What's going on with all this gender stuff?

[tillyoshea]

are you suggesting that if there were more black people within the movement, their arguments would carry more weight?

I can think of some reasons why non-white people may be more sensitive to the suggestion that what one can and can’t do in life, what rights one should have, or - indeed - what toilet one should use, should be determined based entirely on physical, biological characteristics.

[james2001]

This has actually disgsuted me... seriously considering resigning my Labour party membership

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crldey0z00ro

Really feels like he's trying too hard to win back the Reform crowd without thinking about how it's alienating everyone else.

[Tardisrotor]

Damn, I wish people would respect the "sex-based rights" of my cis lesbian friends who keep getting aggro in women's toilets for not looking sufficiently feminine enough which often leaves them having to brave the gents with shewees. I would love it if people would utilise their right to mind their own fucking business.

Exactly this. It'll affect cis gender women who don't conform to the so called norms of femininity if there are security guards as there were at Edinburgh Waverley station last weekend asking for ID if they were suspected of being transgender at the station loos.

Security guards ?!

[Charlie Wells]

This has actually disgsuted me... seriously considering resigning my Labour party membership

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crldey0z00ro

Really feels like he's trying to win back the Reform crowd without thinking about how it's alienating everyone else.

I assume you're referring to...
"Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer does not believe transgender women are women, his official spokesman has said."
If so, why does this disgust you? The spokesman is essentially stating what the supreme court ruled, even if that is different to what Starmer has said in the past.

I think there's quite a bit of confusion about what the supreme court did and did not rule on.

It was essentially clarifying the meaning of "sex" and "women" in the existing Equality Act 2010. This related to the consequence of granting a GRC in accordance to the Gender Recognition Act 2004. It should be noted that the Equality Act protects both sex and gender reassignment.

The supreme court have ruled that "sex" in the Equality Act refers only to biological sex. This in turn affects how single-sex services can operate, which had the ruling been different would have become complicated. It also means that trans men who become pregnant are still protected from pregnancy discrimination, which had GRC been determined to modify sex they might have lost this protection.

It is important to stress that gender reassignment remains a protected characteristic. There also remains "secrecy provisions within the Gender Recognition Act, which make it a crime to disclose the fact that someone has a GRC or information about their biological sex if one comes across this information in an official capacity".

For reference, this article https://knowingius.org/p/sex-in-the-supreme-court-762 written prior to the Supreme Court judgement set out what the court was and would not be ruling on.

[Tardisrotor]

i think many people are getting het up about this. No-one is saying that trans-people are less than male and female its a necessary clarification over a person's biological gender.

By all means identify as a man or woman but accept the fact that in the eyes of the law your biology can't be changed

[Martin Phillp]

By all means identify as a man or woman but accept the fact that in the eyes of the law your biology can't be changed

Trans people would disagree with that statement. They're given hormone therapy which gives them for example the ability to grow beards as trans men for example.

[Cando]

By all means identify as a man or woman but accept the fact that in the eyes of the law your biology can't be changed

Trans people would disagree with that statement. They're given hormone therapy which gives them for example the ability to grow beards as trans men for example.

That doesn't change your biology.
You can take every drug and surgery in the world and you couldn't.
Literally no serious Medical professional has ever said this.

[Cando]

Damn, I wish people would respect the "sex-based rights" of my cis lesbian friends who keep getting aggro in women's toilets for not looking sufficiently feminine enough which often leaves them having to brave the gents with shewees. I would love it if people would utilise their right to mind their own fucking business.

Things that never happened

[Cando]

What has helped the Gender Critical movement substantially is that they have a major ally in author J.K. Rowling who was believed to have bankrolled For Women Scotland's appeal against the Scottish Government.

The other thing which has helped, that can't be understated is what constitutes gender identity is not only contested, but entirely subjective, whilst biological markers are somewhat more defined.

The main players in their movement are largely white middle class women, a small clique who include Rosie Duffield, the MP for Canterbury, Maya Forstater who won her employment tribunal after making transphobic remarks online and Prof Kathleen Stock who left the University of Brighton after also being accused of making transphobic comments.

I'm not sure what race or socioeconomic class really has to do with this debate - are you suggesting that if there were more black people within the movement, their arguments would carry more weight? Or that if someone were poorer, they'd care less about single-sex spaces like changing rooms?

It's worth pointing out, in case you hadn't noticed, that some of the loudest voices on the trans activism side - India Willoughby, Munroe Bergdorf, Katy Montgomery, Heather Herbert, Sophie Mollie, Owen Jones, Billy Bragg, David Tennant, Robin Moira White - are not only overwhelmingly white and middle class, but also biological males imposing their views on what women should be expected to accept as constituting "a woman.". This somewhat less intellectually stable than biological women defending their sex based rights.

Also, it's worth correcting some inaccuracies:

Maya Forstater did not "make transphobic remarks" - she expressed gender-critical views, and the Employment Tribunal ruled that these beliefs are protected under the Equality Act. Similarly, Kathleen Stock resigned from Sussex University after facing harassment and intimidation for expressing her philosophical views on sex and gender - not because she made "transphobic comments."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57426579
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-59084446

The issue is those people and others don't see themselves as being transphobic, but see themselves as women's rights activists despite discriminating against trans women.

It's not "discrimination" to recognise that biological sex matters in certain contexts, particularly when it comes to women's rights, safety, and privacy.

You can support trans people's rights to live free from discrimination, while still believing that access to single-sex spaces should be based on sex, not gender identity - something we already know is effectively undefined.

Defending sex-based rights isn't transphobic: it's acknowledging that women's needs sometimes differ from those of trans-identifying males, and that protecting those boundaries is legitimate and necessary.

💯 This.

[PresIdents]

Damn, I wish people would respect the "sex-based rights" of my cis lesbian friends who keep getting aggro in women's toilets for not looking sufficiently feminine enough which often leaves them having to brave the gents with shewees. I would love it if people would utilise their right to mind their own fucking business.

Things that never happened

Whatever helps stave off the eventual realisation that you are morally bereft, I suppose.

[james2001]

We've really got the transphobes crawling out, haven't we?