The Lib Dem candidate has just been round, and guess what...

Thanks, Crouton - Lib Dems are the only ones who bother canvassing here (safe Tory seat and Labour seem to be too weak locally to bother). I'll be ready and waiting!

I'm at the point where I'm going to say that I'll vote for whichever party isn't in favour of this nonsense. Don't come to my door any lie to me about what we both know, and worse, try to tell me that you reckon men and women have the same offending patterns and expect my vote, you absolute canary.

I wouldn't leave someone that thick I'm charge of a cat, let alone policy. Lacking even that basic competence, don't look for my vote.

The trouble is that saying you won’t vote, not voting or spoiling your vote doesn’t have an impact.

you have to vote for the opposition and that is a difficult to ask.

The “it’s going to happen anyway”/“some women do that too” is one of the LD scripted responses.

https://lgbt.libdems.org.uk/en/page/debunking-transphobic-talking-points-longer-version#predatory

The rest of that link should give you an idea what will come up, and how ridiculous their position is. Absolutely no compassion for women and children, a total Us v Them approach and nothing like the pragmatic approach of the party of 10 yrs ago.

As said on another thread the SDP know what a woman is

He thinks there should be 100 categories of changing room? Or he thinks agender females (aka woman FFS) should share their facilities with men who believe their gender is 'woman'. I would have liked him to share his 'logic' about this. Why does he think people are any more comfortable in 'gendered' ones than they are in unisex ones? The only people who largely appear to feel more comfortable in his proposed set-up are trans identifying men.

It almost by definition requires a religious belief, or a belief in something metaphysical. I'd be uneasy about voting for someone who believes in a flawed supernatural power who determines bodies - at least, not without a really clear elaboration of what their belief entails and whether it would interfere in, e.g, abortion rights.

He couldn't say what a woman is.

It's actually really bloody offensive to go round saying TWAW then saying you have no idea what it is you are saying TW are. If I came across a word I didn't know what it meant I wouldn't go round saying a group of people are it! I'd feel a right idiot!

By what mechanism are people born into the wrong body? Where is the right body?

Green parties worldwide typically do not whip their MPs.

Somebody needs to tell the Scottish Green Party.

"He believes that the issue with men using female changing rooms is not that men might try to spy on women getting changed, because some women do that too and it's a crime that should be punished regardless of the sex of the person committing it"

so does he think we should just have unisex changing rooms? If not, why not?

My Lib Dem councillor is very much GC (she made a point of coming round to chat to people and I specifically asked her) and I’m happy to vote for her based on the LD local policies.

But nationally … no way.

because some women do that too and it's a crime that should be punished regardless of the sex of the person committing it

Presumably he’s under the misapprehension that crimes like this usually result in a conviction. And “women do it too” is such a load of gaslighting bullshit. The cases of women being abusive in women’s spaces must be miniscule.

"He's not bothered that I won't be voting him because of his and his ridiculous party's views."

I think this is very telling and more common with the 'progressives'. Either with me 100% or not at all and if you are not at all you are scum and I don't care.

I live in a super safe Labour seat and in a borough with almost no councillors who aren't Labour so was amazed to have a councillor knock on the door the other day. Nice man. I told him I couldn't vote for Labour as I am very concerned about women's rights and safeguarding of children and other vulnerable people and I feel Labour has lost its way with gender issues. He said he would feed this back. I didn't ask his own views, though, and it could all have been flannel.

Better than the Green chap who canvassed last year to whom I said the same thing. He said he totally supported the party line on gender issues. He looked very disappointed in me but he didn't get my vote. Neither did the WEP woman a couple of years ago who also made sympathetic noises but could provide no substantive reassurance to allay my concerns.

Green parties worldwide typically do not whip their MPs. That's part of the philosophy of the parties which says that MPs should be responsible to the desires of the people they represent.

In practice they have other ways of ensuring they toe the line.

The worry is they will think people vote for them because of their gender ideology not despite it.

MintJulia I will not vote for Labour until they stand up for women, and Starmer says what a woman is.

@Shelefttheweb I hope there is a change. I really do. The election next year is Labour's to lose.

But they are unfortunately, so stupid, I suspect they may still throw it away.

And I can't bring myself to vote for a party who denies my very identity.

Probably win. But they could still mess up.

As a centrist, I think political change is overdue, so ordinarily would be voting labour or Lib Dem next time. But I won’t.

@Shelefttheweb im utterly confused - Labour will win or won’t win?

Yes, but may still win. Unfortunately they will put it down to their ideas being attractive to voters rather than the Tories.

That's a lot of words to say that Labour seem to be inelectable.

The Tories have been in power too long so too many negative things have been attached to them. Many their own fault, others (like cost of living crisis and pandemic) not but regardless of whether actually managed well or not will still be a negative for them. Despite labours best efforts, they are likely to win. An advantage of being out of power is it is pretty hard for you to do anything wrong and as the party in power does more wrong things the opposition find it harder to counteract that with idiot beliefs and speeches.