To think this is a vote winner (though not election clincher) from Sunak?

[Lion400]

Thought this was an impressive and clear response to the question, from Rishi. I suppose Labour will likely win by a landslide, because many people don’t care enough about women’s rights. Because I do care very much about women’s rights, I may vote Conservative for the first time ever (cue outrage for Lion). Will I regret it? Possibly. But I’d regret voting for Labour (aka women’s rights removers), even more.

https://twitter.com/GBNEWS/status/1757143443111841900

Yes indeed.

hotinhereandthere it was a televised Q&A on GB News where the PM took unseen questions form an audience in the North.

Would this only be acceptable if it had been hosted by the BBC?

Thank you for picking this up. I’d lost the will to respond to and correct such misinformed posts.

I welcome the media picking it up, the comments will bring it up the agenda as they realise people are discussing it

It’ll get picked up more. Maybe even by outlets that try to ignore women on this

Oh and yes there’s a reason they’ve tried to avoid it, it’s incredibly hard to look reasonable and coherent when backing gender ideology

No government gets to say who can compete in sports. That’s down to each individual sports governing body, and the governing bodies (FINA, WA, WRU, UCI, etc) have all been amending their rules to eliminate males from female classes, generally by making the men’s category an open category and the women’s category for biological females only. There are a few footdraggers like FIFA and World Gymnastics but they’ll get there.

On womens single sex spaces. I repeat my post to you above, @hotinhereandthere :

When we have Labour saying women can have penises, and when we have Rainbow Labour and Trans Labour saying they will never allow a transwoman to be ousted from womens spaces - who do we believe? ???

Who do we believe?

So do I. We have the whatabouteries. 'But what about her views on this', 'but what about her views on that'? Look over there, look over there, look over there!

They refuse to address THE issue.

“We have all sorts of things that people ask for as protected characteristics,” she (Badenoch) said. “Carers, single people, having ginger hair, being short. Creating a new special characteristic for the menopause is a complete misunderstanding of what protected characteristics are. They are immutable characteristics.”

Pregnancy and maternity, however, are included in the act, despite these not being permanent characteristics. Badenoch said that menopause could be dealt with across age, sex and disability instead, and that creating a new characteristic would involve a lengthy legal process.

Carolyn Harris, the Labour MP for Swansea East and a campaigner for menopause rights, argued that this stance was unhelpful because the act allows an individual to bring a discrimination case on multiple characteristics, but not to combine them."

If one in ten women are leaving the workplace because of a lack of support during menopause then it's not really adequately covered is it?

Yes. Why aren’t they moving on this issue? It feels somewhat kamikaze at this point. Or perhaps they are comfortable it is not.

Labour have stated their position on single sex spaces clearly, as has been shared on these discussions many times:

We need to recognise that sex and gender are different – as the Equality Act does. We will make sure that nothing in our modernised gender recognition process would override the single-sex exemptions in the Equality Act. Put simply, this means that there will always be places where it is reasonable for biological women only to have access. Labour will defend those spaces, providing legal clarity for the providers of single-sex services.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/24/labour-will-lead-on-reform-of-transgender-rights-and-we-wont-take-lectures-from-the-divisive-tories

Can you say which spaces are included as ‘reasonable’?

Is gymnastics really an issue? My understanding was that the men and women's events were geared to their specific abilities, centre of gravity etc, and that generally men aren't much good at women's events and vice versa.

Are you sure? It's just that in 2024, 7 years after Tory PM Theresa May introduced the concept of Self ID in the UK, the Tories still refuse to commit to Single Sex spaces for vulnerable women and girls. There are still men in women's prisons and this Tory government are committedto this.

No, I don't make the laws do I? Write to Anneliese Dodds if you need a clarification.

It’s hysterical to think that some think voters will actually give a shit about this. Enough to forget all the absolute shit and chaos the Tories have caused and ask for another 4 years of it. Stuff the NHS, economy, environment, education, Brexit, dentistry, MH provision, contracts for mates, parties in Downing Street, pandemic management…. a trans witch hunt many are so bored with trumps it all.
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Just shows how desperate the Tories are and how awful their performance is that they keep coming on here to push it. They have nothing else. Here's a suggestion- pick any of the above and defend your atrocious performance, you may get a better outcome.

Well there you go Labour haven’t been clear have they?

They can state clearly what their position is, as I said in my pp

Quite.

No it’s not an issue currently. Men’s and women’s gymnastics are such different sport that it’s very hard to envisage the kind of shit that has happened in athletics or swimming or cycling happening. However I imagine they will follow on from all the other governing bodies and establish firm rules. Football it’s definitely and issue and it’s shocking that FIFA are taking so long about sorting it out.

What is laughable is that all these international governing bodies would somehow reverse then changes they are making just because labour got into power in the U.K.

In my own sport of cycling it was the UK governing body (British Cycling) that first eliminated males from the women’s category for domestic competition and this was then adopted by the international governing body (the UCI). Nothing to do with the government at all.

And again, I ask:

When we have Labour saying women can have penises, and when we have Rainbow Labour and Trans Labour saying they will never allow a transwoman to be ousted from womens spaces - who do we believe? ???

Who do we believe?

Men have sooooo many physical advantages over women in sports, it's not funny.

Try reading this:

www.shewon.org

Well that's the issue isn't it?
Both trans rights activists and Labour completely rely on this ambiguity. On one hand they say of course the law allows you to have single sex spaces, but on the other hand they will never tell you which spaces can or should be single sex. And in cases such as the rape crisis centre opened by JK Rowling, which should be a textbook example of a single sex service, activists will raise hell and describe its existence as a hate crime. This atmosphere leaves providers of more everyday services such as public toilets and gym changing rooms fearful to enact single sex policies.

Women who protested against men in womens cycling got the ban. Women got it. Through no help of Labour. Women had to fight this battle all on our own. When Labour was traditionally the party of feminism. We had no help from them at all. Tories don't care about womens rights. But what is worse? Labour, feminists natural home, didn't come to our aid either. Women had to scream and kick up a fuss and fight. It wouldn't have happened otherwise.

Yes so I’m glad there’s discussion on it, hopefully push it up the agenda so this can actually be asked

There’s no clarity atm

While I agree with your general point about female vs male athletic ability, @dollybird is correct. Gymnastics is a special case as men and women do completely separate discplines which require years of training from a young age. It would be impossible for a medium ranking male to suddenly become a high ranking/winning competitor in a women’s competition as it is with so many other sports. In fact they wouldn’t even complete.

That link you posted doesn’t have a single gymnast on it for this very reason.

But yes, World Gymnastics should absolutely have a policy inline with all the other governing bodies, even though it’s not one that I imagine will ever need to be enforced.

https://www.british-gymnastics.org/clubs/club-support/document-downloads/10422-inclusion-of-trans-people-in-gymnastics-q-as/file

This makes for depressing reading...