Please help advise and shape a Campaign for the Right to Choose Sex Segregation... Basil?

[GuardianLions]

After discussing on other threads the problems of
-using the language,
-reacting to the advances and
-responding to the priorities and concerns of those who seek to abolish women's rights - in other words, allowing MRAs and TRAs set the terms of the debate, there is a risk we are not taking the opportunity to set out our own demands.

So I thought we could set one out.

I brought together some thought and discussion on MN to create a document, setting out a simple demand for the 'Right to Choose Sex Segregation' - a right that is clearly being taking away from us by letting people opt into the services and facilities designated for the opposite sex. Many thanks to everyone who has responded with suggestions/corrections so far.

This doesn't cover the worrying transing of kids deliberately, in order to keep a clear focus of its aims.

It also avoids contentious terms such as 'gender' or 'transgender' and avoids heady intellectual language to keep it as inclusive as possible.

My current thoughts are to

• Create an attractive, printable PDF to raise awareness to distribute during actions.
• Use it as a basis for a widely circulated petition
• Target businesses for twitter/letter writing campaigns, boycotts

However, I don't want to go down the road of Caroline Craido-Perez or Laura Bates and be the face of anything. Is Basil still here? How did it work staying anonymous with 'We Believe You'?

I'd love to have any thoughts, feedback, next steps or suggestions to make this an empowering resource for people who want the option for sex-segregation/ same-sex spaces.

Big thanks in advance.

Certain - I am hoping a friendly graphic designer will swoop in

It is a google doc - do you have a google account? It should work if you are signed into your google account.

Brilliant

I love it.
But I think page 4 belongs in a different document.

This is fabulous. I’m sorry, I’m a lurker, and late to the party, but I do wonder whether some of the language could be pared down further (for example “incarcerated” is a bit loaded and jarring, and mental health wards are mostly not locked) and long sentences broken into shorter ones for clarity/impact.

I’m not a professional writer by any means, but I do create and edit lots of semi-technical communications for my profession. I have to go to work now but I would be very happy to have a go this evening, for you to use, ignore or recycle.

I have no idea how to actually do this in google docs but it’s probably about time I found out....

I also agree to some extent about p4, but absolutely love the title which would perhaps be great worked into the first page as a hook.

Brilliant, brilliant job guardian thank you for taking the time. I look forward to sending this to my MP in due course.
Just a couple of suggestions bearing in mind this doc is already great:

• add to the title ‘ spaces and services’ or whatnot, to make clear what this is about

• emphasis on choice is great. We are being stripped of choice.

-consider adding in the intro- where the reasons why are listed, in addition to some women ‘can only’ use single sec spaces- something to mention preference.
because as well as the excellent reasons you have given, any women just wanting not to share with men should be enough and shouldn’t need a qualifier or life experience as to why. ‘Preference not to’ is enough not want to be put at risk, made to feel uncomfortable or deterred from using spaces originally intended for women.

Eg in the toilet example, I don’t think you need to be a woman or girl in a vulnerable category to not want to share places where you are undressed or otherwise in a more vulnerable situation with men ( which is why you entered that supposedly more private space away from men and other people in general, because you need to put yourself in a place of privacy where there are other women only- there for equally personal and private reasons to themselves. )

• can you mention women’s workplace toilets as a place where this is happening. This has happened to me and I am too afraid to speak up or question it. I consider myself to have been made vulnerable in those circumstances because my job and reputation would be at risk if I said anything against it.

• I really like the way you have broadened the issue beyond toilets (which people can be quite dismissive of as an issue- even though it’s very important!). I thought the points about women-only spaces supporting fellowship, dating and in general the positives in free association and freedom of expression (in an environment with only your own sex) are all particularly well made.

Many thanks Guardians.
I think the document is good.
I expect that this has already been debated - but what about adding ‘validation’ to the list of why people want to access services?
Something like (5) To validate a belief that sex is not determined by biology. Some people believe that their sex is independent of their biologically determined sex characteristics. Some males think that feeling like, or believing they are, a women makes them a women (and vice-versa for males). They believe that you can be a women and have a penis or a man and have a vagina. They seek to use provision designed for the opposite sex in order to validate their belief that sex is not determined by biology/sexed bodies.
(NB This is not to be mixed up with intersex conditions where people are diagnosed with chromosome abnormalities)

Also..... for the sticker idea, I like ‘Let’s talk about sex’. I also like ‘Sex matters’.

YY to "validation"

Just checking in this morning - thanks everyone. Will look again in detail.

Regarding the document. It was created in Word the saved as a PDF because google reformatted it to look weird.

I have set it so that it cannot be edited or downloaded - to avoid sabotage or multiple versions. My thinking is that we should share it for download one at a time by pm to reformat or do the esthetic / flow stuff.

My feeling is that while it is still 'growing' i'll add more bits until we feel it is all in there and ready for streamlining.. that point about workplace toilets is great...

