Maria Miller jumps the shark (again)

[PricklyBall]

Telegraph article on proposal to remove question on sex from the next census

Quote
Maria Miller, the Chair of the Women and Equality Select Committee, said: "I think its a sensible recommendation given the increasing numbers of people not wanting to identify in traditional ways. It's a progressive way of handling the problem."
Unquote

How the hell are we supposed to address things like the pay gap between men and women if the ONS aren't able to collect the data? (I admit to a vested interest in this particular one as my pay claim is limping through the courts as we speak.)

[Ereshkigal]

Maria Miller wouldn't know progressive if it bit her on the arse. Stupid woman.

[Rumandraisin1]

The census is the main story on the front page of tomorrow's Daily Mail. It was just discussed on 'The Papers' programme on BBC News. The (male) guests really didn't get the problem with this and were just painting it as 'progressive' people wanting this and the Daily Mail crowd objecting to 'political correctness', although the (female) presenter did mention about some feminists objecting too.

[DJBaggySmalls]

The Women and Equality Select Committee is not fit for purpose IMO.

[theendisnotnigh]

There's actually a very good article in the Daily Mail (sorry) . It drills down into the methodology used by the ONS to come up with this report. Four focus groups with"cisgender" people (29 people in total) and 18 one to one in depth interviews with transgender people! Extract:

"This is a 3,143-word report by (presumably) highly intelligent people at the most important data-gathering unit in the land – the one which will shape government policies towards every facet of our lives for a whole decade.
These great minds have sought to overlook a primordial question asked of every one of us the moment we arrive in this world: boy or girl?
And yet you will not find the words ‘man’ or ‘woman’ anywhere in this report. There are 44 references to the ‘trans’ population compared against 11 to the ‘cisgender’ community. ‘Male’ and ‘female’ get just half a dozen mentions each."

It's worth a read:
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4961276/ROBERT-HARDMAN-Britains-gender-row.html

[Datun]

Stephanie Davis Arai was just speaking on LBC about it. Sarah Brown, Liberal Democrat, thought it didn't matter because the population was roughly 50-50 anyway and couldn't see any reason why that would change! And that most people would probably fill it in (although if the question is removed, I'm not sure how). And that non-binary people and intersex people need to be recorded.

Yet again, using intersex as a means to push for the trans agenda.

Luckily, Stephanie was well prepared and refuted all her points. Mentioning that categories of sex lead to provision of services, protocols and funding. And that it would disproportionately affect women in a detrimental way. She also reiterated that intersex is not trans and they should not be conflated and that intersex people have asked to be left out of it.

The broadcaster, I believe, said it was a load of cobblers! I was in the car, so I may have misheard that. Hopefully, everyone else agrees with him.

Unfortunately, I think I missed the end of it. But cobblers sums it up.

Again, I'm left with the feeling that most people think it's ridiculous, and pandering to a minute number of people to validate special snowflakery. What they don't have is an understanding of how this is profoundly detrimental to women.

It's incredibly frustrating that they can see it's nonsense, but not see it's dangerous.

[nauticant]

Ah, it's now being discussed on Radio 4 on the Today programme. Let's see how this goes. Humphrys is interviewing Jane Faye. Not promising.

[nauticant]

Jane Fae, not Jane Faye.

The coverage on Radio 4 was utter garbage. I don't think the word "sex" was said once.

[Rumandraisin1]

That's actually a very good article. Do we know if that is what has appeared in the print edition? (They published a shorter article on this on their website yesterday which wasn't as comprehensive.)

[Rumandraisin1]

I'm referring to the Daily Mail link above.

[Anlaf]

I think the print has this on the front cover www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4959906/Gender-question-voluntary-census.html

I dunno if the one above's appeared.

[Richelieu]

And now along comes a story about 'gender-neutral' passports.

