Girlguiding expels leaders who question trans policy

[AgnesBadenPowell]

Well, I guess I knew this was coming. Dissent will not be tolerated. Forget the safety concerns, the privacy and dignity issues, the managing out of gender non-confirming girls. What's really serious is one leader referring to another leader "a nightmare" in a private conversation.

Girl Guide leaders expelled for questioning trans policy

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/34139ed0-bea5-11e8-8d21-451ec1df6b83

Two Guide leaders who had raised safeguarding concerns about the organisation’s transgender policy have been expelled and had their units closed down.

Dozens of children face disappointment because there is no one else to run the units. The expelled leaders say they will take legal action against Girlguiding if their removals are upheld.

Helen Watts, one of 12 leaders who signed a letter to The Sunday Times in April asking for a review of the policy, was told on Friday that her membership was being terminated after more than 15 years with the Guides.

At least one other signatory, based in the northwest of England, was expelled. Documents seen by The Sunday Times suggest disciplinary investigations have been launched against at least five Guide leaders.

[Edited by MNHQ to remove copyright materiel]

So, Guides - which is it? Are you a single sex or a single "gender identity" organisation? Because you can't be both. The law says so.

I'm really surprised that the GG haven't had better legal advice. I don't think they can legally be a single 'gender identity' organisation.

However much it was anticipated by some human rights lawyers, third sector trans activist organisations, academics, equality and diversity experts and members of the trans, non-binary and queer community the Equalities Act 2010 remains in place. Sex and gender reassignment are two of the nine protected characteristics.

James Kirkup:
"Some facts about the events that preceded the Government statement here that the coming consultation on the Gender Recognition Act will be narrowly drawn and not affect the Equality Act’s single sex exemptions.
I offer these facts because some are claiming “there was never any question of removing/amending EA exceptions.” Those claims are either mistaken or dishonest.
August 2015
Stonewall submission to the Women & Equalities Select Committee says MPs should amend the EA to
“remove exemptions, such as access to single-sex spaces” (continues with further evidence)
threadreaderapp.com/thread/1004635839480164352.html?refreshed=yes

Even Cambridge City Council have now corrected their policies in line with the law.
Sarah Brown & Zoe O'Connell (LibDem LGBT+)"disappointed" & "worried"
www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/transgender-toilet-row-claims-city-15199314

I don't do Twitter - can someone ask them whether they are now single sex or single gender in the light of their recent clarification? And maybe RT (is that the right thing) the EHRC to see if they allow them to admit both sexes and both (all?) genders?

Having received the mass email sent out, I replied today. I have asked if they are single gender/mixed sex or single sex/gender irrelevant (as they used to be). TBH I'm not optimistic of a reply.
I think what saddens me is that Guides is actually (done well) a fantastic place for girls and I think this episode will tarnish that safe, friendly image it has deserved for so long. They have been poorly advised.

‘They couldn’t organise a Brownies’ outing’ has never seemed more apt.

I'm really surprised that the GG haven't had better legal advice. I don't think they can legally be a single 'gender identity' organisation.

Did GG actually have any legal advice? They had advice from Gendered Intelligence, which is a genderist pressure group, but it's not clear if they had any real legal advice.

Not getting adequate legal advice over safeguarding is surely a dereliction of duty?

The comments I see in Twitter against the GG statement and defenders of the trans policy, are no longer dominated by people who have XX or Gender Critical in their Twitter bio. The comments are coming from all kinds of people, different ages and sexes and job types. Dads are annoyed, grandparents are annoyed, ex-guiders are annoyed, Guide leaders are annoyed, trefoil guides are annoyed – the general public who understand logic and are wondering how an organisation can have its cake and eat it.

Plus – intelligent people can see the irony of an organisation saying ‘we’re here for girls to break down gender stereotypes and show girls can do anything they want to’ whilst admitting boys who are being defined as girls on the basis of gender stereotypes which hold (natal) girls back in life.

This is not a personal attack on individual boys who have gender dysphoria. This is a matter of logic and principle. Due to this GG fiasco, many more people have had this brought to their attention.

And unlike school, Guides is not compulsory, or even a rite of passage all girls go through. It’s a club that some choose and denying that choice to a boy with gender dysphoria is not denying them the opportunity to join such a club, since there are other mixed-sex organisations doing the same thing, which plenty of girls also join. The Guides were within their rights to say no.

