Sir Keir Starmer on women's rights, sport, and penises, in LBC interview

I do wonder whether we appreciate just how much the impact of all the teenage girls caught up in this are having? Outside of the two transwomen I know, my main contact is with vulnerable teenage girls self IDing out of their sex - all with significant mental health problems etc and all so vulnerable. When you centre these children in this debate, it takes on a very different tone.

I don't think we should underestimate the importance of 'trans children' in this.

Many people, when faced with having to say something about transgenderism which will appear to be 'unkind' towards a vulnerable young person they know who is caught up in this, will try to avoid the question.

I don't think it's a case of 'follow the money' in this case. I think it's much more personal, and is to do with the fact that so many children, in particular teenage girls, now identify as trans. I think it was Emily Thornberry who mentioned at one point that she has a close relative who identifies as a transman. How many other MPs are in a similar position, or have a close friend whose child identifies as transgender, making them terrified to speak out because of the potential personal consequences and the effect they think this will have on the vulnerable young person?

'Yvette Cooper got it right with 'I'm not going down that rabbit hole'. At the moment, the extremists on both sides are deeply entrenched and shouting at each other across no man's land, figuratively speaking.'

Why should we vote for people who refuse to engage with us on the issues we care about? Why is it anything but deeply offensive to call us 'extremists' because we choose to have lines we won't cross, based on reason and science?

It's difficult, isn't it, because the law does actually allow them to change sex. So it's not legally incorrect to say 'TWAW'.

Would be okay to hear politicians say, 'Yes, a TW with GRC is a woman on a strictly legal basis. However, it's ]reasonable - at at times necessary - to separate that administrative category out from adults born female, and therefore I will use the terms "women" and "transwomen" for clarity.'

No problem for me.

Can you define it more eg those who say you can’t change sex or something else

At the moment, the extremists on both sides

Knowing the definition of “woman” does not make me an extremist.

I heard the interview live. Surely the point Starmer was making is that that this is a complex issue, there are two sides to a dialogue and it needs to be conducted in a civilised, respectful way and not at the simplistic reductio ad absurdum level that exists at the moment on both sides.

Ferrari was trying to get a headline and not at all interested in understanding the legal contradictions and practical technicalities of the issue.

Yvette Cooper got it right with 'I'm not going down that rabbit hole'. At the moment, the extremists on both sides are deeply entrenched and shouting at each other across no man's land, figuratively speaking.

Boris isn't coming out of this question well either. Or, his spokesman isn't:

"The Prime Minister has "a very clear position" on trans rights, his official spokesman said.

The spokesman was asked whether the PM thought trans women were women, and said people have "the ability to change their legal sex and how that's recorded"."

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/03/28/keir-starmer-refuses-answer-whether-woman-can-have-penis-latest/

Hand up who would've guessed that:

"[politician] refuses to answer whether a woman can have a penis in latest [party] confusion over trans debate"

Would ever be a headline?!

I've just watched the last part of this interview and completely agree that Sir Keir looks both constipated and extremely shifty. He refused to answer the question about males in women's sport or the question about whether women can have penises properly. His strategy appears to be fudging the issues and using language in a slippery and dishonest fashion. I really can't see this strategy standing up in a General Election campaign. If it's clearly laid out that Labour Party policy is to make single-sex spaces and services effectively (or actually) illegal, indecent exposure a non-crime, women's sports completely expendable etc, even those women and men who at the moment are going along with it may have second thoughts. I'm sure many people who know a little but not much about it at present don't think they or their family will ever be adversely affected. It seems such a niche issue because so much of it has happened on the QT and is frankly bizarre, but I do think this is changing. I've had more real life conversations about this in the last couple of weeks than in the last couple of years. Only one person has been full on TWAW and everyone else has been either well informed and GC or not very well informed and willing at least to discuss the issues.

What are the actual changes Labour want to make to the GRA/GRC & knock ons’ for the Eq Act?

The ones Stephen Whittle et al have been clear they've been promised in cosy back room meetings over a cup of tea and know is in the bag the second Labour get in power?

But the ones Labour don't have the guts to tell the electorate openly and so sound like a bunch of erming ahhing twits about?

• Self ID. Any male can identify as whatever they want at any time
• Removal of exceptions for single sex protections for females from the EqAct2010 (Stonewall have desperately wanted them gone for years for all they keep yelling that they don't exist, they really don't, they don't work at all)
• full male access at will to all female only spaces, fuck the impact upon females and the exclusion of females, yay progressiveness.
• normalisation that females with inconvenient protected characteristics can just be denied services, shunned and punished for their lack of support for male people while still expected to pay taxes
• a lot more females being arrested and prosecuted and visibly punished to teach the rest of them to shut up.

The next ones we can probably make intelligent guesses at?

