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Is this common sense at last?
From ‘The Times’ this morning
Organisations will be told that they can no longer call a space single-sex if they admit transgender people who do not have a gender recognition certificate.
Updated guidance from the equality watchdog will say that services described as being single-sex will not be able to make the claim if they also allow transgender women to use them on the basis of self-identification
Last week the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) sent ministers its updated code of practice, which guides organisations on how to apply the Equality Act. It is expected to be presented to parliament before the summer. The Times understands the recommendations include an overhaul of how single-sex spaces are defined.
A source said of the guidelines: “The upshot [of the guidance] means it's not lawful to have a self-ID service. The fact is that if you let a man in, it's no longer a single-sex service, and that includes trans people without GRCs [gender recognition certificates] .”
The change would prevent those who rely on self-ID from being able to access women-only care homes or domestic abuse refuges without an exceptional reason
My question is just why has this taken complicated legislation - and so long?
I think that there are trans women who certainly do pass as women by whatever social standards are being judged here, they just didn't identify themselves to you or place themselves up for scrutiny on social media. The same goes for trans men.
But if men aren’t safe for Transwomen, whom whatever they look like, are men, how can you say they are safe for women, Syracute?
The people who have caused the problems for women and non confrontational trans are TW and TRA.
You say they look like “you and me”, so they shouldn’t be in female spaces.
But evidently, having to rely on male honesty isn’t going to work, especially when you say you support their dishonesty, Syracute.
If you yourself are a transwoman, or have a very close relative who is a transwoman I suppose that would affect your perspective. David Tennant is vociferous on this subject and has, reputedly, two transgender children. I can understand anyone wanting to defend their child's beliefs but science, especially biology, doesn't actually care about 'feelings or beliefs' it is based in fact not fiction. Anyone can deny facts as much as they want, it doesn't actually change the facts, even if politicians agree with you. Galileo was imprisoned for saying the scientific fact that the earth rotates around the sun because it opposed the Church's belief that it was the other way around. Who was right? Science or belief.
I just wish (and partly fail to understand) why people felt it so necessary to try and argue that biology could be changed as opposed to gender identity.
I realise that that from early in the 2000's the words sex and gender started to be used as if they were interchangeable (I read the GRC again and saw the conflation) so this was part of it.
Mind you, would that have stopped the rise of aggressive men using trans reasons to do what they have - doubt it.
I don't know if it would have stopped them Wyllow but conflating biological sex and socially constructed gender certainly seems to have enabled them.
Prior to the misuse of the word woman, if you asked people what their gender identity was, they’d have wondered what you meant.
People asked what sex, not what gender your baby was, usually by asking a boy or a girl?
The word gender started to be used more frequently when people wanted to lie about their sex in order to obtain what they saw as advantages and for those people, lying became their new norm.
Well I came across it in the 1970's as regards discussions on women and men and of course education wise it became "Gender Studies" so it's been in use for a long time.
The GRA obviously bright it into focus as regards trans, it wasn't the "Sexual Recognition Act".
Long time transwomen called themselves women or transwoman and always have done.
I wouldnt describe this as intentional "lying" just how things were.
But as regards the general public, who haven't had a lot of contact with the debate, its my experience that many haven't a clue really about the debates we've had on here.
Thats not a put down, just what I've found. I recall a political meeting from 4 years ago to discuss the issue and only 3/4 of us had any idea really of the issues except for bits and bobs of newspaper headlines and a confusion about sex and gender.
Oh I agree with that. Lots of people either didn't know, weren't interested or just wanted to be nice. It is a good lesson that 'kindness' or empathy can sometimes lead people down a terrible path.
Yes - or the total opposite - denial that there are trans people at all - since it didn't encompass their experience - they must be ill or hated per se
Wyllow3
It was intentional lying, but it was and is a lie.
How many women feel the need to announce they’re women?
It was the misuse of the lie to harm or to the detriment of women that made it important to confirm that only biological women are women.
