Thread 2: Why can't people respect the rules around toilets!?!?

[Underbudget]

Darn it the thread filled and I wanted to ask @tandora a question. Is this within site rules to start another to do this as I don't seem to be able to tag her? Feel free to report/delete if it is.

Previous thread here: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5372111-why-cant-people-respect-the-rules-around-toilets?page=1

'Tandora · Today 07:51

Eh? Mental health is everyone’s concern that’s why we have a health system.

No one’s rights come “first”- we need to find solutions that respect everyone’s rights.

There is no “female suffering” involved in respecting and including trans people. It will have virtually no impact on your life whatsoever.'

I wondered @Tandora if you'd read my post earlier on that thread, where in my head, children's rights come first? As the basic premise of child protection?

My post (in response to a different poster) if you missed it, was this:

Underbudget · Today 00:51

Slow to reply and expect thread has moved on, but surely you can empathise with a girl victim of csa feeling terrifed at finding themselves alone with a very male bodied person in a public loo between them and the door? Why does that child's feelings mean less than the adult males?
And what if that particular male bodied person WAS a rapist? That people saw entering from the outside but didn't want to "offend" by challenging them. And a child was born from a child as a result?
Doesn't a child's right to safety and protection come before ANY adult's feelings? Especially when a child can be born from rape as a result? As could ONLY happen to a female?
Fellow survivor of CSA here so I can understand you may have issues in thinking around this. I have spent years in therapy due to being overtrusting because my boundaries were fucked.'

I genuinely want to be in a place where all rights are respected, but I can't personally process this risk in any way that makes sense to me. I simply cannot agree with or process that allowing a male bodied person, unsupervised access to a child victim of CSA in a vulnerable space, whether a real or a perceived risk, does not harm that child. As a male, they are not being discriminated against on the basis of their sex, as ALL males are excluded from that situation, rightfully so. No right minded person believes all males are rapists, just as and no right minded person believes all transwomen are. But some of both ARE and that's a fact. I accept that a trans person may feel excluded from having their social transition recognised by not being allowed in the single sex spaces of the gender of their choosing, but equally, a girl in that situation also feels distressed. Why does that adults discomfort trump the discomfort felt by the child? A trans person deserves somewhere safe to go to the loo, but that's not in the women's loos. If that protects just one single child from reliving horrific trauma or worse, then that's what has to happen.

I would truly like to understand your view, ideally in a way that acknowledges the trauma of a child in this situation.

It’s obvious when you think about it. I doubt if I would have the courage to confront a male intruder, having been attacked and injured in the past.

But as we’ve discovered over the past few years, a lot of people in positions of responsibility simply refuse to think about it. We have to accept the painful reality that women’s and children’s concerns are not considered important.

No. DU was confronted because he was a man in a place he had no right to be. Why should the person who had every right to be there wait and be uncomfortable? She doesn’t get up unlimited breaks you know. Why does the predatory man’s feelings and wish for validation trump her need for privacy and dignity? You’d best be careful. Your misogynistic tendencies are showing.

We always engage with the substance of what you say, pointing out why the substance of what you say is wrong. And it's like water off a duck's back.

The Supreme Court has confirmed that Upton's employers did not have the legal authority to just allow him to use a female only changing space for his female colleagues. In doing so they failed to uphold their female employees' legal right to a single sex changing space.

Peggie objecting to having her legal rights trampled over in this way was not harassment. Upton's behaviour towards his female colleagues who tried to take steps to avoid being in the women's changing rooms when he was in there very much is harassment though. And it is quite obviously not how women behave. It would never occur to me to make an issue of the fact that another woman didn't want to get changed in front of me. I would probably not even notice, because it is so deeply ingrained in me that women have the right to choose whether they take their clothes off in front of any other person or not, for any reason. But Upton deliberately harassed Peggie when he realised that she was avoiding using the women's changing rooms with him because he (correctly) interpreted this as a failure by Peggie to see him as a "real woman". Ironically, this is extraordinarily male behaviour. Women don't feel entitled to other women's bodies and we don't have any desire to make other women feel unsafe or uncomfortable by our presence.

She did have a right to be there as agreed with her employer.

The Supreme Court has confirmed that Upton's employers did not have the legal authority to just allow him to use a female only changing space for his female colleagues.

nope. The SC have not “confirmed” this.

Not according to the EQA2010, the Supreme Court judgement or the Workplace Requirements (1992) Act.

www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/notes/division/3/16/20/7

Nah, you know he’s a man.

What part of "sex means biological sex" are you STILL struggling with?

The NHS trust have a legal obligation to provide their staff with single sex changing rooms and toilets.

The Supreme Court confirmed that a female only space with Dr Upton in it is not a female only space.

This. The law isn't optional. Peggie/Upton's employers were breaking it.

Upton's employer is not above the law.

They don't get to decide that their female employees' rights to single sex toilets and changing rooms are optional.

Do you understand that the reason the Darlington nurses' employers lost the employment tribunal claim is because they were breaking the law when they decided to allow "Rose" to use the women's changing rooms? It's the same issue.

