Bristol Uni SU moves to ban TERFs

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I was lucky with mature students - the ones I encountered always seemed to be very thoughtful and committed to the course, and very engaged and polite. It was the young arsey 19-20 year olds I found to be the problem (NA-19-20YO-ALT ).

Flowers [DNA] - that must be awful for you. However, it may not be entirely the current trans madness driving this - students are legally adults, and universities tend not to deal with their parents about mental health/medical conditions (or about their academic performance) for this reason. Terrifying and traumatic for the parents, but sadly the universities' hands are tied because students are adults. I've certainly had parents phone up demanding to know their child's marks, and trying to play the "I'm paying for this" card and had to tell them (politely) "sorry that information is confidential" - and this was 20 years ago. Banning you from campus does seem utterly ridiculous, though.

turnipfarmers - I'm not sure that the poster was saying that the non-renewal of contracts due to student feedback was something specific to Bristol, but it is certainly happening in the sector. And UCU (the lecturers' union) has recently got involved in cases at Birmingham where the university has been instigating disciplinary procedures against staff based on anonymous student module evaluations:

birminghamucu.org/ (need to scroll down the page a bit)

The erasure of free speech is terrifying

I don't know the wider ins and outs of Durham but I do know there's a fair number of Terfy types on the teaching staff.

i was lucky that being low income meant free fees, and hardship grants and loans. i expect i will have to pay for my dc to go to university. whilst i accept that they will be adults etc (although i believe the brain's age of reaching maturity is more like 24 than 18) i am only willing to pay towards a university that supports free speech. otherwise i actually don't think there is a valid reason to even attend as there are many other ways of gaining life experience and entering the world of work.

LM has now tweeted saying how she can’t wait to speak at Bristol Uni as they are banning Terfs.

This is an interesting comment on the article:

"Holding gender critical beliefs is a protected characteristic under the Equality Act.

If gender identity theory is a belief under the EA(and in my opinion it is) then not sharing that belief is also a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010.

It is illegal to discriminate against someone because of their belief or lack thereof

It is illegal to subject anyone to detriment due to their belief or lack of belief

Public institutions such as universities have a positive duty to protect freedom of expression and assembly under the Human Rights Act 1998

The fem soc will be in breach of the EA 2010 if they actuallly do this. The uni will be in breach of the HRA 1998 if they don’t stop it."

I thought we had established this was a SU vote?

However, most students at Bristol do not go near the Union. It is largely recognised as crap. None of DDs friends ever went. Its irrelevant to the majority there who just keep away from it. It is different to campus universities where the union supplies cheap booze. It is doubtful that most students want to get near a hot bed of activists and hugely controversial at Bristol. They are more concerned with internships and careers! Universities have changed over the years.

There are many societies at Bristol which run independently of the union and, quite frankly, DDs friends of all backgrounds, sexual orientation, race and gender were welcome at all of them. A lot of this is just the Union grandstanding. It is not a reflection of Bristol as a university.

and hugely contoversial subjects .....

In other words, believing that men are women because they say they are qualifies as a "belief" under the Equality Act. So someone who is treated detrimentally because they have this belief is being treated unlawfully. And according to the poster, someone who is treated detrimentally because they don't have the belief is also treated unlawfully under the Act.

I'm with you Upstart it's confusing.
"Women's transgender status"?
Don't they mean transgender males female status?
Or do they mean the status of females who identify as men??

I agree with you bubbles. The vast majority of students at Bristol would have zero interest in the SU. So this vote and descion would not be representative of the students and I think this will be true for many universities who have passed similar decisions.

This has been reported as a news item on Russia Today TV channel.

The problem is, because of this sexist (the gender issue is very sexist towards women) issue all of the students at Bristol will be though of as silly little snowflakes with no understanding of reality. If they don’t agree with the union, then they should make their opinions heard.

It's just the Student Union. See the very sensible statement from the University I linked to above. I'd like to see Lily Madigan visit a university, any university - so she can shut up and listen, and learn something. Maybe even read a book or two. She is so clearly ignorant of the history of women & feminism. I could give her a reading list.

The vast majority of students at Bristol would have zero interest in the SU.

This is certainly true of the local students that I know - thank goodness.

HairyBallTheorem, sorry you were targeted but glad it was so clear from the other reports. Did anything happen to the student or would anything have happened if it was more abusive?

TerfyMcTerface so true. They also try to talk over intelligent younger female students and create a toxic and boring seminar environment.

turnipfarmers it is not Bristol specific but across all HE. It is weighted to different amounts at different institutions. I don't know how Bristol is making it's staffing decisions. Sorry, I should have been clearer that I was talking sector wide.

Academia is in a storm now, a consequence of funding changes and bureaucratic bloating. See the #UCUstrike on Twitter if you have it. Despite all this most academics love teaching and inspiring people to learn. We are the ultimate subject geeks and want to share our passion with others.

I am so glad I went to uni just before all of this lunacy. The only thing I remember were the Israel vs Palestine societies regularly in tiffs, and one motion by the SU to ban lad mags from campus. I don't really remember anything else remotely "controversial".

The only thing I remember about the student union was that you could get booze there, which I never took advantage of anyway because we were in a city with plenty of other more fun places to drink. I certainly don't remember them being taken this seriously.