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'Nonsense' of gender data collected by public bodies set for review

34 replies

Rightsraptor · 02/10/2023 04:53

'The Science Secretary, Michelle Donellan, will on Tuesday unveil a review into "the utter nonsense" of public bodies being urged to collect data on self-identified gender rather than biological sex.' (From the Daily Telegraph, online edition, 2nd October 2023)

Well, thank goodness they are starting to see the light and not a moment too soon.

Prof Alice Sullivan is going to head the six month review.

I'm not writing more at the mo because of dying batteries and it's some horrid time of the morning when I should be sleeping, but I couldn't wait to share the good news.

Is that the sound of wheels falling off the wagon?

OP posts:
ArabellaScott · 02/10/2023 07:28

Yes, Alice Sullivan is an excellent choice.

InterestingUsernameTBC · 02/10/2023 07:14

Professor Alice Sullivan was instrumental in getting the census to recognise sex, wasn't she? And she's worked with Fair Play for Women. I think she's an excellent choice.

Boomboom22 · 02/10/2023 07:02

I thought sullivan was not gc? Maybe I'm thinking of someone else. Tbf it would be nice for all scientists and anthropologists to recognise sex but they don't anymore.

ArabellaScott · 02/10/2023 06:59

So a politician is going to call 'gender identity' utter nonsense?

The fallout will be interesting.

ArabellaScott · 02/10/2023 06:58

Sounds promising. I hope they genuinely DO somehow depoliticise it, though, so that Labour don't feel compelled to undo it all when/if they get in.

Hoardasurass · 02/10/2023 06:52

Does anyone know whether Prof Alice Sullivan has drank the coolade or not?
I may be a bit paranoid but after the Barislow(sp) fiasco I just don't trust anyone who works at ucl

PriOn1 · 02/10/2023 05:44

A new pattern is emerging where there’s less pussyfooting around language, which is interesting. Imagine the reaction if that statement had been made three years ago. The power of manufactured outrage is gradually being whittled away.

I know it’s taking a very long time for all this to break, but the gradual change in the rhetoric must be fascinating to a dispassionate observer in terms of watching what seems to be a very extreme form of mass hysteria or McCarthyism (hopefully) being corrected.

AutumnCrow · 02/10/2023 05:21

Took them (the Government) long enough. They were warned and warned. And meanwhile that muppet Gillian Keegan remains in Education ffs and Penny Mordaunt - one of the MPs directly responsible for this mess - hasn't gone away.

(Use Airplane Mode or archive . ph to read the whole article, if you don't have a subscription to read it).

From today's Telegraph:

Ms Donelan has been moved to act by examples such as the NHS sometimes using a person’s stated gender rather than their biological sex in data records.

The review will last six months and be headed up by Prof Alice Sullivan, the head of research at UCL’s Social Research Institute.

It will analyse the collection of research and statistics by all public bodies on sex and gender, with specific recommendations to be made at the end.

‘Utter nonsense’Ms Donelan will say in her speech on Tuesday: “To those who think they have the right to impose this utter nonsense on science, let this message go out from this conference hall today… We are safeguarding scientific research from the denial of biology and the steady creep of political correctness.”

She will also say: “We are making a stand before it suffocates British identity and values entirely… That is why we are depoliticising science, because science is the most extraordinary force for good – from curing disease to growing our food – [and] we must keep it that way.”

The intervention comes as the Conservative Party hardens its position on the importance of biological sex being recognised amid the debate about transgender rights.

The issue has played an increasingly prominent role in British political discourse, with all parties facing pressure to make clear how they would strike the right balance.