Image made by Gabriela Mesones on Canva Pro for Global Voices

Gender expression offers a broad panoply of joy, beauty, and self-determination, and free gender expression is a fundamental human right. And yet, all over the world, we are seeing that right attacked by governments, religious groups, and political organizations, often enabled by Big Tech. While some places have seen an opening in terms of permissiveness and regulation, we are now seeing an active rolling back of rights and freedoms all over the world, especially with legislation targeting trans people. 

Attacks on gender diversity can take a wide range of forms, from undermining the autonomy of women to specific persecution of trans, intersex, and non-binary people, to restrictions on administrative options for gender, to toxically constrained cultures for masculinity, and more. They are underpinned by a range of justifications, many of which are tied to national, ethnic, and religious identity. 

So much of the international media coverage focuses on tracking attitudes and regulation in a small minority of wealthy countries, or follows stereotypes about other countries, necessarily and automatically restricting gender expression, regardless of the actual history and cultures involved.

Global Voices uses its network to amplify underrepresented voices, and in this Spotlight, we want to bring out a wide range of perspectives and analyze the variety of situations around attacks on gender expression, the resistance to those attacks, and the joys of freedom around the world. See our June 2026 Spotlight series below to learn more about gender diversity and how it is being threatened, protected, and preserved around the world.