Women only Cambridge college Newnham welcome men who ID as trans

Um, I'm not the one trying to pretend the governance isn't in agreement with the students when it's patently obvious by the admission of trans women since 2017 they are.

Please feel free to post any evidence they are not. I won't hold my breath….

Oh and yes, I agree that it definitely isn’t a culture of gentle agreement! And the alumnae are not dear old ladies. They are fierce as all hell and tough as old boots (and the college depends very much on them giving their money to it…)

Still digging?

Seems like the 'governance' clearly agreed with the representatives of the students no? Otherwise how did the rules change? The 'governance' & the students were of one mind that's why.

I agree — and there are several other colleges in Cambridge who have recently generated conflicts with their own alumni over issues exactly like this, and it’s taken out at least two Heads of House so far (ie. they were scuppered by their own fellows for generating not only a lot of negative publicity for the college, but also conflicts amongst members and alumni. For at least one, a similar issue was used as the reason to pressure the HoH to go).

But Alison R is reaching the end of her term as Principal, so I guess she thinks she has nothing to lose. They’re on the process of electing a new HoH.

Never heard of Denis Healey’s first law of holes, I see.

Let me explain. The College is a charitable trust governed by certain members of the Fellowship, who are Trustees under the college’s statutes and the Charity Commission (the UK govt regulator of charities). That is the college’s “governance”.

The JCR is the student social society. The students elect members to be on the committee each year, like President, Vice President, Entertainments Officer, Communications Officer, Treasurer, etc. Any post that the JCR decide they want. Like any student society, once “elected”, the JCR committee can write any statements they like based on their own opinions. They don’t even need to represent any consensus by the student body. The document you link to is the personal opinions of that year’s student social committee, and nothing to do with the college’s governance.

Anyone can submit evidence to a government consultation and it gets recorded in Hansard. You don’t fully understand the material you’re making reference to. I imagine it’s because you don’t have a clue about the U.K., which is painfully obvious to all of us here.

I think this is a huge strategic mistake by Newnham. It makes them look like dupes to the majority of their alumni who (presuming the wider UK stats apply) think that this is all hogwash. The current principal is apparently a true believer, but there is by no means consensus among the fellows, if the few I’ve talked to are indicative. They are a lot of very clever women, after all, and don’t have a culture of gentle agreement. This opens for massive and bitter conflict, which the only remaining feminist bastion in Cambridge doesn’t need. They are letting themselves be led towards the rocks by the demands of a few men. There are feminist battles in today’s society where Newnham could take the lead, but this isn’t one of them. The SC judgement gave them a quiet way out and they should have taken it.

On the contrary the 'governance' was responsible for the inclusion of trans women from 2017 & more recent efforts to maintain that so kinda sounds pretty 'official' not to mention democratic:

JCR = "Elected representatives of the students"

Howse the ham tasting now? 😂

https://newnhamjcr.uk/

@MyAmpleSheep

Do you have an opinion as to whether it is (and as a separate question, should be) legal to discriminate in favour of GR people in the provision of services and public functions? GR is mentioned several times in Schedule 3, so however the law is to be interpreted it must be compatible and interpreted harmoniously with those explicit exemptions.

It's my view that discrimination in favour of trans people is legal, so I would have no trouble appointing my trans employee if I felt being trans was a justifiable occupational requirement, nor does the Act need amendment of Schedule 9 or any other part. (Schedule 3 works pretty smoothly in eg exceptionally allowing trans exclusion from same-sex single-sex services, as a derogation from the ban on perceptive discrimination.)

I doubt that any 'cis' men will ever sue Newnham for admission, so we won't be getting an answer any time soon. Each of us will just have to continue to think that we are right about this 😉. Thank you for an interesting debate.

Hate to tell you, the British public ain’t too fond of Rose West, either. Don’t shoot the messenger, and all that…

No, you cited a document of student opinions as “official policy”, and went on about how men can’t possibly be allowed in the “dorm rooms” (Newnham does not have “dorm rooms”, FYI).

You clearly know nothing about any of it. By the way, “ham” in British slang is a terrible stage actor who exaggerates his lines to get attention. You’re really making a fool of yourself on this thread, you know.

