NO NO NO to self ID of trans women

[baldy]

NO NO NO to self ID of trans women

Discuss.

[baldy]

My Twitter profile now includes the following:

"Fav veg: Rump steak. No! to snowflakes + self ID of Trans women."

See:  https://twitter.com/russellhawker

[baldy]

Labour’s trans row shows the party can't handle debate

Telegraph:  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/labours-trans-row-shows-party-cant-handle-debate/?WT.mc_id=tmg_share_em




At a recent dinner party I attended in south-west London, a man in his 60s demanded of a bellicose woke vegan in her 20s how she could dispute that sex was a biological fact â€" that you are born either male or female, based on immutable physical traits.

Within minutes, the “discussion” touched on gender as a social construct and those people who feel trapped in the wrong body… and promptly went nuclear. He threatened to walk out, nearly in tears. She remained calm but deadly.

There’s a moment, about halfway through any dinner gathering, that I begin to feel nervous. If transgender politics haven’t been raised, they very probably will before dessert has been cleared. For it has become increasingly difficult to avoid the subject, even if you really want to.  The old are stunned that the concept of biological sex is being thrown on the slagheap, and therefore can’t leave the topic alone, and the young see this as the fight to the death of our times.

At first glance, it is mind-boggling that a question of gender concerning around one per cent of the UK population has proven so incendiary and so obsessive. But take another look and it’s not surprising at all: the relationship between sex and gender cuts to the psycho-sexual bone.

The stakes really are existential: are you what you say you are? The answer to this will never be straightforward and has profound implications for how society is ordered.

Which is why I find it disheartening to see not just online militias bullying those they disagree with, as if these matters were black and white, but those at the top of the establishment doing so, too, including those gunning for high office.

I felt truly queasy last week, but not surprised, to see Labour top brass, including deputy leader hopefuls Dawn Butler and Angela Rayner, plus Rebecca Long-Bailey, who is running for Labour leader, call on the party to “expel” any member deemed transphobic.

The group to which Long-Bailey and co are pledging allegiance as they call for supposed transphobic heads to roll is Labour Campaign for Trans Rights, which has produced a 12-point pledge card, which the three candidates have endorsed. If they are elected, Labour members will be obliged to “organise and fight against transphobic organisations such as Woman’s Place UK, LGB Alliance and other trans-exclusionist hate groups”.

Unsurprisingly, this hardline has not gone down well with everyone: a social media hashtag, #expelme, went viral in response.

As for calling those who are mobilising to defend women-only spaces and sex-based rights as “hate groups”, neither Woman’s Place nor LGB Alliance preach either violence or death. Rather, they campaign on the basis that sex is biological.

A Woman’s Place UK was set up in 2017 to put pressure on the government to think harder about the impact on women of proposed changes to the Gender Recognition Act. Changes currently being consulted on include allowing people to self-identify as a man or a woman without medical approval, which could mean trouble for women-only spaces such as changing rooms, refuges and prisons.

A Woman’s Place responded to the charge of “transphobia” and “hate” last week by reiterating the purpose of the campaign, which is “to ensure that women’s voices are heard and our sex-based rights upheld”. How hateful. Just like its manifesto: “We are against all forms of discrimination. We believe in the right of everyone to live their lives free from discrimination and harassment.” Off with their heads!

Meanwhile, LGB Alliance â€" formed last year in protest at LGBT+ campaign group Stonewall’s increasing focus on trans rights â€" greets visitors to its website with the message: “Hello, let’s talk about the difference between sex and gender.” Unbelievable!

It, too, presents a cogent position. “We believe that biological sex is observed at birth and not assigned”, and that gays, lesbians and bisexuals are “under threat from concerted attempts to introduce confusion between biological sex and the notion of gender”.

For instance, the alliance defends lesbians who don’t want to engage emotionally and sexually with trans women, notably those that have not had any surgical intervention downstairs. For this, they have been labelled transphobic.

Whether or not you think this position right or woefully wrong, it is still a legitimate position, lawfully and respectfully advanced, and invites serious rebuttal, not insult. Indeed, in response to the accusations last week, the LGB Alliance promised with perfect grace to “keep speaking the truth and remain open to reasonable discussion”. To see what the Labour Campaign for Trans Rights says of them, you’d think they were swearing to cut up babies and eat them. 

