Response from my MP re MM's gender identity bill

[Gallavich]

Anyone else want to share here?
@italiangreyhound

So, because you don't like some content Exit has previously posted, you report a blank post?

There's a word for that sort of behaviour

As it happens exit, I told MNHQ that it wasn't a problem. I just pointed out to them what seemed to be going on. I did say it wasn't a problem.

They deleted it. But you seem to be having a go at me. Have a go at MNHQ. Tell them to fuck off like you told me to fuck off.

So, because you don't like some content Exit has previously posted, you report a blank post

You mean content that got deleted by MNHQ and that she seemed to have been warned about by MNHQ?

There's a word for that behaviour as well.

Passive aggressive, oh look what Exit's doing, only it's not a problem, I'm telling you what she's doing, for no reason whatsoever :)

Maybe exit can explain why she posted a blank post on the 2 trans threads I have been on recently just after I posted something when I reported her to MNHQ for her comments about me?

Coincedence?
Place marking?
or trying to say she felt silenced?

Just tried to post M agdalene B latest video against D J R and got this?? What the hell is going on. Isn't free speech allowed on mumsnet?

I have done a screen shot in case that post disappears too.

Reporting blank posts.

Son of a deity on a bike. Are we really at the thought police stage?

We are being censored why?

or maybe it was just a blank post, like what folks have been doing all over MN since someone worked out how to do it.

You can't police what you think someone may or may not be thinking. Deleting a blank post is a pointless act.

This had gone very weird...

Mine wasn't blank. One got posted and then disappeared but without MN message saying it was deleted. When I reposted I got that message. Perhaps it was an IT gltich?

So if I am now allowed to post this is well worth watching

What the heck has happened here? Has somebody really had a blank post reported and deleted? Why on earth would somebody report a blank post?

Why on earth would somebody report a blank post

If you bothered to read the explanation, you'd get the context. MNHQ have deleted it - it does seem pointless that it was deleted - I would have thought MNHQ would have asked exit why she seemed to be following me and doing blank posts.

It does seem strange it was deleted. But I have no issue with reporting someone for repeatedly doing blank posts after I post on trans threads.

Still, blank posts make a nice change from the usual comments I receive from certain people when I post on here.

Been meaning to update on mine for ages. (Namechanged in case this got too identifiable).

I wrote a (very long!) email to my MP before the December debate, covering various things I was concerned about including the whole self-identification/segregated spaces and safety thing, sports, transing of children etc etc. Poor MP having to wade through it all... but I had a lot to say!

Anyway MP replied with a short but quite encouraging email saying thanks for the "extremely detailed and thoughtful" email and that they had written to Caroline Dinenage (Equalities minister) to share my concerns and ask for her response.

My MP eventually wrote again enclosing a response from Caroline Dinenage, which frankly was pretty feeble. She (Dinenage) had not responded at all to several points (e.g. sports), and on the issues about transing of children she gave some waffly but basically pretty meaningless reply that schools were aware of gender issues and had been given some updated guidelines blah blah - but nothing to really answer the concerns I'd raised.

The worst/weirdest bit though was that regarding the concerns about safe spaces and self-identification, Ms Dinenage responded by referring to the Equality Act 2010 which "allows for separate male or female services to be provided" and saying that "A business or service provider can decide whether and how a transperson can use such a service, depending on the circumstances", and "laws are in place to prevent unlawful access".

I found this really odd and disingenuous, given that she was actually involved with the original govt report, which specifically recommends modifying the Equalities Act and removing these exemptions, along with making the proposals around self-identification, which would make it impossible to impose any such separations because anyone self-identifying as female would be able to legally become female and then surely could not legally be barred from those places or services. As I'd specifically referred to the proposed changes in my email, it seemed bizarre for her to reply on the basis of the existing legislation when she was directly involved in the debate about changing this...

My MP though sounded more sympathetic and had finished by saying they were "more than willing" to take this further if I had any comments on this response (yay!)... so I have emailed again to point out the issues with it, and going into detail on the recommendations made in the government report and how these contradict what Ms Dinenage had said in her reply. I also mentioned that even before any legal changes have been made, some of these proposals already seemed to be being put in place semi-officially, for example in the CPS schools guidance which is already promoting the line that self-determination rules and that challenging this is potentially a hate crime.

