Trans media watch are lobbying mnhq

Well my MP is a useless twat but I've written to him anyway

If anyone is going to write, re-write the letter in your own words, I think when they receive template letters they don't take them as seriously.

There's more info about the original enquiry here:

www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/women-and-equalities-committee/inquiries/parliament-2015/transgender-equality/

I fear that transphobics and TERFS views may be ignored.

'Its'

I can't believe this. I feel like I'm living in an Orwellian nightmare.

Do you know if there is ANYONE representing women's rights ?

Sorry for jumping in, but there is a debate on transgender equality (ie self identification = GRC) on 1st December, template letter (which IMO needs a bit of work - I changed a fair amount) and way of finding your MP here fairplayforwomen.com/write-mp-house-commons-debate-transgender-equality

ErrolTheDragon

But that's what I mean. It's just a proportion of masculine or feminine. Or if you can do it, neutral. There is no third gender or fifth or tenth or 76th. It was Prawn (I think) you mentioned a gender (demi-something), which meant you identified as a person who was only interested in relationships within a romantic context (so not one night stands presumably). Which isn't a gender! It's a preference.

"Correction" also implies there are lots of doctors and midwives needing to undertake refresher training on the basics.

"Correction", to me, would only apply to the small number of intersex individuals. "Change" or "amendment" would seem appropriate to describe transgender individuals.

DD is adopted, so has a new birth certificate - this has her "adoptive name" on it, not her "corrected name"

On the ability to inherit peerages, I thought that this was something that got put into the act during its passage through the Lords? Must do some digging on that

Goodness knows what gender means nowadays (other than to a gramarian). Someone might have a 'feminine' appearance but a 'masculine' career or hobbies.

To be honest, I had this conversation on another thread. I thought there were only two genders - masculine and feminine. And all the 76 were variations on the theme.

How come there are 76 genders?

God I'm so confused.

So gender has a direct correlation to biological sex? But gender identification means you can switch?

With the talk of "assigned at birth" and "gender", things can get pretty confusing. I offer a summary of my understanding of some terms in case it may help anyone:

For intersex people and some people with other rare biological conditions including Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, biological sex may not correspond to external anatomy. Therefore, at birth, this very small group may be assigned a sex (often called "gender" nowadays). For everyone else, including trans people, their anatomy corresponds to their biological sex. Therefore, this enormous group is not assigned a sex at birth. Their biological sex is recorded at birth .

A person is assigned a gender role (expected behaviour), based on his or her biological sex (so it is sometimes called a sex role).

How a person feels about his or her anatomy and/or gender role is his or her gender identity.

Amend/amendment would have been more neutral. Language matters.

'Although the UK Government are happy to "correct" that a baby boy with perfectly normal male anatomy' ... not to mention, standard XY chromosomes.

EnormousTiger wrote - "I don't agree it is always a change not a correction."

In case it's me that you disagree with, I did not claim that a change is never a correction.

My point is that a correction is always a change but some changes seem more equal than others. The UK Government has chosen to make a value judgement that the record of a trans person's biological sex will not only be changed (which is entirely sufficient to enable a trans person to adopt their new social role) but the change will also be regarded as a correction. I think this gives a false impression that the people who did the original identification at birth were incapable of recognising the difference between male and female genitalia, as if it was recorded wrongly on the original document due to e.g. incompetence. I think treating the changes as corrections makes it look as if the people who used biology to accurately and correctly record a person's biological sex were wrong and/or biology was wrong. The vast majority of trans people, however, have the normal anatomy of their biological sex as recorded at birth. This rewriting of history is changing the recording of biological sex into a recording of the feeling of a gender identity, that was not expressible at birth or may not have even existed at birth. It turns the data recorded on a birth certificate into a retrospective autobiographical opinion.

Although the UK Government are happy to "correct" that a baby boy with perfectly normal male anatomy was supposedly "wrongly" identified as male, the Government still continues (hypocritically?) to base its recording of a baby's sex on the same biology as it used in previous decades and on the same anatomical features as it used in previous centuries.

