Well, I believe that the main problem that lesbians face in Mexico
has to do with invisibility. This means that there is no specific provision,
or a specific approach to meet the needs that
we, lesbian women have when it comes to health, access to work,
or the possibility of development within the work environment.
I think that in the school environment,
or the education system in general, the problem is not that great.
Those who really
face challenges are trans people.
Also, it's almost as if bisexuality did not exist in our country.
Something that we
realized really soon is that the voices
of lesbian, bisexual, and queer women were nowhere to be seen,
and unfortunately that's just true in
Australia.
And we know that there are
serious issues to be dealt with; there
are really serious issues when it comes
to the mental health of lesbian, bisexual,
and queer women with the levels of
sexual harassment that they face, and
there's all of these issues that
need to be brought to the attention of
the UN and the Australian Government
to make sure that more is done to protect
their rights.
I feel like there will be a great help
to possibly push the passing of a
gender recognition law, to implement properly - 
help implement properly -  the
anti-discrimination laws, and generally
every woman has a right to health care,
and if we can achieve better empathy and
understanding, and a safe space for these
LBQT women to attend regular
screenings and generally receiving
health care, that will be amazing.
I believe that, after Beiijng, it has not been possible
for us to go back. That is, since Beijing, the different spaces
within the United Nations were increasingly including
sexual orientation and gender identity as two dimensions that had to be considered.
As a matter of fact, today we have the opportunity to raise the specific challenges
that LBT women are facing:
this seems to me like an opportunity we can not waste. We have been involved
mainly with the CSW, but now CEDAW allows us to
have a much stronger articulation and approach of reporting, conversation
with the experts, which makes the government pay more attention to what we are requesting.
There's still so many
issues that don't get any attention, and
we think that is really important that
people hear the voices of lesbian,
bisexual, and queer women, and we're
really excited that, you know, we can
work with ILGA and make sure that this
happens right here on the world stage.
It has been so fantastic to meet so many
incredible advocates from the LGBTI
community here in Geneva!
Sometimes it can feel really isolating:
we are on the
other side of the world, we're in a
completely different time zone, and it's
really difficult sometimes to get that
sense of community where we are, and get
a sense of the global international
issues facing our community, so it's been
such an incredible experience and I've
been really proud to be able to speak here at the UN.
I think that having prepared an alternate report
allowed us to
have a much clearer general framework regarding which protections
we have at the international level and which we have at the local level.
It was the first time that we elaborated an alternate report,
and having an advice, a permanent communication with the office of ILGA for us
was very, very important.
This defined a much more specific route on which issues we could address,
how we could delve into some issues,
what we had to use as references.
The experience has been great:
I've got a great system that helps me
and I feel like they're paving the way
for every activist here representing
NGOs to have better results in
communication with thr CEDAW committee.
There is no question that, without the
support of ILGA, I would not have been
able to fly all the way across the world
to make sure that the CEDAW committee
actually heard the voices of lesbian,
bisexual, and queer women.
With the funding
and support from ILGA
we were able to make sure that those issues were
heard, that they were front and center.
I mean it's a great experience,
it's a great way for your issues to be heard on an -
I guess you can say - international level.
We had the opportunity to have a dialogue
with the government,
so that they can take our conditions
into better consideration.
I think it is a very systematic, profound way of working
that can really have an impact on the lives
of LBT women in our countries and in our society.
My advice, if you are thinking of engaging with CEDAW, is that it is actually a
really easy process to go through:
please get in touch with Kseniya and the
amazing folk here at ILGA: they can
help you out, they can give you tips and
pointers... It doesn't have to be something
that's daunting: it's supposed to be an
accessible system, and it is so important
that your voice is heard.
