Stonewall's Report on domestic and sexual violence services. Interviews with professionals in the sector

[R0wantrees]

Stonewall comment:
"nfpSynergy spoke to representatives from 15 organisations across Britain
Many participants say reform of the Gender Recognition Act would have no relevance to how they deliver their services

Report follows intense speculation on the impact of reform to the Gender Recognition Act

A report looking at the experiences of professionals delivering support to trans women in domestic and sexual violence services.

The qualitative research, conducted by nfpSynergy, is based on in-depth interviews with representatives from 15 organisations across England, Scotland and Wales.

Key findings show:

Domestic and sexual violence services in England and Wales have been supporting trans women in their single-sex women-only services for some time with many taking proactive steps to ensure their services are trans-inclusive.
Services take a personalised, client-centred approach.
Many participants told us that reform of the Gender Recognition Act would have no relevance to how they deliver their services.
Several participants expressed concern that there are trans survivors who are being let down when seeking support, with some likening their experiences to the struggles faced by many black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) women, lesbians, bi women and disabled women seeking support.
The report was commissioned by Stonewall, in response to the intense media attention focused on inclusion of trans women in single-sex services.

Much of this reporting was sparked by the UK Government’s announcement that it would reform the Gender Recognition Act (2004).

The voices of the service providers have been largely missing from this coverage.

This research was commissioned to better understand the experiences of professionals in the field and to hear their views and approach on trans inclusion.

Representatives from the three main political parties have written forewords for this research and fully endorse the effort to gain greater evidence."
refers to Maria Miller MP, Jess Philips MP & Baroness Burt of Solihull, Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Women

Report:
www.stonewall.org.uk/sites/default/files/stonewall_and_nfpsynergy_report.pdf

www.stonewall.org.uk/supporting-trans-women-domestic-and-sexual-violence-services

Previous thread about this was taken down due to being posted by a PBP

current thread running:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3325247-Stonewall-report-into-domestic-and-violent-services

I dont think the Stonewall report shows the whole picture.;

• services have been told to be inclusive or have their funding cut.
• Trans activists have been targeting DV and rape crisis services, in an organised campaign;

actionfortranshealth.org.uk/2015/04/27/help-us-improve-rape-and-sexual-assault-crisis-centres/

APRIL 27, 2015 BY ATH TEAM
Action: help us improve rape and sexual assault crisis centres
People often don’t think about rape and sexual assault crisis centres until they need them. But when you need them, you really need them. Whilst trans people face higher rates of rape and sexual assault than their cis counterparts, we often face significant barriers to accessing services designed to help survivors, making us all the more vulnerable.

Help us to collate a list of trans inclusive rape and sexual assault crisis centres by ringing up your local service and asking them about their policies and protocols and filling in this short form about what they say. When the services look like they are in need of trans training, we will get in touch and offer it to them. It would be good to have a look at the questions on the form before ringing. Thanks!

I questioned in a previous thread NFPSynergy's neutrality in their position as market researchers.

One of the researchers had previously retweeted a negative c** related thread and talks/writes on changing sex to gender.

What impact did that have on questions to participants? Did this result in leading/biased questions I wonder?

Whilst trans people face higher rates of rape and sexual assault than their cis counterparts

What is the evidence for this, does anyone know? Jess Bradley, for example, is more likely to be a victim of rape than a woman? I would like to see proper, credible figures for such a claim.

What is the evidence for this, does anyone know? Jess Bradley, for example, is more likely to be a victim of rape than a woman?

Statistics comparing rates of rape and sexual assault between trans women and 'cis' counterparts need to acknowledge the additional risk factors re prevelence of prostitution.

APRIL 21, 2015 BY ATH TEAM
Jess Bradley: 'On being a trans student, and why the NUS should have a full time trans officer'
"When I was 18 I started having sex with men for money. I started because, despite my having a part time job at the time, I found myself having to make the choice between eating and paying the bus fare to university. Like many trans students, I had a sometimes strained and sometimes non-existent relationship with my parents, and couldn’t ask them for help. At the time I was newly out as trans, and taking an engineering course at Bradford University. Nobody on my course would talk to me or want to work with me in group projects because I was trans. When they did, people asked me why I would do “a man’s subject like engineering if I wanted to be a woman”. Eventually, like too many trans students, I dropped out of my course.

