Are you saying the current Gender Recognition Act should be repealed?
I'd have said no until very recently. Having now discussed it with a number of transsexuals and a couple of legal eagles, my answer is yes.
It has become obsolete and it has enshrined a dangerous legal fiction in law that is now being used to make even worse laws (cf the Scottish law on equal representation for women on non-exec company boards which has been written so that a) the state now states that men actually become female - as in biologically female - by mere declaration of intent to become a woman and b) a company board composed of 50% men and 50% transwomen is a board that represents men and women equally under this law.)
The language used is a hot mess wildly swapping sex and gender, its purpose of protecting a truly minute number of post-op transsexuals has been superseded by new developments within the trans community.
It should be replaced with a system that respects the protected characteristic of sex AND protects post-op transsexuals and individuals with severe gender dysphoria who for various reasons cannot or will not fully medically transition.
Those who identify as trans but do not suffer from GD are protected against discrimination under the EA but have to accept that they are not entitled to the legal rights conferred by a GRC or a similar replacement. Identity does not trump material reality.
If so, are you suggesting withdrawing hormones from those who have already transitioned?
Eh? You did not read that here. Have you maybe mistaken the very reasonable demand that hormones should not be administered to anyone without proper counselling with that claptrap? And what does this have to do with the GRA that you're saying if so?
Do you think a fully transitioned trans woman with a GRC to ‘prove’ she is a woman (eg Nadia from Big Brother) should use the men’s loos and be in a male prison / care home / hostel?
I have zero idea who Nadia is.
A post-op transkid who never went through male puberty at all should in my view have access regardless of GRC ownership.
A post-op transsexual who transitioned after male puberty should be treated on a case by case basis depending on which female spaces we're talking about.
Non-med, non-op transgender males do not belong in women's spaces - ever. However, I would actively support third spaces for transgender persons.
Do you think TRAs who say things on Twitter like ‘suck my ladydick’ and 'enjoy your erasure' are representative of transgender people as a whole?
They often seem to be when a) they're the ones invited to speak on trans issues and b) when trans orgs completely fail to condemn their behaviour or that of people like Tara Wolf who was convicted of assaulting a 60-year-old woman but who was nonetheless supported as the victim of transphobia by all or almost all of the official trans orgs and a whole slew of trans allies.
But no, deep down in my heart I do not think they are representative of transsexuals. Gender radicals, yes, definitely. TRAs yes definitely. Transgender - unsure. As transgender people do not distance themselves from those uttering those vile views, it's becoming harder and harder to think that they are unrepresentative of transgender people as a group. (By transsexual I mean trans people with gender dysphoria and by transgender those without GD).
Do you feel transgender people threaten your safety and well-being as a woman? If so what personal experiences (not what you have read on Mumsnet / Twitter / Reddit) have made you reach this conclusion?
Yes. Both on a personal level and a class-based level. But even if I hadn't had negative personal experiences I would answer yes to this question. Not because I am afraid of trans people as a group, but because gender radical or TRA goals are not compatible with sex based protections for women and girls.
Men as a group are a danger to women as a group. Male violence and dominance are the problem and the reason why single-sex protections and provisions exist.
The goal of the TRAs is to introduce self-id without any kind of gate keeping ie to allow access for all males who identify as women to all women spaces, places and rights. I am completely opposed to this.
Do you think current exceptions in the Equality Act (eg it is legal to exclude trans women from competitive spots and certain job roles such as rape crisis counselling) are sufficient to protect women? www.equalityhumanrights.com/en/advice-and-guidance/gender-reassignment-discrimination
No. They are far too restrictive and they are not properly applied.
If your male child repeatedly told you they were female from the age of three, wore dresses, played with girls etc and were very distressed at the thought of male puberty, how would you help them?
Having spent a lot of time with three year old boys, there is no such thing as a transgender three year old but there are quite a lot of parents with extremely rigid ideas about behaviours and expressions appropriate to either sex.
I've actually discussed this with my mother recently who spent 35 years teaching three year olds and the empirical evidence of thousands of children of that age supports that view. (Parents project a lot of their views onto their children in how they interpret behaviours and how they attempt to influence unwanted behaviours.)
Children's identity is flexible and plastic, it responds to outside influences, lived experiences and physical changes. Which is why the vast majority of gender-non-conforming children and of children with gender dysphoria reconcile with their birth sex during or after puberty.
There are extremely rare cases of genuine gender dysphoria which presents in early childhood and persists into adulthood, at a rate of 6 in 100,000 children. These children are always homosexual transsexuals and no gender dysphoria expert in the world can reliably predict which child with GD will persist and which doesn't. Which is why the new affirmation-only approach is so dangerous.
So, if this was my child, I'd do what I did - my kids wore what they wanted and played with who and what they wanted. We did not tell them they had to behave a certain way based on their sex.
I would fight tooth and nail against any suggestion of giving puberty blockers and cross sex hormones before the age of 18. I would sue anyone for clinical malpractice who damaged my child in that way. Why? Because we now know that puberty blockers arrest sexual, physical and neurological development, damaging all three irreversibly. They lower IQ FFS - who on earth wants that for their child?
Allowing the development of normal function and then giving hormones if the child persists into adulthood would lead to vastly better outcomes healthwise. This would bring the drawback of the child going through male puberty of course, but with an 80% chance of this being the right approach, I would go that way - even if my child was indeed transsexual as this approach would also mean they could enjoy a healthy sex life after transition.
(This is based on extensive reading of the medical literature on the effect of puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and mental health outcomes.)