Guides had to fight to remain a single sex organisation after the Scouts took girls.It’s now made a mockery of that fight by wanting single-sex status and single-gender status.

I’m imagining a conversation like the one below.

Parent: Is Guides all girls?
Guides: Yes
Parent: Why is there a boy permitted?
Guides: That’s a girl.
Parent: But they have a boy’s body
Guides: They identify as a girl
Parent: Why does that matter?
Guides: Identity is more important than biology. We take anyone who identifies as a girl
Parent: So, my daughter who is confused about their gender and dressing as a boy, using a boys name will have to leave Guides?
Guides: Yes. No. Yes. No. We didn’t say that. We updated out policy this morning. Girls who identify as boys can stay
Parents: So, you’re a single-gender-identity-organisation AND a single-sex-organisation simultaneously?
Guides: Oh, stop asking us logical questions. We were just doing what the men told us to do.

Does anyone have screenshots of the ‘guidelines around disclosure’ from before this got heated? I think they changed a bit but can’t recall the old wording.

Guides: Oh, stop asking us logical questions. We were just doing what the men told us to do.

Bingo!

Discussion on the topic is banned on the GirlGuiding Facebook groups, but the Scout ones are full of it! Trying very hard not to get pulled into an argument.

Ok, there’s literally no point in trying to explain why it matters when the only argument you get back is “but transwomen are women”.

Scouts isn't a single sex space and hasn't been for ages. And they have decent safeguarding guidelines. So they can rant all they want but it's not applicable.

Any Questions was trailed this morning, to include discussion on Guides and this issue. Dimbleby mentioned the firing of a GG leader. Radio 4, 8pm (repeated Sat lunchtime with a public phone in, Any Answers).

There was a conversation on one of the big scout Facebook groups yesterday when I attempted to say “but, this is the problem”. Apparently I “should have seen” what the two guide leaders in question had to say about trans people. Thus cutting down conservation about safeguarding, changing policies, and general “stuff” to rumour and hysteria (which I don’t believe).

That's interesting about any questions. I'll have to call any answers on Saturday!

Sky News have a programme called The Pledge, which is a panel debate on topical issues. Girlguides will be discussed there too but not sure when it's on.

jeninena had they seen what Agnes and the other leader said? Because GG haven't made it public AFAIK. So are they saying they have read GG private correspondence and are now reporting it?
Maybe libel against Agnes??

No @drspouse they hadn’t. But they had jumped to conclusions based on 0 evidence...

So they are implying that something derogatory was said. I wonder if that's actionable?

Latest BS from GG twitter

"Sex isn’t listed as a protected characteristic because our 'girl only' offer is permitted as a positive action under the Equality Act 2010. We’re permitted to only allow girls to join as young members and some leadership positions are only open to women members."

Anyone got any clue WTF that even means? 🤔

That doesn't make sense, does it, Swift? What are they on about?

Their 'girl only' offer (i.e. to exclude boys) is permitted under the EA2010, yes. But now they are admitting boys... that's the problem!

Does the Equality Act define girls?

A boy can't be a legal girl under existing law because you can't get a GRC as a minor. Have they even begun to understand what this is about, even if they don't agree with it?

Im not aware the Eq Act talks about positive actions?

I think they mean, we can discriminate on the grounds of sex so we can't say we don't.
But they don't know what "sex" means AND they are discriminating on the grounds of gender reassignment.

It's a bizarre attempt to square a circle.

"We are still only open to girls. Honest. We really, really are, and to prove it, we'll remind you that we went through all that equality act stuff to ensure we would be only open to girls. The fact that we won't tell parents if any girls or leaders on residentials are actually just 'identifying' as female is because we're so mired in cognitive dissonance that we are now actually lying to ourselves."

Sooner or later this is going to end up in court.

I hope for the sake of the Girls it happens by banning a tomboy or some other bit of daftness. And not because some poor girl suffered abuse because of the holes in the safeguarding regulations.

Tough shit to those who didn't listen to logic at the time and decided to ban leaders they didn't agree with.

Interesting.

The bit which people are complains about not including ‘sex’ starts:

“No girl Guiding member should suffer discrimination on the grounds of...”

I wonder if they think they don’t have to include sex because all members are girls, therefore any discrimination could not be due to sex because they are all the same sex.

But now they admit people of the male sex, this is no longer the case and it would be possible for male children and female children to be treated differently by GG and potentially suffer discrimination.

They seem to not to be able to compute that male children who identify as girls are still male in every sense of the word including legally.