High Court Battle - pronouns

I expect here that the belief will be protected but he may lose on the the manifestation of it (using non-preferred pronouns).

We shall see - for my part, this is not a hill I would die on in the GC cause. I think it’ll be an easy win for the TRA lobby and give them ammunition to come out with the bullshit about gender critical feminism and the Christian Right etc. Hope I’m wrong.

just as a trans person would find the religious belief that you can't change gender upsetting

I'd agree with VestofAbsurdity that this is a matter of sex not gender. However, with its emphasis on clothing, it's arguable that one of the previous quotations does cover gender to some extent. However, that is a desperately anachronistic interpretation of the matter and I say that knowing that I'm blundering into an areas of exegesis and that for some the Bible is literal truth.

I sometimes find the common belief among some people of a range of faiths that non-adherents to that faith or non-believers will be tortured for eternity quite upsetting. However, those are the occasions when they're proselytising to me or someone vulnerable who is reporting it to me.

If those thoughts stay inside their head and don't manifest when they're interacting with me and they don't discriminate against me because of this difference then we're fine.

It does beg the question why can't there be a universal accepted definition of gender.

Is it a change of clothing? Is it pretend pronouns, is it an acknowledgement that you find the treatment of your sex, sexist?

The fact that it's all about gender, until rights and spaces are concerned and then suddenly those must be ceded on the basis of sex, is quite telling.

It's the very end bit that suddenly means sex, not gender, that creates the lie.

owlinnahat

You talk about the upset for transgender people but:

Dr Mackereth said during proceedings that he was asked in a conversation by his line manager: 'If you have a man six foot tall with a beard who says he wants to be addressed as 'she' and 'Mrs', would you do that?'

I find the idea that a six foot tall visibly male person with a beard could demand and expect to be addressed as she and Mrs fucking insulting and upsetting.

just as a trans person would find the religious belief that you can't change gender upsetting

Here we go again with the obfuscation of sex and gender. Dr. Mackereth is quite correct no-one can change sex and he is not prepared to be complicit in a lie that they can.

I am reassured that there is an A+E doctor in Shropshire who believes in sex.

If this person (heads up - upsetting case linked about consequences of hiding sex in health records) had had someone who knew that a trans man was female then perhaps the outcome would have been happier.

I am so sad for that person, did not know they were pregnant, presented with pain, told the staff their gender identity but the medical records said "M" and so they were triaged as a male and labour, pre eclampsia and prolapsed cord were missed. Sex matters www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7395710/

Deuteronomy 22:5 ESV
“A woman shall not wear a man's garment, nor shall a man put on a woman's cloak, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God.

Mind you these Biblical laws are also sexist, pro-slavery, homophobic, racist, unscientific so not really great to stand by, though obviously Christians depending on brand feel free to ignore mosiac law.

However people should be allowed to follow religions if they want as long as they can do their job without prejudice. Lots of people manage it all the time. It isn't difficult.

I have had great interactions with people whose religions I don't agree with at all. It is messed up this guy lost his job.

[quote Mochudubh]@owlinnahat

Did you seriously mean to equate stating biological fact with Holocaust denial?[/quote]
I was thinking of beliefs people hold that have upset me (Jewish, bisexual) in the same way that I think that kind of deliberate misgendering would upset a trans person.

I think it's about the impact on the vulnerable patient. I've been in the position of being under the care of a doctor who had some very conservative views - my first psychiatrist insisted that my relationships with women were a symptom of "risk taking behaviour" and "low inhibitions" and was quite blunt about this. I'm sure he also thought he was just stating biological fact. It was very distressing and impossible to really challenge as he had a great deal of power over me, as the doctor. I've also gone through DWP fitness to work assessments and they are hell. The relationship with the assessor is so loaded and has such amazing capacity to be abusive. I just think in that situation it is right and appropriate that there be a fairly strict degree of oversight of medical professionals working in that kind of environment in order to protect patients from this kind of thing. No one is asking him to carry out a smear test on a trans woman. He's been asked to use the preferred form of address (Mr or miss presumably) and preferred pronouns when talking to patients about their disabilities.

Forcing people, legally, to deny the evidence of their own eyes is placing them in an untenable and subordinate position. It's simply not compatible with daily life, particularly in the context where the sex of the person is entirely relevant.

Making people lie is weaponising this ideology to an unacceptable level.

It would also appear that the original court has been superseded by the Maya case. You can't say that Christian beliefs are not worthy of respect! Neither can you force people to believe in transgenderism.

From what I understand of the remit of the EHRC, it would appear that the sensible course would be that this should be dealt with by somebody else who doesn't mind using wrong sex pronouns.

And there certainly needs to be clarification.

There needs to be a distinction between calmly stating the truth, and it being deemed malicious or harassing.