There is plenty of nasty thuggishness in the anti-trans camp, too, and they really have no excuse. But as last week showed with sinister clarity, it doesn’t matter who you are or how you argue. If you take a particular view on these matters, you risk being treated like toxic dirt, to be purged, rather than someone to argue with, in good faith, over one of the thorniest issues of our time.

The Labour Campaign for Trans Rights insists that “bigotry has no place in the Labour movement”. Sadly, what they really seem to mean is that there is no space for a divergence of views in the party. But we knew that already, didn’t we?

[Shizzy]

What is  "self ID of trans women"

[baldy]

See:  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/10/the-gender-recognition-act-is-controversial-can-a-path-to-common-ground-be-found


There is a proposal to change the law so that instead of needing a Dr to confirm that someone has changed gender to a female they can self identify as a female whether anyone else says they are or look male or not. Lots of folk think this is a bad idea,

[Old Codger]

I really cannot see this topic being of any interest to Westbury Town Forums.

[DORIAN]

Thanks Old Codger for the maturity of reason, this is just dire news for a dire society who wish to engage with it

[baldy]

I really cannot see this topic being of any interest to Westbury Town Forums.

Well, I certainly think it affects a small minority in society to start with but then the effects on women as a whole will be quite widespread on an occasional basis.

As far as I can tell, almost all women with any intelligence are paying attention to this if they read newspapers or are involved with national politics, not least because many see trans women (ie. men dressed and acting as women - some may be fully "transitioned" and some will not and so are still biologically men) as a potential threat in places that should be safe for women eg. female toilets, hostels etc.

Personally, it does not affect me but it is certainly a live debate going on right now amongst some folk. It gets raised as a subject by women in my experience, who are asking what I think to see if I care or if I basically agree with feminism.

I'm not keen on feminism apart from agreeing that the sexes deserve equal treatment and equal rights. I start to lose interest when it all starts getting too militant and when it is all about exceptionally agressive women wanting top jobs when a lot of the time they are just not up to it. However, this issue of self IDing as trans women (by men) has got me definitely supporting the feminists who are alarmed at the threat to the safety of women in what should be safe spaces /places for women.

As far as I am aware, about 1% of the population is not binary in being clearly male or female and so that 1% may or may not change sex / gender at some time from what they were assigned at birth.

Secondary schools are installing mixed sex / non gender toilets where girls have no choice but to use the same toilets as boys. This happened at Matravers only about 6 years ago. It causes all sorts of issues for girls who hate going into mixed sex toilets shared with boys.

Personally, I think its craziness as everyone seems to be pandering to the trans community far too much, in my opinion. Those with gender issues need help rather than being offered the opportunity to threaten the rights of women (straight or lesbian).

Those men who have no interest in this subject tend to be oblivious to the issues or are basically queasy about it or just plain ignorant. I think this forum is capable of discussing any public issue - this topic is being hotly debated as a current political issue especially in the LGBT+ and left-wing nutters community plus feminists who at last now have my support (on this issue anyway).

[baldy]

Thanks Old Codger for the maturity of reason, this is just dire news for a dire society who wish to engage with it

I agree that it is a rather dire topic and the proposal is obnoxious to me.

I'm saying "No!" to it in the same way I'd tell a vegan to get lost if they wanted to influence how many steaks I eat.

You might be able to get through life by avoiding topical issues. Some people do discuss difficult issues. Even folk in Westbury have been known to talk about current national political topics.

[Al]

BritishCycling already does this. If you identify as a woman, or a man, you can enter the female, or male, categories for a non-license requiring race. If you need a license then you have to have your gender stated on your license in accordance with UCi rules (so testosterone levels and a doctors letter). But since most races in the UK don't need a license, its a free for all.

[Shizzy]

I think the biggest threat of this is to women, frankly, they can sort it out themselves, they have enough pressure groups representing every aspect of their lives. I suspect the feminists are in a bit of a quandary and really don't want to be seen to disrespect the trans community by being too vocal about it. They are happy to load the gun and get men to fight the issue and take the flack.

[Bob DeBilda]

It's time to abandon discrimination in all sport. Let men and women, whether transgendered or not, compete with each other on a level playing field. The best at each sport will rise to the top.

[Shizzy]

It's time to abandon discrimination in all sport. Let men and women, whether transgendered or not, compete with each other on a level playing field. The best at each sport will rise to the top.

