Fighting Gender Ideology in the WI

[WomensInstituteDeclaration]

People on this thread are well aware of the ideological capture of the Women's Institute by the trans lobby. We are fighting back and need your help!

Please can you sign the petition to demand a moratorium on trans women joining the WI, to have a debate about this direction, and a vote.

The request has been formally turned down by the Board of Trustees of the National Federation of Women's Institutes, after a formal submission in February this year.

There is a question to ask whether or not you are a member so we can disaggregate the results.

DM us if you want to get further involved, especially if you are a WI member who disagrees with the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Policy 2021 and share as widely as you can too.

Thank you for your help.

Sarah

If transwomen are by their very definition men

they are adult human males who ‘feel’ female (eg tecer that feeling is)

If you change the definitions of Man and Woman then obviously TW can be a woman.

But you've only changed the definitions. You haven't changed the people.

The people that were previously defined as women still exist. They still have the same characteristics that defined them as Women under the old definition, and they still experience the same social and physical consequences because of them, and they are still different to the people that were previously defined as men who do not have those characteristics and do not suffer those consequences.

For all the rhetoric of "progressive" and "inclusive", all you have really done in practice is to use a sleight of language to take resources intended to mitigate those consequences from the people who suffer them to the people who don't.

You're not having your views challenged regularly, it is an echo chamber. Obviously this one is just full of sensible people who use logic. Although everyone who regularly communicates in one will think that!

You’re conflating views with facts.

We’re constantly challenged! By policies and studies and government consultations.

We just don’t give a rats arse about ‘yes… but’ sea lioning challenges.

Bring evidence and we’d dig into it.

we can provide evidence for our assertions, such as the biologic point markers stuff that I linked to.

I imagine your eyes would be a big help in spotting the blokes.

because you all believe that trans women are men

Um... well yes that's exactly what trans women are. Biological men. That's just science and fact. There's no "believe" about it.

Quite.

Yet here you are. Apparently challenging us.

Sigh, I typed a reply and lost it. Here's a quick precis:

I'm not struggling with any concepts to do with gender. I seek out other views both online and IRL and I'm confident in my own position.

No, my struggle was simply understanding the linguistic distinction you are making between Not Viable and Not Worth Doing. If there's any echo chamber involved it's the one that comes from decades in business where something judged Not Viable is definitely Not Worth Doing 😂

But!

Since my lost post I realised why we are missing each others' point!

It's an interesting demonstration of the logical concepts of Necessary and Sufficient.

In logic, A is Necessary for B if B can't be true unless A is true. A is Sufficient for B if A being true means be B must also be true.

So, in this case Viability is (usually) Necessary for something to be Worth Doing. However, it's not Sufficient. Something could be Viable but not Worth Doing, for example because something else is more urgent, or will generate more benefit. Which indeed is what you were asserting from the dictionary definition - Viable and Worth Doing are not the same thing.

However, your original argument was that making the WI female-only again was Not Viable, ie you were arguing a negative case.

An interesting feature of formal logic is that relationships don't hold the same way when we look at the inverse. If A is Necessary but not Sufficient for B, we cannot conclude we have B just because we have A. However we can conclude that if A is not true, B also cannot be true.

So in your original argument, when you assert that a female-only WI is Not Viable (because in your view female-only requires not just no males in principle and 99% of the time in practice, but guaranteed 100% no males at any time with no risk of deliberate male deception, and so sorry to the many women(female) who'd be more than happy with the former and accept those limitations but them's the breaks and what can we do?), you are implicitly saying making the WI female only again is Not Worth Doing, and that is the statement people were disputing.

Now, I'm obviously not suggesting that posters who disagreed with you were consciously applying these formal logic rules! But the meanings are baked into our language and generally we apply them instinctively. Just sometimes it's helpful to apply that formal framework to see where the disconnect is.

(I think I've met you before under another username...I do enjoy a chance to brush off the old logic training so thank you. Probably less fun for the rest of the posters 😳 )

I don’t believe I know

@Wonderingiforifnot

With these words of yours:

Echo chamber: an environment in which a person encounters only beliefs or opinions that coincide with their own...

... you have proved conclusively that this is NOT an echo chamber.

Yup. For the horde!!!! 🤪

You are working on the assumption that transwomen will ignore a rule that says the Women's Institute is for women.

Why would they?

Sometimes people do deliberately ignore exclusion rules that they believe are discriminatory, as a form of protest. So there needs to be a solid case that the exclusion is not discriminatory.

I don't appreciate your loaded language, @Wonderingiforifnot .

It's not a "trans ban," it is a single sex WI we are requesting, as had existed for nearly 100 years. "Trans ban" is as manipulative as saying "pro life" for restricting access to abortion - an attempt to make the opposite position sound unreasonable from the start.

