Is it really all that bad?

[Notevenmyrealname]

I was having a conversation today with a friend who works in HR and is very clued up on the law and equality issues and he was saying that most of the scare stories about transgender stuff are a storm in a teacup. Realistically nobody is going to allow a small group of militant trans activists to remove women’s rights. All the updated GRA will do will allow people who need it a slightly less hassle way to change their gender officially and as it affects such a small number of people (supposedly 1% of the population) it’s really not going to have a massive impact on the vast majority of people. There are no plans to change the Equality Act of 2010, so sex will still be a protected category.
I’ve been trying to read up on lots of stuff over the last month or so and, I have to be honest, really scared myself - particularly reading all the BS spouted by Mermaids. The thought that those people are let loose in schools peddling their pseudoscience to teachers is awful, but again my friend thinks the stuff that gets reported in newspapers is always the worst of the worst as they just want clicks on their pages and I shouldn’t get myself wound up.
I’m actually going to give myself a break from all this over the next few weeks as it’s really getting to me but I was wondering if anyone else thought maybe things won’t be as bad as all the worst case scenarios that are discussed on these boards?
I’m still very much of the belief that gender identity and biological sex are separate things and I think if something could be put in law that makes that distinction clear, surely everything would be fine. Stupid ideology like the crap pushed by Mermaids and the like will be found out eventually and it’s just because they’re riding the wave with the GRA consultation having happened so recently. Teachers are regularly updated on safeguarding and the secrecy aspect would only apply if they thought the child was in actual danger (he gave the example of an extremely religious family who might try taking their child abroad to marry them off or worse, they were from a culture that commit “honour” killings).
Please reassure me that these worst case scenarios are unlikely to happen, or is my friend actually oblivious to very real dangers if these changes go through?

You might want to take a look through this thread for things that have already happened

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3348290-It-will-never-happen-resource-thread

I work in HR.

Your friend is a man. He clearly gives no shits whatsoever about women not wanting their facilites available to males at work. It doesn't bother of affect him and if he thinks women are scaremongering when they say they don't want that to happen he is an arsehole. Tell him that from me..

I'm looking forwards to the destruction of the gender pay gap when a bunch of dumb woke women elect to be non binary and we have to delete them from the report and make the analysis meaningless. Cool result. Muppets.

The press always report the worst.

They never report when somebody has been drink driving and they didn’t hurt anybody or didn’t get caught, or when a mototcyclist without a helmet doesn’t fall off and get brain damage.

They never report on blocks of flats that don’t burn down and jars of baby food without shards of broken glass in them.

1% isn’t a small number. For a public toilet that could be dozens per day. For elite sports that 1% could mean the end of women’s sports.

Realistically nobody is going to allow a small group of militant trans activists to remove women’s rights

I work in IT. It's a matter of time until we have a transwoman in the department. If I say nothing I'll find myself sharing the toilets with a male. If I say something I'll be branded awkward at best, bigoted at worst.

eventually this will impact everyone.

but right now the people at the sharp end are women prisoners. 1 in 200 people in womens prisons now is male

this is very, vert real

Your friend is wrong. Anyone can already change their gender at any time and good luck to them.

Allowing people to get a GRC by self-identification has the following effect:

1 - it devalues the GRC for genuinely dysphoric people who have struggled and suffered with their illness
2 - It means that instead of the current 5000-ish, closer to 500000 (conservative estimate) people would immediately be able to gain official recognition to be treated as if they were the opposite sex. Not gender, sex.
3 - this would cause a potentially significant clash of rights under the EA2010 as nobody can answer whether these people are affected by the single-sex exemption clauses or not.

That's my take on it anyway. That's why I'm here, and why I'm tentatively putting my GC viewpoint across more and more in real life.

Your colleague's a man - it will have litle impact on him and so (like many, but not all men) he isn't giving the slightest thought or consideration to how it will affect all women and girls.

Women's sport is already being detrimentally affected - as Aspie has already said, even as little as 1% will effectively destroy elite sport.

