Gonzalez underwent the procedure in 2008. She was one of eight Cubans to do so through a program begun in 1988 — then suspended for two decades, after many complained that the communist government had better ways to spend its scarce resources.
The operations have begun anew under President Raul Castro’s daughter Mariela, Cuba’s top gay rights activist; 22 more transsexuals are awaiting the procedure.
Mariela Castro says the government is moving cautiously, doing only a few per year.
“There has been a lot of resistance because homophobia remains strong in our culture,’’ she said at a recent conference on sexuality.
In the 1960s, Cuba was ferociously antigay, firing homosexuals from state jobs, imprisoning them, or sending them to work camps. Many fled into exile. Transsexuals, though not gay, were considered the same.
Government media campaigns now discourage homophobia. Hundreds of gay Cubans marched down Havana’s spiffy La Rampa boulevard last spring, just a year after authorities had forbidden a gay-pride parade.
“I’d like to think that discrimination against homosexuals is a problem that is being overcome,’’ Fidel Castro, the former president, said during a series of interviews with French journalist Ignacio Ramonet between 2003 and 2005. “Old prejudices and narrow-mindedness will increasingly be things of the past.’’
Mariela Castro has seen to it that the state formally recognizes transsexuals. A state-trained kindergarten teacher with a degree in sexuality, she runs the National Sexual Education Center.
The center spent years lobbying communist officials, who finally agreed to lift bans on sex changes in 2008 — though the resolution was never made public to avoid unwanted attention.
“These processes of negotiation are sometimes done very quietly,’’ Mariela Castro said, “so as not to stir up ghosts.’’
She now says that financial concerns in the past were simply used to hide prejudices.
That’s not unusual, said Denise Leclair, executive director of the Washington-based International Foundation for Gender Education. “In many countries people complain bitterly. It’s primarily driven by religious beliefs,’’ Leclair said.