Sorry. it wasn’t intentional lying
Mollygo
Wyllow3
It was intentional lying, but it was and is a lie.
How many women feel the need to announce they’re women?
It was the misuse of the lie to harm or to the detriment of women that made it important to confirm that *only biological women are women.*
People living as transwomen for a long time didn't go around "declaring" anything, they just lived as women - and it was gender wise accepted legally.
I don't think they have suddenly morphed into liars - it will be up to individuals to disclose aspects of their personal life and we'll have to see what sorts of guidance are laid down by the Equalities Commission as regards form filling and what can and can't be said.
Apparently passports can be a problem if data doesn’t correspond.
Sorry Wyllow3, you said,
Long time transwomen called themselves women implying that they “called themselves women.”
It was rather a muddled way of putting it Mollygo.
I meant the long term transwomen who have lived as such dont go round declaring themselves any more than I do "I'm a women". They have a lived reality and it only becomes necessary to "declare" in legal or form filling circumstances.
Which now will have to have appropriate changed guidance as per the law.
A friend/colleague completing a diversity form for a 6 week old had to tick sex - answer, boy. Next question gender identity - answer he’s a 6 week old baby boy.
My colleague feared being sent on updated diversity training. Yes I know, we’re gender identity sensitive etc but really, how much unnecessary time taken up that could be used talking with a 15 year old genuinely wondering about all kinds of Big Stuff
Iam64
A friend/colleague completing a diversity form for a 6 week old had to tick sex - answer, boy. Next question gender identity - answer he’s a 6 week old baby boy.
My colleague feared being sent on updated diversity training. Yes I know, we’re gender identity sensitive etc but really, how much unnecessary time taken up that could be used talking with a 15 year old genuinely wondering about all kinds of Big Stuff
I remember the days when, confronted with forms to fill in at work about one's age, race, religion, sexuality, one could put MYOB in the box, which many of us decided to do without fear of being questioned.
Then there is often the category, "other".
It depends for me on what the point of the form is. We need to collect data for say a census form to make decisions on resources and some social policy. Others have become OTT.
Diversity and social inclusion matter to me, I don't want to go down the Trump route of totally abolishing DEI.
This is the sort of thing that worries me too, Wyllow. Social science research doesn't exist in a bubble. It drives policy and if we don't know what is happening to women as opposed to men there can't be policies in place to support either sex win necessary.
I feel so afraid and sad for trans people now. The genuine ones have a lesser place now. What have they done wrong? Nothing!
They don't have a lesser place. The law hasn't changed.
Wyllow3
Then there is often the category, "other".
It depends for me on what the point of the form is. We need to collect data for say a census form to make decisions on resources and some social policy. Others have become OTT.
Diversity and social inclusion matter to me, I don't want to go down the Trump route of totally abolishing DEI.
The forms I referred to suddenly appeared at work, then we received a notice back again summarising the information we'd submitted, telling you your name, dob, etc, your race, your sexual orientation.
Which we knew anyway.
Even taking a recreational course partially funded by the County Council necessitated filling in such forms.
whywhywhy
I feel so afraid and sad for trans people now. The genuine ones have a lesser place now. What have they done wrong? Nothing!
I don't think anything has changed though. 'Genuine' transpeople can carry on as before. The ruling hasn't made it illegal for them to use the Ladies (assuming they are TW), just clarified that they are male, which they must have realised given that they made the choice to transition.
I can see that in the (unlikely?) event that someone complains to management that there is a TW using the Ladies at work the decision of any tribunal might be to suggest that they use the Gents. But the reality is likely to be that this won't happen, as people are, on the whole, tolerant.
More importantly though, there may be implications for males getting posts which are legally allowed to be ring-fenced for women only, such as delivering personal care, or rape counselling. Much as this may be worrying for a very small number of transpeople who work in these areas, IMO it is a good thing that women can be assured that when they ask for a female carer they will get a woman, not a TW.
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