GG and WI - is it a coincidence?

Hope this isn't a derail, but as its been also mentioned here is anyone up to speed with where parkrun are at?

For me its a lower tier issue - I'd rather focus on the areas of sport where it matters more first. They are foremost about participation and I get that.

The problem they have is that age and sex matter for results and age grading. If you say you are something you aren't these get messed up and it affects other participants. If they are going to publish results (and I think they should) these need to be based on reality, not identity.

FWIW I think the solution is for people who aren't comfortable with their real sex (or age) being public, to be able to choose not to say, so they can participate and get an overall placing and time but this opts them out of being included in any age or sex stats.

It's not a coincidence, and a number of charities will have been taking advice on this at the same time, probably from the same law firm, and almost certainly consulting with each other. So I suspect we'll see other announcements soon. I'm waiting to see if we get one that doesn't make it sound as if it's a deep tragedy that they have to follow the low, but I'm not going to put money on it.

They are showing up on here in their droves and women are not having it.

This I imagine is true

Maybe they both take the same legal advice from the same chambers or somethimg; or someone quite senior is influential in both and can see which way the wind is blowing and wants to avoid a damaging, high profile court case.

If it got out that a lead commissioner of a regional guiding unit was a self publicised fetishist and posted images of himself with guns it wouldnt go down very well with the public.

The reaction to this reminds me of when the FA announced earlier in the year that men wouldn't be allowed to play in women's football anymore.

All the lamenting about these poor men, their mental health, how they were being banned from the sport they love etc etc. And barely a whisper about the women who had been harmed by the policy and were delighted to see the back of it.

If orgs like Parkrun ever see sense and restore the female category, we can expect more of the same. Or Hampstead Ponds - we'll be told that trans ladies have been swimming there tranquilly and peacefully and in harmony with the other women for decades before the bigots decided to spoil it.

If ever we needed evidence that we are fighting against male dominance, this is it.

Yes it was awful. Her acknowledgement of women who will be happy about the decision was so grudging. It seems it there needs to be a change of leadership so they can move on from this and refocus.

Reddit is losing its mind. Apparently we are all fundie evangelical American right wing billionaires who are funding all the legal cases. Sadly my bank account didn’t get the memo.

It’s beyond them that women are entitled to women only spaces. They really hate women.

Agree - I think the most realistic figure was the one in the aibu poll yesterday – when I saw it more than 90% (not all regulars on this board) agreed with the WI decision.

Massive waiting lists for all Units around where I am suggests the opposite. And that's the same situation across the country. GG have been pleading for volunteers for years to save units at risk of closing or to set up new units to reduce waiting lists.

And I suspect there might be an influx of former Guiders, who couldn't volunteer for an organisation which was so determined to ignore safeguarding at the expense of girls and so betrayed its founding principles, who will now go back.

You'd think that Scouting would get an influx of those volunteers who seem determined that GG should be mixed sex but I suspect that won't be the case - teeth gnashing and arm flailing seems to be the order of the day.

How about a massive public apology to actual women and girls instead? Those embarrassing professional manpleasers st rhe top should be sacked by their boards for lack of professional integrity because of misleading their organisations this long. They just felt above the law all this time, ignoring their own charitable aims in favour of their own sexist, homophobic politics and thereby failing to carry out their public benefit duties and creating huge organisational risk.

I hope the charity commission can somehow sanction them for behaviour not befitting leaders of charities or something. They should resign since it clearly pains them that much to run something just for girls and women.

I couldn’t believe my ears listening to Women’s Hour. That WI CEO made it sound like the whole point of the Women’s Institute was to make trans women feel better about the fact that they aren’t women.

I'm utterly sick of the emotional stories being told on Facebook and those (apparently) hundreds of women up in arms about this.

I can imagine some conversations

Lawyer: so what are we talking about? 50% of your membership are Transwomen

GG/WI: 20

Lawyer: 20%. OK lets..

GG/WI: erm.... No. 20 Transwomen.

Lawyer: are you fucking kidding me? In that case just follow the bloody law you stupid idiots.

I noticed a petition up to make them change their minds. 11,000+ have signed so far.

How do they get so many to sign? I'm honestly puzzled.

I think that they both ended up with the same actual solicitor. She looked at all the legislation and offered up the following legal advice: "Youse are on a very shoogly peg".

Gg is a dying trend. Most girls are not interested. It will be interesting to see if the number of girls and volunteering drops further

I think was blocked from their FB page ages ago, possibly for commenting on the Monica Sulley incident. I’d been looking for a local brownie pack for my DD at that point, after her old one folded, but knowing she could potentially be sharing local camp accommodation with him made me deeply concerned and she never went back to Girlguiding.

I agree. I can’t see the Ponds have a leg to stand on as things are at the moment. And to make all 3 ponds mixed sex would be a big step when everyone already has access to 2 out of the 3 ponds already.

I suspect they got legal advice together, and decided to split the costs. Sounds like a common sense way of doing things.

I don't know, the majority of comments on GH Facebook post are 'how awful' and people declaring they will be distancing themselves from the organisation. I'm assuming the many people who distanced themselves when they stopped being an organisation for girls are just holding their tongues.

I wonder if the number of those born male in each organisation is very small in any case.

As for Park Run, as it is open to all and just the record times that are false, I doubt they will follow suit. Hampstead Ponds seems unlikely too in my opinion.