From stigma to inclusion

Abstract

Sexuality is one of the most controversial topics of human behavior and according to the historical moment has been demonized, idealized, penalized and even labeled as a disease, when its forms of expression differ from the moral and cultural traditions of the majority of individuals in a community.

One of the pillar concepts of sexuality is gender identity, understood as the personal perception of one's own gender, independent of biological sex. Some people identify with the opposite gender to the sex assigned at birth and this is what the World Health Organization (WHO) in its version in force since 2022, of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD 11), calls "Gender Incongruence", a term that seeks to depathologize this condition, by removing the definition from the chapter of mental illnesses and including it within the conditions related to sexual health; however, it is still listed as a mental pathology that is called "Gender Dysphoria", according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM 5 of 2013