The original tribunal concluded that "Belief in Genesis 1:27, lack of belief in transgenderism and conscientious objection to transgenderism in our judgment are incompatible with human dignity and conflict with the fundamental rights of others." So were not protected by the EA. That's clearly wrong and I'm sure the court will find that christian beliefs are protected. If "belief in genesis 1:27" is not a protected belief - an important bit of the faith that the head of state pledges to uphold when she's crowned- then what is the purpose of protection of religious beliefs? That must be wrong.

The question will be in what circumstances is the expression of that belief protected?

The doctor is now in emergency medicine, but I'm not sure exactly what the previous job entailed. Did he meet patients or was he assessing case notes? I don't want doctors to address patients in a way that makes them uncomfortable, feel belittled or upset, or to refer to them in such a way in their presence. I doubt the court will say that's protected. The circumstances where a bearded person wants to be 'she' are set outside the consulting room, and can't really be addressed in the moment in that consultation. So it depends what he was wanting to say and in what circumstances.

If you’re the patient’s psychiatrist then challenging them may be in your clinical remit. Otherwise? Address people how they want, because a medical consultation is about them, not you.

GPs do a lot of work supporting their patients who have mental health issues too. It's a mistake to think this is a role only taken on by psychiatrists - who actually tend to become involved as the mental health issues become severe. Expecting GPs to collude with a delusion is not as neutral as people think and neither is asking a GP to act in an unscientific way. It undermines the medical role.

“unwashedanddazed

The tribunal ruling stated: 'In so far as those beliefs form part of his wider faith, his wider faith also does not satisfy Grainger [the requirement of being worthy of respect in a democratic society, not incompatible with human dignity and not in conflict with the fundamental rights of others].

So they ruled that Christianity is not worthy of respect in a democratic society. I'm an atheist but this is an appalling statement for a court to make in a predominantly Christian country. I'm very happy that all that Maya went through is helping to fight such totalitarian dictats.”

It does seem to be ruling that Christianity is not worthy of respect if having a trans gender identity takes precedence.

One protected characteristic trumping the other. But don’t we have to accept that law does not have to adhere to Biblical precepts anymore?

So according to the TRAs, it’s illegal to be Christian now? Wow, that’s constitutionally complicated in England.

Interesting to me how the TRAs always, always, go after someone’s livelihood. They’re so incredibly vicious. If they were really trying to promote tolerance, they’d have a methodology of engage and debate, not these vicious attemps to destroy reputations and livelihoods.

Someone upthread said why can’t you just use the pronouns people ask for? My answer is that pronouns matter. They don’t just matter to the trans person, they matter to me to. When you deny my right to describe physical reality, you do me psychological harm (and you become a totalitarian facist).

Why can't people be sensible about all this?

He should be able to refer to people by their name if he does not wish to refer to their chosen gender.

It is also important in medical matters to know the sex of the person you are dealing with, so its important anyone reading a patient's notes knows their sex as well as their chosen gender.

This should not be an issue. It should be possible to accommodate everyone's position.

@owlinnahat

Did you seriously mean to equate stating biological fact with Holocaust denial?

I suppose it depends on whether Mr and Mrs are ‘names’ like any other names, however silly they may seem - so something someone could choose for themselves and expect to be called.

But what about someone calling themselves ‘Colonel’ or ‘Princess’ as their name regardless of their position or sex? Would that mean someone had a legal right to expect them to be used? Mr and Mrs are titles too.

Sacking him was punitive not protective

The obvious solution to clash of rights is to allow him freedom of conscience and refer transgender clients to another person.

Obviously Christian interpretation will vary but there will be a significant number of Christians who take issue with the idea that our bodily sex is irrelevant.

(I'm assuming the person in question didn't have a GRC).

In the hypothetical question from the manager or was there an actual incident?

He was sacked for refusing to lie. This is what it boils down to.

It will be interesting to see how this ties in with the Forstater case. If I remember correctly, in the Forstater ruling, the judge said that gender critical beliefs were protected in law, but that this didn't extend to using the "wrong" pronouns.

Of course this claimant is using religious belief rather than gender-critical beliefs, and it is potentially very interesting because of the clash of rights: do religious beliefs that there are only two sexes override the apparent right of people with gender reassignment to be called what they want? It's obviously very tricky because the judge will have to consider a) whether a belief in transgender identity contradicts Christian beliefs b) what exactly gender reassignment means in this context (I'm assuming the person in question didn't have a GRC).

The tribunal ruling stated: 'In so far as those beliefs form part of his wider faith, his wider faith also does not satisfy Grainger [the requirement of being worthy of respect in a democratic society, not incompatible with human dignity and not in conflict with the fundamental rights of others].

So they ruled that Christianity is not worthy of respect in a democratic society. I'm an atheist but this is an appalling statement for a court to make in a predominantly Christian country. I'm very happy that all that Maya went through is helping to fight such totalitarian dictats.