• redefinition of homophobia and misogyny in law to better protect male people and shut up inconvenient female people who don't know their place as walking resources
• safeguarding boundaries to be removed at will if TQ+ is involved.... any oh whoopsie outcomes that causes kids and other vulnerable people fully predictable harm, well, shrug, it's all in a good cause, minimise the recording of it and letting it get into public knowledge, and emphasise a lot that those harmed were far less important and vulnerable than the people the boundaries were moved for
• full blown conversion therapy law that largely prevents anything at all but enthusiastic affirmation regardless of a child's presenting needs
• making it much easier for children to access life altering medication and surgery. (Again, some oh whoopsie issues ahead but whatevs right?)

God only knows the bits not even Stonewall have dared to mention yet, but I very much doubt it all stops there.

Wankers, never vote for them again

'I am truly wondering why Starmer and Labour ARE so deeply invested in the first place. Why? Donors maybe?

Yes I expect that’s it.
Apparently Labour’s finances aren’t in a good way so they have to take what they’re offered.

'If a transwoman is a woman how could you legally exclude them from a refuge? He is supposed to be a legal expert but he won’t answer.'

You can, using the single sex provisions in the Equality Act. Those allow services to be provided for biological females, not males, whether or not they possess a GRC and are legally female.

He is fudging that deliberately.

I'm glad she's seen the light. IMO young people have been left blindsided by the internet, a new and aggressive psychological landscape they should have been better protected from.

Why can’t he just answer the question , he used a refuge as an example . If a transwoman is a woman how could you legally exclude them from a refuge? He is supposed to be a legal expert but he won’t answer .

In the meantime the women fighting the Russian men in Ukraine are fighting for this 'freedom'? Our model of democracy? Where they can't even identify themselves as women.

We owe it to them at least to do better.
My teen dd is finally on side, it has taken three years of Saturday night conversations but there was a final straw for her. When a friend turned into a guy overnight and she was 'expected' to now fancy 'him'. All of her friends challenged her as to why she did not find 'him' attractive. It was an enlightening moment for her.

The lived reality of our teens is seriously messed up.

So no, we just deserve justice

Justice designed by and defined by men, of all kinds.

'I don't feel sorry for him. It's his job.'

Nor do I. I don't buy any of the 'poor baby MP Keir Starmer, only sixty years old and been an MP for six years and leads the Labour Party and wants the nuclear codes' talk.

He can't have it both ways. He's either a big boy who can have the big conversations, or he's not PM material.

His - how

I mean its possible he has a plan, get in power, sort this out to advantage women(cunty type) and rest on his laurels, but I doubt it. What will actually happen is the menz shout louder and swing their dicks, and the women yet again are told, after the revolution sweetheart now go make the tea dear.

Where did Blair’s government get money from and his has that changed?

The Labour party have become a lost cause to so money women.

'Are women not entitled to 'social justice' tabby?'

Justice is justice.

Social justice isn't justice, it's a distortion of the concept that presents people according to a hierarchy of oppression.

It is just for women to have single-sex spaces, which we need in order to mitigate against the proven dangers presented by males, and in order to meet our needs for privacy and dignity in a grossly sexist society.

In the 'social justice' model, those considerations are inverted. Pointing out that males are a threat to females becomes unsayable unless you pretend that some males are females. 'Women' become 'cis women', a privileged group trying to exclude 'other' women from their legitimate rights.

So no, we just deserve justice.

Nothing he says males sense.

He says of course hes going to keep women safe.

Women deserve safe spaces etc. But until he actually defines who he is talking about it doesnt mean anything

I don't feel sorry for him. It's his job.

And I don't believe it doesn't come up at LP meetings and that it's somehow new. I say this because it has been coming here for years and I know women who left as far back as 2017 over it, having been told to stop being bigots by males who were happy to let the women do all the donkey work like setting up stalls, so long as they didn't step out of line.

If Starmer lacks the courage to say what we all know to be the Truth, then what other cobblers would he say once in charge with Commons majority? How much worse things could be, doesn't bear thinking about.

I do wonder whether we appreciate just how much the impact of all the teenage girls caught up in this are having? Outside of the two transwomen I know, my main contact is with vulnerable teenage girls self IDing out of their sex - all with significant mental health problems etc and all so vulnerable. When you centre these children in this debate, it takes on a very different tone. Of course, the issues are about social contagion, co morbidities and everything the Cass Review identifies. But I suspect if you're not familiar with the grim reality of trans sex offenders / Wi Spa / Lia Thomas, NHS policies then objecting to this massive social change might feel "wrong".
Just musing really, but it seems, yet again, as played out in the Denton's Playbook, the #nodebate that enabled this to happen behind closed doors with children captured / weaponised at the earliest opportunity has been very successful in framing women's warning voices as "unkind".