Irish man wants to obtain thousands of euros by identifying as a female STEM student

[QuietContraryMary]

old.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/9mzr1h/making_use_of_a_female_scholarshipgrant_as_a_man/

"I am a university student currently taking a STEM course, and as a result, I have to pay a large tuition fee every year. However, it has come to my attention that there are an array of female-exclusive scholarships/grants available in the STEM field (I am investigating one of these already, but will not name it here for privacy). I was wondering whether it would be possible for me to make use of these as a man.

I have searched around the internet considerably, but resources on the topic are scarce, and none relate to the Republic of Ireland. As a result, I thought it would be best to post it here, given the large Irish-centric userbase. Has anyone attempted this before, and if they have, can they tell me how it went? Is changing the gender on my ID simply enough? I doubt I could pull off a female appearance if they needed to meet me in person. Any tips?"

Answer:

"Gender Recognition Act 2015 is your only man (!)

www.citizensinformation.ie/en/birth_family_relationships/changing_to_your_preferred_gender.html

Basically you need to apply, get a sworn statement to the effect you want to do it (any notary public can do it. For extra giggles ask your parish priest, they're usually one).

And hey presto.

There's no charge"

Obviously this would never happen, nobody would be so terrible as to abuse self-ID to get money.

And it's also not as if disproportionate numbers of women in STEM/compsci are transwomen. Oh no, nothing like that would ever happen.

Sake!!

I’m shocked. If I had pearls I’d clutch them.

Self-id. Yay!

So much for the 'but there's self-ID in Ireland and it hasn't caused any problems' argument.

But this never happens. No man would take awards and funding and scholarships from natal women.

Maybe this Reddit poster here is really a stunning and brave transwoman in denial. Live your truth, Reddit poster!

It's an interesting question why there are such bursaries for women but not for men. Feminism 101 would answer that of course but it seems people need to be constantly reminded.

Are there REALLY that many scholarships for women in STEM? It seems to me like one of those things mras believe but when you look into the reality it's pretty limited.

(would love to be wrong...)

Didn't happen

Such scholarships certainly exist. I fear that piss takers like this will bring an end to such scholarships rather than an end to self id. There is usually a bit of publicity going along with the award. Awkward photo shoot. I wonder will he put on some lippy or just brazen it out

What are the chances though, that if you asked the administrators of whichever scholarships/grants are relevant to this OP, they would say oh yes, they are for anyone who identifies as a woman?

Might have to do some research on which awards they might be...

Good for him if he does! I don't know about Ireland (despite having dual Irish/UK citizenship), but in the UK, white working class boys are, by far, at the bottom of the academic pile. THey have every right - morally speaking - to take advantage of whatever opportunities are not given specifically to them.

Such scholarships exist for sure, and if there is a specific one that this guy fits the bill for aside from his gender, it's easy to see why he would want to change gender.

Intel: €3k/year www.intel.ie/content/www/ie/en/women-in-technology-scholarship-program-leixlip.html

Amazon - up to £30k (bursary programme active at several unis)
www.kcl.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/fees-and-funding/student-funding/scholarships-and-bursaries/2018-19/amazon.aspx

L'Oreal www.forwomeninscience.com/en/home

I can see his point of view, and how he must think it's discriminatory. Presumably he worked hard to get the required grades etc and thinks it unfair a female would get a scholarship and he doesn't qualify.
I know there are reasons for positive discrimination but I still don't like it. It's useful to point out the ridiculousness of self-ID, though.

This seems v odd to me - third level education in Ireland is officially free of fees at undergrad level. There's a registration fee which is somewhere between 1 and 3 grand a year, though you can get grants for that depending on income. So if this person is paying huge fees they are either not actually studying in Ireland, are an international non-EU student, or are doing a post-grad course. The vast majority of post-grad bursaries are merit-based: I've never heard of one based on sex, and I have a lot of female friends who studied and graduated in STEM here. I know that's not the point, but it really does read v unlikely that this is a genuine query.

Somewhat related, something I've found interesting about moving back to Ireland from the UK is the extent to which people coming out as trans seem to genuinely be predominantly teens/young adults, compared to the UK where there seems to be a much higher proportion of middle aged men doing it. It definitely has a huge effect on people's perception, and I'm curious if its actually based in fact or if its just that we don't have the vocal TRA component. But in the media, and anecdotally from friends who are teachers, it v much seems to be young teens/students as both the face of people who are trans but also the reality. I'd love to know if this is accurate, and why - there was v little debate ahead of the law change so it may be that piss-takers like this guy simply don't know about it yet.

"Good for him if he does! I don't know about Ireland (despite having dual Irish/UK citizenship), but in the UK, white working class boys are, by far, at the bottom of the academic pile. THey have every right - morally speaking - to take advantage of whatever opportunities are not given specifically to them."

Where did you read that he was working class? Or indeed white?

I'm somewhat of the opinion that maybe there's a better way of allocating grants etc to help alleviate structural sexism in the STEM field than just by sex (let alone 'gender'). The type of thing I'm thinking of is this royalsociety.org/grants-schemes-awards/grants/dorothy-hodgkin-fellowship/

'This scheme offers a recognised first step into an independent research career for outstanding scientists and engineers at an early stage of their research career who require a flexible working pattern due to personal circumstances, such as parenting or caring responsibilities or health issues.'

Unsurprisingly the majority of fellows seem to be women.

Maybe this Reddit poster here is really a stunning and brave transwoman in denial. Live your truth, Reddit poster!

@somerville this seems relevant (?evil twin?) to your recent question. For GC people non-binary is bollocks and woman is a real thing, so your application would be reasonable. If there is no definition of woman other than cogito ergo sum, then this application would be fair enough?

Could this actually happen? I mean, I know it's on Reddit but is it technically possible??