... to think women need protection from hate?

[LisaTheMug]

All police forces have made a specific list of specific social sub groups, who must not be offended, insulted or verbally abused. Doing so constitutes a "hate crime".

The protected groups are:

disability
race or ethnicity
religion or belief
sexual orientation
transgender identity

As you see, women are not included.

Surrey Police has made the decision to include alternative subcultures, for example "Goth" "Emo", "Punk". But even they still exclude women.

I don't know about you, but since childhood I have experienced rather a lot of offensive, derogatory, insulting and indeed threatening comments made to me purely because I am a woman.

And yet it's like the police are saying that's OK.

Do you think women should start a campaign to be included on the list?

I agree, it should be a hate crime. Growing up, I had frequent abusive comments directed at me. Vile disgusting stuff.
The first time I remember it, i was 12 and two men in a white van were trailing me down the street shouting things such as, "show us your mnge" and "let me fck you, I promise I won't take your knickers off, you can just pull em to one side". I was petrified.
Many a chant of "get ur t*ts out for the lads" and so much more that I couldn't even list it all.

Singlenotsingle you said "I've never been targeted by offensive comments because I'm a woman."

So you are saying that the 85% to 90% of your sex who have been harassed or being female should not be allowed legal protection, just because you personally haven't experienced it?

I've never been raped but I still want it to be illegal.

"In an open letter from Green Party deputy leader Amelia Womack [female] MPs said: "From unwanted sexual advances to verbal and physical assault, acts of misogyny are part of everyday life for women in the UK." A poll by End Violence Against Women found that 85% of women between 18 - 24 had experienced unwanted sexual attention, while campaign group Hollaback! found that 90% of women experienced street harassment by the age of 17. This demands urgent action."

Absolutely, misogynistic hate crime should be a criminal matter. (I have no objection to hate speech that is derogatory towards men as a class also being a crime, btw, but I can't recall an instance of it)

Also hate speech which is discriminatory against people based on size, weight or appearance which is also so common as to be normalised in our society.

Yes, discrimination or hatred on the grounds of sex should be on the list

TodaysUserName

Yes! Nottinghamshire DOES include misogyny.

"Race
Religion
Sexual orientation
Disability
Transgender
Misogyny
Alternative sub-culture e.g. goth"

So that is two so far. That has to be a precedent we can work with to get it rolled out across the UK.

Hampshire has "disability, gender identity, race, sexual orientation, religion, or any other perceived difference."

I guess the last 5 words cover women.

LisaTheMug I believe it started in 2016 as a trial with a view to it being rolled out nationwide? All seems to have gone a bit quiet. Perhaps they’ll get back to it after Brexit?

If I'm remembering correctly, they were planning to make it so nationwide at some point.

From what I've gathered in most places "gender" is a protected characteristic, so they're taking both misogyny and transphobia under that. They overlap pretty often, so I daresay it's sorting out what classifies as what (which would have to be done officially, I imagine) that is taking so long.

Gender is NOT a protected characteristic. The protected characteristics are sex and gender reassignment. They’re completely different, hence two different categories.

There is another thread about a woman who was called a “fucking stuck up slag” by a male motorist.

To be that feels misogynistic and sexist because I doubt he would have yelled it at a 6ft bloke.

The problem is there would be a huge backlash against it.

Gender is NOT a protected characteristic. The protected characteristics are sex and gender reassignment. They’re completely different, hence two different categories.

Oh, really? Sorry for any misinformation! I'll have a quick Google; it was my understanding that a lot of places (without sex as it's own) were just dealing with them under the umbrella of "gender", which caused problems when dealing with harassment etc. that appeared to be entirely sex based.

The issues aren't always entirely separate from one another though; discrimination always overlaps, but these two issues are especially intertangled.

Roses lots of places are, they’re breaking the law.

they’re breaking the law.

Oh, so places are doing this? I thought I had gone completely bonkers for a minute

I didn't think it was illegal though. My understanding was that it was the way it was done but after problems were recognised, plans were made to separate gender and sex based hate crimes.

It did cause some backlash though, which might be why some places seem to have forgotten!

rosesandflowers1

You're getting muddled up between protected characteristics under the EA2010, and what I am posting about, which is a totally different thing.

I am posting about the list of sub-groups in society against whom harassment etc can be a hate crime if the person perpetrating it targets that specific person because of their race, religion, transgenderism, disability, or colour.

Neither gender OR sex are on the list for the vast majority of police forces, though some are using the woolly term "or any other perceived difference."

At the moment in most police areas, a man shouting sex-based abuse to a woman in the street isn't committing a hate crime but a man shouting skin-colour-based abuse to anyone in the street is.

*I don't know about you, but since childhood I have experienced rather a lot of offensive, derogatory, insulting and indeed threatening comments made to me purely because I am a woman
*
It's already a criminal offense to make threatening remarks to someone.

And how are you going to prove that you would not have received the "abuse" were it not for the fact that you were a woman?

Because the simple fact of the matter is that IF you could bring evidence that you were abused ONLY because you are female, then it is almost certainly the case that you have been on the receiving end of sexual harrassment or some other already illegal behaviour.

Hungryhippie Your experience was sexual harrassment - already a crime.

If sex is on the list, that would include men and women. So essentially that would be any crime motivated by hostility or prejudice towards men or women.

All people should be protected from hostility or prejudice if they belong to a group that someone hates and are attacked because they belong to that group.

There's a list of protected characteristics there - but then there are crimes committed against rival football fans, different political leanings, against women, different classes, being foreign etc. All because someone has an issue with that group.

OP...you seem to be of the opinion that it's perfectly OK currently for men to be shouting abuse at women (or anyone) in the street.

It's actually not.

Neither gender OR sex are on the list for the vast majority of police forces, though some are using the woolly term "or any other perceived difference."

I thought some had decided on "gender-based hostility" or something... but you might be right and I'm getting muddled I'll have a look.

why is age not on that list?
really this whole thing is bordering on the ridiculous
any crime is a hate crime - to decide to add extra sentencing because of certain criteria that imply the perpetrator is more evil because of an assumed vindictiveness towards that particular characteristic. Sadly if you are white or male or straight or old- it is not as serious a crime if you get beaten up. still hurts the same though.

any crime is a hate crime - to decide to add extra sentencing because of certain criteria that imply the perpetrator is more evil because of an assumed vindictiveness towards that particular characteristic

If someone specifically targets people of a certain group, should that carry more weight in sentencing to act as a deterrent - compared to someone who targets anyone?

How are they listing ‘any other perceived difference’ in the stats? and how do they collate all of this into national figures if different forces have different categories? Very confusing.

Yes, I think women should be on the list.

Of course being female should be on the list. As a pp said, look at the thread on this very board where a woman was abused while driving just because she's a woman, and many other posters echoing similar experiences. The men that did that would probably not dare to try similar with a man.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3290340-To-be-shocked-by-what-happened

Are people really oblivious to this sort of thing, or somehow think it's not a problem?

verbally abused

What you are suggesting is sex discrimination.

So is having race and ethnicity as a protected group racist then?