GUADALAJARA, Mexico . Fausto Martínez is a non-binary person who lives in Guanajuato and is an LGBT activist. On February 11, their gender identity was officially recognized on their birth certificate following a legal challenge brought by the organizations Amicus , the Trans Youth Network , and Colmena 41. This marks the first time a non-binary person in Mexico has had their right to identity legally recognized.

As we previously discussed in Presentes , non-binary people exist. They are those who do not necessarily identify with the male or female genders. They can be both, neither, destroy that binary, or build something new.

Following the legal process, a judge granted Fausto's request for protection and ordered the Civil Registry of the State of Guanajuato to issue his birth certificate, which now reads the acronym "NB" in the sex box corresponding to the non-binary identity.

“I felt disbelief. It was unreal—I don’t know if that’s the right word—but if I could define one feeling, it would be immense joy. Joy because it’s also an achievement for those who accompanied me, and I hope it can be the beginning for others,” Fausto described in an interview with Presentes , the moment he held in his hands the birth certificate that recognizes his gender identity.

Guanajuato is a state in central Mexico where reforms guaranteeing the identity of transgender and non-binary people have not yet been approved. However, since last October, an initiative seeking to reform the Civil Code and the Law for the Protection of Human Rights in the State of Guanajuato to guarantee this right has been under review.

According to the initiative presented, from December 2019 to October 2021, at least 60 trans people from Guanajuato had to travel to Mexico City to process the birth certificate that recognizes their gender identity and name.

The beginning of everything

Fausto was able to put his gender identity into words when he was 18. Today he is 26 and since then the people who have supported him the most are his friends.

“There came a point when I consciously said, 'I'm not a man, I don't meet the characteristics, the expectations'; but I'm not a woman either. I started researching, reading, finding groups of non-binary people online, and that's when I felt that the non-binary spectrum fit me,” she told Presentes .

Last September, she requested that the National Electoral Institute (INE) reflect the acronym NB in ​​the gender marker on her voter ID card, in the "sex" box, alluding to her gender identity: non-binary.

“In a peaceful and respectful manner, I come to request that I be issued a voter ID card with a photograph in which I am assigned, instead of sex H, the sex of NB (non-binary),” said the letter that Fausto addressed to the president of the INE, Lorenzo Córdova, in September 2021.

The INE quickly responded to the request with a negative response. “They told us no, and that in order to issue my voter ID with my gender, I first had to rectify my birth certificate,” Fausto recalls.

This same request was also made by three other non-binary people from the states of Aguascalientes, Chihuahua and Jalisco.

Fausto was the only person to publicly request the INE (National Electoral Institute). “It brought me a lot of online harassment, to the point that I had to close my social media accounts because it was too much.”

Faced with the refusal, in October 2021 Fausto approached the Amicus , led by Guanajuato lawyer Juan Pablo Delgado, to promote an injunction before the Civil Registry of Guanajuato.

The legal protection process was also accompanied by the Trans Youth Network , coordinated by lawyer Jessica Marjane and Colmena 41 , a project co-founded by Enrique Torre Molina, an LGBT consultant.

“NB for non-binary”

In a statement , the civil organization Amicus indicated that in October they requested the Guanajuato State Civil Registry to rectify Fausto's birth certificate, but the institution responded negatively. Consequently, on November 10, Amicus filed a writ of amparo (a constitutional remedy).

In January 2022, a judge in the city of León (Guanajuato) granted the injunction and ordered the Civil Registry to issue Fausto's birth certificate, which was delivered on February 11.

The organizations celebrated the judge's ruling, but emphasized that it only has consequences for the person who filed the lawsuit. They added that they cannot guarantee that filing an injunction outside of Guanajuato will result in recognition of a gender identity outside the male/female binary. They further stated that recognition for non-binary or queer individuals registered in that state "is only possible after exhausting the injunction process."

“It was all very, very fast. I thought this was going to take more than six months, but basically in four months I had my new birth certificate with NB, NB for non-binary, which reflects my identity,” Fausto says in an interview.

Regarding the decision to have the acronym NB appear on his birth certificate instead of an X, as is the case in Argentina or Canada, Fausto commented: “The team was very frank with me. They told me: that's your decision. They brought up the cases of the DNI in Argentina where the X is used, but they told me it was my decision, a decision of self-perception. And that's how I decided on NB.”

“This is just the beginning”

The recognition of a trans person's gender identity on their birth certificate is only the first step towards having the rest of the official documents aligned with that information.

The beginning of it all is to standardize the Unique Population Registry Code (CURP) , which is an alphanumeric code whose function is to individually register Mexican and foreign people who reside or are in transit through Mexico.

This code consists of 18 characters, including sex, and is designated in binary form by an M or an H. For this reason, every trans person, and in some cases non-binary people, with a new birth certificate must obtain a new CURP.

Fausto is still not entirely clear on this and comments that "perhaps it would be to opt for an x, but even an x ​​can represent a lot or nothing in terms of the self-perception of a non-binary, queer, gender-fluid person…," Fausto maintains.

According to the document " Compendium of Practices for the Legal Recognition of Gender Identity in the Federal Entities of Mexico ," the importance of the CURP (Unique Population Registry Code) lies in the fact that many government agencies consider it an essential requirement for obtaining other documents such as passports, visas, voter registration cards, school diplomas, health cards, etc. Essentially, the CURP is necessary to access basic public services.

Fausto is aware that there is still a long way to go. “This is just the beginning… Juan Pablo and the Amicus team have told me that there is a long road ahead and that I will be accompanied until my identity is reflected in every instance. It will mean knocking on doors without success, then filing a lawsuit to get a judge to order them to act, because that's also what activism is about, isn't it? Knocking on doors, seeking conciliation, and where that fails, perhaps the legal route is the only option. But I believe there will be the will to act.”

“I think what has happened to me and what is happening in the country is a good moment to continue demanding recognition in all states, not only for older trans people, but also for children, and that non-binary people be included as well, because as they say colloquially: what isn't written doesn't exist. And if it doesn't exist, we will continue to pursue this through legal action, with all that it implies, and it shouldn't be this way,” Fausto concludes.