Keep Prison Single Sex closing

Here is a good example of where someone is only considering the human rights of men.

And once again we get the lie that ‘trans people are more at risk than they are a risk’ ignoring the fact that there are more trans murderers than there are trans people murdered (or than trans people are at the lowest risk of murder of any demographic). Or the fact that men who self ID as women are several times more likely to commit a sexual offence than other men, and yet men make up 99% of offenders and women 88% of victims.

"It's Article 8 of the ECHR (right to privacy and family life) that was the basis of the Goodwin judgment that meant the UK had to pass the GRA, IIRC."

Wasn't the issue that same sex marriage wasn't allowed? It is available now, so no need for false ID.

There's no human right to pretend to be the opposite sex.

I can't believe our choice is to allow pretence or throw out our human rights framework altogether. That's bonkers!

I don’t think a safeguarding only approach works either. Where do you draw the line on that? Safeguarding is about degrees of risk, and if you push it to the nth degree you end up in a totalitarian state. That is why human rights are important too. The problem so far with the human rights approach, including the EHRC judgement which led to the GRA, is only the human rights of men seem to be considered. The human rights of women gets ignored.

Self Id is inevitable because it is a basic human right and there is no evidence of any detrimental effects to society. It actually improves things for all.

You just have to think of things as a risk assessment and we know trans people are more at risk than they are a risk. The whole modern period of history proves that.

The issue, for me is, "We do not think that we can solve the conflation between sex and self-declared “gender identity” so simply, since GRCs give holders the right to be considered as members of the opposite sex for certain legal purposes."

What legal purposes? Specifically. And who decides?

Why should there be any legal situations where women are expected to say a man is a woman in order to validate his own self image?

because that's beyond even 'be kind'. It's legally stipulated.

Presumably there weren't any human rights implications here, though? It's Article 8 of the ECHR (right to privacy and family life) that was the basis of the Goodwin judgment that meant the UK had to pass the GRA, IIRC.

But how, without leaving the ECHR (which would be massively damaging to our legal human rights framework and indeed to our national reputation)?

Of course I guess there could be a change in the direction of ECHR caselaw in this area, but I don't see any signs of it and am not sure how the UK would influence this (but would be great to hear the views of any posters who are more familiar with the European Court of Human Rights and its jurisprudence).

The problem with repealing the GRA is that doing so would put us immediately in breach of the European Convention of Human Rights

What human right is breached by removing a law that provides a certificate to obtain a false birth certificate?

Yes, exactly - and hence why (presumably) Sex Matters is taking this approach. I don't think there's necessarily a conflict between rights and safeguarding here.

The GRA is a ridiculous piece of law, the idea that it cannot be repealed only makes sense if you think that no laws can ever change. It might be hard but definitely possible.

Wonderfully succinctly put. This has been apparent for quite sometime but I’m not sure how widely understood this is.

I think SM had to be a human rights organisation for becoming a charity? Or that's what they picked. Anyway, IIRC Stonewall is also a human rights charity. Didn't stop them seemingly saying nothing about the impact of all this on sexual orientation during the passage of the EQA and GRA. Also didn't stop them lobbying to remove women and girls' sex based rights. So quite why SM seems to be beginning from a point of compromise with people who will not stop until are rights are eliminated, is baffling.

I know this sounds almost comically simplistic, but why is sex matters a human rights organisation? Why can't they just be a feminist organisation?

Then this need to balance the rights of men over women's safety would disappear.

Because at some point, they're going to run out of road, surely?

I still want to know the specific situation where legal sex trumps women's safeguarding.

Even these last few posts show why the conversation has to be had. We need to be very careful about spending time and energy only to find we were at a dead end all along. SM need to have a serious rethink of their position, it seems.

I don't believe that the GRA is as strong as we are lead to believe because minsters had no problem introducing policy that stops grc holders convicted of violent crime being placed in the womens prison.

Or female holders inheriting a title over their younger brothers.

One of the problems is that the EqA and GRA cannot be the basis for safeguarding. Its not possible to balance the rights of a girl needing intimate care and the rights of a man to hide his sex, or the rights of women in prison with the rights of men in prison.

Got it. Safeguarding has to come first.

But for a humans rights organisation It's not that straightforward?

One of the problems is that the EqA and GRA cannot be the basis for safeguarding. Its not possible to balance the rights of a girl needing intimate care and the rights of a man to hide his sex, or the rights of women in prison with the rights of men in prison.

I don't believe that the GRA is as strong as we are lead to believe because minsters had no problem introducing policy that stops grc holders convicted of violent crime being placed in the womens prison. The ECHR didnt stop that policy. The question should be why was that arbitrary line drawn there? Where is the evidence that a grc holders convicted of tax fraud arent a threat. Would the ECHR force us to ignore safeguarding?

This!!

If a labour government is going to make a GRC a piece of piss to get, well more of a piece of piss than it already is, it's absolutely the conversation to have.

The problem with repealing the GRA is that doing so would put us immediately in breach of the European Convention of Human Rights. This means that a) it's not going to happen under a Labour or moderate Conservative government and b) Sex Matters, as a human rights charity, cannot really argue for a measure which would require the UK to withdraw from the ECHR which is the framework of human rights law in this country.

Right. But that would be the conversation to have, wouldn't it? How do we do it?

Because the other conversation - we can't do it. so we have to decide where it matters - needs explaining.

If a GRC gives a man any kind of legal right as a woman, whatsoever, what is it?

Because the example was a man searching a woman. My question is on what basis do you decide that a man is a legal woman for certain things, but not others.

Yah. That's why Radical Feminism was born in the first place.

They absolutely deserve a lot of credit. I agree.

The ECHR also doesn't stop us depriving someone of their liberty (DOLS applications, sending people to prison, or MH sectioning) or removing minors from their parents.

I don't believe repeal isn't possible. What I do increasingly believe though, is that there are quarters in which discussing it is seen as a problem. Why, I don't know. But I worry it's because deals are being done. We've been fucked over so many times now. Trust is wafer thin, or gone.

Sloejelly · Today 08:48

More wine to go with that cheese...

More like sour milk to go with they's soggy scornflakes.