Mary Harrington in DM: When a group set up to fight homophobia is at war with a lesbian champion of gay rights, it's no longer fit for purpose

I don't know, I suspect the Health and Safety part was put in there to give an illustration that the demographic the article was aimed at would relate to.

The health and safety part was lazy* and undercut the rest of the piece

It came across as "and now, a word from our sponsor" and served to break the convincing flow of the actual argument. Otherwise, it's a terrific piece.

The health and safety part was lazy and undercut the rest of the piece - I'd like to see which official health and safety org. was behind those anecdotes as it's usually an over-zealous person using H&S as a cover for their apprehension about insurance and what it covers. Sometimes it's not the article's writer who includes that stuff, it can be inserted by editors etc.

That article has clearly been written to bring this issue to the door of a specific, ahem, demographic (and you can see from the comments that it has worked!) but it is sunlight and exposed the absolute farce that Stonewall has now become. Plus, Allison Bailey is just awesome!

Good.

There needs to be a Public Inquiry into the dealings and funding of Stonewall, including their relationships with all the rest of the players, Gendered Intelligece, LGBT Youth Scotland, The Eqality Network etc.

The Harrington article is a really clear explanation of the problems with Stonewall for people who are new to the debate. It’s a shame she had to introduce the health and safety analogy into it but otherwise excellent.

In today's Sunday Times there's a brilliant article by Matthew Syed (such a good journalist) about the BBC, NHS & Oxfam and how their cultures of purity enable scandals to thrive. Share token as it's a such a great piece:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/9fab77c8-bb1c-11eb-88a0-2b24633e3d76?shareToken=c790f8e27748e623d416ecce1826e580hat take place because of their

Thanks for sharing, I have a Times sub but rarely read the Mail unless linked here going to enjoy this article with my breakfast!

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4252103-EHRC-cuts-ties-with-Stonewall

A spokeswoman from Stonewall defended their policies as being “based on guidance provided by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

So stonewall were both advising EHRC, which no doubt affected guidance, then said their policies were based on EHRC guidance? Isn't that a bit circular?

That's excellent news that EHRC are dropping the diversity champions thing.

Have now read the article. It has many of the same arguements as the Matthew Paris article in the Times.

Looking forward to the other MSM who have been such trans allies, printing articles like this.

And maybe one day the Guardian?

I've said this on the other thread but ceasing to be a Stonewall Diversity Champion does not mean that the EHRC has cut ties with Stonewall, ie they may include them in discussions in the future.

But the EHRC ceasing to be a Diversity Champion is a huge blow to the validity of the scheme.

Hopefull a lot of other organisaitons will also opt out of it. I dont care if the do it quietly, but as soon as it is acknowledged to be anything but diversity the better.

I wonder how many organisations and companies are going to look round for a fall guy to blame for every getting them involved in something so obvious without merit.

The FTSE 100 should now seriously be considering whether they want to continue their association with such a tarnished organisation

She says "And as the MoS reports today, the watchdog has now cut ties with Stonewall, ending its own Stonewall Diversity Champions membership. " but I can't find that report.

Matthew Parris has written something very similar in today’s Sunday Times

“as a publicly funded organisation we have to ensure that we are making the best choices when it comes to our budget and have recently been reviewing all of our memberships”
“We wrote to Stonewall in March to let them know that we would not be renewing our membership, and this has now expired.”

sex-matters.org/posts/updates/press-release-equality-and-human-rights-commission-cuts-ties-with-stonewall/

I bet this is why the Stonewall Diversity Champions page online got taken off the Stonewall website.

Losing the EHRC is the biggie, isn't it?

Well spotted Pear. Government departments have got to do likewise being a member is anathema to impartiality due to the lobbying and dictating Stonewall do and how can any Government department or publicly funded institute maintain ties with an organisation that persistently and deliberately falsifies what the Law as laid down by Parliament actually says. No-one elected Stonewall, they do not have the democratic right to make up Laws as they see fit.

I absolutely love Mary Harrington's writing. I've read articles by her on loads of stuff and loved them all.

I think she's a Mumsnetter too.

Losing the EHRC is the biggie, isn't it?

Brilliant piece

A very clear and well reasoned argument, the guardian had something recently too that made me think perhaps the emporers new clothes are being recognised. Can't seem to find a link to it.

"Founded in 1989, the lobby group had achieved its last major LGB equality goal when gay marriage passed into UK law in 2014."

"Blistering" really is the word for it. Wow! And I do hope that's true about the EHRC!

In 2010 Stonewall was such a moderate, cautious organisation that it couldn't make up its mind whether it favoured same-sex marriage or not. Yet only five years or so later it attached itself to the extremist wing of TRA.