There's this thing called 'nut picking'. I could also mention Rose West but that would be bad faith not to mention irrelevant .

Patriarchal systems require society's complicity to survive. Therefore it's imperative advocacy for structural change, education of harm & root causes is addressed. Whilst its important to highlight the ways in which patriarchy is damaging & advocate for solutions, the root cause: Gendered expectations needs to be equally addressed

Congrats, @Howseitgoin, it seems that you’re actually a gender critical radical feminist! Welcome to the club. This above is EXACTLY what gender critical radical feminists believe. We all knew you’d get there in the end. 👏

"I literally held a fellowship at Newnham; but you’re talking shit to me about “dorm rooms” knowing nothing at all about it. The rationale of Newnham being a women’s college is NOT for women’s safety. It’s for women’s education. It’s a college for women, for the promotion of women’s education and for the benefit of women. It’s not a retreat or a padded cell or a refuge. It’s somewhere which was founded for women, just for the benefit of women, to have something of their own in a wider world where still even now men get the vast majority of all the best things: the jobs and the money and everything else, and in which women are still fighting to access these on the same terms as men. And are not treated as equal yet."

I never said Newnham's sole purpose was safety rather other commenters queried the necessity of trans women's inclusion which Newnham stated was as a "sanctuary from patriarchy."

Don't shoot the messenger…

Not my area of law so am not an expert on this issue, but my reading of it is that I don’t think what they are doing is unlawful. I do, however, think it’s depressing.

Err, not all men are patriarchal 'supporters'.
Patriarchal systems require society's complicity to survive. Therefore it's imperative advocacy for structural change, education of harm & root causes is addressed. Whilst its important to highlight the ways in which patriarchy is damaging & advocate for solutions, the root cause: Gendered expectations needs to be equally addressed which gender critical ideology obscures by focusing all their attentions on single sex spaces & delegitimising trans people.

It seems a spectacular missed opportunity to delegitimise trans people when the point should be the interchangeabilty of gender that they represent. It's not as if championing self determination (the essence of gender equality/feminism) & managing competing priorities are mutually exclusive.

Just a reminder that it is not dehumanising anyone to segregate provisions by sex when it is needed.

And also:

Safety is but one aspect of the safeguarding needs for female people.

There doesn’t need to be any ‘large’ data collection done to prove there are issues either. Because the ‘harm’ is not only about reportable physical harm. There will be a large amount of harm that will never be reported and only partly because women and girls don’t bother reporting crimes where they are the victim to any authority.

However, safety is but one aspect of the safeguarding needs for female people. There are numerous harms.

Harms include:

-Rape and sexual assault.

-Violence.

-Sexual abuse that is not rape or sexual assault.

-Sexual abuse that also includes solo sexual acts or using the experience in future sexual acts.

-Any other abuse that may include verbal abuse, intimidation in any way etc.

-A male person's presence where female people need privacy and dignity.

-A male person's presence where female people need to feel safe from any male person's presence (over the age of about 8 years old).

-Female people self-excluding knowing that there may be a male person accessing that provision.

-Any female person who is displaced because a male person has been included in that provision designed to directly address sexist oppression of female people, and only female people.

Narrowing the discussion to sex and violence offences does not remove these other harms from consideration for single sex provisions.

And trying to focus only on violence is an attempt to distract from the other harms which are important and remain focused on a person's female body which is unchangeable.

No person declaring there is no harm in including male people in provisions designated as female only is making a carefully considered point. Because any inclusion of a male person in any provision in the UK designated as being female sex only will harm some female people. Any claims to the contrary are using falsity to support that claim.

JCR = “junior common room” — student society. They do say this in the actual paper you link to. They might aspire to be the “voice of the college”, but in reality a statement by the JCR is just a few students’ personal opinions, and has nothing to do with the Fellowship or governance of the college or the college’s “official position”. The JCR is basically the student social society. It’s like assuming that the opinions of the student socials committee or Phi Beta Kappa are the same as the Harvard Corporation.

You’re a prize ham, aren’t you? You do know that’s by the JCR — a group of students — not the college itself?

Not according to Newnham as you appear to be conveniently ignoring.

