Datun, thanks again.
I have never not seen the concerns that you eloquently express. Well not since I started looking into this mess a couple of years ago.
But the key to me is that this mess comes from provocation occurring on both sides from small numbers of - and very vociferous media savvy loudmouths.
The GRA itself is not the problem. Otherwise the trans activists would not be desperate to remove its necessary safeguards.
The fact it is protective of those trying to use it rather suggests it works.
So we have to ensure it is not diluted into a dangerous non filter.
Act or no act the arguing will go on.
If trans people are getting through the act when they should not be then the act needs tightening or its application better policed.
But my sense is the ones shouting the loudest about inclusion and rights are the ones motivated to do so because they do not have them and they do not believe they could - or should - follow the restrictions placed on the GRA as now.
They are not going to stop shouting and protesting and doing silly things if the GRA is axed as unworkable.
Instead a lot of suddenly disenfranchised non argumentative and previously quiet and non provoking people will join the fray out of self defence - as already happening - and things will escalate.
As noted I am in favour of better defining the boundaries of and even tightening up the ground rules for a GRC.
As noted earlier insisting on surgery probably is not going to be something any act can legislate. But some better definitions for qualification could be - which could and should be more than just along the lines of self perception and definition.
Nobody I think could accept or should accept a simple statement of identity as sufficient grounds to redefine something that effects that persons status in society and directly impacts on many others around them who have no say in that decision.
That should be a principle of gatekeeping here.
The idea of a provisional GRC with no full recognition until the rules of the granting of a full certificate are met, but that gives some recognition that can demonstrate intent to, say, someone applying for a job, might be a way to pacify both sides whilst retaining or strengthening the ingress to a full GRC.
The concerns about the 'living as a woman for two years' clause which seem to upset some as almost being a parody of femininity is being misunderstood but could be redefined.
It seems assumed it was created as part of the act. It wasn't. It has been a condition of transsexual treatment since at least the 1970s. It was original known as the real life test, which is a far better term
Basically when a person was passed onto a gender reassignment programme after initial assessment by specialist medics and psychoanalysts to rule out other problems they started a two year programme called the real life test.
By this point they had transitioned and started cross sex hormones and there was now a 2 year wait before surgery was considered.
This delay was important for many reasons.
Physically the hormones have to work for a time before surgery can be done.
Mentally the two years allows assessment of whether transition is working to actually resolve the causes of dysphoria. If the person is clearly getting better and mentally stable then the doctors monitoring progress will determine when they are ready to transition surgically - that being an irreversible step, as opposed to what was happening up to then.
Socially the two years were used to demonstrate that the transitioner could live within the real world environment as a productive member of society. They get a job and are not suffering abuse that would destabilise their transition. They contribute positively to the economy rather than drain upon it.
These were all regarded as keys to giving the final go ahead for full transition. You had to be ready and to have improved from how you were before.
Obviously if you were a trans woman this involved 'living as a woman for 2 years' but that was never really perceived in a dress, behaviour, hobbies sort of way as being presumed. Or it was not in the 2 years - 1974 - 76 I was in this period under Charing Cross.
Some people have referred to the rather sexist male ideologies of some of the doctors of that time. They were there. I saw them. But I was never asked to wear dresses or full make up or act in any specific way. I was judged and passed for surgery entirely on the grounds described above.
If that is not how the two year hold as most of us called it then is being interpreted under the GRA then it should be adapted to be because this was the genesis and not what is being perceived.