SCOTTISH GRA REFORM ANNOUNCEMENT BROUGHT FORWARD

[Mbwashenzi]

It was going to be announced on the 25th - now moved forward to Thursday. Anyone going to join me in the public gallery at Holyrood??

twitter.com/wornoutmumhack/status/1140953953758261248?s=19

What purpose does a GRC serve?

I'd really like to see this question answered.

The original purpose I believe was to avoid bringing in same sex marriage legislation. A purpose that's now defunct.

Given the equalisation of pension and marriage rights, it is an anachronistic piece of legislation. Why is the legal fiction of being the opposite sex even needed now?

I'm reading through the transcript.

It says,
In 2002, the European Court of Human Rights found the UK to have breached the European Convention on Human Rights in respect of the lack of legal recognition afforded to trans people.

I thought the GRC was brought in to allow trans people to marry because same sex marriage wasn't legal then. Or was that to do with the issuing of a new birth certificate?

In 2002, the European Court of Human Rights found the UK to have breached the European Convention on Human Rights in respect of the lack of legal recognition afforded to trans people.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodwin_v_United_Kingdom

What about the stress we women suffer every single day due to our biology and the relentless harassment by males of all identities? How does this compare to the dreadful stress of not being able to get cosmetic surgery on the NHS....?

The reply by SAS to the question about why the LGBT Youth guidance was withdrawn was interesting. It was a very carefully worded admittance that that it was dodgy and flawed and they were hoodwinked by it.

Withdrawing that schools guidance is huge. It's a major acknowledgment that thinking up till now has been flawed.

I'm feeling cautiously encouraged.

This government has a duty to address the concern that reforming the process for gender recognition will increase the risks women face from men.

This government will therefore develop guidance that helps to bring clarity to these issues and ensures that policy makers and service providers better understand how to ensure that the hard won rights of both women and trans people can be collectively realised.

I hope the woke and TRAs are going to stop attacking us for mentioning these risks.

Yes it's fantastic news about the withdrawing of that LGBT youth guidance - "dodgy and flawed" doesn't come anywhere near to covering how appalling it was in so many ways, I was when I first read it.

Joan McAlpine
@JoanMcAlpine
My response to the #GRAReform statement today by
@SASomerville

@ScotParl

mobile.twitter.com/JoanMcAlpine/status/1141774459919044608

Joan mcalpine is fucking amazing and I think more thank you cards are in order

Withdrawing that schools guidance is huge

Yes I agree. And I think it's something that the people (on here and elsewhere) trying to get "Allsorts" type stuff out of their children's schools will be able to use as really useful ammunition.

Something else I found really, really interesting? (I can't swear to this witout re-watching the whole session, but I'm pretty certain that Somerville didn't use "cis" once.

AFAIK all the countries who "led the way" didn't have much of an informed debate

Also AFAIK the UK is the only country so far where women realised this was coming, argued it, wrote to people, held meetings, raised awareness, forced it into the media and said no, there are big issues here. The aim was always - as is being argued by some desperate to get this through - to rush it through undebated, too fast for anyone to ask questions or point out the issues. Because everyone trying to push this through knows damn well if it's properly debated and argued and impact assessed it won't stand up.

Hugely encouraged that two big things are mentioned here: women's safety from men, and girls excluded from their own single sex spaces. That's been stated, it will have to be addressed. Now to work on them picking up on the rest of it.

Bloody well done Joan and FPFW and everyone else who has put hours of their lives into standing up for women over this, and defending the needs and massive issues for women that to TRAs are just meaningless 'transphobia'.

Yeah great great work 💪💪💪💪

I think instead now perhaps instead of asking define what a woman is we have to ask. How do you live as a woman

Is there rules and regulations

And should women be consulted on how they live as women ?

Are there women consultants on this like gender studies experts

Love too how Joan repeatedly pointed out, women have no funding at all and are standing up against lobby groups with 6 figure government grants, and gets in policy capture.

I've just watched this and on the whole found it quite heartening.

Most of the women who asked questions acknowledged there were issues, even those in favour of changing the GRA. It was all very respectful.

Meanwhile the stroppy little men in suits (and Kezia Dugdale) had nothing except 'waawaawaah you promised! ' They're looking increasingly silly and irrelevant.

I could pick giant holes in Somerville's statement, and her responses to questions (and I will), but she has made it very clear that yes there is a debate and it needs to be had before laws are pushed through. Brava!

After years of #NoDebate bullshit, 2019 is the year we have the debate. See also the UK women & equalities inquiry into enforcing the EA.

This was the state of parliamentary debate in December 2016:

hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2016-12-01/debates/D4F283FB-2C02-4C8C-8C7E-BEAB889D1425/TransgenderEquality

(there's probably TV of this somewhere, I'll see if I can find it)

Look how far we've come in such a short time. We did this

I wonder if any trans people could comment on why exactly getting a GRC is the ultimate endgame? I do have sympathy for the tiny minority experiencing gender disphoria, and recognise they need help & support. BUT if they can alleviate those symptoms by ‘dressing like a woman’ and many do not even bother to try & get a GRC yet continue to thrive living in their new gender, what purpose do GRCs serve?

I think they are VERY exposed as regards legal challenges to what they have been doing to date, allowing self-ID by stealth and failing to invoke the same-sex exemptions when it would very clearly have been justified to protect female rights. Prisons, NHS? Refuges. Delegating policy drafting to lobby groups, not consulting, no legal scrutiny. The PSED, not fulfilled. Bias - forcing women's organisations to be "inclusive" of trans when the law very clearly states that same sex collectives are exempt where appropriate. Self ID in relation to crime stats, police recording. Gender self-ID in relation to intimate searches by prison staff and police. The list goes on. They are in breach of oodles of laws, both procedural and substantive.

I hope they realise this.

I hope they realise this

I think they do, there was an emphasis on the EA exemptions, and on looking at how sex gender are disaggregated in data. I hope they manage to join the dots.

Yeah happy is no5 clear at all what the end game here is for ppl who have dsyphoria

It seems like this has been pushed by organisations where they get loads of money and with that comes power and then more money
The push don’t seem to, come from the real ppl who have dysphoria

Or ppl like mermaids where it is the whole reason for being

Sometimes I think it’s like a collective madness pushed by erm I don’t know who but there must be a financial reason

I noticed Patrick Harvie didn’t applaud SAS after she’d given her speech. He really is an odious little toad.

I'm sure the lobbying register will be interesting too. Assuming it's properly filled out. Perhaps it's been given a glittery rainbow cover in honour of Pride. Or something.

God has something good happened while I was at work?

I’ve been fuming for two weeks after sitting through a presentation from University of Dundee (let’s name and shame) equality officer where she repeatedly conflated sex with gender identity and categorically stated several times that the equality act protected characteristic of sex refers to how you identify as a gender and that it was now law that you no longer need a GRC and it was illegal not to recognise you if you identify as a woman.

I did try to challenge but it’s pretty scary.

I think in the light of this I need to write a formal complaint?