Irish prison officers demand guidelines on trans inmates

I've posted a link to this article before, but it's worth reading to see how little thought about the potential consequences went into this law before it was passed.

www.lawsociety.ie/gazette/top-stories/male-bodied-transgender-inmate-housed-with-women-prisoners/

Robert Purcell is chair of the Law Society Criminal Law Committee: “The law that was enacted in 2015 did not envisage this situation, and it puts the Prison Service and the courts in a difficult position because, obviously, if somebody is self-declaring that they have to be recognised, then they have to be dealt with on that basis, even though physically, they have not have made the [physical] transformation.

“I don’t think the legislation envisaged the ability of transgender people to be able to self-declare; and it didn’t foresee the problems it would cause if a transgender, self-declared person was held in a mixed prison,” he said.

Since they passed a law which meant transgender people could self declare, why didn't they think about the problems which could arise if transgender people were able to self declare?

^7. Tie your campaign to more popular reform
In Ireland, Denmark and Norway, changes to the law on legal gender recognition were put through at the same time as other more popular reforms such as marriage equality legislation. This provided a veil of protection, particularly in Ireland, where marriage equality was strongly supported, but gender identity remained a more difficult issue to win public support for^ - p. 20 www.iglyo.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/IGLYO_v3-1.pdf

That this was never thought of is just bloody ridiculous. So many blatantly obvious issues with selfID, and none ever thought through it seems. Though IIRC the Irish bill passed totally undercover of something else..but laws shouldn't be passed that way anyway.

I suggest while the courts sort out this lunacy..male guards 'self ID' as female for the searches. Afterall, it would only ba a bigot who questioned this yes?

Let's not forget that if that person had been carrying some improvised weapon, it might not have have been caught with the wand search. Putting everyone else in danger. Increasing their danger to the women among which they have been placed.

A male could be potentially violent, a rapist or murderer, but if they identify as a woman it all falls away and the fact they claim a 'gender' identity is worshipped and recognised as sacrosanct. These males are treated as 'special' and preferentially to other criminals.

Hopefully their union will fight for them. From the article, it seems to me to be fairly evident that they still recognise the fact that a male body is a still a male body.

I would love to know what the female TD who sent the awful reply to a woman who posts on here, thinks of this really. I mean, I know she hates women like us, from the text of her reply. but what about female prison officers, female inmates ? Sorry to sound classist, but they probably represent many of her constituency and yet she is willing to throw them under a bus to keep woke.

Do these female TDs and MPs who represent women in working class constituencies really hate their female constituents so much that they are willing to sacrifice them to the latest left wing cause? Did they think it through? I do not know which thought saddens me more, that they know what they are doing and don't care, or that they have no clue what they are doing and cannot see any consequences of their actions due to lack of critical thinking skills.

@Aesopfable yes I know but we're supposed to be nice, & all that apparently entails. Frustrating.

It's a problem with no good solutions.

There is a simple and good solution.

@ChakaDakotaRegina I know. It's a problem with no good solutions. (I am trying to be polite & not say what I really think or my post will likely just get deleted.)

The way it is reported is a bit refreshingly factual though. The reporter writes it as it is; prisoners who identify as women but are physically still men.

Only thing, from my viewpoint, I don't see how that can ever change. They must, in my opinion, have at least been expecting all male genitals removed, as a cosmetic effort. A gesture, if you like.

Undoes all the good work the Dep't of Education and teachers ever did on the Science syllabus.

Sadly, things won't change until something really bad happens

You mean like a male being misgendered? Because obviously rape, assault or murder of women doesn’t count.

Having male bodied people who identify as trans working in prison, is just going to mean that female prisoners are going to be refused the right to be searched by a female, as the trans officer identifies as a woman. I like your optimism, but since the government are letting males into female jails, because they identify as trans, they then can’t refuse to treat a male prison officer as a woman, if they identify as trans. It is indeed a tangled web and it’s the female staff and prisoners that are the fly.

There was an old lady that swallowed a fly...

There is no way on earth that those in control of prisons will prioritise the mental and physical health of the female officers over the wants and demands of a male bodied person who identifies as trans. Women will always be shit on.

Not necessarily. The staff may have good unions. And workplace health and safety regulations will probably play in their favour.
They have a much better chance to be heard than female inmates, who have (almost) no one defending them.

So the outcome might be more trans staff in female prisons...

Makes me sick to my stomach that this shit is going down and no one is really talking about it especially the mainstream media. We as women are rightly hated in this world. So sad

Well that's not awkward at all...
A bit as if the people pushing for reforms had not quite thought through their practical implications?
Well done to prison staff for raising the issue, though. And good luck to them (hopefully they will be able to defend the angle that sex trumps gender when safety is involved...)

What will actually happen is that women will be forced to search them. Because, reasons.

This will be it, won't it? :( Fuck how the female officers feel about it.

What an ill thought out, embarrassing fucking shambles. The women on this board foresaw these problems years ago, yet those in power put zero though into it. What a joke.