But as has already been said also - women in prison are experiencing being housed with men now. And they can't escape!

The right of women prisoners to safety, privacy and dignity is being sacrificed as a sop to some unhappy males

the erosion of women's rights is happening now

my friend actually oblivious to very real dangers if these changes go through?

Your friend is oblivious.

He's talking as if he's completely a full risk assessment of the situation, when he has, in fact, just said what he thinks based on his knowledge and imagination.

Many of the arguements around the removal of women's rights seem to be based on 'how much damage can 1% of the population do?'

Everything is peachy if you know you're not going to be part of the group impacted by the 1%.

To take just one area of the issues - girls and young women presenting with gender dysphoria have had a 4000% increase in the last 10 years. If they become trans men they are vilified by trans women with penises who identify as lesbian for not wanting to sleep with them.

I never in my wildest dreams thought I would ever write a sentence like that.

Our kids, especially our girls, need this nonsense to be challenged and stopped.

Thank gawd there is a govt enquiry about this.

Key facts provided by the Government alongside the GRA consultation suggested they had estimated the number seeking certificates pretty accurately at slightly less than 5,000. Their estimates of how many would take advantage of any new act were up to 500,000.

That is a huge difference. And Stonewalls umbrella is pretty wide and includes people like fetishists.

It may not affect HR that much, in that the mad/bad element sheltering under the umbrella may have pretty low employment rates. However they will be a danger in prisons, in refuges and in wider society.

Self-ID, espcially when coupled with dead-naming means a dismantling of safeguard protecting the most vulnerable.

Does he have children?

I am really concerned about the future of women’s sports, including sports scholarships in the US.
I am mystified as to why men who cross dress are being lauded as “women in business”.
I’m annoyed that trans women are taking “women’s officer” posts that they are unqualified for because it is trendy and right on.
I do not understand how someone can change gender and it can becomes illegal to refer to or enquire about their past in anyway. No other sector of society is given that level of privilege, to be able to eradicate their past to that level.

I’m surprised that as an HR employee he hasn’t given this aspect more thought to be honest.

Realistically nobody is going to allow a small group of militant trans activists to remove women’s rights

It's ALREADY happening. Male rapists are locked up with women based on a feeling they claim to have. Men are winning women's sporting events and edging women out of business awards based on a feeling they claim to have. But if a man says it's not an issue then I guess that's the end of it, I'm sure Karen White's victims will be very relieved

Realistically nobody is going to allow a small group of militant trans activists to remove women’s rights

As has been pointed out, it's happening.

Key facts provided by the Government alongside the GRA consultation suggested they had estimated the number seeking certificates pretty accurately at slightly less than 5,000.

Was that 5,000 estimated for 15years or in total, ever. Because, even if the rate of take up doesn't increase, it will be 10,000 in 30 years, double the original estimated number.

Agree with everyone on here. Your friend is not affected as the fetishists are not targeting him. But they are targeting children in schools and removing safeguarding from the vulnerable, they are targeting adolescents online (ROGD), women in prisons are already having to shower naked in front of convicted male sex offenders and women are already being replaced by born men in women's sport.
Your friend will simply be part of the woke army that enables this shit and when everyone has been legally silenced by the weaponised police force (woman as adult human female = transphobia) then the most vulnerable will be picked off by the predators sheltering under that umbrella just waiting to be enabled.

Sorry OP. I agree with everyone else here and think that your male friend is way wide of the mark. This is already having a dreadful impact on vulnerable women in prison and women's sport as well as making language (what does woman mean?) and official statistics (crime for example) meaningless.

Has he got a beard?

Realistically nobody is going to allow a small group of militant trans activists to remove women’s rights

a) it's not a small group of militants. It's every predator in the country, every sexist man, every misogynist.

b) how does he think we can stop it?

It's already happening. You and your "friend" are choosing not to see it.

Reminder to sign the petition re women’s prisons. Link is on the ‘talk to your family about this at Christmas’ thread.