Finally, a balanced overview article in the Guardian...

[MacaroonMama]

The Gender Recognition Act is controversial – can a path to common ground be found? - the guardian

Need to do breakfast! But this is mostly v balanced and optimistic

RatRolyPoly
Yes I agree, I think it is balanced and helpful for better understanding. There have been very strong views expressed about WPUK and hopefully more people will read the article and consider the alternative narrative.

Apols if I sounded snarky Rat. I was feeling frustrated as I haven't been able to read it at all yet cos my phone has the battery life of a mayfly, which is why I was looking for it on the Graun website. And now I've finally found it (after much searching) I'm not inclined to read it in a very woke open plan office, however balanced it might be. Says it all really.

Regarding the 'men with far-Right associations' bit - an unwillingness to accept the agenda as laid down by the authoritarian Left does not an Alt-Righter make!

Male poster, been here ooh, two weeks now and am impressed by the number of posters who value critical thinking, are willing to debate with Trans activists but not willing to be railroaded into what is seen as the 'correct' solution by the more militant TRAs.

A lot of the current commentators I have time for (Maajid Nawaz, Sam Harris, Dave Rubin, Jordan Peterson) are involved with that Intellectual Dark Web (couldn't they have chosen a less-threatening sounding name?), as is Heather Haying and CH Sommers (I posted the thread on her - didn't follow Gamergate, just know Sommers from her taking various claims made by third wave feminists and seeing if the data backs them up). Hope to see other female writers and academics take part in the future - Germaine Greer would seem a natural fit and Oxford Vice-Chancellor Louise Richardson was very impressive during the Rhodes Must Fall future.

Another chance to enjoy the NYT take on it: mobile.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/opinion/intellectual-dark-web.html

Plus the Graun take on it that's so bad it can only have been written by Stuart Heritage: www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/shortcuts/2018/may/09/the-ntellectual-dark-web-the-supposed-thinking-wing-of-the-alt-right

(That should have read 'Rhodes Must Fall' furore. Stupid phone).

Worth finding this one too Floisme by Glosswitch in New Statesman
"The demonisation of Mumsnet is just the latest incarnation of witch-hunting
Naturally, it frightens people to think of what a group of mothers might actually demand."

(extract)
"And yet, mean or otherwise, unless one takes into account the historical fear and demonisation of women communicating without supervision, it is frankly bizarre to see activists appointing themselves monitors of Mumsnet conversations on the relationship between sex and gender. It is both disproportionate and a distraction from meaningful work to dismantle stereotypes.

The political engagement of mothers and older women matters. Naturally it frightens people to think of what these highly-exploited groups might actually demand – and of the services they might stop providing – if a sufficient level of organisation could be achieved. This has always been the case, long before the internet came into being. This is the context in which we should see pushback against Mumsnet when compared to other, far more offensive but somehow less vilified social networks."

www.newstatesman.com/politics/feminism/2018/05/demonisation-mumsnet-just-latest-incarnation-witch-hunting

Freespeecher do you follow Claire Fox from academyofideas.org.uk she has been discussing free speech issues in universities but identifies wider implications?

Thanks R0wantrees, another good one! I recognise the name but I'll need to dig out more of her stuff. Does she write for Spiked too?

Yes Freespeecher; read that Guardian pass notes thing on The IDW and it really got on my tits - Stuart Heritage you think? He should stick to TV reviews.
Claire Fox is often on The Moral Maze R0wantrees ; don't agree with everything she says, but on the free speech issue I think she's spot on.

Honestly, people having a civilised debate and, if it comes to it, agreeing to disagree (copyright Dave Rubin)... It shouldn't feel like a second Enlightenment but it increasingly does!

No idea where she writes, as LittleLebowski says, she is a regular on Moral Maze. Like LL, I don't always agree with her but she has a good handle on the extent of non-platforming behaviours in universities and is challenging the NUS who continue to minimise this. The Academy of Ideas website has a lot of podcasts though, she is on Twitter as Fox_Claire

Also, *Freespeecher I think the wider significant influence that some within NUS LGBT+/Women's/Trans groups may warrant greater focus.

recent threads include:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3239267-Free-Speech-No-Platforming-at-Universities

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3237230-NUS-Conference-breaks-down-after-the-UK-Border-Force-Arrive

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3225459-Primark-Coventry-challenged-for-asking-trans-woman-for-ID-before-allowing-entry-to-female-changing-rooms

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3222263-Slide-show-on-How-to-Deal-with-TERFs

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3233018-Freedom-of-Speech-A-statement-by-the-Chair-of-the-Universitys-Equality-Diversity-and-Inclusion-Group

Channel 4 has been exploring the idea that gender identity is a spectrum – stretching from non-binary (identifying with neither gender), to trans, to gay, to a dizzying number of other possibilities

Transgender advocates are teaching that sexual orientation is part of the "gender spectrum". They tried to force team the L&G under the trans umbrella in 2005 but this gender spectrum strategy targeted at children is being much better received.
Demonstrated by the acceptance of the "gender spectrum" as a basis for discussion without ever asking WTF fresh homophobic hell is this?

