The Topic Area Summary Dear delegates, It gives me immense pleasure to welcome you all to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (UNCSW) at the Zenith Model United Nations Conference 2017. I earnestly hope that these two days of the conference will prove to be fruitful and enriching. We will be discussing Gender Dysphoria with special emphasis on sex reassignment surgeries. Gender Dysphoria is defined as the condition of feeling one's emotional and psychological identity as male or female to be opposite to one's biological sex. In simpler terms, it is a situation of uneasiness that a person goes through when his/her physical gender identity is in contradiction to what one perceive themselves to be. It is easy to define the terms but the plight of those suffering under this condition is unimaginable. Feeling that your body does not reflect your true gender can cause severe distress, anxiety, and depression. With Gender Dysphoria, the discomfort with your male or female body can be so intense that it can interfere with the way you function in normal life, for instance at school or work or during social activities. Gender Dysphoria used to be called “gender identity disorder.” But the mismatch between body and internal sense of gender is not a mental illness. Instead, what need to be addressed are the stress, anxiety, and depression that go along with it. Sadly, many cases of Gender Dysphoria go untreated and people continue to live under depression and at times shame due to the stigma attached with this topic. Apart from USA and Europe (that have shown some interest in this topic), much of the world is fairly ignorant or deliberately silent on the fact that Gender Dysphoria as a concept needs attention. Lack of awareness and the constant tag of ‘mental illness’ attached to this issue has not helped the discussion on Gender Dysphoria lead to any meaningful conclusion. Sex reassignment surgeries have been touted to be the most effective way to ease gender identity distress but they too entail a list of challenges that still await comprehensive answers. Not to mention the plethora of cases where these surgeries have gone wrong and have had harrowing impact on patients both physically and psychologically. Keeping in mind the lack of global discussion on this issue, it is not surprising to note that Gender Dysphoria as a concept has never been discussed at the UNSCW. However, the reason behind it is not exactly lack of apathy. UNCSW has consistently worked for strengthening and upholding women’s rights and a topic like that of Gender Dysphoria does not easily fit into the stereotyped image of a “women’s issue” since it transgresses and criss-crosses the gender lines. However, recently there has been an effort to include the issue of Gender Dysphoria into the UNCSW mandate since clearly the issue of Gender Dysphoria cover a wide spectrum of population including women who are experiencing

gender identity distress and also men who psychologically perceive themselves to be women- both come under the ambit of the UNCSW’s mandate. We at Zenith MUN’s UNCSW shall attempt to make a valuable contribution to the issue that has sadly got very little significance at the world stage. It is an extremely sensitive topic and I would sincerely expect all of you to discuss it with utmost seriousness and gravity. I am attaching a link at the end of this letter and would request you to watch this video. This video was the starting point of my understanding of this issue and hopefully it will be helpful in starting your research as well. Good luck! Link- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V60lYY41slg Regards, Sankalp Dikshit Chaiperson UNCSW E-mail: [email protected]