For epidemiological reasons

In a public post in a public Facebook group, a discussion of what to tell contact tracers.

Layperson looking for feedback. So I am in training to be a contact tracer, I have a trans family member so I escalated the way we were initially asking these questions. For epidemiological reasons we are required to ask for the following information:

Sex at birth

Gender identity

Sexual orientation

I have now been asked to create the verbatim myself that will go out to all the trainers for current and future training. The reason for this post is I am hoping to hear what would be prefered in terms of the verbiage for how a tracer would ask for that info.

Preferred meaning what? The goal here is getting accurate information. The goal is not flattering the feelings of people who think they have bespoke genders. This is a pandemic, people, not a meeting of the Self-obsessed Society.

But sure enough – the third reply proudly announces a policy of not telling the truth.

Speaking as a layperson, quite frankly regardless of the method used, if someone came to me asking me these questions, I’m going to give you answers to those that Will probably make those data points irrelevant. I would flat out refuse to answer any questions about my sexual orientation, and I’m going to match my sex at birth to my gender identity Because there’s no way I’m outing myself to you. It’s nothing personal to the contract [sic] tracer, but I don’t know them, and I don’t know what’s being done with this *public* data on the back end, and I don’t want anything to come around and bite me later with someone who might decide to misgender me in the current political climate. I despise the idea that some researcher somewhere will decide to use my sex and birth information to make decisions about what data set I belong in which may or may not be actually medically accurate depending which transition steps I may or may not have done. As a contract [sic] tracer, you’re not my doctor; I have no personal relationship with you. Thus, I have no vested interest in giving you accurate answers to these questions.

16 likes and loves; no dissents.

We’re doomed.

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