Dr Adrian Harrop, who the funk does he think he is?

[TrumpTrump]

If you're not familiar with this supposed physician (yes, really), then you need to get over to Twitter and see this.

Harrop seems to spend most of his time harassing and insulting natal women whilst unquestionably supporting trans women. He is hiding behind his "medical expertise" and using it to shout women down.

It's both hilarious and terrifying!

I've considered where best to raise this issue but perhaps this context is more appropriate.

On both the Victoria Derbyshire show and Genderquake debate, TRA's used the analogy of women who had had hysterectomies being as 'real a woman' as trans women.

In both cases, I don't think this assertion was challenged on by the female hosts of either show.

I would hope though that any doctor, GP or otherwise would be aware of the women, particularly younger women, who have had hysterectomies due to medical necessity (eg Gyny Cancer) and the impact that this has on their lives.

Using, what is for many, a serious operation, to win what seems to me a semantic argument is deeply offensive to those women as well as showing a shallow regard for critical thinking and logic

Having being involved with lobbying for better awareness and resources for women affected by gyny cancers I feel that sadly, this lack of consideration and regard reflects the wider picture.

They don't give a fuck though Rowan. Women's illness or grief of infertility is immaterial.

As a great doctor intending to become a great GP I am passionate about women’s health. Ladies - get your prostate checked.

I've been blocked and so has my husband! Despite the fact he only uses the twitter account that is blocked in a professional (medical) capacity but doesn't ever touch on transgender issues. There is no way to work out we are married so they must have a hell of a TERF blocker!

Look what he's up to now.

twitter.com/DrAdrianHarrop/status/995420771404181505?s=19

Hi Dawn 👋🏼 @DawnFurness I notice that you are scheduled to appear as a speaker / contributor at an upcoming meeting of @WomansPlaceUK in Newcastle. Can you please clarify your stance re: #trans issues, and whether these line up with the policies of @TheGreenParty? 🏳️‍🌈

Who does he think he is?!

Rowan I think they say it because for people new to the issue it puzzles them. It has an impact because they have to work out why it's wrong. By the time they have, the moment is gone. It should be up to intelligent women 'adjudicators' to point out the fallacy.

I was wondering why he blocked me, I too follow Miranda. Most of my tweets are retweets of non-political nonsense. Litter picking in the local vacinity, that kind of thing.

I feel quite important now

I agree Pratchet, I also think that it is massively affected by the discussion being seen solely with regards to people who are transgender. That those who ask questions are 'anti-trans' just as its the 'TE' in TERF which is the focus rather than the 'RF'. We really need to be discussing 'sex and gender' and acknowledging that as such this affects us all.

Is Adrian Harrop being defamatory there? Woman's Place U.K. is not amti-trans. Trans people are invited to, speak at and attend its meetings.

I would encourage Adrian Harrop (and those with similar attitudes towards Womans Place UK to read Gaby Hinsliff's recent article in The Guardian as a starting point:

"Woman’s Place formed last autumn out of a conversation “literally around a kitchen table”, according to teacher and co-founder Philipa Harvey, between a group of friends – trade unionists, academics, lawyers and others – worried that they had nowhere to debate freely. They wanted to discuss the potential implications for women and girls of sharing single-sex spaces – from domestic violence refuges and female prisons to swimming pool changing rooms and Brownie packs – with male-bodied people, and to explore what they see as the risk of predatory non-trans men finding a way to abuse such access to reach vulnerable women. They wanted to discuss bodies and biology without being told that mentioning vaginas excludes women who don’t have them. And they suspected other women also had questions they weren’t asking, for fear of being called transphobic. “There are people who will say nothing about this in their workplaces, because their jobs are on the line; in social situations people won’t talk about it,” says Harvey. “But there is a change in the law being proposed and it will impact women. Women have a right to ask: ‘What will the impact look like for my daily life?

These are women who feel silenced, erased and intimidated – and yet it is clear that many trans women do, too.’”

www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/10/the-gender-recognition-act-is-controversial-can-a-path-to-common-ground-be-found

& I wonder which of these WPUK demands are so 'controversial or divisive?'
Respectful and evidence-based discussion about the impact of the proposed changes to the Gender Recognition Act to be allowed to take place and for women’s voices to be heard.
The principle of women-only spaces to be upheld – and where necessary extended.
A review of how the exemptions in the Equality Act which allow or single sex services or requirements that only a woman can apply for a job (such as in a domestic violence refuge) are being applied in practice.
Government to consult with women’s organisations on how self-declaration would impact on women-only services and spaces.
Government to consult on how self-declaration will impact upon data gathering – such as crime, employment, pay and health statistics – and monitoring of sex-based discrimination such as the gender pay gap.
womansplaceuk.org

I noticed Adrian Harropa few weeks ago creeping around on Twitter, he seems to be angling for a witchfinder general gig. The fact that he is looking out for woman linked to a womans place etc then reporting them is fucking awful. He is a clear example of not understanding woman, and not wanting to understand woman.

A woman without a uterus is a woman in exactly the same way that a woman without a leg is a woman.
A man without a leg is a man, a man without a uterus is a man. Shockingly (perhaps) a man without a penis is also a man.
The surgical removal of an organ or body part does not change a person's sex.

