Trans women to be banned from female hospital wards

Does this mean an end to mixed sex wards more generally then? I was on a ward with men (not the ones in frocks) the last time I was in hospital. Transwomen would have made no difference they let men in anyway.

We are a dichotomously sexed species. There's no nuance about it - we are male, or female.

And can I ask why you think a transwoman would be 'at risk' on a male ward, what evidence you are basing this belief on?

I should think that being unable to accept reality and being unable control everyone's thoughts feelings and speech would lead to poor outcomes. Dont you think helping people to face reality is a better use of time and money than attempting to re organise society to pretend reality doesn't exist in order to enable people to carry on ignoring it?

Barriers are there for many people. For many reasons. We could be tackling racism, misogyny, sexism, poor education, employment issues etc
Problems that actually exist and are the cause of so many poor outcomes and barriers to helathcare. Colluding with identities ,that realky are the business of the person who claims to have it and nothing that anyone else should feel obligated to participate in , is simply a first world manufactured problem that is basically a choice. You can choose to face reality or ignore it but the consequences are on you and you only.

Also, you used the term 'lived as women'. How does a man 'live as a woman'?
I imagine it means insisting on using women's facilities such as toilets, changing rooms, and hospital wards...
Oh, and reporting those who use to buy into the pronoun bollocks (or correctly sex them) to the Gestspo.

Men who think they are women are not 'living as women' because they aren't women. What they might be doing is living their own stereotyped view of that they think being a woman is about.

Exactly. They are pretending to be women, living as a male fantasy of how a woman lives.

I think third spaces and gender neutral facilities in most kind of situations will offer dignity and protection for all. As for hospitals - many new hopsitals are now going over to single rooms - so being on a male wing would not be so compromising for trans identified men.

What makes you think these males who identify as transwomen (and may still have penises) would be at risk in a male ward?

Also, you used the term 'lived as women'. How does a man 'live as a woman'?

What does 'lived as women' mean?

Men who think they are women are not 'living as women' because they aren't women. What they might be doing is living their own stereotyped view of that they think being a woman is about.

@MargotBamborough it’s not.

and part of the reason we’ve ended up in this mess is because women have sucked it up to “be kind”.

it’s also one of my main argument points when yet another male gay friend lectured me about this issue. They aren’t being made unsafe by letting trans men into their spaces. Bio women are.

And I’m fucking sick of men telling women what to do.

I’m just conflicted. And not sure how we (society) fix it for everyone.

I worry that placing them into a male ward will place them at risk and I'm sure the announcement today will have upset them.

This is how women feel when males inc those presenting aa women, are placed in female wards.

as PP said, this isn’t women’s problem to solve, women have been sacrificed for this cause for long enough already

With the greatest of respect.

Why is this women's problem to solve?

I struggle with this one. Binary male and female wards (or changing rooms) don't capture the nuance as society.

I can think of several transgender acquaintances who have lived as women for a long time. They have had extensive surgery (don't know full extent of bottom, but definitely top surgery) and currently use female facilities. I worry that placing them into a male ward will place them at risk and I'm sure the announcement today will have upset them.

The health outcomes for the trans community are already poor and placing additional barriers around access is not going to help things. But equally healthcare needs to be safe for all users and simply opening the doors to female only spaces to mitigate this has not been safe / reduced accessibility to biological woman.

Do we need to move to all cubicles for toilets, changing and hospital??

I think that the early 2000s would be a really interesting period for British politican historians to study.

It's the new millennium, you have Tony Blair fresh into his second term as prime minister, cool Britannia, it's boom time.

In current affairs you have 9/11 and the Iraq war, and on the legislative agenda you have civil partnerships, legal sex changes and fox hunting. WTF?

20 years on, Tony Blair is largely in disgrace to the point where the left wants him to STFU even though he was the only leader in recent memory who won them any elections and even though he is often right about stuff, civil partnerships didn't even last 15 years before they were superseded by same sex marriage, legal sex changes have blown up into an all out culture war which may yet cause Labour to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at the next election, and still nobody gives a shit about fox hunting.

Were our MPs just so distracted by the shit show going on in Iraq that they forgot what the words "male" and "female" mean as they nodded along to the arguments in favour of the Gender Recognition Bill?

Bloody hell those male views never die do they

It's so weird isn't it. The logic is just completely absent.

Its why i dont believe the idea that GRA was introduced, even in part, because of the inability to marry someone of the same sex.

It was obviously just an excused to give men female birth certificates and privacy.

Sounds like projection to me

It's so weird isn't it. The logic is just completely absent.

I cannot for the life of me understand why it was deemed necessary for trans people to be able to do this but not gay people, to the point where they introduced a mechanism for legally recognising a same sex relationship as a heterosexual one rather than simply legalising same sex marriage

It's especially bonkers because at around the same time as the GRA, the Labour government introduced civil partnerships for same-sex people. They could have killed two birds with one stone and legalised same-sex marriage.

It avoided same sex marriage in a legal sense by making someone with a gender recognition certificate legally the opposite sex.

It facilitated it in the actual sense of allowing two people of the same sex to marry each other when this was otherwise prohibited.

I cannot for the life of me understand why it was deemed necessary for trans people to be able to do this but not gay people, to the point where they introduced a mechanism for legally recognising a same sex relationship as a heterosexual one rather than simply legalising same sex marriage.

I can never understand how allowing some people to pretend they are the opposite sex so they can be married avoided same sex marriage. Didn't it facilitate it? And why was it deemed to be so important for this group to access marriage when other same-sex attracted people had to go the civil partnership route? Also what were the demands that ECHR were making that meant that the GRA was a work around?

But surely the idea that "misgendering" is forbidden is in conflict with Articles 9 (freedom of thought, conscience and religion), and 10 (freedom of expression), and the idea that women cannot say that trans women are not women and act accordingly is also in conflict with Articles 11 (freedom of association) and 14 (discrimination).

Or are some people more equal than others, when it comes to exercising their convention rights?

I doubted myself a while ago after my mum sent me a photo from a family friend's wedding and I couldn't tell which one of two people in the photo was the trans woman. Turns out they both were.

It isn't so much that it stops people asking about the legal status of a person. I believe that there are exceptions when someone reasonably needs the information (i.e. an employer looking to recruit a nurse for, say, gynae care, where there may be a single sex exemption, for example).

It's more that it lends support to the idea that sex is something that is self declared, and a status that can't be discussed, that 'misgendering' is forbidden.

The idea that society could be forced to see men as women in all situations is clearly bonkers.

I know lots of people claim to have lovely friends who transitioned to the point no-one would ever know their true sex, but the fact is, lots of people do look like and behave like their actual, not desired sex.

It means that men with gender have expose themselves to women, have raped women and as a result, women feel uncomfortable with these men. Anyone who is critising women for wanting single sex spaces is blaming the wrong people.

Im sure the passing TW will be upset by the increasing number of policies introduced, effectively stopping them from hiding their sex, but how was it ever going to work otherwise?

If a man doesnt want his sex to be known, he cant be in situations where sex is important, its that simple.

I would really like to see the Article 8 argument re-tested in the courts.

If an individual is deemed to have a right to privacy meaning that their transgender status should not be revealed without their consent, firstly that is going to be a theoretical right in the vast majority of cases since very few people can convincingly pass as a member of the opposite sex, and secondly that clearly conflicts with other people's rights in certain circumstances, for example, when it comes to single sex spaces, or offenders being able to change their names and identities more easily.