Labour Party and gender

[Mobley52]

I've seen quite a few threads where people have said they would not vote for Labour because of their stance on gender.

Would somebody be able to explain in simple terms why this is please

Many thanks

Well why on earth would I vote for a party which is either gaslighting the whole populace out of cowardice or genuinely believes impossible dangerous bollocks?

Because they care more about the ‘threat’ of trans people apparently than the country going down the toilet and people dying as a result.

They want to make it easier for men to claim they are women. And for those men to use women-only spaces and faciities with no challenge - toilets, changing rooms, rape crisis counselling, quotas of women on boards, statistics on female criminals and victims, women's awards, DV shelters, women's prisons, the list is endless.

It hasn't anything to do with trans people, except I guess incidentally for kicking the whole thing off.

It's about women's rights. Women as a group have only fairly recently won these rights. I'm not yet 40 and when I was born marital rape wasn't a thing. Things we take for granted, like being able to work outside the home on equal terms to men, vote, have bank accounts - are all quite new.

These rights weren't won easily, and women fought hard for them. Those we have are now protected in law and policy. We have protected single sex spaces where women are vulnerable, like hospitals, changing rooms or in sports. These all hinge on the word "woman".

If you can't define woman, none of these mean anything. We are talking about moving the definition of woman from something scientific, observable and objective - to a subjective feeling on the part of the individual concerned.

Labour for a long time have been trying to please 2 opposing groups, trans rights activists and women's rights campaigners. They have promised seemingly contradicting rights to each. For example promising to maintain single sex spaces but allowing people to use the spaces that match their identities.

Now the manifesto is out and journalists are asking questions about the details. Labour have clarified that when they promised to protect single sex spaces, they meant a narrow range of spaces like women's refuges but not things like public toilets.

As well as the spaces issue, there are conflicts over whether to keep the recent schools guidance on gender issues, plans to make it easier to change legal sex, and whether their ban on conversion therapy will make it hard for mental health professionals to give neutral non-affirming care to people questioning their gender.

I've tried to describe that neutrally but you can probably tell which side of the debate I am on.

This is fairly new to me to. Enough to stop me voting labour. Are other parties taking this stance?

Labour want to make it easier for people to change their legal gender identity and sex. They have stated that they will remove the requirement for someone to have "lived in their preferred gender" and only one doctor will need to sign off on the change of legal sex rather than two.

This is self ID. So a man can say he is a woman. If anyone can say they are a woman, that becomes meaningless. And it becomes much harder to keep males out of women's sports, prisons, rape crisis centres, hospitals etc.

There have already been cases of predatory men saying they are a woman and being given access to vulnerable women, then committing rapes and sexual assaults on them. Read up about Karen White.

I will not support a party that denies the important reality of biological sex. If they can say that a man can suddenly become a woman, then they are liars and I can't trust them on anything else.

Most of them are worse tbh!

The only one (marginally) better on this topic is the Tories. But then with them, there is just about everything else...

I will not vote for any party that will not acknowledge biological reality. Women do not have penises. Men do not have a cervix. I tried the #bekind thinking but then they came for women's refuges, sports, toilets. They came for children in schools and now I'm dragon mode. Penis people out of women's and girl's spaces, no quarter given.

Labour, Greens, SNP, Lib Dems all take this stance.

The Conservatives don't, neither do the Social Democratic Party.....and I'm guessing Reform don't but haven't checked.

Yes. SNP, Greens, Lib Dems. Maybe some others.

If you haven't heard about it, read up on what happened with the GRR (Gender Recognition Reform) bill in the Scottish Parliament. It was aimed at making it easier to get a Gender Recognition Certificate - all you would have to do would be live as the opposite sex for 3 months (what does that even mean?) rather than 2 years, and the age would be lowered from 18 to 16. No blocks for sex offenders, they would be able to change their legal gender too.

It played a large part in the downfall of Nicola Sturgeon, when Isla Bryson (aka Adam Graham), double rapist, whose photo was splashed over the front pages in tight, bulging pink leggings, was due to get sent to a women's prison. In the classic interview below Sturgeon refuses to commit to saying whether she thinks he is a man or woman, saying only that he is a "rapist" - leading to the many digs on this site about "rapist gender".

The GRR bill was only stopped by being overruled from Westminster.

Most of them. Reform UK, the SDP and one of the Communist parties are wholly against it.

Sunak says that they oppose it, but it's too little, too late. The trans shitshow happened because of TRAs within the Conservative Party. Given that he's out on his arse the day after the election, we have no idea who the new leader will be or what stance they will take.

amp.theguardian.com/society/2017/oct/18/theresa-may-plans-to-let-people-change-gender-without-medical-checks

This is not accurate.
They want to remove the two years "living in their acquired gender" and replace with a "2 year cooling off period".

I actually prefer this as "living in preferred gender" is nonsense and at the moment the assessment is done remotely so "living as preferred gender" means "changing name on bank account" for example.

Labour will still require a diagnosis of gender dysphoria and sign off from a medical specialist so it is not "self ID"

It is a pickle though OP because in broad brush terms you have lib dems/greens going full self ID, Labour/Conservatives requiring a diagnosis and using the Equality Act to keep some, but not all, spaces single sex and Reform being the only big party saying sex is biological.

