Why I'm voting Conservative

It is not anything until the last vote has been counted.

I still haven't made up my mind not that it Will make a difference. My constituency is down as a 99% Labour win

Me. I'm lucky(!) that the particular circumstances of my constituency means labour are very, very unlikely to get in. We're likely to go from blue to yellow. My tiny vote will make very no difference to anyone except me. It's hardly up there with the sacrifice of the first born, but I feel it's on that spectrum.

I'm not voting 'of course a woman can have a penis' LD.

I do wish the labour candidate had replied to me. It would be nice to know they were fielding someone sane. No hoper or not, I might have voted for that.

I am voting for the conservatives and for women and girls everywhere, yes!

The LibDems are as trans ally as Labour. Ditto Greens, some of whose candidates have praised Oct 7th as resistance to white/colonial oppression. Reform is full of right-wing nutjobs and led by a man who thinks the NHS should be privatised like the US health industry. Cannot vote for any of those today. Thinking of voting for the independent - he won't get in but I will have avoided voting Labour (not sure of his opinions on trans but given his ethnicity and probable religion he is likely not very friendly towards women, but does know what one is).

I'll be voting Tory too. I shouldn't be and tbh don't want to. I have a severely disabled child who I'm a carer for and live in one of the poorest North West towns. I want to vote Labour but I just can't bring myself to do it because of women's rights.

In addition we've had a Labour council for a very long time and they not prioritise services etc which have no consequence to me.

I could be you except we have a Green possibly taking the safe Tory seat - although I think much of this is spin and that it will stay Tory. Labour are nowehere.
I am dithering although we do have an SDP candidate so I may go with him. i cannot vote Green, Labour, Lib Deb as they are up to their eyes in id pol and I don't want to vote Tory.
What a mess the Left have left us in when this should have been an easy choice.

I have been dithering over who to vote for in the morning. I came here to see if anyone else left-leaning is voting Tory.

My problem is that Labour can’t win in my constituency. Our candidate isn’t local, isn’t engaged and clearly doesn’t give much of a shit. Labour is WAY off the lead, not a hope in hell of being elected here.

Ours has been a safe Tory seat for a very long time but with the change in boundaries it’s now neck and neck between Tory and LibDem.

The incumbent Tory is ok. Well-informed on local issues. We obvs don’t agree on a lot as he’s a Tory and I’m left-leaning but he’s not completely awful.

I cannot vote for LibDem. They are so firmly on the TWAW bandwagon it’s ridiculous, and they show no signs of altering their stance. It’s a bit of a shame as I like Ed Davey and LibDems otherwise but this is a complete showstopper for me. I want them to have as few seats as possible because I don’t want them to have any influence over women’s rights. Sorry Ed.

Also the local LibDem candidate seems like a complete tool. He refused to respond to my comment re women’s rights, and he doesn’t have any specifics when asked about local issues.

No independents running here.

So, either I throw my vote away on Labour, or I spoil my vote…….or I do the unthinkable and vote Conservative.

I absolutely do not want another Tory government. I wouldn’t vote Tory if I thought they could actually win.

But as I can’t vote Labour in here, maybe it would be useful for the Conservatives to hold onto a few seats? I still have concerns over Labour’s policies on women so I’m thinking that having decent opposition that believes in women’s identity might be beneficial?? Which means a Tory vote for me.

Cant believe I’m even considering this but it’s a tactical vote to keep the LibDems out….

I don't quite understand the argument that the Tories should have acted on this sooner.

Maybe - I'd say they were at about the same place as the public mood, which doesn't show much insight.

But the real issue is - Labour still haven't moved on.

There's no ideal choice eve on this on this issue alone. It's all relative to the other, actual choices.

I also don't think it's really useful to talk about whether a political party "cares" It's not a person, it has no feelings.

But there are absolutely Tory MPs that do care about women's rights. The left likes to claim caring, and feminism, among other things, for themselves, but it's just not true.

You certainly shouldn't vote for Labour if you care about women. They believe that men can grow.their own cervix and tthat a percentage of women have penises and that radical medication and surgery are helpful to children.
.Should we really let people.who believe such things into power?

