent of Ballarat's population, making the city the fifth-highest local government area in the state, according to 2017 data.
The transgender flag flew in Ballarat for the first time in November at Child and Family Services Ballarat in Lydiard Street.
At the time, Cafs employee Sage Akouri said it was a momentous occasion to promote inclusion for Ballarat's transgender and gender diverse people, but also to show Ballarat was a welcoming place. Akouri said it was really pleasing to see out the front of town hall.
"Our goal through raising the flag at Cafs was a transvisibility call to action, encouraging others to step up and do the same thing," Akouri said. "I do hope the flag encourages other businesses to follow council leadership and council does show support for the transgender community."
Transgender people are those who gender identity is different from what they were assigned at birth. KL Joy also carried the non-binary flag at ceremony, which is a more specific sub-group of transgender people who do no identify exclusively as male or female.
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City of Ballarat mayor Daniel Moloney, in speaking at the flag ceremony, said there was still so much to learn, including in health and education, about transgender people.
Cr Moloney hoped flying the flag would be a symbol of respect, pride, unity, acceptance and greater understanding rather than, for so long, as it had been a symbol of refuge. He called on Ballarat's business and sporting communities, and council, to consider what more they could do to be genuinely proactive and inclusive.
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