Ireland..you could not make this up

In recent months and years, entrenched opinions, polarising rhetoric, and misinformation have very unfortunately characterised parts of the “discourse” about the lives and healthcare of trans people....In this atmosphere, it is increasingly difficult for civil conversations to occur online.

Jesus this movement is gaslighting start to finish.

Ah, ok. So not only are this transgender network organisation the authority on same sex attracted people, they are the authority on women too. I was going to say in Ireland. But they have denounced British women as hateful for standing up for their rights. The lads who are career activists on large NGO salaries in Ireland don't want any of that nonsense of women thinking they can stand up for themselves in Ireland.

I was going to say I bet they'd like to influence what material Irish people are allowed to read. But of course, that is being covered. .. .

GCN in collaboration with TENI and Una Mullally present an information evening for journalists and other media workers.

gcn.ie/talking-sense-launches-to-combat-harmful-anti-trans-discourse-in-the-media/

You couldn't make it up. TENI advocate representation be removed form people who don't believe in their ideology. Then they say it is hard to have a civil conversation and say there has been honest and open conversations. Stealth and sneak more like.

It should be recognised that legislative progress in Ireland, which gave rise to the Gender Recognition Act in 2015, was a rare example of the political machinery being somewhat ahead of the public’s familiarity with the lived experience of trans people.

Sounds like a coup.

They probably meant to sign it from the NWCI but just forgot who they were acting as that day.

Why are TENI presenting themselves as the voice of women? They are a transgender network/ group, aren't they?

Gender identity is their shtick, not biological sex. Maybe they really mean to talk about the impact of the pandemic on people with certain gender identities. And as gender identity doesn't seem to be necessarily attached to sex ... .

Well the IT is back to its usual self this morning. A letter about the impact of the pandemic on Women signed by TENI. When I saw them refer to women and pregnant people I realised it was not written by people who represent me.

Looking at this Seanad speech from Jillian van Turnhout who seems to think that the treatment of dysphoric children be driven by the proclamations of random transgender adults. Of course, their guiding compass will be child protection and children's rights.

Elizabeth Reilly et al published a very interesting piece of qualitative research on the issue which solicited the views of transgender adults about the needs of gender-variant children and their parents in the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy – the peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Routledge – in 2013.

www.jillianvanturnhout.ie/gender-recognition-bill-2014-2/

I hear there are VAWG protests planned for the weekend, heard Ruth Coppinger on the radio.
I hope they are respectful and not hijacked by others with specific agendas

This is a transcript of the meeting, which was continued the next day.

www.oireachtas.ie/en/debates/debate/joint_committee_on_education_and_social_protection/2013-10-24/2/

I mean are we really advocating that we'd have a difference of opinion between someone's gender of identity and what someone else says?

But the Irish legislation basically states that their sex changes in line with their 'gender identity' (whatever that is). And can access all areas according to that sex into which they have transformed. You have the duty to look at the potential problems when as a TD you are involved in making legislation for someone who says they have a gender identity of 'woman' they become someone of the female sex. And dismantling safeguarding because of 'what someone says'. Were these people in Ireland in the final decades of the C20th?

He is like a preaching priest outlining the tenets rather than someone who has a duty of care to make sure the rights of all citizens are balanced. How could this mess have been any different?

@FionaMacCool , the nodding head is Leslie Sherlock.
They state I am a transgender ally, activist and educator with LGBT Noise, which is a non-party political, voluntary, independent group . Below is a link to the transcript of another meeting. Sherlock start speaking about halfway down this page.

Of interest too is Donal O'Shea, adult endocrinologist. He states In 20% of cases in which there is a diagnosis (of gender dysphoria?) before puberty there is a change of mind. Of course, we now know that it is likely that 80% of gender dysphoric children will desist if they go through through puberty. That meeting was in October, 2013.

www.oireachtas.ie/en/debates/debate/joint_committee_on_education_and_social_protection/2013-10-23/2/

The wide desemination of information in the media usually starts with the comments. I noticed that in the UK. Times articles appearing infrequently to start with and then picking up speed as the paper realised where there readership were. The paper then gained readers as it produced more articles and although it puts in some to give balance, you can't balance 80 - 20 by a 50-50 stance.

Hopefully Irish media will realise where their readers are. I have my fingers crossed

I tried to listen

Cailleach I couldnt listen to all of that clip that you linked; he meandered on, touching on "State imposing divorce", medical and constitutional issues, the status of the family.

Who was the blonde lady in a blue jacket who nodded along in agreement when he started to talk about sports?

Did nobody around that table, stop for a moment, to think about

• safeguarding children
• safeguarding women.

They're legislators...isnt there some rule about not disassembling barriers without first asking why the barrier was there in the first place?

they have somehow 'earned' their inclusion as literal women is such nonsense. Lots of people were involved in Repeal, including 99% of the women who EOT labels so perjoratively.