I understand you believe the law on this is settled. It is not. nor was it settled at the time this confrontation happened.
Even If it were settled in the way you wish to believe that it is (it’s not) it still wouldn’t make Dr Upton all the awful things you are accusing her of.

The law is a civil law about the obligations on employers related to avoiding unlawful discrimination. It’s not about who has a “right” to be in any given space or not. you just simply don’t understand what the law is about, and you are drawing all kinds of wild conclusions off the back of that misunderstanding,

If Peggie had a problem with her employer’s decision the only appropriate course of action was to take it up with them. To confront Dr Upton in the changing room with intrusive , personal questions , accusations of being predatory etc was harassment and disgraceful.

The Supreme Court confirmed that a female only space with Dr Upton in it is not a female only space.

There is no part of the judgement that says “a female only space with a trans woman in it is not a female only space”.

It says that sex means biological sex. That is literally the judgment in one line.

A single sex space is a space for members of one biological sex.

Upton is the opposite sex to Peggie. Peggie is female, Upton is male.

Therefore a space with both Peggie and Upton in it is a mixed sex space.

Law on EQA2010 has been settled since 2010.

Law on the Workplace Requirement (1992) Act has been settled since 1992.

Bams misrepresenting these doesn't change the law.

And as discussed in the ET, Sandie did bring it up with her employers on at least two occasions.

Are you actually following the ET or just relying on 'interpretations' from Blue-sky?

It is entirely lawful to discriminate against male people by not allowing them into female only spaces.

If you are an employer and you have a legal obligation to provide female only spaces, you are breaching your legal obligations if you choose to allow male people into them. This is why the Darlington nurses won their tribunal case.

Why do you think this isn't settled law?

Do you think you have a deeper understanding of this matter than the judges?

The only harassment that occurred was Upton trying to force unconsenting women to take their clothes off when he was in their changing rooms. He literally made a record of times when they avoided being in there with him. How is that not harassment?

From the EQA 2010,
'739.This paragraph contains an exception to the general prohibition of gender reassignment discrimination in relation to the provision of separate- and single-sex services. Such treatment by a provider has to be objectively justified.Background740.This paragraph replaces a similar provision in the Sex Discrimination Act 1975

Example

• a group counselling session is provided for female victims of sexual assault. The organisers do not allow transsexual people to attend as they judge that the clients who attend the group session are unlikely to do so if a male-to-female transsexual person was also there. This would be lawful'

It says that sex means biological sex. That is literally the judgment in one line.

it says that the protected characteristic of sex in the equalities act refers to “sex at birth”. It also allows for circumstances where the protected characteristic of sex may have ramifications for treating trans people differently from others of their birth sex as a result of the impact of gender transition on perceived “birth sex”.

It clarifies that it is not unlawful for employers to preclude trans women from a female designated space.

No where does it say that “a female-only space with a trans woman in it” is unlawful.

Even if the SC had said that, it doesn’t mean that Dr Upton was in the wrong for being in the changing room and that it was acceptable for Peggie to harass / confront her.

Point of order here.

I don't think this part was ever really in dispute. (Although it was always disingenuous of trans activists to claim that organisations were allowed to provide trans exclusionary single sex spaces if they wanted to but then persecute and attempt to defund any organisation that tried to. Even to the point of emailing every venue in Brighton asking them not to host a grassroots female only rape support group set up by a woman who had been denied appropriate support by every rape crisis organisation in Sussex.)

The FWS case centred on whether a male person with a gender recognition certificate counted as female for the purposes of the definition of "sex" in the Equality Act.

The Supreme Court went further than most people were expecting when it pointed out that if you are using the single sex exemption is actually has to BE single sex, meaning that you can't use the single sex exemption to provide a space or service for women plus trans identifying males.

pointed out that if you are using the single sex exemption is actually has to BE single sex, meaning that you can't use the single sex exemption to provide a space or service for women plus trans identifying males.

please reference the paragraph in the judgement that says this.

No where does it say that “a female-only space with a trans woman in it” is unlawful.

There is no such thing as a female only space with a trans woman in it.

Louder again for the hard of thinking.

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A FEMALE ONLY SPACE WITH A TRANS WOMAN IN IT.

The Supreme Court judgment confirms that trans women are male for the purposes of the definition of "sex" in the Equality Act.

That means that a space with women and trans women in it is a space containing both female and male people, and it is not a single sex space within the meaning of the Act.

If the space you have created is not a female only space, there is no legal exemption which permits you to exclude other male people from it.

It’s judgment. If you’re going to continually misinterpret it at least spell it correctly.

I'm on my phone and it's a 90 page judgment. I don't have time to go through it now for the benefit of someone who wouldn't believe water was wet if you drowned them in it.

Everyone who isn't a complete idiot has managed to grasp the implications of the Supreme Court judgment.

As I said there’s really no point whatsoever in shouting the same points over and over again at me in capital letters.

If you can point me to the paragraph that specifically states what you are trying to claim, I will stand corrected. If you can’t do this then all you are doing is applying your own reason/ interpretation to elaborate the judgement on points that have not been tested in law. I’ve already explained multiple times how alternative interpretations are entirely compatible with the reasoning in the judgement and why.