Good luck Harry The Owl

[BoreOfWhabylon]

Court case today.

twitter.com/WeAreFairCop

Today has gladdened my heart.

Particular thanks to our own @Spero, who I believe was responsible for the superb twitter feed.

Does anyone know who the transwoman complainant is?

I could have a good guess, but I don't want everyone of my posts to get reported

There are a number of things that really trouble me about this case aside from the obvious thing that it's a case at all.

It's that the quality of MPs we currently have and are likely to have come 13th Dec from ALL major parties has meant that the future looks pretty bleak.

If Harry wins it doesn't mean a victory in the long term.

What Harry is fighting is ultimately how activists want the law to look. And the spinelessness of MPs in all this mean its a real possibility.

If Harry wins it will probably be under provisions under the EA2010 and Human Rights Act relating to free speech.

At present the Human Rights Act is protected to a degree by our membership of the EU and the ECHR.

But we know that there are those who wish us to abolish the act and leave not just the EU and ECHR. A trade deal with Europe will probably have membership of the ECHR as a pre-condition but if that falls through and we look more towards the US that could be an issue...

Meanwhile those on the other side who want to remain in the EU want to abolish the EA2010. But don't seem to equate how that tallies up with laws protecting free speech either. Instead they seem to think enforcement by intimidation is fair game anyway.

I honestly don't know how anyone is arguing this bullshit either in court or in sincerity as a law maker.

The whole thing is bonkers: only males can be transwomen, by very definition no females can be transwomen. So there can be no transphobia if women are all simply women and there is no distinction between transwomen and women and transwomen cease to exist as a concept if sex is erased. And if transwomen don't exist because sex doesn't exist and isn't important there can be no transphobia either.

It is impossible to define transwomen without sex. If we can't talk about sex because it's meaningless, we also can't talk about transphobia as a concept.

It's all rather like Back To The Future where Marty is about to disappear because his own mother has fallen in love with him inside of his father so Marty ceases to exist : the Grandfather Paradox.

Except this about sex and gender.

We should probably name it the Trans Paradox for all the Scifi fans out there...

The lunacy for me is that MPs are supposed to scruntise for a living to spot inconsistencies like this to prevent the equalivent of a legal paradox where legal terms have replaced reality thus creating a situation where the law no longer has effect for the purpose it was designed because of all these legal fictions.

What is their actual fucking jobs?

They certainly do not convince me they know a single thing about reality, have basic knowledge of existing law nor understand how the heck you go about creating new law which actually works for the purposes desired.

I can't see how we are anything but fucked when we are lead by an army of the parliamentary equivalent of Biff Tannen.

Imagine a world where you could be lifted by the British powers simply on the word of an accuser. It would be known that some would use the new laws as an act of revenge against those they had issues with, an angry neighbour, bitter ex, bigoted work mate. But the powers would brush those complaints to the side, as the end goal, civil control, was more important. Think that this is 1984, a paranoid imagination, would never happen in a civilised society like the UK?

If you want to know what the future might hold for us, if we don’t take lessons from the past, then look at internment in NI in 1971. This TRA juggernaut needs stopped, before they have full control of the security services, government, etc.

Imagine a world where you could be lifted by the British powers simply on the word of an accuser

You mean like when women when sent to lunatic asylums on the say so of their husbands?

Like that?

Bob Zemeckis is on record that Biff was based largely on Donald Trump.

Bob Zemeckis is on record that Biff was based largely on Donald Trump.

Didn't know that.

It figures to say the least...

You mean like when women when sent to lunatic asylums on the say so of their husbands?

Exactly. History is full of those in power abusing that control, yet we are constantly being told that we’re being silly, have nothing to worry about and just to stop talking about it. It’s fantastic to see people stand up to those in power and say, ‘fuck no! We won’t shut up!’

Authoritarians always shit on women first.

ALWAYS.

Women are always on the front line of authoritarianism.

...and when Doc in 1955 expresses incredulity that a movie actor could be President in 1985, it was more prophetic than we knew at the time.

I'm reading a lot at the moment about 'petty treason' - the killing of a husband by a wife was once such a a treason (but not of course the much more common other way round). It was considered worse than murder, as a subordinate woman threatened the whole social framework of her superiors by her agency.

Women know your place

DH & I just listened to Harry’s interview this morning on R4. It was very clear. Well done Harry.

Can we not all report that we perceived lesbophobic hatred and took offence at the police removing lesbians from pride in, was it Bradford?

And we were surely all offended at the removal of pizza-eating lesbians from the Accenture event.

I'm definitely offended by the refusing of drinks to lesbians in t shirts in that bar.

(And I tick three separate boxes on the Equality Act protected characteristic list, so presumably I can be offended three separate times. High score, collect the jewels.golden rings and advance to next level etc etc.)

Fallingirl

Yes.

Michelle

Indeed.

I think that [] this, and the Maya case has shown is that we have to fight back in court.

Yes I agree. It must be so very stressful for the individual people involved but it's so important to have them.

There has been a lot of discussion about "regulatory capture" and "policy capture" on these boards over the last few years, and I think a growing awareness of just how enormous some of the battles we are going to have to fight are.

But you know what there haven't been?

Legal cases.

And that's in spite of there being at least one organisation (TELI) set up specifically to create them. As far as I know the only case they have initiated has been one arguing that TW should be able to have male-specific crimes struck from their criminal records; the case in question I think involves a conviction for what used to be called "cottaging", and is about a corner of law where the, I don't know the exact term but the "Turing amnesty"? turned out not to apply.

That is - the whole edifice pretty much knows that it relies on not being tested in law.

So. These cases are not just about Maya Forstater and Harry Miller, they're not even just about issues of free speech and employment rights. They are about re-establishing what the law actually is.

That is - the whole edifice pretty much knows that it relies on not being tested in law

Agree with this.

Because as soon as you put it in front of a court the whole thing collaspes because of biologically thingies (said like Doctor who when they say time whimey) and the Trans Paradox.

A trade deal with Europe will probably have membership of the ECHR as a pre-condition but if that falls through and we look more towards the US that could be an issue...

I’m confused, wasn’t the ECHR a British (Churchill) initiative in the first place? I don’t understand what it has to do with the EU, it completely predates it?

Just caught up. Feeling relieved and hopeful reading the Judge's comments as reported here.

Imagine a world where you could be lifted by the British powers simply on the word of an accuser

A better comparison would be Pakistan’s blasphemy laws

Could someone please tell me where to find KS statement? Is it on the WAFC twitter page? I've read the whole thing twice but must keep missing it?

Try here Once:

kathleenstock.com/witness-statement-in-the-fair-cop-judicial-review/

The ECHR has nothing to do with the EU. It's Council of Europe, which is a completely different organisation, and which we aren't leaving. The EHCR isn't affected at all by Brexit.

A lot of politicians and journalists don't seem to know this, so it's not surprising that the public get confused. But the EHCR will be binding on us whatever happens with regard to the HRA. That's why the tagline for that legislation was, "Bringing rights home". You could always appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, and the domestic law was always subject to its decisions, but you had to exhaust every appeal in your nation of origin first, which got expensive.

The EU also have courts, but they relate to EU law. Different.

Sorry, ECHR not EHCR. (And the Convention and Court make for identical acronyms for both, which doesn't help.)

These cases are not just about Maya Forstater and Harry Miller, they're not even just about issues of free speech and employment rights. They are about re-establishing what the law actually is.

Don't want to get ahead of myself, but the judge today was so clear. Am thinking about the Wizard of Oz behind his curtain...