"It is important to note, therefore, that colleges such as Newnham have a particular responsibility to transgender students, whose oppression within and without the University is inextricably tied to their gender. Any space advocating for the rights of women, or offering a space as respite from patriarchy, must acknowledge that trans women are more vulnerable to sexist violence & discrimination, due to which in the ways transphobia & misogyny intersect. This is known as transmisogyny."

https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/16843/pdf/

By their own admission they do provide a 'safe space' from patriarchy.

BTW, the relevance of trans people being included in Newnham college life was brought up firstly by others questioning their eligibility to 'special circumstances', I simply surmised correctly & then helped provide the official Newnham position.

Do keep up dear. I suggest you read before you post.

That is not in the least the gender critical position which is one to openly dehumanise & demonise trans people as dangerous mentally ill predatory fetishists

Absolute made up nonsense.

Have you considered that multiple court cases in the U.K. and Ireland have ensured that dangerous mentally ill fetishists are doing that job perfectly well all by themselves? (Please see: Barbie Kardashian, Isla Bryson, Sarah Jane Baker, Katie Dolatowski et al.)

"Thank you. You have just expressed a gender critical position, that some spaces should not be based on gender identity, but on sex. "

Motte bailey. That is not in the least the gender critical position which is one to openly dehumanise & demonise trans people as dangerous mentally ill predatory fetishists in order to delegitimise their existence.

"Perhaps there is a further question, of how we provide specifically for the needs of trans people who have been, or are at significant risk of being, "materially" harmed. Is this why you suggest that all spaces where there is not a need to reflect sex need to reflect gender? I don't think most spaces need to reflect sex or gender; they can be open to everyone regardless of whether they are men or women, and regardless of their personality. Genuinely single sex spaces where there is [a risk of] "material harm" (which needs definition). So called "third spaces" where trans people successfully advocate for them; these will usually be open to all though. Everywhere else open to all."

The question was put to me as gendered & non gendered so I answered it in that way.

Women's bathrooms is an example of where its harmless to include trans women but not cis men. So I don't necessarily agree all other spaces should be open to all. As I have stated it depends on harm that can be measured in terms of criminal reporting, surveying offending rates & research on jurisdictions where laws have changed which have indicated that trans inclusion hasn't increased crime.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-018-0335-z

...ending with the emoji with its tongue out for that extra dash of gravitas

I am on tenterhooks waiting for Howse's coherent, structured and rational response to both this and your subsequent post.

S 13(4) is only about marriage and civil partnership, so not relevant to consideration of pro-trans vs anti-trans discrimination - did you mean another section?

I think anti-cis discrimination is legal because 'cis' is not a PC, whilst you think it's illegal because it's not been removed from the protection of the Act by a 'passage' like S13(4).

To be clearer, I think anti-cis discrimination is illegal because it's still "about" someone (else) being GR. Accepting we disagree on that, without a decent precedent, we're both guessing what the Court of Appeal would say.

Whilst GR people must be treated at least as favourably as others as the default, but there are exceptions.

As discussed, I don't agree. That formulation also falls into the trap of thinking of the "group of GR people." In terms of direct discrimination, it's the mental act of using the yardstick of GR as part of your decision-making to treat anyone detrimentally that is the unlawful discrimination.

How am I going to find a trans director for my trans charity or service provider for trans clients?

I will have to follow the contents of Schedule 9 more carefully to see if that's where I think it takes us. But, if it does, bluntly, your difficulty in finding a trans director for your charity is not my (the Act's) problem. Lots of people think the EA2010 is inadequate in various ways - I don't need to list them. If you are quite sure that being 'trans' is a genuine occupational requirement for directing a 'trans' charity (it doesn't seem to me prima facie to be so) or any other role (which?) you may add yourself to the list of people who wish to campaign for a change in the law. But let's not make the mistake of thinking that if the law should allow something, that it therefore does. That's what took FWS to the Supreme Court.

Do you have an opinion as to whether it is (and as a separate question, should be) legal to discriminate in favour of GR people in the provision of services and public functions? GR is mentioned several times in Schedule 3, so however the law is to be interpreted it must be compatible and interpreted harmoniously with those explicit exemptions.