So the Guardian's been forced away from a stance of 'no debate, nothing to see here, ignore, ignore' by the reality that there's already a debate on other sites, on tv and on social media.

Framing things in terms of gender recognition and trans rights - it sets the reader up to be either a liberal or a bigot. For the Guardian's readership, that's herding the readers in a particular direction.

"what bothers opponents is the idea of changes such as these happening without women’s consent" ... so nobody's bothered about
the redefining of the word woman and taking out the rights connected with that.

No no, it's all about wanting to be asked.

Right now if I were Labour (and/or the Guardian since they endorse Labour) I'd start paying some attention to this:

Election Data @ election_data
Something remarkable in the YouGov polling from today. These are figures for those in social grade C2DE (January numbers in brackets):
CON 43% (35% in January)
LAB 40% (46%)
LD 7% (6%)
UKIP 3% (7%)
GRN 2% (2%)
Seven-point swing to the Tories from Labour since January

These are the figures for Con-Lab performance amongst C2DEs since 1997
1997 Lab 55, Con 24
2001 Lab 52, Con 27
2005 Lab 44, Con 29
2010 Lab 35, Con 34
2015 Lab 36, Con 30
2017 Lab 44, Con 42
Source: Ipsos-Mori How Britain Voted series

How C2DEs voted since 1974:
1974: Lab 53, Con 24
1979: Lab 45, Con 37
1983: Lab 37, Con 37
1987: Lab 42, Con 35
1992: Lab 45, Con 35
1992: Lab 45, Con 35
1997: Lab 55, Con 24
2001: Lab 52, Con 27
2005: Lab 44, Con 29
2010: Lab 35, Con 34
2015: Lab 36, Con 30
2017: Lab 44, Con 42

1974: Lab +29
1979: Lab +8
1983: LEVEL
1987: Lab +7
1992: Lab +10
1992: Lab +10
1997: Lab +31
2001: Lab +25
2005: Lab +15
2010: Lab +1
2015: Lab +6
2017: Lab +2

In terms of small town voting winning policy, trans rights score negatively for Labour.

Just something to ponder on if you live in a left wing liberal bubble. Cultural trying to sell this to Stoke on Trent Central will be 'hard work'.

I agree RedToothBrush that this is a really important consideration. With ever increasing political pressure due to Brexit/ Free speech etc I am very concerned that Labour, LibDems, Green Party & SNP may end up damaged by their position with regards self id despite the fact that last year the Conservative party's position was nearly aligned.
Furthermore, those in the Conservative party who have encouraged discussion such as David Davies, Norman Tebbit occupy a specific political position within the Conservative party.
When there is a narrow margin between power both inside the Conservative party as well as within Westminster between parties, a single issue such as this has the potential to affect hugely significant changes.

Thank you for the link to that Glosswitch article, R0wan It's bang on.

Have just read this. Overall better than before from the guardian but some things just not challenged enough IMO.

The Clara Barker complete lack of interest in how women and girls have a hard time stands out. Just because they had a hard time growing up (from toxic masculinity), why should women give up hard won rights which help counter their biological disadvantages? Why not try and change the toxic masculinity or campaign for third spaces rather than just expect women to budge over and give up their privacy, dignity and safety? This smacks of someone who had a hard time from bullies, so decides to go and find someone smaller and weaker than them and bully them.

Annie says it better...

Just because you had a shitty time as a boy and a man, and experienced homophobia, that doesn't mean all your male privilege is negated. You still have male privilege, just as, say, while people who were born into poor families still have white privilege, however shitty a time they had growing up. Being disprivileged on one axis doesn't magically remove your privilege on another.

Latinista so agree...

resolve tension over erasure and the demise of women-only spaces. Reducing protected spaces to the level of a toilet cubicle is really not good enough.

Good balanced piece... but was all about us listening to each other and DID NOT mention challenges where there is no middle ground - such as potential female crime stats for sexual violence rocketing as evidenced by the 6 rapes carried out by "females" in latest stats...

and how this affects so many arenas - like sex pay gap, etc....

I think when people have had a really shitty time it's very hard for them to hear they have any sort of privilege. This is not helped by the way that class analysis is being misused to imply hierarchy and deny people a voice for their perceived privilege. I think this is a shame as its a vital tool for recognising and working on oppression but I think it is being so misused that it will end up being discredited as a concept.

A family member was disputing their white privilege on the grounds of their deprived upbringing recently. Then they imagined that they had had the exact same circumstances but been born black instead. They could see various ways in which their childhood could have been even worse, especially in regards to the possibility of not being accepted so easily into the church that ended up really helping them.

Interesting article here which draws together many important political points with regards not only Labour but all parties:
medium.com/@tom_farr/the-left-are-abandoning-women-and-in-doing-so-abandoning-everything-they-stand-for-51fd63457d8c

It's come way, way too late in the argument for me
As a poster said upthread, the Guardian's stance on this has been extremely antagonistic towards any discussion on the subject that doesn't support transactivists.
Just because they're now realising how many people dispute that and have got the egregious Gaby Hinscliff (who wrote a memorable article saying that women in Cologne on nye 2016 were responsible for being attacked and we should feel sorry for the attackers) to tell us so.
So I still think they can fuck right off.