To think the gender and sex Ed wars are created by tories

Hello OP,

Just my tuppence worth on why this is an important issue to me.

I was thoroughly peaked by this - https://www.brightonandhovenews.org/2019/12/09/hospital-apologises-to-rape-victim-for-branding-her-request-for-same-sex-breast-screening-medic-as-transphobic/ a rape victim who was branded transphobic and held up as an example of bigotry by her local hospital for wanting a woman to carry out her mammogram.

The implications of this for all women are obvious. A physically disabled young woman would not be able to insist a woman change her sanitary protection when she is menstruating. An elderly woman who has suffered from domestic violence and marital rape would have to allow a man to help her shower.

Some women will be fine with men (however they identify) carrying out these roles and that's great. But the ones who are not - the most vulnerable of women right at the bottom of the pile - need to be protected. There has to be a clear distinction between natal and non natal women in law and I would vote for any party whatsoever (from Communists to Monster Raving Loonies) who would unequivocally pledge to protect these women. I don't know who started it, but all I care about right now is who is going to fix it.

Whatever you say the tone of your messages is that it is all a fuss about nothing. Well it isnt. It's legalising and promoting harm to children and denial of women's rights to safety and privacy. I wont be voting for the tories unless they actually do a great deal more than they have done already. Words wont cut it, I have great difficulty believing anything a tory politician says. However Labour - and all other parties apart from the communists - are useless on this too. How can a party that deny reality and claim you can change sex be trusted on anything?

In practise the government in power matter less than you think. Everything in life is controlled by money and some very rich men are trying to drive this through. There is a programme about this, if you went to the womens rights part of this website you'd be directed to it. The tories are doing what they think will get them elected, after which they can backtrack to keep the favour of the rich. Labour should be standing out against this, the party was not formed to toady to rich white men.

maddening · Yesterday 21:35

I think that they have been caused by academia,.increasingly in the last 30 years, and ideologically captured graduates are now in Media, tech, journalism, teaching, HR, in government, therapy, medicine and in management throughout the Western world.

Absolutely 100%

And it's not just the gender issue that crazy academics have warped beyond recognition.

You seem to be very much in the dark on this issue despite it apparently being a war by the Tories, you have done no reading around, you've just made up your mind, its Tory it must be bullshit. If you had done any research at all , you would know asking for a same sex hcp could be classed as transphobic, and the woman asking, will be the one in trouble.

So you see no issue with a male HCP, every woman has to be ok with a male HCP!
Can you think of even one reason a woman might want a female HCP to do smears and other invasive procedures?

Do you believe women should have a choice?

Yup -I’m voting Cons as the labour leader couldn’t state what a woman was. He’s a lawyer FGS.

Agreed.

This

Big Pharma. Stop buying into all this crap.

Yep

Labour created this issue with the 2004 GRA. Stonewall made it mainstream when they switched their focus from gay rights to trans rights when Ruth Hunt took over about 10 years ago. Theresa May wanted to detox the Tory image with self-ID.

Current Tories are only able to make hay with this because the other parties won't support womens rights in this fundamental way. If you can't define a woman, you can't protect women.

No the Tories didn’t make it up. But they are seeing it as a chance to score points.

Which is depressing because as a non conservative voter I do think the safeguarding of children and protection of women’s rights are important - and I do lobby for womens rights, disability rights, gay rights, equal pay, carers equality etc.

But my impressionable disabled DS who is very feminine (totally fine) was going to be taught that there is he might be in the wrong body by a lobbyist group - at his specialist school. And that’s how it came to my attention, not some ‘media frenzy’.

I think the Tories created these issues but not in the way you mean.

As a Teacher both of these things cause genuine practical problems which impact pupils I see every day. I've known a child that we fought to get Social Services support for for years because the family struggled to deal with her SEN (to be told she was nowhere near the threshold of need) removed from her family because they wouldn't support her social transition.