And you can pretend you’re not party political but you are so weirdly focused on trying to persuade people to vote Tory by spouting utterly incorrect information, that I’d be surprised if anyone believes you. I certainly don’t. You certainly have the required authoritarian streak to be one…

This is just about what is going on in your head.

My pointing out the fact that it was the Tories who stopped the trajectory of the trans agenda, is just what it is, a fact.

And I can assure that which is obvious from the many threads about who to vote for and it is clear I am not voting Tory.

Can you find one post where I have said vote Tory?

Why in you head, does telling something factual, translate into saying I support those who created the fact.

Why are you so upset that the Tories might have done one thing right in the midst of all they did wrong.

It is a fact that without the Tories and specifically KB we would probably have self id, and no protection for women only services.

And the likelihood is that once Labour is in power this will happen any way.

It may turn out that the last 5 years will be the highest point of women's sex based rights being a possible part of Government policy.

The irony of referring to my post as 6th form soapbox speechifying after all that hot air in your post!

Guess what? Outside this forum are real women in the real world who have been campaigning and actually working on these issues, not on social media, for years. And I am one of them. I have been on this forum for years, but change my name frequently to avoid being outed.

I am not party political, and never have been. I am, however, a feminist and have dedicated the majority of my working life to feminist causes. This government do not give a shit about women. Not only have they failed to act on this issue, their policies across the board, over the last 15 years, have plainly not had women in mind and have actively caused women harm, in some cases. That’s why I won’t vote for them.

And you can pretend you’re not party political but you are so weirdly focused on trying to persuade people to vote Tory by spouting utterly incorrect information, that I’d be surprised if anyone believes you. I certainly don’t. You certainly have the required authoritarian streak to be one…

Anyway, I think we’re done. Enjoy being a keyboard warrior and trying to police public forums. All perfectly normal behaviour… Night night!

God all this YOU HAVE TO BE IN THE CLUB TO SPEAK HERE re FWR.

I’ve been here since 2016 under different names, when it all truly started kicking off. Just because I don’t post here often under my old name doesn’t mean I’m any less concerned about women than you are.

This is not a members only club. We can bloody well type what we want. This has been an issue for YEARS with men wearing dresses trying to shut this place down. So pack it in

If you want to be a Tory, be a Tory. I am not trying to influence you or anyone. But some of us have been involved in this campaigning and work for a VERY long time and can see what’s what.

Again factually wrong.

And I suspect I have been far more engaged than many who only woke up to the issue once FWR on mumsnet got their teeth into.

Most women who think of themselves as feminists did not appreciate the impact of the GRA on women's rights.

And there was no public push back.

Most women did not realise the double edge sword of the SSE.

Partly because as feminists who were part of Women's Liberation it never occured to them that so many women would be overwhelmed and taken in by the Stonewalling of gender dysphoria.

Had this societal change not happened the ambiguous wording of the SSE would not have become an issue.

And for individual women and women's groups the wake up call was the Tory proposal to amend the GRA.

The discussions that came out of that made many women aware that in fact our sex based rights were not secured by the EA.

And if that combined campaigning had not taken hold, and been taken up by a few bold MPs, nothing might have happened.

And like it or not, it was only when Kemi Baddenoch was appointed that there was any movement by a Minister to address the issues. But unfortunately the GE had stopped her plans for putting forward ammendments in the autumn.

So me stating actual facts doesn't make me a Tory, but it does make me a realist.

Only confirmed by Keir Starmer being quoted today as saying Labour will not amend the EA.

So in terms of women's rights not only have the Tories done more, but they have the guts (unlike labour) to say we got it wrong and now we are (or would have) put it right.

The problem is those who insist on seeing this through the false prism of the two party system.

Women who are realists, realise that we have to take whatever opportunity we can to if not advance, but at least hold onto our rights.

Dumbing it down to trying to imply I am only saying this because I am Tory implies I actually dont care.

But I think for all of us on FWR who have been grappling with this issue for what is now years, know only too well we can not rely on politicians.