Personally I've therefore discounted this as a voting issue and will vote on other feminist issues instead. VAWG, getting rape prosecution rates up, poverty and childcare are big ones for me.

I would disagree that the conservatives and Labour are similar on gender issues. Here is a breakdown of the three main parties' manifesto pledges related to gender...

Comparing the three main party manifestos on sex and gender - Sex Matters (sex-matters.org)

I don’t understand this.
TRAs are saying that KS and the LP hate them, want them cancelled, are thoroughly transphobic.
GC posters on here are saying KS hates women and girls.
Which is it ?
To me Starmer cannot win either way. None of the GC believe him whatever he says (despite bigging Sunak up on the basis of a few comments to win votes).
I also think mixed in with women’s right to safe spaces, loss of identity fairness in sport etc there’s a prurient distaste for trans people much like that directed at gay folk back in the day.

I don't see where anyone has said KS hates women and girls.

I can only speak for myself, but I do not feel distaste towards trans people. From a progressive pov, it is very strange for me being put in the right wing bigot box, having been accused of quite the opposite most of my life.

My most benign interpretation is that these changes have been made, with the best of inclusive intentions, without full discussion and understanding of the implications.

And that is what we are pointing out now - changing how we define women does have a significant knock on impact to women's rights. We want to understand how this is being managed. This is not an unreasonable ask for any change in policy

It has very little to do with trans people for me and everything to do with women’s rights. I’m a bit sick of being taken for granted.

I wanted to vote for a party that will

1. enforce the Equalities Act and recognise that sex is just as important a protected characteristic as any of the others; implement the Cass recommendations;
2. admit that taxes are going to have to go up if we aren’t going to have a total breakdown of public services. Caring falls disproportionately on women.
3. recognise the existential threat that the climate and biodiversity crises represent and create policies accordingly. Again, evidence is that globally, women suffer more from effects of climate change, usually because we’re bottom of the heap.

No one standing in my constituency does all three so I have spoiled my postal ballot. Add to that KS’s outrageous treatment of Rosie Duffield and the fact that the wider Labour Party seems to be easily ruled by the mob on various issues (self-id is just the latest), and I can’t in all conscience vote for them.

Also, while I wouldn’t say KS hates women I do think that like a lot of leftwing men of my acquaintance he doesn’t really ‘get’ us. I liked him a lot early on but the more I hear him speak (or rather not speak) on women’s rights the more I think he thinks feminism has done its job and now women should go back to cheering on the more important work.

Agree with you but Labour are not above and beyond superior to other parties in every other respect either. They're just not the Tories. Combined with their inability to recognise a woman, I absolutely will not be voting for them.

You don’t see where folk have said they think KS hates women and girls ? 😂

Absolutely.

I can't in all conscience vote for "the best of a bad bunch". 1 and 3 above are dealbreakers.

I think there’s a lot of misinformation around on Labour’s stance.

Yes, they want to make it easier to get gender recognition certificates (which is also something the Tories did about 3 years ago) by dropping the 2 doctor requirement in favour of 1 doctor. Bearing in mind that very few GRC’s are applied for (usually around 30 per year) and around 95% of applications are successful, I’m doubtful that Labour’s changes would result in an increase is successful applications.

Some people have raised concerns about Labour potentially scrapping the spousal “veto”; I can understand being opposed to that but it’s an incredibly minor issue to me. The “veto” has only been exercised twice in the nearly two-decades since the Gender Recognition Act came into force (and no idea if by men or women).

Labour have said they support the existence of single sex spaces and will implement the recommendations in the Cass report.

I’m not quite sure on is the interplay between implementing the Cass report with their pledge to band trans conversion therapy, thought I don’t think those two things are necessarily incompatible depending on how conversion therapy is defined. The conservatives have also said they’d ban trans conversion therapy.

The only real difference that I see between the two is that while Labour are promising to provide legal guidance on the application of the current Equality Act, the conservatives are (now) pledging to amend it to define sex as biological sex. I can understand that the Tory stance is more appealing to some but it would be fraught with legal challenges, which is presumably why they’re now only making the pledge (after years of inaction) when they know they are not going to be in government anymore.

@SquattingOtter

I think there’s a lot of misinformation around on Labour’s stance.
Speaking of misinformation...

Bearing in mind that very few GRC’s are applied for (usually around 30 per year)
Not sure where you got that figure from but that is a small fraction of the real number. The last year I can see published Government data for was 2021-2022 where there were 466 applications. The number has been steadily climbing for the last decade.

The conservatives have also said they’d ban trans conversion therapy.
This is also not right. The Conservatives have dropped plans for a trans CT ban.

Labour have said they support the existence of single sex spaces

Do you know which spaces this will be and how they will do this?

There seems to be some contradiction in their statement and recent views from Bridget Phillipson

You’re completely right re the numbers of GRC applications, I misremembered, apologies. Although given that around 90% of applications are successful I still don’t think changing from 2 doctors to 1 doctors is likely to see a huge surge (maybe no increase at all) in issued certificates.

I also now see that the Tories have backtracked to “we’re still thinking about it” on the CT ban.