What the Tories have done and allowed to happen to Social Services and CAHMS is awful.

Sex Ed in schools used to be fairly standardised and factual. Now it's a fucking mess. Kids can go through school with no real understanding of how their bodies work. Again- Tory policy.

I certainly don't think the Tories are doing anything useful and are just point scoring but YABVVU to think everyone is imagining the problems.

Absolutely this.
Also cements their votes from the right-wing press readers. Get the press to whip up a frenzy - respond to the frenzy with capitulating policy - repeat as necessary. See also immigration.

This.
But reframe it as a culture war rather than legal and medical insanity and child abuse and then blame the Tories when the SNP, Greens, Lib Dem and Labour all seem to think that telling women we are getting worked up over nothing whilst eroding our rights.
Grow up OP.

Yep that works too. No objection from me.

I'm just highlighting that if the Left really thinks this Culture War stuff is a trivial distraction from the Real Issues engineered by the Tories it's entirely in their gift to defuse it. And if they don't, maybe they don't really think the issue is trivial, maybe what they really think is trivial is people's objections.

Do you know what would be easier and more effective? If the Tory government sorted it all out before they are removed from power next year.

No, it's the fault of Labour, Greens and Lin Dems.

Literally ALL they need to say is

"a woman is an adult human female. Trans women are not women. We commit to supporting trans people in living safe, happy and dignified lives but we will not redefine womanhood as a mental state to do that, or will we include male people in the definition of womanhood. We will repeal the GRA and replace it with protections that are fit for purpose and don't rely on a state sanctioned legal lie. Right, that's sorted, now let's talk about climate change, education and the Tories' dreadful failures with the environment and the economy".

And yet they don't.

If it's so very minor, so unimportant vs the Tories' failures, why on earth are the various parties in opposition not doing the one easy thing that would take it off the table?

They have shat on the country.

But people seem to love the smell - as they continue to vote for this crap ... Boat people! Gender confused kids! ULEZ!

I think they're stoking and exploiting it as they are with their culture wars, as a distraction from their destruction of our health and education systems and of the environment.

I think it's also important in its own right.

To me gender ideology is important not just due to the impact on women's rights but because it requires a religious type belief in an innate "gender soul" (which is not biological or from socialisation). It is not sufficient for that belief to be tolerated in others - everyone is required to subscribe to it and perform it, otherwise they are transphobic. There's also the double think of what gender you are being a fundamental part of identity and also anything you want it to be and impossible to define. And the attempt to redefine "woman" so that it becomes meaningless. I find it all completely illogical and sinister. I care about having the freedom of speech to challenge religious type ideologies in a civil way (particularly when they affect the rights of others). That isn't to say that other people can't hold those views and dress and present however they like of course.

I have also read a lot about trans healthcare for children recently and really think it's the next lobotomy. I think it's difficult to understand just how negligent and experimental some of the treatment is without doing a lot of reading due to the misinformation about it even from reputable medical bodies (like puberty blockers being reversible and having no long term effects). And the tide is starting to turn on this across Europe including in left wing Scandinavian countries so I don't think this is a Tory issue. It's a niche issue but it does matter because it affects a growing number of children who can't give informed consent to the treatment they receive.

I think the Tories have seen that this is an important issue for some of their voters and are taking advantage of that but that is how politics always works.

Once again:
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/society/2017/oct/18/theresa-may-plans-to-let-people-change-gender-without-medical-checks

Once again, the Gender Recognition Act 2004 was passed when Labour had a massive majority.

The Left haven't been in power for a long time. The trans mess is one of many, many, many ways the Tories fucked the UK over the past 13 years.

Ps be warned there are loads of Tory Stooges on here. The right wing are very very good on social media Yeah that's right @smilesup I'm just on here pretending my child is destroying his life - you thoughtless idiot.

I cannot understand why Labour haven't swooped in to pick up all the votes. They should win by a landslide. As everyone keeps saying, it's an open goal.