I agree

[baldy]

Telegraph:  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/finally-hit-peak-insanity-trans-havent/?WT.mc_id=tmg_share_em


These days, you can chart cultural change through public loos.
In Los Angeles, gone are the bold-print doorsigns that say “gender neutral restroom”, complete with baffling stick men/women dressed in the kind of half-skirt, half-trouser ensembles that belong on a Jean Paul Gaultier runway; the interlinked ‘Mars’ and ‘Venus’ symbols with pompous explanatory small print welcoming “everyone, regardless of gender or expression”. Thanks, guys, but it’s a bathroom â€" none of us are planning to stay long enough to feel the love.
Today, the signs simply read: “We Don’t Care.” Or, my personal favourite: “Whatever. Just wash your hands.”
However, in the UK, when it comes to bathroom signs, there is no such levity. We’re still desperately contorted about trans and gender issues â€" and a long way from levelling out a debate that, I fear, hasn’t yet reached peak insanity.
I thought we’d peaked last year, when Always, the sanitary towel company, agreed to remove the ‘Venus’ symbol from its wrapping after the trans lobby complained that “not everyone who has periods identifies as a woman”.
I thought we’d peaked when the police were forced to reveal that convicted rapists were allowed to be logged as female when arrested, “if that is how they choose to identify themselves”. When the BBC promoted an educational short film telling nine-year-olds that there were “over 100” genders, that had to be it?
Surely we peaked last January, when former policeman Harry Miller was visited by police after tweeting “transphobic” comments (such as: “I was assigned mammal at birth, but my orientation is fish. Don’t mis-species me”)? Miller claimed that the Humberside Police officer who interviewed him had said he’d committed no crime, “but we need to check your thinking”.
Which is Orwellian enough â€" but after Miller discovered his “tweet incident” had been entered onto his police record, as a “non-crime hate incident”, he launched legal action so that a court might establish once and for all that he had not broken any law. The police probe was decreed unlawful by the High Court on Friday.
But this is no time to celebrate, thanks to the opposition Labour Party, which, in the midst of its leadership contest, is busy descending into a farcical civil war over transgender rights.
A controversial pledge card calling on the party to expel “transphobic” members has exposed a faultline running through the movement â€" between and those who sign up wholeheartedly to the trans-activist insistence that “transwomen are women”, and seasoned Left-wing feminists, who worry about proposed reforms to make it simpler to transition legally and, thus, access all-female spaces â€" such as changing rooms and toilets.
Out there in the Labour heartlands, these are not the issues keeping voters up at night. It’s as if the party has learnt nothing from Trump or Brexit â€" or from Jo Swinson, the headmistressy and super-woke former Liberal Democrat leader whose election campaign went up in smoke on the altar of transgender ideology.
But all of this pales in importance beside an easily missed news item tucked away in this weekend’s Sunday papers. One headline ran: “NHS endorsing guide for transgender patients that approves puberty blockers and declares anatomy ‘is not always a good guide’ to determining a child’s sex.”
The NHS has already tarnished itself over matters of gender. More than once, the scandal-hit Tavistock Clinic, the country’s only NHS gender identity service for children, has found itself in the eye of the storm after accusations that it was “fast-tracking” young people into changing gender and offering children as young as 11 hormone-blocking drugs. But at least this shockingly proactive approach has been limited to patients within the clinic â€" until now.
A number of NHS trusts across the south west are to send out a “Supporting Trans People” toolkit, written by trans campaigners and branded with NHS logos, that declares that anatomy “is not always a good guide” to determining a child’s sex. It also condones the use of puberty blockers on adolescents, drugs that are, at present, licensed in the UK only to treat children who start puberty abnormally early, not those just questioning their gender identity.
Both the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and NHS England have ordered national reviews into the ethics of prescribing such treatment.
It’s the inherent contradictions in PC-culture-gone-mad that I can’t get past. Because if you pare down the argument for hormone blockers, it’s all about protecting youngsters’ mental health â€" a mental health that could understandably suffer if someone felt trapped in the wrong body for years.
So what do we do? We pump them full of drugs that keep them in that state, preventing their natural sex hormones, oestrogen and testosterone, from kicking in.
It’s official: we’ve hit new levels of gender insanity.

[Bob DeBilda]

I'm not sure if you are posting all this stuff Baldy in an attempt to just have a dig at the Labour party or you are actually crying out for help?

#agonyaunt