Girl Guides are now GIRL ONLY! - Thread 2

[CohensDiamondTeeth]

I hope no one minds me starting thread 2, I clicked post on my last reply but the thread had filled up.

There was some interesting discussion had, and on the last page @LostMySocks posted that she was thinking of sending a positive email to HQ, which I think sounds like a great idea. Maybe those who support this move could do the same? It would show Girl Guides that people are paying attention.

Link to the first thread here: Girl Guides are now GIRL ONLY! | Mumsnet

The first post of the thread was so good I'm just going to copy and paste it here too. Girl Guides statement is incredibly begrudging in tone.

@Iamwhoiamwhoareyou · Yesterday 14:41

Following April's supreme court ruling, the Girl Guides have FINALLY made a statement and will remain GIRLS ONLY - Finally closing the door on admitting trans members or allowing BOYS to invade female only spaces/camp (which, would be done without informing parents that their daughter would be sharing a room with a biological male!) - I have a previous post in feminism chat for anyone wanting to read the previous thread on this

EMAIL RECEIVED HOT OFF THE PRESS 5 MIN AGO -

As the parent of a young member in Girlguiding, following April’s Supreme Court decision relating to sex and gender, we wanted to give you an update. Many organisations across the country have been facing complex decisions about what it means for girls and women and for the wider communities affected, including us.

Girlguiding’s governing charity documents set out that the membership and people who benefit from our organisation are girls and women. In April, the Supreme Court ruled that girls and women are defined in the Equality Act 2010 by their biological sex at birth.
Following detailed considerations, expert legal advice and input from senior members, young members and our Council, Girlguiding’s Board of Trustees has made the difficult decision that Girlguiding must change Girlguiding must change, following the Supreme Court’s ruling.

From today, 2 December, it is with a heavy heart that we are announcing trans girls and young women will no longer be able to join Girlguiding. This is a decision we would have preferred not to make, and we know that this may be upsetting for members of our community.

There will be no immediate changes for current young members but more information will be shared next week.

Most adult roles, including unit helpers, district helpers and administrative support, are already open to all, so we are confident that no volunteers will have to leave the organisation.

Girlguiding believes strongly in our value of inclusion, and we will continue to support young people and adults in marginalised groups. Over the next few months, we'll explore opportunities to champion this value and actively support young people who need us.

You can find our full statement and updated policy on our website.

We are proud to be the UK’s largest youth organisation dedicated to girls and is focused on creating an equal world for girls and young women. For over 100 years, we have been a welcoming space for all girls to have new experiences, support their communities, build friendships and grow their confidence.

While Girlguiding may feel a little different going forward, these core aims and principles will always be the same. We remain committed to treating everyone with dignity and respect, particularly those from marginalised groups that have felt the biggest impact of this decision.

If you have any immediate questions, we have our special support team in place, to give volunteers, parents and carers the best support we can. We are asking Girlguiding HQ, trading and country/region staff to refer any volunteer or parent who has questions about this announcement. Details below.

Contact [email protected] or 020 7532 3970
All calls/emails will be confidential, and the service will be open 24hrs, 7 days a week.
Find out more, including how this team will handle personal data.

Denise Wilson (Chair of Trustees), Felicity Oswald (CEO) and Tracy Foster (Chief Guide)

it does make you seem very close minded as to what and who a girl can be.

Were the NAACP being closed minded when they said Rachel Dolezal wasn't black? Are people who think that Stefoknee Wolscht isn't a six year old (or a girl) just closed minded? (Apologies to anyone not familiar with Stefoknee who now googles). What a girl is is a female human under the age of 18. Who a girl can be is limitless.

Surely the only reason to attempt to change sex characteristics is if you were 'transphobic' enough to think that being a girl requires being female?

If you think it's about how you feel inside and not the body, then no need to change the body.

You're free to disagree but it does make you seem very close minded as to what and who a girl can be.

For me, the only requirement to be a girl is to be female. Other than that, it is utterly irrelevant what they like, what they want, what they are good at. That has literally no bearing on whether they are a boy or a girl.