Gotta drop those kids off at school!

I have already complimented this on the other thread, but feel the need to do so again. I cannot see anything at all wrong with is and think its just perfect, even for a 'new starter' this should be easy to understand. So this is to be given to businesses? I wonder if Heather would get on board..just been looking at twitter and the support she has after the WEPs fucking ridiculous decision is really strong. I saw 2 people, out of hundreds, say it was the right decision and when pushed to explain they could not..as usual

If you printed up stickers you could sell on eBay to cover costs- I would buy a job lot and keep them in my handbag for slapping up when out and about!

This idea is amazing. I would also do this. If enough of us do it, we could probably cover most of the country tbh.

I love how work is starting to actually wake up the public, rather than letting everyone sleepwalk into a nightmare that would be hard to reverse. I am so grateful for mumsnet, for waking me up to it all. I find it utterly terrifying that we could have already had this law passed without anyone even knowing about it..the transactivists certainly tried their hardest, and are now raging. They know that once people think about it all, it falls apart, hence the nodebate thing and the endless threats and intimidation to try and get women to shut up.

Even more fabulous GuardianLions

I, too, would buy a job lot of stickers.

Thank you so much both!

I really like 'Sex Matters!' as a name for the campaign..

Hey hope you don’t mind me joining your thread, I’m really not very up to speed with the whole situation but I’m learning more and more each day, and I have to say worrying more each day as it’s a lot bigger than I thought.
I think what you’ve done guardian and other pp’s is fantastic and I’d support and share anyway I could to help.
I didn’t know shops business were already unisexing facilities like ‘primark’ You note!
I’m horrified, I have a bladder condition and this means often frequent trips to the lady’s, it also means I’m in there longer than average and the thought that I would potentially have to be in a unisex environment in a vulnerable situation like this scares the hell out of me. I simply wouldn’t go in. I won’t!
It puts me off going out for fear I’d be in that situation. And my situation is just one of the many scenarios you’ve covered.
When you look at the whole situation as you have so clearly explained this is just not something we can sit by and watch happen (any more than it has)
So I wholeheartedly would support your campaign. I’m sure I speak on behalf of many people just like me when I say you really are doing a great thing, and thank you.

Yay, I’m pleased you like Sex Matters!

I have also been wondering about a fact sheet (what puts me off is the ludicrousness of it). It should be absolutely surplus to requirement but unfortunately seems necessary in order for any meaningful discussion to take place. Something along the lines of.....

The following facts are fundamental to any decisions being made about sex segregation/sex segregated services:

• Humans are a dimorphus species, meaning that we are born either male or female.
• Some people are born with intersex conditions. This does not mean we are not a dimorphus species (just as the fact that people born with one leg that hasn’t fully developed does not mean we are not a bipedal species)
• Being male or female is determined by the type of reproductive system one is born with, regardless of whether this system is fully or partially functioning
• hormone blockers, cross sex hormones and cosmetic surgery does not result in a person changing sex. It changes appearance and specific functioning only
• people born male, die male (and vice-versa) regardless of intervention and bodily changes through life
• there is no such thing as a female penis or a male vagina.

I would love for the main political parties and companies in the UK to complete a survey to see whether they agree the above to be true. I think the vast majority of the population would gawk at even being asked.

Once the above is put to bed (the basic matters about sex) we can begin to debate when and how sex matters.

Sorry, that should have said fact sheet about sex. All the smoke and mirrors served up by TRAs wrt sex being a continuum etc hijacks and shuts down meaningful discussion.

Hello everyone. Thanks again for your amazing input, encouragement and comments.

I have incorporated as much as I can in this version of the document

I wasted a lot of time trying to format and mucking around with the design of the thing - thought what I did looked rubbish, so did this more simple version of the changes.

I won't have any time next week for this doc - so I hope it is pretty much there.

I also agree about needing more fact sheets etc, so I think it would be good to have a website resource for everything to be centralised.

If anyone fancies being the 'face' of this and taking the baton that would be great - I would support in the background....

MsBeaujangles

It could give some of the differences in male and female health problems and treatment, such as heart disease.

Hi Beau & Eresh,

I added your fact sheet to the end of the document

You’re fucking awesome, OP.

Personally I would change the bit about “rapists and murderers” in women’s prisons to something like “male offenders, including sex offenders”. Because it applies to all offenders regardless of what they’ve actually done, and sounds a bit too open to NAMALT (or NAoffendersALT). So I’d make it a blanket term but add in sex offenders in case anyone misses the MASSIVE implications.

I cannot applaud you enough. Well done.

Would (whisper it) MNHQ support this campaign? They have as far as I’ve seen been very quiet on trans issues after the initial arguments and laying out of rules a while back. This does not misgender, seek to deadname, or even define trans people, simply to protect spaces. How about it, HQ?

Oh, also: what about AWS?