Trans women are still women

[Lostcat]

AIBU to share what the Supreme Court judgement on the meaning of women in the Equalities Act does and does not do/say/mean.

Although there are now moves to take the ruling and embed discrimination against trans women into uk law, this was not the intention of the Supreme Court judgement. In fact, the judges made it very explicit that politicians, media and activists shouldn’t seek to weaponise the judgement for political gain. Unfortunately that is exactly what people (including a whole host of mumsnetters) are doing.

So what does the judgement do?

Myth: the UK Supreme Court says trans women are not women

Myth: the ruling means trans women can’t claim legal protection as women

Myth: the ruling says you can ban trans women from women’s loos or other women only spaces

What the ruling actually says:
“It is not the role of the court to adjudicate on the arguments in the public domain on the meaning of gender or sex, nor is it to define the meaning of the word ‘woman’ other than when it is used in the provisions of the [Equality Act] 2010.”

The ruling says that in sex-based provisions under the Equalities Act 2010, sex means “biological sex” and refers to one of two biological sexes.

The ruling reiterates that trans women are protected from sex discrimination as women - because they experience the same sexism as women do.

The ruling affirms also that trans people are protected under the law from discrimination on the basis of gender reassignment.

As before (and as the law has stated since 2004) trans women, with or without a Gender Recognition Certificate, should be treated as women and given access to the relevant women’s services - as before, an exception may be made under limited circumstances where the need to exclude trans women may be proportionate (the law gives women’s refuges as an example of a space where this may be necessary, sometimes).

The ruling merely states that in legal references to “sex” the words “man” and “woman” in the sex discrimination clauses of the equalities act refer to “biological” women and men - it is merely about the use of language in legal cases of discrimination.

The very real impact of this on trans and non-binary people’s lives comes from misinterpretations of what is meant or intended by the ruling.
The trans community is fearful because of the inevitable spin manufactured by biased news media and the powerful gender critical lobby (including wealthy and high profile people such as JK Rowling who claim they are “silenced” by trans advocates).

Yes. A male with a DSD is male.

I'm not sure if the OP is here to deliberately muddy the waters about the Supreme Court ruling. There are a number of factual inaccuracies in the post which I'm not going to even bother to address. Anyone who is seeking clarification about the judgement should have a look around on the internet for resources and information provided by people who do know the law, like Prof. Michael Foran, or Sex Matters - there's a good article on their website called "What does the For Women Scotland judgment mean in practice?

And in the words of the great Ricky Gervaise "If facts hurt your feelings, you need new feelings, not new facts."

So you don't recommend that people should try and get ahead of the law. It's a pity that Stonewall didn't have that attitude when they told people that allowing men into women's single sex spaces was just them getting ahead of the law.

@Lostcat you are incorrect on basically everything you have said.

This all day long. Nothing is ever acceptable to transactivists if it stands in the way of men's access to women's spaces. That's what this thread demonstrates.
Millions spent on trying to bully women into undressing in front of men (see the current NHS cases). Children all over the country being schooled that girls have no right to privacy in showers, changing rooms and dormitories if males require access for their personal validation or desires. Women's sport being dismantled in favour of mediocre sportsmen who failed when playing in their sex. No latter what compromises were offered - 3rd spaces, open categories - all rejected.

Finally the SC has spoken and what we're seeing is a collective tantrum from men (and some women) being told no.

Yes I just picked up on that. We can call ourselves whatever we like. It doesn’t make that a legal definition of what we are.

For the purposes of this thread anyone who is trans believing they are a women runs into the danger of believing they have use of womens spaces and categorisation. They don’t. They are ttranswomen and have the rights of trans women. Or trans men, of course.

I know 2 trans women, both many years post op who detested the activism. They would very much have been the occasional, accepted trans women you reference. A lot of damage has been done by the movement.

And herein lies the problem- that people believe this based on how the judgement has already been misinterpreted and weaponised

The ruling also states that sex means biological sex. A girl is of the female sex, even though she is not an adult. I teach at a girls' school. To my knowledge we have so far never had a female-identifying boy apply to the school (though we do have a few girls who consider themselves to be boys). This ruling presumably would allow the school to confidently reject applications from boys who want to be girls.

Is that the best you've got Boggins? What a knobber. It's a survival instinct for women to instantly recognise whether someone is male or female and nothing you say will change that 🙂

It's not about getting ahead its about working out the implications of the very text of the ruling to society.

I think some people are conveniently misinterpreting the judgement.
Its really not that confusing.

Lets not twist the obvious.

Suggest you go back and listen to it in full yourself. Avoid the in appropriate hype on other forums.

What if you had missed 3 transwomen in the last 2 weeks despite your gaydar turned up to 11 and you getting v close to their faces, as is your methodology? How would you know you had missed them?

@Bogginsthe3rd

"its about working out the implications of the very text of the ruling to society"

enlighten me, please

Yes, they know and we know that “it’s illegal to tell men who identify as women that they can’t use the women’s space” as they relied on with service providers is now no longer going to fly.

@Bogginsthe3rd

aha! so now I know (sadly took me this long!!) you are a blimmin' troll, shame on you!

eta; qualification

The whole thing was a pointless charade. If I can't confront a trans person in a women's changing room through fear of being arrested for hate speech despite the Supreme Court accepting these men are NOT women, what was the purpose of it all?

Excuse me? PP literally gave her methods for knowing she had never missed a transwoman, which I repeated to show how ridiculous her argument was.

How would you know you had missed them?

exactly

it’s what they always do when confronted with their illogic- cry “troll”!

But the decision itself is attempting to answer a question about what the meaning of the words sex, man and woman mean in terms of the Equality Act (or whatever the correct terminology for the Act is). Are schools covered by this?

Why should anyone male be permitted to participate in any women's sport, even chess? Why should any woman playing in a women's chess tournament be expected to play against a man with all his male entitlement and higher levels of testosterone?

Why should any female chess player lose out on her place in the team/ tournament because a man has decided he's a woman? This is about fairness and. reasonableness. It's not reasonable to allow a man to compete in any female category because of his feelings.

Thank you Pluvia. That's a wonderful article from Kathleen. As I was reading it, I thought this extract summed up this thread and the OP perfectly 😂

"This left only three options: intellectual misdirection, emotional blackmail, and aggressively shaming opponents into silence.
The result of the first of these was fancy-sounding obfuscation about spectrums, social constructs, and the supposedly close relation between trans-identified and so-called intersex people. But this was only ever likely to work with the young or dull-witted, while cleverer minds watched and learned from the mistakes".

She's such a good writer and intellect.

If trans women are as kind as they say they are they will stay out of women only spaces.
We have a right to question if we have concerns and others in law to stand with us in that right.