Yet you seem to think being a girl requires certain types of feeling (and aren't even open-minded enough to share what you think these are) - you are restricting the definition, not me.

"You're free to disagree but it does make you seem very close minded as to what and who a girl can be."

Really? You have made so many poorly aimed accusations at me, this one is really laughable. This is your next line of attack?

Remarkable. A 'girl' can choose do be whatever she wants to be and do whatever interests her while she will always be a female juvenile human. No male person can be 'a girl'. If you cannot understand the difference between acknowledging the material reality of a sex class of humans and having no other expectations of a girl than that, I think you have again demonstrated your own limitations and not mine.

"I'm really not demanding, I'm requesting."

No. You are continuing to demand it. You can deny it all you wish, however the more you attack me for disagreeing with your demand the more that anyone reading this thread sees that demand for what it is. It is in no way a request. A request can be freely rejected. You have continued to personally attack me with the intention of shaming me to comply with your demand - making it not a request at all.

"How is the erasure of women through language a huge problem, compared to the erasure of 1% of the population?"

Referring to a person as their sex class when sex is entirely relevant to the discussion being undertaken at that time is not 'erasing' people with transgender identities. However, people with transgender identities demanding to be described using language that doesn't accurately convey what their sex is and demanding to be described using the language that female people need to use to for their own rights, when that person is male not female, provably does remove the rights of female people.

A very clear example of this has been when male people described themselves as female athletes and convinced sporting federations to allow them to enter into female sporting events.

@SolidMamwhy wouldn’t you expand the definition of what a boy can do and be like?

You can be honest about your child’s sex and they can live as they like still.

"The girls that might want to allow their trans girl friends in to Brownies won't be protected by this ruling, they'll be sad, confused and frustrated.'

Now we have reached the 'but what about those girls who want their male friend to be in the group'?

Do you actually understand how consent works in this instance? Surely, if you are safeguarding trained as I would have thought a Brownie leader was, you would understand this.

Just because some female children agree that their male friend can access a female single sex provision, it doesn't change that fact that one female child who doesn't is the bar set for consent. And this would have to also be organisation wide.

Despite this, it is the law.

So those sad, confused and frustrated female children might need to understand that when a group is designated as single sex, it means female children only. However, if they all want to join a group that is available to both sexes, they can join Scouts together. That way your child will have friends to join him.

"I wonder how and if the board at GG consulted with the girl members themselves about the decision? This is common practice across many charity organisations. I know it's a response to a legal change but that simply doesn't make it right or correct."

yes.... I wonder whether the board at GG consulted with the girl members to allow male children into their groups in the first place. I doubt it. As a volunteer around the time, I didn't see any discussion of this inclusion with the female members.

"I suppose that I'm realising through this debate that that I just don't agree that sex based rates need protecting as much as other people clearly do on here. I thought there'd be a wider range of views - but I suppose that's how echo chambers occur."

Echo chambers occur when alternative view points are blocked and removed. You are here having a discussion, while making personal attacks I have to point out. No one is blocking you or asking for you to be removed from the discussion.

That you, personally, don't believe that female sex based 'rights' (I assume, please correct me if I'm have assumed you meant 'rights') don't need protecting is a choice you are very free to make. And feminists will feel free to disagree with you and point out why they believe sex based rights are vital to be preserved.

"It is a terrible shame however, that you have taught your son that as a biological male, he's doing it 'wrong'."

Indeed.

This should have been an excellent opportunity for a male child to learn that he can do whatever interests him and be whatever he wants to while acknowledging that he has a male sexed body and is a boy and later a man. Because all that boy and man indicate is the maturity status of a male human.

We should be making sure our children know this and that there are endless ways to be a 'boy' or a 'man', but the only requisite is that they are male people.

I am. Boys, trans boys, it's all good.

https://x.com/KnownHeretic/status/1988090968613237131?s=20

Maybe this is useful for people who don't understand how consent works for access to single sex provisions and how if some female people want their male friend to have access, this does not remove the basic standard of consent to be met where if even 1 female user of that provision wants it to be female only, that is where the standard has to be.

So why don’t you let your son know he can be a boy and do whatever he likes, dress how he likes?

