Kitty Anderson (activist)
Kitty Anderson | |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Community activist |
| Known for | Intersex activist, co-chair of OII Europe |
Kitty Anderson is an Icelandic intersex activist. She is a co-chair of European intersex organization OII Europe, a co-founder of Intersex Iceland, and chairman of the board of the Icelandic Human Rights Centre.[1] She has been described as a "leading voice of the intersex movement in Europe."[2]
Background
[edit | edit source]Kitty Anderson was born with androgen insensitivity. She found out when she was 13, but only found out she was born with internal testes when she was aged 22.[3][4] Anderson has reported that her "mother was told to lie" to her until she was aged 13.[5][6]
Activism
[edit | edit source]Anderson co-founded Intersex Iceland in 2014,[7] and currently serves as its chairperson.[3] She is co-chair and spokesperson[8] of OII Europe and chairperson of the board of the Icelandic Human Rights Centre.[1] She has also served on the board of Samtökin '78, Iceland's national queer organization, and the national Ministry of Welfare Queer Committee from 2014 to 2016.[3] Anderson has spoken against secrecy and shame associated with intersex:
When I found out I was 13 and I completely freaked out. There can be a lot of secrecy and stigma related to being intersex and it was something that had been kept from me. But when my cousin – who is also intersex – was born a couple of years later, my family didn’t keep it a secret and it was a healing process for all of us [4]
She also campaigns against intersex medical interventions.[9][10] In an interview with NIKK, Anderson has stated that "surgeries will continue until we get a law that prohibits them".[11]
Anderson has presented to the Council of Europe Committee on Bioethics,[12] and speaks at a range of conferences,[2][13] media,[14][15][16] and human rights institutions across Scandinavia and Europe.[17]
In 2015, Anderson campaigned to change terminology in the biology curriculum in Icelandic schools, and dictionaries, after finding out that the word intersex was being translated into Icelandic as "freak".[18][19] The publisher of the school text later apologized.[20]
References
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