Shin Thant (; born Aung Thant on 19 May 1990) is a Burmese LGBTQ+ rights activist, politician and human rights defender for LGBTQ+ people. She is one of the leading LGBTQ+ rights activists in Myanmar. Shin Thant is also a beauty queen who won Miss Trans Grand International Myanmar 2018, a beauty pageant for transgender women.

Early life and education

Shin Thant was born on 19 May 1990 in

Mandalay Mandalay is the second-largest city in Myanmar, after Yangon. It is located on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River, 631 km (392 mi) north of Yangon. In 2014, the city had a population of 1,225,553. Mandalay was founded in 1857 by Ki ...

, Myanmar to a traditional Buddhist family. Her birth name is Aung Thant (male name). She started identifying as a transgender woman when she was age 17. She graduated from Co-operative University, Thanlyin and holds a B.A. in Business Science and also studied business in Japan after receiving a government-paid scholarship. She publicly changed her gender identity from male to female in 2012.

Activism and movements

In 2012, she was arrested under Section 35(c) of the Police Act. Soon after, Shin Thant meet with Aung Myo Min, an LGBTQ+ rights activist. Afterwards she sought out to speak out about the violence that Myanmar's LGBTQ+ community faces and to fight for her human rights. She started working with local LGBT rights organisations to fight for LGBT rights across Myanmar and became one of the leading LGBTQ+ activists in the country. In 2013, when a group of transgender women were arrested in

and allegedly forced to strip before being taken into custody, Shin Thant worked with Colors Rainbow, a Myanmar LGBT rights organisation, to seek justice. In January 2017, she helped transgender model

Myo Ko Ko San Myo Ko Ko San (; born 1 September 1994) is a Burmese transgender model, and beauty pageant titleholder who was elected Miss International Queen Myanmar 2014 and represented Myanmar at the Miss International Queen 2014. Early life and education M ...

who was wrongly accused of being the administrator of the controversial ''Cele Cele Small'' Facebook page which reports celebrity gossip and rumours. In March 2017, Shin Thant also participated in a youth conference with

State Counsellor of Myanmar The State Counsellor of Myanmar () was the ''de facto'' head of government of Myanmar, equivalent to a prime minister, from 2016 to 2021. The office was created in 2016 after Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won the 2015 Myanmar ...

Aung San Suu Kyi Aung San Suu Kyi (born 19 June 1945) is a Burmese politician, diplomat, author, and political activist. She was awarded the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize. She served as State Counsellor of Myanmar and Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Myanmar), Ministe ...

, in addition to her LGBT-focused activism. She had served as the

Yangon Region Yangon Region (, ; formerly Rangoon Division and Yangon Division) is an administrative region of Myanmar. Located in central Myanmar, the region is bordered by Bago Region to the north and east, the Gulf of Martaban to the south, and Ayeyarwady ...

's representative on the drafting committee on

Myanmar Youth Policy Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

. Shin Thant believes that in order to achieve equality, the government should take responsibility for ensuring that LGBT people are represented in every sector. She hopes to become

Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

's first openly LGBTQ+ member of the parliament by 2025 and is lobbying for the abolishing of Article 377 of Myanmar's Penal Code.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shin Thant 1990 births Living people Burmese activists Burmese LGBTQ rights activists Burmese LGBTQ politicians Burmese transgender people People from Mandalay Transgender female models Transgender women politicians 21st-century Burmese LGBTQ people 21st-century Burmese politicians 21st-century Burmese women politicians

Early life and education

Activism and movements

See also

References