to ask why you wouldn’t sign the petition?

[CircleSquareCircleSquare]

The petition set up by Amy Desir (one of the women who self identified as a man to attend a men only swim session) is asking the government to consult women on privacy and dignity that could be removed or impacted by proposed changes to the gender recognition act.

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/214118

The petition is merely asking for debate - doesn’t it come to something when women have to petition the government to have to ask to debate their safety?

Most gender critical feminists recognise trans human rights but we don’t want their identity and wishes to be placed above our safety.
I posted on MN recently about my experience of living in a domestic violence refuge as a child and now I was terrified of men, a male bodied person presenting as a female in that safe space would have terrified me and impacted my PTSD more than the other experiences already have.

If you haven’t signed it why not? Please reconsider, if only so both sides can be heard. Of course signing isn’t mandatory and I’m not angry but I would be interested in hearing more.

If you would like to sign it, you can find it here
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/214118 - your details are kept private. Please consider sharing.

g1itterati
I think you’re doing a terrific job at proving our point. 👍

"Who needs this exactly?"

I don't know SpringHen, but neither do you. Maybe some men feel alienated by their own sex? Maybe they have mental health problems? Maybe they are having a breakdown or having an extreme reaction to childhood abuse? We simply don't know, but one thing is for sure - an abuser will abuse whether this self-id law gets passed or not.

But why would you want to make it easier for them to do so?

Even if I was pro GRA I would still support the petition because I support everyones right to be heard on issues that matter to them.

Why on earth wouldnt you?

Signed.

my experiences have led me to believe that the minuscule minority of men who may ID as women or whatever they like are the least of my worries in the wider scheme of things.

So you are prepared to ignore all evidence that proves that sexy segregated spaces protect women because of your own experiences?

Out of interest, have you ever been in prison? Because the scenario you present, that a woman could "ask not to share" with another prisoner who they feel uncomfortable about, is very remote from my own knowledge and professional experience.

And, while we're on the subject of prisons - what would your solution be to any child which was conceived in prison as a result of sex between a woman and a trans-woman - either consensually or a product of rape?
Prisons have been sex segregated the world over to avoid that very situation - it's quite regressive to return to a situation in which babies are conceived in prison, don't you think?

I don't think it necessarily does make it easier Darth. To self-id as female is to identify yourself as "different" - most abusers go to great lengths to blend in, unnoticed.

Why is it transphobic to ask if you could please talk to us before you redefine us?

Yes, if you're happy to call yourself CIS and have the defintion of woman no longer mean "person with a vagina" but person who feels like a woman, I'm guessing you have some idea of what that means. I wish you'd explain what that means as it doesn't include me. And yes, I'm annoyed as I've been treated worse because I'm a woman my whole life. And I found feminism to deal with that but now feminism doesn't deal in biology so who do we turn to?

I don't believe any of you relaly want transmen in male prisons. NO one wants that. ANd you don't want it because you know they're women and the abuse they'd get is sickening.

Circle - it's irrelevant to me whether I'm proving your point or not. You asked why I haven't signed the petition and I've tried to explain why. I'm sure I haven't said anything that hasn't been said a million times already.

I thought you wanted a debate.

I don't claim to be an expert in this area, nor do I have any axe to grind. I'm just giving my honest perspective that I don't think self-id necessarily equates with predatory behaviour. That's it really.

So what DOES it equate to. Full time transpeople are already protected. So what is the GRA for

And

Even if youre pro GRA why dont you want women consulted about it?

There are many ordinary situations where self-id would give men the right to make women feel uncomfortable.

For example - a female security guard being asked to search a man who says he is a trans woman.

Self-Id would make it more likely the woman would feel her job was at risk if she complained.

A man abusing a woman would be able to tell her he would track her down at a women’s shelter and live there too. It doesn’t matter how unlikely this is in practice - this law would allow an abuser to sow a seed of doubt in a woman’s mind.

*Haidees

But glitterati, you arent debating as you arent answering the questions.*

This

g1itterati - What struck me reading many of the debates on this, is that abusive men won't have to identify as woman, because woman and girls are already being told not to question obviously male bodied people in spaces like toilets and changing rooms.

They won't have to live differently, but will be less likely to challenged in spaces they shouldn't be. It won't raise suspicion to see a man in a ladies bathroom in the way it currently does (or 'did' as so many bathrooms already have signs telling woman that the shouldn't flag it as an issue, it's probably a transperson).

Instead of blustering something about accidently walking into the wrong room, men who are seeking out woman in vunerable situations can just say "I idenfity as a woman" if security /staff ask them what they are doing. But more likely, if a woman goes to a staff member and says "there's a man in the ladies changing room" she'll be told "they probably identify as a woman" and he'll not be confronted in the first place.

I could be wrong, but I don't see how self ID can do anything other than make all spaces that are currently female only open to all male bodied people, regardless of how they identify/live.

Has anyone raised this at the school gates?
I have had a few discussions about this at pick up and drop and everyone so seemed to be baffled by what was going on and promised to look into it more.
What kind of discussions are you having/seeing in real life?

If my daughter is half naked in a changing room and a predator walks in, what does she do?

The same thing she would do now.

The law is about making it easier for trans people to have their gender identity recognised within the law.

Whether you identify as a man, a woman or a stapler, if you're a predator, being predatory, you'll be charged for it the same way you are now.

I worked for 6 years in Child Protection in Westminster. I genuinely can't think of a single case that involved a trans person as a perpetrator.

I have worked in secure units with rapists and self-identifying as a woman would have been extremely unlikely for any of them, unless it's some sort of niche fetish.

Do doctors and nurses currently have the right to refuse to treat people on the basis of gender? No, of course not. Neither does the security guard. Chaperones should always be available for personal searches anyway.

I'm not particularly well educated when it comes to gender politics etc I don't know who this Amy Desir person is. I do feel a bit uncomfortable with the description of what she did - seems a bit sensationalist to me.

Anyway from my reading of the this thread and the petition you want woman to be consulted before proposed changes are made to existing laws. Won't this be debated in parliament anyway? Aren't there female MPs in parliament who we have elected to be our voice? Won't the changes to the bill have to agreed by parliament before they are implemented? Admittedly I'm not a massive fan of the current government but I know almost half of the labour MPs are women.

There are a lot of things going on in our country at the moment which bother me. There are a lot of policies I really wish I could have a say in. To be honest the entire tone of this thread (arguments on both sides) really puts me off being involved in this issue and I think I'm happy to leave it up the parliament to slog out. So now I've read the petition, I've thought about the issues and I don't want to sign.

Moo678

This wasn't debated properly in Scotland, so I wouldn't hold out much hope for this side of the border...

fairplayforwomen.com/scottish_stole_woman/

I feel that the issue of being able to complain is analogous to this debate.

On this thread and others many women have said they are scared to discuss this issue or sign the petition because they are scared of the consequences.

If we are already at a point where even debating an issue and asking for women's concerns to be given consideration is deemed to be contentious, my worry is that with every piece of additional ground given the ability of women to be heard is being diminished.

The view that obtaining a GRC is difficult and deeming is worthy of debate. Whether you believe (given the implications) that it shouldn't be easy/easier or conversely that it should, there's a very big gap between the current process and self id.

Navigating that "gap" is impossible however, without debate.

Tbh I'm actually more concerned about the way the self id campaign is being run that the proposals itself - because the narrative of "trans women are really women" is one that seems now inextricably linked with self id with the implication that what defines womanhood is being re-written to erase biological principle and the reality of the physical differences between the sexes.

Differences that have incontrovertibly been a significant factor in how women are treated in society.