Nuremberg / Berlin – When I reach Tessa Ganserer the morning after the general election, the suitcases are already packed. The next day is the first parliamentary meeting of the Greens, for which the 44-year-old from Nuremberg will sit in the upcoming Bundestag – as one of two openly transgender women. “A historic moment” was the evening of the election: “We made history with it in Germany.” She had hoped for even more if the CSU wanted to get rid of the direct mandate in the constituency of Nuremberg-North. Until August it still looked like it. Finally it was enough for second place in front of the SPD, but behind the CSU. According to Ganserer, critical of her party, election results are “the result of a team game and not solely due to the candidate”.
This candidate won 22.6 percent of the first votes, which she understands as a “clear sign of an open and tolerant society.” But she has now also been elected as a fighter against an obsolete city motorway project in Nuremberg: primeval green transport policy. Now she brings the Bavarian state list to the Bundestag. In addition to her, there will also be Nyke Slawik from Leverkusen, also transident. Visibility in the Bundestag: for the Bavarian politician a sign that “transgender people have arrived in the middle of this society”. But so far these people often still live marginalized. Is this the turning point?
“The debates in the Bundestag will change”
“I believe that the debates in the German Bundestag will change because we can finally speak up where we are being decided and our voice will be heard there.” Ganserer has not forgotten how the SPD recently did one The initiative of the Greens to abolish the partly unconstitutional transsexual law was thrown off: “Fundamental and human rights of minorities have been subordinated to the reasons of the coalition.” “With such fundamental decisions when it comes to basic human rights, one cannot maintain the pressure to form a party. I would have liked to see the voting open to everyone, like in marriage. “
But she also does not want to allow the Union to accept fundamental opposition to, for example, self-determination for trans people and discriminatory rules in the law of parentage: “Especially since, like Markus Söder, they never tire of speaking out in public for tolerance and diversity, and are not too bad at action days to wave the rainbow flags. If they don’t follow their words with actions, they become even less credible. ”Credibility in politics: a precious commodity.
At the next election, Tessa Ganserer is certain, her long-discarded male “dead name” will no longer be on the ballot paper. In order to change it, according to the current legal situation, many of those affected would have had to go through a humiliating psychological appraisal procedure. Abolishing that, that’s what she is now fighting for, wants “a clear government mandate” for it. And if the parliamentary struggle has not been won in four years, she will also want to fight for her rights in court if necessary: she would go to the Federal Constitutional Court for it.