This was a rough time for me. Fortunately for me, one of the sabbatical officers self-defined as trans and I came to them for support. We quickly became friends; if it wasn’t for them I’m not sure I would be alive today to be honest. I ended up switching over to a new course at Manchester University where I could get a bursary. I fast found a vibrant queer community there, but still struggled, almost failing and dropping out of this course after I was sexually assaulted on campus one too many times." (continues)

actionfortranshealth.org.uk/2015/04/21/on-being-a-trans-student-and-why-the-nus-should-have-a-full-time-trans-officer/

Oops, I suggested that Bradley wasn't a woman just then. Sorry, MMHQ. That was naughty of me. I am normally careful not to misgender, but it just goes to show that sometimes you can't always override what you know in your head to be true.

Anything that comes out of Jess Bradley's mouth needs to be fact-checked more thoroughly than a Donald Trump tweet.

Also - if Jess is talking about rape in the context of prostitution, then the only fair comparator is females in prostitution.

Thanks Rowan. Yes, that's the issue isn't it? Is Bradley (who that article states was "outed as" a sex worker) more at risk of sexual assault than a natal female sex worker?

One of the researchers had previously retweeted a negative c related thread and talks/writes on changing sex to gender

That is really interesting Carter do you have a link to the tweet and/or their work?

NUS June 2016:

"In February the Women’s Campaign and the LGBT+ campaign worked with the Sex Workers Open University and the English Collective of Prostitutes to launch a survey to gather information on the lives and experiences of students’ sex workers. Today we are launching the results of the report with recommendations to help better support students working in the sex industry to fight the discrimination, stigma and violence they face."

www.nusconnect.org.uk/articles/5-things-we-learned-from-the-student-sex-work-survey-e1d9

The question might be asked, how are the experiences of trans women (&/or non binary trans women) to be extrapolated in any research from questionaires?

The NUS survey does not include 'sex' as a defining characteristic:

"Gender identity: The majority of the sample defined their gender identity as woman (71%), 11% identified as Man and 18% of the sample defined ‘in another way,’ including identifying as
genderqueer, non-binary and gender fluid. The vast majority (80%) said that their gender identity was the same as the gender they were originally assigned at birth, 16% responded no, and 4% preferred not to say."

Whilst trans people face higher rates of rape and sexual assault than their cis counterparts

Difficult to find sources when the police collect data on 'gender identity', lumping together women and men who identify as women.

I suspect that the perception of heightened vulnerability has roots in such things as the Trans Murder Monitoring Project (from Transgender Europe). There is, indeed a very real risk of trans-homicide in the following circumstances:

• you work as a prostitute

And -your work brings you into contact with highly dangerous clients/"managers"/partners And

• you live in South America, Russia or some other such homophobic place.

Apart from those extra vulnerabilities for male prostitutes in particular countries, the risk was less than the risks for women. By a long, long, long way.

When you present as a woman you are more likely to experience women's well-placed terrors - but interpret those terrors as a special trans thing.

tgeu.org/tmm/

Difficult to find sources when the police collect data on 'gender identity', lumping together women and men who identify as women.

I would wager to arrive at that conclusion, trans people did a self selected survey (that was spammed by transactivists trying to prove a point), and for 'cis' women only successful prosecutions were added to the figures, or something.

Sorry, no way will I ever believe that transwomen face more sexual assault and such than women. Transmen probably face a lot of it, but this will be because they are read as women, on the whole. And a lot of people associate bitch women with being lesbian, and just going off the people I know, lesbians have it a LOT harder than other women as men seem desperate to try and 'turn' them (because being randomly grabbed by the fanny is sure to turn you onto blokes .

My cousin is a lesbian and she has been raped by 4 seperate men, and sexually assaulted countless times.

Wander
The researcher is Anna Wates - she also runs LGBT film events. She has written a blog and presented her marketing firm's stance gender preferences in terms of marketing research.

There are a team of researchers at the agency and others may also share similar views, it's just Anna clearly has an interest in gender and trans rights.

Placemarking to come back to this thread

Thanks Carter

Even in South Americathe chance of being murdered as a trans person is actually lower than for the rest of the population due to their astronomically high murder rates.

Kathleen Stock comment:

twitter.com/Docstockk/status/1025365862923030528

Whilst trans people face higher rates of rape and sexual assault than their cis counterparts

I wonder what they're basing that statement on?

Whilst trans people face higher rates of rape and sexual assault than their cis counterparts, we often face significant barriers to accessing services designed to help survivors, making us all the more vulnerable.

They used to use prostituted transgenders compared to women statistics to support this false claim in the US. Finally someone did the math and found that transgenders were at lower risk than other segments of the population and the First Nations women and Black men are at the highest risk.

Lobbyists have no compunction about lying if it gets them the access to power and the filthy lucre they are in business for.