EnormousTiger wrote - "There are lots of different kinds of people and some are attributed the wrong gender at birth as they have lack of clarity with their sex organs"

If you are using gender as meaning biological sex, then being recorded as the wrong gender may apply to intersex people but it applies to almost no trans people* because there is no such lack of clarity for almost all trans people, most of whom will forever keep the very same birth genitalia that "wrongly assigned them to a gender".

(* for example, some gender identity researchers like to reclassify, as trans, any intersex person who switches their gender role behaviour)

Noone is attributed a gender at birth though?

Disliking your sex organs does not mean you are actually in the wrong body. Anymore than me disliking my breasts means I have the wrong breasts :S

Its great to have a chance of 'changing' this, especially if it causes large amounts of distress. But we really need to move away from the 'designated female at birth' way of thinking. A 'gender' isn't 'chose' by a doctor when you are born, so it cannot be 'wrong'. A sex is noted. Only slight difference is in those who are intersex, which is nothing to do with trans

I don't agree it is always a change not a correction. There are lots of different kinds of people and some are attributed the wrong gender at birth as they have lack of clarity with their sex organs

"...enjoying all that it has to offer to its members." To me that reads as though the rumours are true and Mx Jenner retains all the privileges of male members whilst having a female changing space.

from www.gov.uk/correct-birth-registration/what-corrections-can-be-made :

"The original information will always be shown in the register. After the correction has been authorised, a note will be added to the margin of the register. This will explain what the correct information is and when the correction was made.
All full birth certificates that are issued from this time will include the note in the margin.
Short birth certificates only include the child’s details and won’t have a note in the margin - they’ll just include any correct new details."

The UK Government has crossed a line there by referring to subjective "corrections" instead of objective "changes".

Aaarghh, forgot to put the link with the statement from the golf club

“TMZ never contacted the Club for any input into its story about Caitlyn Jenner, and it shows,” the statement read. “The story is almost entirely false, other than the fact that Bruce Jenner has been a valued long term member at the Club in good standing. That fact has not changed one bit. Caitlyn Jenner will continue to be a valued member of Sherwood Country Club, enjoying all that it has to offer to its members.”

www.golf.com/tour-and-news/caitlyn-jenner-still-welcome-elite-golf-club

Twogoats

I'm not sure about that one tbh. Sherwood Country Club has female members albeit with their own (vastly inferior) separate facilities, including the dining room.

The statement from the club is rather ambiguous and doesn't say which facilities CJ uses citing "privacy". Rather ironic considering CJ made a reality show out of their transition. The club's ambiguity also extends to calling CJ Bruce Jenner as well as Caitlyn Jenner in the same statement!

This article doe state that CJ has been given a "women’s locker room spot at her country club"

www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/caitlyn-jenner-grateful-accepted-country-club-article-1.2551235

So a bloke who likes wearing dresses sometimes is in the same category as someone with serious body dysphoria?

And this is the issue, but so many refuse to see it.

I heard that Saint Caitlyn of Jenner still plays golf on a 'male-only' golf course...

I read about April Ashley in the 1970s. I have always been very sympathetic to those born in the wrong body. Most mumsnetters are and treat such people with compassion.

What I do object to is when men (or whatever they want to call themselves) invading women's places like MN and trying to shut down discussion. Discussion helps us all understand the position of other people just as the autobiographies I have read over the years of trans people helped me in my teens and now understand how those people fee.

I have followed the UK legislative changes too particularly before 2004. It was always a very difficult topic but only because we are such a gendered society. The more sexism we rid ourselves of the less it will matter as we may be as likely to have men in high heels as women and ditto all the other stuff.

I am equally unhappy about websites like this stopping those with different views from others expressing them too. i want to live in an England and post on a mumsnet where people can deny the holocaust, say women are unequal to men and all the rest even though I dislike those views intensely. The free speech should trump (pun intended) all as long as we can all be polite about it.

As soon as you start pandering to the overly sensitive feelings of special groups you lose. Those people who get upset by reading things need therapy and help but that should not mean other people are censored.

However it is a devil of a job running websites with discussions groups fairly. I don't eny them their task and it is often simpler just to take material down if people object as you cannot have the time to analyse every dispute. However that then becomes unfair as those who are not robust and who complain all the time win.