To ask you to sign our letter to Girlguiding UK?

[AgnesBadenPowell]

IMPORTANT! Deadline 9pm Thursday

We (me and the awesome team at Fair Play For Women and some others) will be publishing an open letter to Girlguiding in a national newspaper this Sunday. We set out the safeguarding concerns with their trans policy that allows a male child who identifies as a girl to share sleeping, dressing and washing facilities with girls, and that parents are not allowed to know. We also highlight that Females who identify as boys are expected to leave, disproportionately impacting lesbian girls.

We are now asking for our supporters to sign the open letter. I obviously need your name - you can PM me with your name, and indicate whether you are a parent, Leader, former member, grandparent, aunty, concerned member of the public etc. OR you can complete the online form here:

fairplayforwomen.com/add-your-name/

We can’t publish the full text of the letter but all the issues are summarised in this factsheet and can be seen in more detail this report.

https://fairplayforwomen.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/FPFWGirlguidess_factsheet.pdf

https://fairplayforwomen.com/guide-leaders-call-for-halt/

Spread the word and the link and lets get as many signatures as possible. Girlguiding has made a big misstep with this policy. As a Leader, I don't do this lightly. It's not my intention to embarrass Girlguiding but they MUST listen to our concerns about this policy - concerns shared by legal and child protection experts as well as parents and leaders.

You can read about the Girlguiding policy question here (and click through to the specific guidance on residentials): www.girlguiding.org.uk/making-guiding-happen/policies/girlguiding-policies/equality-and-diversity-policy/transgender-gender-reassignment/

Girlguiding's most recent statement on this issue can be read here: www.girlguiding.org.uk/what-we-do/our-stories-and-news/news/coverage-of-equality-diversity-policy/

I've signed; I have been following @AgnesBadenPowell's posts on this for some time and am tremendously impressed by the comprehensive, reasoned and committed work she and FairPlayForWomen have put into this. And yes I entirely trust them enough to sign the letter without reading its exact wording.

fascicle

I don’t understand why you wouldn’t think it’s the basis for her comment?

95% of girls who identify as boys are same sex attracted, ie protected by the protected characteristic of same sex attraction IN LAW. 80% of all children who say they are transgender DESIST, the most likely outcome for these children is to be LBG and not T. Therefore the lesbian angle IS relevant to GG, particularly when you read their cognitively dissonant guidance on talking about gender and gender ID and sexual orientation.

Polly Carmichael, lead clinician at the Tavi says this herself. Also referrals, about 1,600 in 2016, 1,000 of these kids were GIRLS.

If you drill down into the trans suicide stats by SEX, not gender ID, it is also FEMALES at most risk of self harm and suicide.

GG is for GIRLS, therefore the trans debate is absolutely pertinent to this organisation and they should be standing up for these girls and making a safe space for them and not centering boys.

And I read just last week, a story by a mum whose daughter was forced to share a school shower with a boy who said he was a girl, and he stood staring at her naked body with his erect penis in his hand. When her parents went to the police, they were warned about their transphobia and their daugther was told she needed educating out of her bigotry.

GG's own surveys shows sexual harrassment of girls by boys is off the charts.

@FencingFightingTorture35 you can use a pseudonym and say "foster carer of Guide", there are obviously a lot of those about!

@fascicle

Guidance on website: "We understand that if a young member is transitioning from Female to Male that they will be experiencing a great amount of change and uncertainty. Flexibility and the Leaders’ discretion in conversation with the parents must be used to determine how long the child stays within the unit" (2017)

PDF download Let’s Talk About Gender and Gender Identity: Advice for Leaders states: “at the right time, you may wish to begin to work with the young member [who identifies as a boy] to find another organisation that may better support their needs, for example an organisation open to all genders”. (2015)

Done. So important

The fact that people are willing to sign something they haven’t read just illustrates the level of trans hysteria on MN.

Signed. All the best to you.

@Skarossinkplunger the OP has linked several times to the factsheet FairPlayForWomen have produced about this issue that the letter summarises, and she is a longstanding and well known poster here. I've read both her posts (on this thread and others) and the factsheet, and other discussions of this issue, and I imagine that everyone that has signed has done the same. You're very welcome to do the same yourself.

But I’m correct in that the actual document has not been seen.

Signed.

How do I PM please anyone?

But I’m correct in that the actual document has not been seen.

Have a look further up the thread ska. This issue has already been extensively explained and discussed. It would be boring to go through it all again.

@DontCisgenderMe

Your post at 13:21 is spot on.

The letter is a precis of all that has gone before, it contains nothing anyone will not have seen before, and I know because I wrote it.

Whether or not I agree with the contents of the letter I find it immoral to publish a letter in a National Newspaper with a number of signatures on it when those people did not know what they were signing. Will there be a disclaimer informing people that this was the case?

@IAmSproutycus

Tap on the three little dots on the right hand side of a post written by the user you want to pm and it will give you a menu, on being one of the options.

By which I mean I'm part of the FPFW team, and I worked with Nic Williams and Helen and we summarised a 3,000 word report into a short few hundred words which took an entire day and 9 drafts! There's absolutely nothing you don't know already, you already know the contents, just said very briefly.

That's it. You are entirely free not to sign it. That's absolutely your choice but I can't see how it would in anyway strengthen our cause to lie to people, no journalist would touch us with a bargepole again.

There's nothing to fear, it will say EXACTLY what you expect it to say, as Helen as summarized.

Thanks for your support, believe me, this is BIG.

ska

Read the posts upthread about this. Another user had the same concerns as you (though they expressed them in slightly less
polite terms) and they were answered.

@Skarossinkplunger as you have repeatedly said. Newspapers do this all the time, it's standard, perhaps take it up with them when it's out.

Thank you for your replies. I shall be taking it up with the Newspaper.

@Skarossinkplunger can I suggest you read the fact sheet and the long report, and then imagine that summarised in 300 words, that's it. No mystery.

I have read it, but the people who are signing this only your word for it. I think that by presenting an unreleased document with signatures put in place before seeing the document is questionable, at best.

To be clear:

Every thing we've ever said and written on GG is being summarised in a short letter in a national newspaper this Sunday. If you agree with what we've said, and our aims, please feel free to add your name to the many hundreds of others, to show your support of our aims, that's IT.

The letter is a 300 word distillation of the factsheet and FPFW Girlguiding articles.

We have absolutely nothing to gain, as a grass roots coalition of women with very good media relations, by lying or misleading anyone. Why on earth, having built our grassroots support on mumsnet, in thousands of posts, would we lie now? That would just be silly.

It takes lots of work to build links with newspapers, we are not going to risk that, or the good faith people have put in us.

In an exclusive with a Sunday newspaper, you CANNOT reveal what you are publishing, or it's no longer exclusive.

That's the only reason for not revealing the form of words, I absolutely promise.

If you feel strongly that you still can't sign, then by all means don't. That's totally fine. We're not asking you to.

But can i ask please, don't cast aspersions on FPFW or Helen, who has risked a lot to go public.

And as Helen said, most people who have signed it have seen it in secret. Including plenty of famous names.