Just trying to think if it's at all unusual for some groups to have minimum involvement but somehow be wholly responsible for successful outcomes and therefore entitled to All The Nice Things and All the Outcomes and therefore The Ones Who Should Be Allowed to Determine and Shape Future Related Matters.

twitter.com/ripx4nutmeg/status/1370270337796038657

You can see why the women of Ireland were screwed over when you see the calibre of the TD's who introduced the GRA legislation. This example of a Minister of State overseeing the deplorably written GRA doesn't appear to consider or care about impact on others wrt the effects of the legislation he and his (overwhelmingly) bros introduced.

He says I think the piece about sport is bordering on bizarre. Who are we as a legislative body to tell any sporting organisation or who can or who can't play what sports. I find that really really just strange and odd and completely unnecessary and slightly offensive.

God, he is painful to listen to. And so limited.

So, he didn't find it bordering on bizarre, strange, odd, offensive or completely unnecessary to introduce legislation where a signature made you a different sex without any gatekeeping whatsoever. With the abuses carried out on women and children by church and state barely investigated, these TD's introduced legislation which would dismantle safeguarding in the way of any male opportunists so inclined. This is a TD who would introduce legislation which locks convicted rapists and violent men up with women. Because TD's like him didn't think it necessary to look at the impacts and legislate accordingly.

The 'I think' part is embroidering the truth a little there. Member of the 85% men's Dáil that screwed women over. That is why that legislation is so awful. It needed people with expertise and people who had the wherewithal to think about the impacts of the legislation they are making. And people with the respect for all Irish citizens. Not just the men who wanted whatever they wanted.

Because it was drawn up by TD's of that calibre, it is not surprising that Robert Purcell, chair of the Law Society Criminal Law Committee said: The law that was enacted in 2015 did not envisage this situation. This was in relation to imprisoning convicted rapists and violent thugs with women. Of course it wasn't envisaged; having to think about impacts was obviously beyond the scope or concern of Aodhán's and his TD bros. And was viewed by them as bordering on bizarre. And unnecessary. And strange. And odd. And offensive.

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

Irish women deserved better than him and his fellow 85% male Dáil. Irish women deserve better today.

The letters are excellent. to any MNers who wrote in.

Yes I agree - I have an online subscription but will buy it today and also write a letter to Niamh Smyth.

miri thank you, thank you for linking to those letters.

I raked through my Irish Times app this morning to see responses to that article; there are 259 (currently) comments below the line. Most (maybe 80%) were critical of the piece, of the Irish Times lack of balance, and of the underhand way the legislation was brought in. Many noted the stirring of anti-British feeling also contained there-in.

I have never written to the paper, never been the sort of person who thrives on the drama of outrage. However, I have thought a lot about this issue. I work with vulnerable children. I have a responsibility to my own daughters.
Niamh Smyth will hear from me; I will buy the IT today ( I have an online subscription but I want to make a point); and I will write to them to ask for a counterbalancing article.

Excellent to see those letters. I’ll even buy a copy of the IT to keep them.

Wow those letters are very impressive

The letters to the editor have been published about that piece, all brilliantly written. Surprisingly none in favour of what O'Toole wrote, usually they at least try to balance it but maybe no one wrote in to defend it.

www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/feminists-must-avoid-transphobia-trap-1.4508914

It doesn't matter if transpeople or trans activists supported Repeal. It should be expected that they did, just like others in the population because it was the right thing to do. They don't get a special award. The majority of the electorate supported Repeal and made it happen. What we got nothing in return is a more decent society. Same goes for transpeople. They get nothing more or less than a better world to live in.

Whether they ever have to face the decision to have a termination is neither here nor there. None of the men who voted for a Repeal will ever have to face that decision. They voted to Repeal on behalf of the women who might one day face that decision. The same applies within the trans community.

Sometimes you do the right thing because it is the right thing, not because you intend to use it as a bargaining chip.

It's an absolute nonsense that transwomen had anything to do with repealing the 8th amendment. A tiny handful hopped on it as the issue du jour and managed to make it as much about them as possible. Their contribution was so slight as to be almost nonexistent.

Also, just want to add: Emer O'Toole hasn't lived in Ireland for over a decade, so it's a bit rich for her to be complaining about us being captured by those evil UK based outside influences.

Nowhere does Emer address the issues she identifies as raised by British feminists in relation to the idea of self-ID (the same issues reaised by Irish feminists and feminists across the world). She just lists them and moves on.

Her claim that Self-ID was heralded in "with little opposition and much celebration" is a blatant lie. Much celebration was what we saw with Repeal and Marriage Equality. There was no national response to Self-ID because we didn't bloody well know it had happened.

There was no transphobia at that conference. Of course, if you think centring women and women's safety is transphobic then that's what you'd see. It doesn't make it true.

If Self-ID in Ireland was problem free none of these threads would exist, women wouldn't be writing to their TDs, the discussions on Irish parenting sites wouldn't exist, the arguments on Twitter wouldn't exist, TCDFFT wouldn't exist, the IWL wouldn't exist, RadCailini wouldn't exist, the outrage at the erasure of the word "women" from the CervicalSmear documentation wouldn't have happened. The vested interests are in trying to make it appear that Self-ID is problem free and consequence free.