To be terrified about what will happen if the Gender Identity Bill is passed?

[TheWorldAccordingToToads]

I'm a nervous wreck right now

Will it replace sex as a protected characteristic? Does that mean that women will have no legal protection at all?

I'm scared .

Elmo "Any professionals we come into contact with are trained in their field and a bound by their code of conduct, I doubt anyone is going to train in a field then decide they want to say they identify as the opposite gender just to make YOU feel uncomfortabLE"

No one said that, we are saying that we don't care what reasons they decided to change gender, many women DO NOT want a woman with a penis carrying out intimate examinations or procedures.

Hold on - where are you getting this "replacing sex with gender identity as a protected characteristic" stuff from? The link above says clearly that the Bill hasn't been published yet, but also says that it is intended to replace the current "gender recognition" with "gender identity". That is not the same thing as sex in the Equality Act.

This debate appears to give a bit more detail about what it's actually supposed to be about. s1.intellisurvey.com/run/rnw0244374336?pan=991

By all means point me to more info which backs up the OP - I am not being snarky, I just don't get it.

On 24 March if it appears on the order paper at all it will be at the end of a long list of Bills, mentioned at the end of the sitting (2.30 p.m.) when any one Member can block it. These Bills can only succeed with government approval, and it hasn't got it, and it isn't going to get it, and if it does like I say any Member will be able to stop it going anywhere.

This Bill would be dangerous rubbish if it were passed, but it won't be. It has not even been drafted yet. I think Ms Miller may have thought better of it.

I have nothing against trans gendered people. I know the majority are lovely, don't mean any harm and just want to get on with their lives and I wish them the best.

However this isn't really about trans. This is about gender self identification. That means Dave could be Dave one day but then decide the next day that he is Davina and be allowed to shower and change in the female changing rooms at the gym. That is what gender self ID means

Okay if it's highly unlikely to be passed then that makes me feel a bit better again

I think that 'gender identity' is self proclaimed. So it undermines protected characteristics by allowing someone who is not of the female sex to claim to be female.

www.google.co.uk/search?q=danielle+muscato+transition&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjqm4KE5sfSAhUCtBoKHep4Bb4Q1QIINygA&biw=533.3333333333334&bih=800&dpr=1.5#imgrc=hLKhpMGAH2v6_M:

This is Danielle. She identifies as a woman. I am absolutely sure my elderly frail MiL would have loved getting intimate care from her, when she specifically asked for her carers to be women.

Oh yeah I forgot about the queue of predatory men training to become HCPs in various fields and hanging around to enter rape crisis centres or changing rooms. In reality how often do you think most of the scenarios people are coming up with are actually going to present themselves?
I just don't understand why accepting the rights of one person should automatically deem to be infringing on the rights of someone else?

Even if it doesn't replace sex it could still be very risky. It still means that anyone could self identify as the opposite gender.

I'm far from an expert though and have only ever met a couple of trans male to females who have both been lovely so my opinion is probably influenced by this.

I have known lovely trans women. I have particularly admired their attention to detail when it comes to clothes and nails. I would not have the patience or time. I have never been in a situation where I have felt at all threatened.

However, I have no more in common with them than I do with any one else.

I just don't understand why accepting the rights of one person should automatically deem to be infringing on the rights of someone else?

BECAUSE IN THIS CASE IT DOES!

Yes I'm shouting but I'm mad! You seem to be missing the point on purpose!

Signed petition. Definitely a slippery slope.

In that case Elmo why do the rights of a man identifying as a woman trump my rights to have (for example) a smear done by a nurse who is actually a biological woman?

Seriously why is it so hard to believe that a rapist who wants to hurt women might use these laws to their advantage? It's already happening in the states and Canada so why do people deny it will happen here?

I am sorry Elmo but you are naive, because stuff is already happening.
-I know (personally) a woman who was sectioned and had a transwoman on her supposedly female ward. No privacy because toilets, showers etc weren't lockable etc due to suicide risk. Staff scoffed when she complained. Very frightening for her.
-A woman I know of asked for a woman nurse to do her smear and was given a transwoman. She complained, the NHS trust apologised, but the damage was done ; she was a rape victim and it really mattered for her to have a woman, as it had been hard for her to psych herself up for the smear in the first place.
-Some awful stuff happening in American prisons now. Not in the UK yet. Women prisoners being watched in showers and threatened with sexual violence by transwomen prisoners.

Basically it is the most vulnerable women who are at the sharp end of this. You can sit on your high horse and lecture women about transphobia if you want but I don't think that is feminism.

I just don't understand why accepting the rights of one person should automatically deem to be infringing on the rights of someone else?

I don't think people are concerned about transgender people. They are concerned about men in women's toilets once all toilets become to all intents and purposes unisex.

Ok, so the thread has moved on since I started writing my post above.

That petition wording is wrong - the Equality Act says at present:

"7 Gender reassignment

(1)A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person's sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex.
(2)A reference to a transsexual person is a reference to a person who has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.
(3)In relation to the protected characteristic of gender reassignment—
(a)a reference to a person who has a particular protected characteristic is a reference to a transsexual person;
(b)a reference to persons who share a protected characteristic is a reference to transsexual persons."

I.e. - there is no requirement that you have completed or be undergoing treatment under the current law.

What scares me most is that it is so easily open to abuse.

A rapist could easily access/work at a rape crisis centre for example just by saying he identifies as a woman.

Women are always told to shut up, to calm down, to move aside, stop being hysterical....

Sorry but NO! I just won't STFU!

On 24 March if it appears on the order paper at all it will be at the end of a long list of Bills, mentioned at the end of the sitting (2.30 p.m.) when any one Member can block it. These Bills can only succeed with government approval, and it hasn't got it, and it isn't going to get it, and if it does like I say any Member will be able to stop it going anywhere.

People said there would be no Brexit - there is. People said Trump was not going to to win the elections - he did.

I find it very naive to rely on common sense to stop this idiocy. Police already do crime statistics according to gender self-identification, and men win awards for Woman of the Year, and women's sports competitions.

And you are still so sure this new idiocy is not going to happen? As far as I can see it already has happened in many places.

This is already happening in some places.

Men who identify as women are being placed on women's wards in hospitals. If any women are uncomfortable with this even if they have perfectly valid reasons for not liking it they are told to STFU basically

WRT rape crisis centres - there was a transwoman in Canada who spent 12 years in legal action against Vancouver Rape Relief, as they would only offer rape counsellor training to females, and the person felt discriminated against at not being able to participate. The complainant lost at the resolution of it all, but that was in 2007. Legislation and the political & social climate have changed so much in Canada in the last few years, I imagine the case might end differently a decade on.

This is a voluntary sector organisation providing support to traumatised, vulnerable women. The entitlement of the complainant at being excluded from providing 'woman to woman' care is breathtaking.

thetyee.ca/News/2007/02/03/Nixon/

Yes 0dfod, that is right, because the PE teacher would be legally a woman.

The Lauren Jeska case of attempted murder recently, the media couldn't say that she was a transwoman because Jeska has a GRC. Even though it was material to the case (the man she tried to murder was investigating whether she should be competing in the women's competition - she was female British fell running champion).

If all you need to get a GRC is to self declare, then it will be illegal to identify a transwoman as a male / trans, even if they do nothing to transition.

That said, the Bill is very unlikely to pass. But Maria Miller is the Chair of the Women and Equalities Commission and might try again to get government backing next time (when it would pass).