Because, according to the person who is fighting for them to be introduced in the U.K., 'non-gendered people are often treated as though we have no rights'. They go on to say: 'the...passport application process requires applicants to declare whether they are male or female. It is inappropriate and wrong that someone who defines as neither should be forced to make that declaration.'

Again we're being asked to believe that 'sex' and 'gender' are interchangeable.

[ErrolTheDragon]

Of course passports should be gender neutral. Gender is completely irrelevant in this context (as it is, or should be in most contexts).

But if they don't record your legal sex then that's probably going to impact their function of allowing you into other countries. I would have thought that not having legal sex on the passport might actually be quite problematic for transsexuals with a GRC?

[miri1985]

Gender neutral passports are pointless IMHO unless you're never traveling outside the EU. Every country that I've ever been to that you have to get a visa for or fill out a landing card upon arrival has a binary option for the mandatory question of sex.

Having a passport without sex or a gender neutral option would make traveling more of a hassle and I imagine would potentially put people in danger in some parts of the world

[SpaghettiAndMeatballs]

The obsession with sex these people have is truly ridiculous. I have a sex, just like I have a height and an eye colour. These things are just things, they say nothing about me, they don't make me good or bad, or more likely to enjoy sausages or wear purple jumpers, or enjoy making artisan rugs.

Making your identity hang on your sex is what's causing the whole problem here - ABOLISH GENDER - be what you like, but denying that you have a sex helps no-one and just denies the basic reality that some people make sperm and some people have eggs, and that's just how human life works.

[AdalindSchade]

It's utterly insane that people can say things like 'I'm not male or female' with a straight face and have this total lie validated by the government of all things.

[Ereshkigal]

Adalind I had a totally boggling twitter conversation with one of these people. They said they had no legal rights as they were not male or female.

[Ereshkigal]

I use they as I don't know what sex this person was for definite as it was twitter and pic not clear. I suspect male though.

[Ereshkigal]

They basically said they were a non person legally as sex discrimination law would not protect them from discrimination for not having a sex and the gov needed to change this urgently. They thought I was an awful transphobe when I challenged this and reported me to twitter then whined when twitter didn't take any action.

[Datun]

What IS it with non binaries? I seriously don't get it. Knock yourself out and call yourself something, I don't care. But what does it actually mean. In real life. From day to day. Apart from what clothes you wear.

Is it that you get triggered and erased if someone says male or female and then forgets to say and non binaries?

If they're having a heart attack, is the doctor supposed to scan his textbook to find the symptoms for someone who is neither male nor female? If they have sex and don't want a child to be the result, how do they know whether to go on the pill or wear a condom?

What's it for?

I suspect it's a kickback against the perception of our gendered society and not wanting to adhere to it.

In which case, get out from under the trans umbrella and get into feminism.

Fight for the right of sexual equality, not create a third box for superficial reasons and then do fuck all about sexism.

Own your sex and campaign on behalf of it, not pretend it doesn't exist.

[BakerCandlestickmaker]

Personally I'd self censor the use of "Progressive".

It's getting connotations of blinkered authoritarian thinking. See also current SNP use in signage.

[AdalindSchade]

The emperor has no fucking clothes for sure.

[nauticant]

sex discrimination law would not protect them from discrimination for not having a sex

Unless they're intersex (and we all know that these people never are), then they'll have a sex. This means that their aim is for the law to be changed to state an untruth. The person is either delusional or derives satisfaction from forcing people, who don't want to, to state complete untruths.

[AdalindSchade]

Intersex people still have a sex.
Most intersex people appear male or female with complications. CAIS and PAIS is complex as they appear female but have a Y chromosome so in those cases only I would say chromosomes don't straightforwardly denote sex but AIS people don't usually discover they aren't biologically female until puberty so not actually ambiguous at all.

[HattiesBackpack]

The Women and Equality Select Committee is not fit for purpose IMO

^^this

[BetsyM00]

I thought passports were already gender neutral. After all, they are not issued with pink or blue covers.