Regulatory Capture

[BovaryX]

If a determined pressure group achieves regulatory capture and significant swathes of government policy, higher education, corporate policy submits to its dominance, what are the best ways to resist this? Reading some threads on this board, reaction ranges from disbelief through to frustration and sadly, resignation. It strikes me that resignation is a direct aim of those engaged in aggressive regulatory capture. So what would be the best form of resistance for those of us that think the train has left the platform and is careeening way off the tracks?

Yes, it's possible for groups you disagree with on everything else to see the truth of things in the same way as you, and equally possible that they have a different perspective that you don't support.

Of course, one reason to deny the existence of regulatory capture is because if the entire apparatus of power is being manipulated by a niche lobby group, that is not democratic. It is problematic and needs to be challenged. Lots of people on this forum are becoming increasingly aware of this.

what point do you get a niggling doubt that maybe it's a mistake to plug your ears and go lalalalala to Amnesty International, Flora, the NSPCC, Helen Mirren, M&S, and the United Nations

On the contrary Frack, I’m listening to them very carefully and I’m asking lots of questions to understand more clearly their position.

What I’m hearing concerns me greatly and I find myself unable to support their position. If indeed they are able to articulate their position clearly or at all, which in many cases, they seem unable to do.

Do you think institutions, charities, corporations and actors should always go unquestioned and unchallenged Frack?

The first rule of lobbying is to obscure and deny that there is any lobbying going on. That's what Frack is doing here.

Black Forest,
Bingo. It’s quite amusing to see the denial, the appeal to authority fallacy and the outrage at identifying regulatory capture for what it is . A niche aggressive lobby group whose control over the apparatus of power becomes more explicit every day.

Lol as if I am not capable of doing my own research and have to let my opinions be guided by the views of a margarine manufacturer and a luvvie actress. I mean, I love Helen Mirren, but I don’t really want to take medical or political advice from her.

OTOH I would be concerned if numerous doctors and lawyers were now coming out to say that actually this shit is pretty dodgy and isn’t going to end well. I would also be worried if the people I held up as brave stunning champions of my cause (eg Jess Bradley, Lily Madigan, Aimee Challenor) kept being outed either as incorrigible sex-pests or as facilitating sex-offenders. It would also make me think twice if the only way I could get my point across was by threatening my opponents with reporting them to the police or their employers.

But maybe that’s just me...

And don’t forget that PIE got government funding and political backing for ages. Those concerned about that were no doubt also told they were on the wrong side of history. Just because you’re doing something now doesn’t mean that it’s automatically right or better than anything that was done or thought in the past. The passage of time doesn’t always equal progress.

Just because you’re doing something now doesn’t mean that it’s automatically right or better than anything that was done or thought in the past. The passage of time doesn’t always equal progress.

This in spades.

I say we fight back with regulatory capture of our own! What's to stop us becoming lobbyists is we have the time and energy?

disingenuous to make out that trans people have more of their ear than anyone else (see the Times, the BBC).

The BBC as an example where pro trans views are suppressed? Ha, you're funny

At what point do you start to wonder whether the support of every establishment entity and institution means that your "liberation" movement would be more accurately described as an elite supremacist movement.

Nail on the head.

Regulatory capture is jusy a clever sounding way of saying we presented a range of evidence collected by qualified experts to our democratically elected lawmakers and they made a decision on the basis of the information they had

Except that bears no resemblance to what has been happening. For example, Maria Miller's enquiry into trans rights and the GRA. The professional body of psychologists who deal with inmates in prisons were ignored; she chose instead to listen to Action on Trans Health, an extremist group with no qualifications or expertise who've made all sorts of weird attacks verbally on gender critical women and the police.

Listening to experts would include listening to whistleblowers from the Tavistock. Isn't happening. Regulatory bodies seem to prefer listening to an unqualified mother who took her child to Thailand for surgery which would have been illegal in the UK (and, following that case, has since been made illegal in Thailand).

The question is why the regulatory bodies are listening to unqualified randoms with a political axe to grind rather than actually qualified experts in medicine and psychology.

I'm another who constantly doubts what I think. Though that's a slightly odd list if authorities... I know there are lots of others though.

I can't say that transwomen are women, transmen are men though. I can't say it or believe it. That's the awkward doorstop I keep tripping over.

the question is why the regulatory bodies are listening to unqualified randoms

Quite so. One of the things which is truly shocking about the current state of affairs is A) the power which a well organized, niche pressure group can wield over the apparatus of state power B) how quickly this regulatory capture can become ubiquitous and C) the role of fear exercised via social media which has been instrumental in silencing dissent. At some point in the future, this point in history will be looked at not with admiration but with astonishment and disbelief.

Didn't you hear the Moral Maze episode? Michael Buerke isn't that open minded, it turns out.

And liberation politics isn't supposed to exclude a whole class of people.

Frackoff
And liberation politics isn't supposed to exclude a whole class of people
I completely agree with this statement. So please explain why Women are being excluded?

FrackOff trans people are not being excluded by women retaining sex based rights. Trans people have human rights but they do not have the right to appropriate the rights of another group that were designed specifically for that group. No matter how loud you shout, trans women are trans women and not biological women and therefore their experiences and needs will very often be different. They should surely be proud and be recognised as who they are, not something that they are not. That is not hate. Being a woman isn’t some badge or status or exclusive club. It’s just a description of those who happened to be born female and the protections are there to prevent unfavourable treatment. That has to continue because there is zero evidence that they are no longer necessary. Trans people have protections under the Equality Act against less favourable treatment and discrimination. However, that is a separate category to sex. If you want to get rid of the sex category, you are removing vital rights from women.

The only class of people relevant to women's liberation is women.

@RealityNotEssentialism very well said!

I say we fight back with regulatory capture of our own! What's to stop us becoming lobbyists is we have the time and energy?

It is extremely expensive. Political consultancy and lobbying is an entire industry.

It is also anti-democratic because the aim is to railroad change through without the public being aware that anything has happened.

I should add that it's not just money. There is also the culture of quangoism as a career where people move between governmental and third-sector organisations, copying and pasting their diversity policies as they go.

Amnesty International, Flora, the NSPCC, Helen Mirren, M&S, and the United Nations

Thats the weirdest fucking list

For anything really

*Thats the weirdest fucking list

For anything really*