But be honest about his sex which he can’t change.

And here is that dishonest language usage.

EasternStandard : Why are you not open to what a boy can be like?

SolidMam : I am. Boys, trans boys, it's all good.

Leaving the reader to have to ask, hang on... what does the word boy mean to each of these people? Knowing that one of these people has stated that their male child is a 'girl'.

This is the power of language.

Thank you SolidMam for demonstrating that so very clearly .

It's just all so bloody regressive.

No, my daughter can be/ wear and do whatever she wishes.

The fact that she doesn't engage in stereotypically female activities and doesn't dress in a stereotypically female way doesn't make her a fucking boy.

It's so offensive it's untrue. Thankfully now she's gone through puberty she has got over the I would rather be a boy bit. She's a happy teen / young adult female.

I am sorry @SolidMam I really think you have let your son down. Boys can be whatever they want to be, what they can never be is the opposite sex and they have no place in single sex spaces reserved by law for people of the opposite sex. If your son is upset by this it is entirely on you and any other adult who has lied to him since before he could even speak!!!!!

By the way, how is it also erasing 1% of the population when 100% of the population has a sex class that their body belongs to.

AND when feminists talk about protecting female people's rights, they are also including probably 50% of that 1% who are female people.

This accusation is one we see very often and it lacks accuracy, logic and coherency.

I genuinely think that awful term "erasure" that gets rolled out so very much is far, far more applicable, by any stretch of the imagination, to women and girls' current predicament.

Surely the group that is closest to being "erased" is the group denied the language necessary to describe and distinguish themselves to advocate for their rights?

And that loss of our language is so dramatic, so absolute, that I really do feel as though I struggle to know how to express what "women" used to mean. It's an awful, genuinely frightening position in which to be, particularly when that language that I've lost is fundamental to my health, physical safety and psychological wellbeing: medical research, single-sex spaces etc.

A transgirl doesn't have the same problem of an inability to describe their needs. They may not have the power to make me use the pronoun they prefer, but they do at least have a word with which to unambiguously describe themselves and their demographic.

Even then, it's not women who would be erased - just their rights.

Exactly! Like you, I think, am following the fast-moving main WI thread in FWR on and off, and the amount of hyperbole from the TRA side there is beyond belief. (It's a rather nice oasis of calm over here in comparison🌴).

That thread is very eye opening. Just when we think we have seen it all.

Eye-opening and repetitive. It's nice to come over here for a break!

I do let her know. She can be a boy if that's truly what her gender is. But as I said previously, when it got to a point that our assertions on her gender as a boy became harmful to her, such was her distress, we began to support her more actively. To listen to her. And she hasn't looked back since. If anything we are trying to avoid any feelings of dysphoria with her gender by accepting her as a trans girl

She knows what her sex is and has her dad in the house, so she has an idea about how she will physically develop. She's not an idiot.

What is gender?

Yes, I asked that a few times earlier - still no answer. How strange.

This child has been very confused and misled.

Yes. Your son is a trans boy. So had no place in a girls single sex organisation. His distress is all on you. You did this to him. It may be harsh but there it is. The fact you think a baby can tell you what sex they are is beyond belief. I hope your son grows up to be happy and healthy but with someone so batshit as a parent, it’ll be tough for him

This is nonsense.

His sex is male. He may like things that are stereotypically liked by girls but that doesn't make him female/ a girl.

You've really failed him.

What your message should be is that you are a boy and there is no wrong way to be a boy.

How would one know what one's gender is?

Apparently you can know before you can speak according to @SolidMam you just wave in the general direction of a picture and that confirms what you are if your parents are trained in Interpreting these signs . It’s like some special magic sense. And it doesn’t matter if your ‘gender” doesn’t match your biological sex, your loving parents will bully you others into pretending you're what they say you are.

You write very powerfully. Language is so important. I'm so sorry for your sense of loss - and it is more acute for women than men, when it comes to trans issues.

In contrast, I see the broadening of definitions as potentially empowering of all men and women. More solidarity of women across the division of sex-based rights would be great. But if people refuse to see trans girls and women as such then it'll be long road, sadly.