So I'm waiting to hear back at the moment. Also depending how things go, I might even try to chat with my MP directly sometime as they seemed quite responsive to this. Maybe a potential Spartacus?

I still haven't got a reply from my mp.

Sparctopus

Your MP sounds very encouraging. I would definitely try and meet with him/her. It's not just about halting the proposed change, it's also about reversing the consensus that seems to have accepted that change without it yet happening.

Good stuff though.

Oh get off the cross Ego, we need the wood.

😱

Sorry for the delay posting J Greening's response (which is actually from Caroline Dinenage). Been away from my laptop and no clue how to do this on my phone. Not sure this will be very legible, but it doesn't say much, to be honest, and seems to be a stock response sent well before I sent my email to Vicky Foxcroft, so not covering any of the specific points I made. This is the email I sent:
***
To: FOXCROFT, Vicky
Subject: Gender Identity (Protected Characteristics) Bill - concerns

Dear Ms Foxcroft,

I'm writing to you as a constituent because I'm very worried about the possible adverse consequences that may arise if Maria Miller's Gender Identity bill passes unchanged into law. I want to stress at the outset that I am not transphobic in any way. I simply feel that the rights of women and children are not being given enough weight in this difficult debate. My concern is about the risks that follow if people are allowed to self-identify as a different sex than their biological sex, specifically biological males self-identifying as women.

A few concerns:

1. Crimes committed by biological men who are self-identifying as female are already being recorded as committed by females. This includes rape. This is a nonsense. Biological men are far more likely than women to commit violent crime and accurate crime statistics in this area are essential. The police and press are even failing to issue clear descriptions of trans women they want to interview, for fear of misgendering. This is not helpful.

1. Biological men who are convicted criminals serving prison sentences and self-identifying as female are insisting on being moved to women's prisons. Many women in prisons have been subjected to abuse by men. How can it be right that they are now expected to share accommodation, including shower areas, with biologically male inmates, some of whom are registered sex offenders? Don't these vulnerable women have needs that are at least as important as the transgender women's?

1. Women's refuges are meant to be safe places for abused women. Trans women insisting on access to these facilities usually still have male genitalia, and again a small percentage of transgender women are convicted abusers. Their presence in a refuge is likely to be harmful to the women residents. The same applies to women's wards in mental health facilities, where again many women patients will have a history of being abused. There are reports coming through of acutely ill women objecting to the presence of trans women on a ward and being told that they risk being discharged. Surely this can't be right.

1. Transgender women are increasingly turning up in women's sport, even though they are stronger and taller than biological women. This gives them an unfair advantage and in the case of contact sports it is actually unsafe for these people to be playing against smaller, lighter biological women. Women's sport is seriously at risk from this.

1. Children and adolescents under 18 are increasingly pushed towards the transgender label. It is not helpful or healthy for restrictive gender stereotypes to be used as a yardstick of whether a very young person is transgender or not. Lots of little girls don't like pink or dolls or dressing up. Lots of little boys are not interested in rough play or construction toys. In neither case does this automatically mean the child is transgender. Some of them might in due course realise they are gay, and there is evidence emerging that some families and communities, especially if they are very socially conservative/religious, are less uncomfortable with a transgender diagnosis than with a gay child. Other children are clearly suffering from some form of body dysmorphia. If this showed up as anorexia the child would be recognised as in need of therapy, but once a child is diagnosed as transgender nowadays they are increasingly pushed towards hormone therapy and surgery. The hormone treatments are not tested for safety on children and teenagers and may cause irreversible sterility. Surgery is also irreversible. Surely we should be supporting children and adolescents who struggle with their identity and the changes of puberty, offering them counselling/therapy and ensuring that they wait till they are adults before they decide on these life-changing medical interventions?

For all these reasons, I would ask you to please consider very carefully whether the bill should pass into law in its current form.

Thank you.

Best wishes

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Any chance you can upload that in a different format? It's almost illegible. I'm getting about one word in five and I'm still hopping mad.

Although she seems to suggest that single sex provision should also be provided?

OK, this might be better.