Where I live has one of the largest trans populations in the country. We're not quite Brighton, but it's significant enough number that it is rare to be out and about and not see a trans identifying person going about their lives. And yes, 99+ times out of 100 it's blatantly obvious* because of their gait, before you see their face/hair/makeup/whatever. Our different skeletons mean we move in distinct ways. I find it disingenuous of you to pretend otherwise.

You don't need to have a 100% enforceable rule to make it viable and sensible. Most people are decent enough to observe the social contract of sex segregated spaces. When someone breaks that contract, it helps having rules to point to, indicating "we do not need to accept your intrusion in to our spaces, off you pop."

The WI has every right to withhold membership for whom it isn't applicable. My cat cannot join (not human). My daughter cannot join (not an adult). My father, husband and sons cannot join (not female).

• men are far less likely to spot the sex of a trans person than women, it's been documented frequently. My guess is for women it's an evolutionary advantage to spot the potentially dangerous half of the population.

I'd be extremely interested in the first principle (ie not simply "because EA/GRC" but looking at the purpose and intent of the provision) argument for why female people plus those males who identify as women should be included but all other males excluded.

Seems like that stance, which requires subjective judgement about who qualifies for "Womanhood", is far more arbitrary and therefore discriminatory than simply having female-only services as a response to the easily evidenced female social and political needs that arise from our undeniable and easily evidenced physical differences and historic inequalities.

Just to add - the focus on passing, misses the point for me. It is the male pattern behaviour that is the problem - it is this that disrupts the feeling of safety that all adult female groups value.

Males may try to 'protest' single sex exemptions as laid out in the EA, but they'd be in the wrong legally.

As FlirtsWithRhinos says above, it would be good to see this challenged.

On women being better at spotting, I usually clock them. Newcastle and the surrounding areas have a large number. There are at least six in my little town.

Males may try to 'protest' single sex exemptions as laid out in the EA, but they'd be in the wrong legally.

This where it gets sticky for me. The law is complicated, and is WI covered by single sex exemptions in law?

For example we don't yet know if it's legally discriminatory for a rape crisis group to fail to provide a women-only group by sex. That's still to be tested and I know it's not the same thing but it means the law is not clear-cut. And there are different rules for employment, social groups etc.

As FlirtsWithRhinos says above, it would be good to see this challenged.

But I'm sure nobody wants to be the test case!

argument for why female people plus those males who identify as women should be included but all other males excluded.

The arguments pro and con seem to depend on different perceptions of who "males who identify as women" are. Some of us think Hailey Cropper, others think Isla Bryant. And which of them are likely to join the WI and what effect that would have.

For employment that division isn't legal but again AFAIK it hasn't really been tested. Opening a job to women or transwomen but not other men probably isn't legal, but according to the Equality and Human Rights Commision it would have to be a man bringing the case. (And there could be a case where you wanted a woman or a trans person....)

So yes I would also like to see the arguments for including only "female people plus those males who identify as women" laid out more clearly and logically (and preferably without accusations of transphobia)

is WI covered by single sex exemptions in law?

Why not? It's a proportionate means to a legitimate aim - women want to meet in a group for women with other women who share their womanhood. So they exclude males.

Obviously people will debate what 'proportionate' and 'legitimate' mean - and again this shows up the issues with the EA. It needs proper scrutiny, that Act.

WI, along with nearly all other organisations, have been cowed into submission with explanations of how legally the exclusion of men with an identity is unenforceable.

It's not. But if people tell you that you risk bankruptcy and destruction if you do it, and that the inclusion of men with an identity is kind, and what's a woman anyway there's no legal definition, organisations are going to back off and then hypocritically present inclusion as the reason.

It's not the reason, it's fear of financial ruin.

That's why you get stonewalled when you ask about it as a hint of dissent could have the lawyers after them.

It's all a bit tragic really, that the older trans people have done this, have positioned normal women as their enemies they will attack legally over and over.

I can't think of a worse way of going about inclusion but when you read Whittle et al it's clear they felt they had to win a war and that we are the enemy they had to defeat.

War on women.

Absolutely agree.

The passing comment is just an acknowledgement that liars and cheats who try to force themselves into female only spaces, when explicitly told they are not allowed, will occasionally achieve their aim if they "pass" as female.

It doesn't change that they shouldn't be there in the first place, just that it's harder to stop them. The 30-something in Scotland who managed to get enrolled at a secondary school doesn't mean that rules not allowing adults to be pupils at schools for teenagers are perfectly viable rules, and we should be concerned about adults who try to get round them.

C'mon Ghenghis!

<excited>

We has Horde!

<waves sword and leaps onto sturdy short-legged pony>

Some of us think Hailey Cropper, others think Isla Bryant.

Tellingly, Hayley Cropper was played by a woman.

Had he character been played by (say) Karen White, Barbie Kardashian - or even India Willoughby or Rose from Pottery Throwdown - the entire storyline would have been unbelievable and would have been protested by every Corrie fan.