I don't understand why this seems such a radical or contentious thing to say.

I have friends who have had testicular cancer, they are men, nobody would suggest otherwise and if I were to imply they weren't men I would be being both cruel and ridiculous and get my arse handed to me. So why can TRAs get away with being so casually cruel to women?

PerspicaciaTick

It is grasping at straws that's all.

Also Adrian Harrop is the shock troop for medics who do not know what a woman is but are quietly getting positions in the BMA. I saw on twitter that a character called James Haddock who actually admits not knowing what a woman is was recently elected. He gets no attention but has acquired a position of influence over BMA policy while attention is focussed on Harrop. There's like a group? Called Doctors for Change or Progressive doctors or something.

They've been stealthily trying to change the language used in the NHS for a while now.

Things like "pregnant person" instead of woman, "parent" not mother. Midwives will soon be so busy trying to get their trans-inclusive language just right, and asking endless questions about gender identity and pronouns, they won't have time to deliver the babies.

It's a clumsy way of trying to argue that you don't need to be in possession of certain body parts in order to be in the category woman. True. However, no woman has ever had a functional penis and testicles. Ever. I put functional there because I think there are some intersex conditions where women can be born with rudimentary male sex organs.

MB et al aren't interested in providing their own watertight definition of womanhood. I believe MB has said that it's not necessary for woman to even have a definition. They want to move away from a definition which fits 99.9% of women, to one that is so airy fairy and nebulous it has no meaning at all. A woman is someone who identifies as a woman. You identify as a woman if you have a strong internal sense that you are a woman. However, only trans women have this strong internal sense, if you're 'cis', and your body and identity are in alignment you won't be aware of this internal sense of your own gender. Welcome to the brave new world where only men can be women.

Part of me would actually like to see how far down the rabbit hole this could go if we let them have their way.

Goodness me, Dr Adrian is pompous, isn’t he? And shouldn’t he spend a little more time doctoring?

Wow, didn't really know about this guy before, but the way he's hounding Dawn Furness with a string of pompous tweets is way over the top. What a prick. I like this response:

Hi Adrian 👋 @DrAdrianHarrop I notice that you are scheduled to appear as a twatbadger / cockwomble on upcoming threads of @Twitter. Can you you please clarify your stance re: #shuttingthefuckup, and whether this lines up with the standards of normal human beings?

I saw on twitter that a character called James Haddock who actually admits not knowing what a woman is was recently elected. He gets no attention but has acquired a position of influence over BMA policy while attention is focussed on Harrop. There's like a group? Called Doctors for Change or Progressive doctors or something.

This sounds very similar to how a relatively small number of students with NUS LGBT+/Women's/Trans groups with a particular ideology have exerted a disproportionate amount of power & influence on policy which has wider and very significant consequences for all.

I also fear that whilst there is concentration on this particular person's views and actions / LM's latest social media post /fall out from the GenderQuake debate etc, the very more significant lobbying of those in Westminster continues, perhaps with fewer challenges to encourage politicians to consider the wider possible implications of changes to the GRA.

Parliamentary events
9th May Caitlin Jenner speaks on Diversity
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3240113-caitlyn-jenner-to-speak-to-parliament

15th May Stonewall reception for MPs
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3223840-]][[Parliament-hosting-Stonewall-panel-event-on-trans-issues-and-changes-to-GRA

17th May Peter Kyle MP (Labour) Has secured a 3 hour debate in the Commons to mark International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia.

4th June Westminster forum on Next Steps for Transgender Equality
www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk/conference/transgender-equality-2018

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3242812--Amnesty-International-Mermaids-and-Stonewall-have-signed-an-open-letter-to-Penny-Mordaunt-stating-the-importance-of-reforming-the-Gender-Recognition-Act

I follow Miranda, and loads of GC people. And am not blocked.

A little ditty.
Ahem...

There once was a doctor on twitter who loved to witter and witter.
He droned on and on, telling women they are wrong and said “Fuck off you TERF’s you’re just bitter.”

From the version of the Hippocratic Oath rewritten in 1964 by Louis Lasagna,
"I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon's knife or the chemist's drug."

Liberal arts education (Latin: liberalis, free and ars, art or principled practice) can claim to be the oldest programme of higher education in Western history. It has its origin in the attempt to discover first principles – 'those universal principles which are the condition of the possibility of the existence of anything and everything'. The liberal arts are those subjects or skills that in classical antiquity were considered essential for a free person (Latin: liberalis, "worthy of a free person") to know in order to take an active part in civic life, something that (for Ancient Greece) included participating in public debate
(Wkipedia)

Germaine Greer replies to a question towards the end of this interesting and important lecture based on her book 'The Whole Woman',

"I don't tell anybody what to do.... I don't want people to do anything but think and if they think about the issues that I've raised and they disagree with them, that's fine. I don't mind losing the argument but I do mind not having the argument raised at all."

www.youtube.com/watch?sns=fb&v=sVzYi4bRNwQ&app=desktop

Rowantree no-one in medicine actually care much about the Hippocratic oath.

It was just a fun thing to do at graduation and entirely optional. As I recall I disagreed with some of it - I think the bit about abortion - at the time, so I didn't bother.

It always makes me smile that some medics will say 'you took an oath!' as no, I didn't. And there weren't any lectures on it either.