This may have been our last chance to get the EA changed to protect biological women, but we will not only have lost it, but will have our rights further impinged by Labour changing the GRA to bring in self ID.

I have too much respect for myself and other women to think politics is about being some brain dead follower of this party or another.

The reality for women is we need to know what happens in practice. Not some 6th form soapbox speechifying.

It's not difficult at all. Men are not a vulnerable group, women are. TW are men obviously.

The Tories want to clarify the EA 2010 to ensure that sex = bio sex. That would solve a lot of the confusion.

Surely you can see how public mood has changed over the last few years

Politicians reflect the public and this has snowballed

We also needed someone like Badenoch to pick up the task

Of course Labour are about to get in so how much they reverse ground gained we’ll see. Depressing though

And it’s down to their GRA after all

Well, here we are!

Nope. You are wrong. And rather rude, but I don’t particularly care about that.

The Tory government made their announcement (with a whimper, not a bang by changing the scheduled statement in Parliament into a written statement several months later and at a time when it would garner less publicity) in 2020. Plenty of people (including me) had responded to the consultation as early as 2017 setting out that the definition of sex required clarification and that this needed to happen through an amendment to the EA. I know for a fact that this was before Tory Ministers that early - I can’t say what I do but I confirm I know this through work.

Those of us who were were actually there, know that the Tories could, but chose not to focus on this issue and could have worked on it. They didn’t care about the issue enough themselves, and didn’t think enough of the public cared about it aside from those who responded to the consultation, to bother. They made a calculated decision not to address this when they could have, because they didn’t think it would impact their electoral position. And all through this period, various government departments such as Education were still following the TRA line, with the full approval of the cabinet.

In all, they have had a very long time to legislate around this issue. They chose not to. The suggestion that they were just about to but somehow got caught out by the election is bonkers - they called the election.

Funny how they are suddenly saying all the right things and proposing changes just before an election. Apparently it suddenly matters to them. I’m sure that’s nothing to do with the fact that they are trying to pick up disaffected women voters from Labour or the Greens…

If you want to be a Tory, be a Tory. I am not trying to influence you or anyone. But some of us have been involved in this campaigning and work for a VERY long time and can see what’s what.

Sorry, I just don't believe anyone "to the left of Corbyn" would vote Tory because "it's good to try something new."

You've had over a decade of Tories. You can see the mess they have made of our public services. You can see how child poverty has increased and the gap between rich and poor has widened. If you vote for them over a single issue you are betraying the whole principle of fairness that underpins left wing principles.

The issue of transgender and women's rights is complicated. That's why the labour party is making a hash of it - because this is an area where the rights of two vulnerable groups are at odds. There isn't a simple way through this, and the conservatives pretending there is are being dishonest. Most of them don't give a toss about any marginalised groups, they just spotted a way to exploit the culture wars. If you believe most of them really care about women's rights, let alone Lesbian and Gay rights, you are deluded.

No good 'knowing what a woman is' when they're desperate for an ambulance and there isn't one available! I could never, ever vote Tory, they really are awful.

Not to mention that Labour doing badly this time might finally scare them into doing something about their very major misogyny problem.

Right now, I look at how Starmer has treated Rosie Duffield and how he's tacitly supported how his party has treated Rosie Duffield. And that's who he is, guys.

I'm not sure how many women realise the possible consequences of Labour's very murky policies.

For those who do, I think holding your nose and voting Conservative is quite tempting - if only to ensure a proper parliamentary voice for women. The Libdems won't be that voice, which only leaves one alternative.

I'm afraid my bar is set at 'does not believe in alternative realities with legal penalties for speaking unwanted truths/defending your rights' because..... fgs you cannot identify out of reality while in power and just try and imprison everyone who argues with you. That is not someone you want in charge of anything.

Agreed, so much leafletting and campaigning for the Greens, I wasted 8 years.
And there was always sexism, so many sexual assaults not dealt with. Their safeguarding and complaints procedure are pox.
I even relocated to be nearer the action which was so difficult.
When I read Caroline Lucas appalling article in the Guardian justifying Challenor, I simply could not believe it.