Sara R Phillips
Human Rights Activist / Chair of TENI / Co-founder of Dublin Trans Peer Support Group / Board member of the National Womens Council / Treasurer of the International Trans Fund and Transgender Europe (TGEU)
Image by: Jules, The Stairlings Collective
In 2006, TENI (Transgender Equality Network Ireland), as we know it today, was re-activated (having been originally founded in Cork in 2004) by a small group of trans people in Dublin. In the beginning, TENI were focused on providing support and information for trans people while building an organisation that would survive into the future. Focus on attaining legal rights for trans people wasn’t a priority initially. The group was a grassroots organisation and for the first while of its existence, was funded entirely by the members themselves. In 2007, they received funding through the Equality Authority to produce an informative leaflet which was sent to every GP in the country, and with the surplus organised a personal development and capacity building weekend workshop for about forty trans people.
Sara R Phillips, who was a co-founder of the Dublin Trans Peer Support Group, founded in 2005, almost immediately became involved as a member. At first, because she was going through her own medical transition, she did not join the first committee, but was an active member supporting the organisation’s events.
Sara had come out in the early 90s but it was much earlier on, as a small child of five when the boys and girls were being split and sent to different schools, that she began to question her identity. At 17, she had a conversation with her father and tried to explain what she was feeling, only for him to tell her that what she was experiencing was a phase (although, she would later explain that this retort was actually a ‘good result’ for the time period, when so many others were being kicked out of the house over similar conversations).
Sara grew up, fell very in love and got married. She and her wife had three children. But the need to express herself in her true gender identity continued to grow as she moved into her 30s. She came out in 1992 amidst an atmosphere of ‘voyeurism and negativity’ towards trans people in Ireland.
“Our identity is a fundamental part of who we are – whether it’s your nationality, your race, your religion, or your gender, and we should all be the arbiters of our own identities.”
Image by: Louise Hannon
In 2012, Sara was appointed Chairperson of TENI. Her team were lucky in that they could build on the structure that had already been established but it was still very much a small NGO with just two and a half staff and little funding. Sara would later state that this period of time was all about teamwork - most people working in the LGBTQ+ sector were doing it in a voluntary capacity. It was a passion because it was so important to them - not only were they fighting for the rights of their community, but also for their own rights.
One of the biggest concerns within TENI at this time was getting the Gender Recognition Act passed through the Government. Gender recognition legislation would ‘provide a process enabling trans people to achieve full legal recognition of their preferred gender and allow for the acquisition of a new birth certificate that reflects this change.’ Up until this point, the lack of State recognition of trans identities was ‘a major contributing factor to the marginalisation of trans people’ and had the potential to ‘out’ those who were applying for a new job or passport, which in turn, could result in discrimination and/or abuse.
The Act was successfully passed in 2015, making Ireland just the fourth country in the world to allow adults to self-determine their gender on official documentation (however Ireland was also one of the last in Europe to introduce any form of gender recognition laws). Despite belief in some circles that this Act was somehow rushed through or passed ‘under the radar,’ the campaign for Gender Recognition was not a new one; it had begun back in 1997 when Dr Lydia Foy began legal proceedings to ‘challenge the refusal of the Registrar General to issue her with a new birth certificate.’ And nor is the struggle over, as TENI and others continue to campaign on behalf of non-binary, intersex, and young people today.
In 2018, the government reviewed the legislation and wide ranging recommendations came from the committee, chaired by BeLongTo director, Moninne Griffith and of which Sara was a member.
In the same year, Sara was honoured as Dublin Pride Grand Marshall and with the theme being “we are family” was delighted to have her mother and daughter join her for the parade.
“We’ve got to tell people that these histories are there and they exist [...] This community has a history.”
Image by: Conor Horgan
Beyond TENI, Sara also founded the Irish Trans Archive in 2016 and through her own research and archivism, has documented over 300 years of Irish trans history. This has been a lifelong endeavor for Sara, who, since the 70s and 80s, has been collecting any notes and stories that she could find on gender variant people. For Sara, the archive is ‘about more than just preserving history. It’s also about making a present day statement.’ She wants to show the wider population that trans people are not some recent phenomena, but a community with a longstanding, decorated history spanning centuries.
Sara was elected to the board of the National Womens Council of Ireland in 2020. She is also on the boards of Transgender Europe (TGEU) in Berlin and the International Trans fund, a philanthropy organisation based in Toronto.
“Everything I do is for our trans community, everything I do is for the people who have gone before me but also those who are coming after me, because currently life as a trans person in Ireland still is not good enough. [There] is still a lot more to do.”
Has much changed in Ireland since Sara came out? She says yes. There have been massive wins in healthcare and education, and the overall visibility of trans people is far more positive now. However, there is a huge amount of work still to be done in these areas. Healthcare has now fallen behind where it should be. ‘We should be advocating and providing healthcare based on informed consent and international best practices. There needs to be far more comprehensive education around trans issues, not only in the education system and teacher’s colleges, but in employment sectors and amongst the general public too.’
Sara continues to fight for improvements in trans rights, both in Ireland and worldwide.
Thank you to Sara for sharing her story with us.
Co-written by Sara and Katelyn.
Want to read about historical LGBTQ+ women? See our photo essay here.
Sources:
‘Oral history interview of Sara R. Phillips,’ Digital Repository of Ireland, online: https://repository.dri.ie/catalog/k356ps22c [accessed 29 Mar. 2022].
‘Gender Recognition,’ online at: https://www.teni.ie/gender-recognition/ [accessed 6 Apr. 2022].
‘The Irish Trans Archive: Taking recognition beyond the courtroom,’ online at: https://epicchq.com/story/the-irish-trans-archive-taking-recognition-beyond-the-courtroom/ [accessed 6 Apr. 2022].
‘Keynote Speakers: Intersex Mapping Study,’ online at: https://www.dcu.ie/intersex/keynote-speakers [accessed 1 Apr. 2022].