Andrew Marr questions Angela Rayner and Jo Swinson on SelfID and EA2010

[WhereYouLeftIt]

Wow, the BBC are on a roll! After yesterday's interview of Laura Piddock by Justin Webb on R4's Today programme, today on the Andrew Marr show he was interviewing Rayner, Swinson and Michael Gove on various electoral issues. His last question to Rayner and Swinson were on SelfID and the Equality Act.

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000bqht/the-andrew-marr-show-24112019

Rayner's response is at 33.56, Swinson's at 52.58.

Jo Swinson is my MP. Fun times.

Angela Rayner:

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AM: One other area - at the moment, if you want to transition from one gender to another then you have to get a medical certificate showing that you've got gender dysphoria, and you have to sh ...

AR: Andrew can I say, at the moment it's not that people want to transition ...

AM: ... no, well ... just let me ...

AR: ... you know, you're making it sound like it's a lifestyle choice, I mean, I think that's ...

AM: ... I'm not saying it's a lifestyle choice. I'm asking you as neutrally as I can ...

AR: OK

AM: ... but at the moment, you have to get a medical certificate and you have to show that you have lived for two years in the gender to which you wish to be assigned, the acquired gender. Is Labour going to remove those requirements and allow people to completely self-identify?

AR: I mean, Andrew, this is a really sensitive point and if you look at the amount of young people that are ... you know, the suicide rates among young people, and especially from transgender backgrounds, is really a scourge on society. And anyone watching this show, I don't want them to be offended that somehow we're saying that they're choosing to be a particular gender. That's not how it feels for people that are going through that process. What we're saying is we will be sensitive under the Gender Recognition Act to ensure that people can be valued of who they are and protect their rights, whether that's women, whether that's transgender women, whether that's men or whether that's girls. We will make sure that everybody feels valued as part of a society and tolerant. And at the moment, language like 'we're choosing our gender' really doesn't make people feel valued, and it's really insensitive to the trauma that many people have to go though. It's not like buying a dress or going out to the shops and deciding which drink you're having, it's an incredibly difficult and traumatic process for people.

AM: Would a future Labour government change the Equality Act to forbid the exclusion of self-declared people from certain spaces?

AR: No, we will protect spaces under the Equality Act. We will make sure that women feel protected and that there's spaces, but we'll also protect transgender women as well, and make sure that everyone feels valid. There's so many young people at the moment, Andrew, feeling that they're not good enough in our country and it's an absolute scourge, and if it was your child that's in that situation, being told that they're choosing what they want to do, and somehow that this is just a lifestyle choice, I think takes us back to the days of Section 28. And I think that's really, really ...

AM: You used the word lifestyle ...

AR: ... damaging.

AM: You used the word lifestyle, I never did, but Angela Raynor, thank you very much indeed for talking to us.

God, the prospect of an Education secretary who's that thick . . .

That irresponsible chat about suicides gives me the rage.
(Thank you Pencils for transcribing)

'young people from transgender backgrounds'

Thank you for transcribing.
It's even more disturbing when laid out like that x

Sorry for the x, was simultaneously texting my mother!

but we'll also protect transgender women as well,

Telling. What about those teenage girls who suddenly decide they are in the wrong bodies? Don’t they need protecting?

It's that doublespeak again.

It's an insult to females.

Neither of them mentioned transmen and yes that example was homophobic and how come that was what her mind jumped to when talking about refuges?

make sure that everyone feels valid

What is this fuckery? Why would it be the job of policy makers to make sure that people “feel valid” and what in the name of arse could that even mean?

The homophobic thing people keep saying is you don't want to (inset vulnerable situation here) with males? Well do you object to (XXX) with lesbians then? I don't think what Swinson is saying here. She hasn't twigged that it's male bodies generally that are triggering to victims, not just the possibility of a specific male getting in. She's talking as if the only issue is preventing a specific abuser from entering. I see a distinction there. There is no implication that homosexuals are a higher risk than other females in general. Or is there and I'm missing something?

I think the Equality Act does a good job. We have different protected characteristics because every individual in this country, no matter who you are, deserves to have protection on all of those different fronts.

Jo Swinson is absolutely right when she says this. Women and girls have protection from direct and indirect discrimination on the grounds of sex, as well as protection from harassment and victimisation.

Harassment in the Equality Act is unwanted conduct related to a protected characteristic that has the purpose or effect of violating our dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for us.

Karen Ingala Smith has repeatedly and eloquently explained why this risk assessment idea is utter fucking bullshit, but that's not even the point!

Here is the point that Jo Swinson missed:

It's not enough that any particular, carefully risk-assessed male person is unlikely to actually rape us or physically attack us. That bar is far too low.

The law also says that service providers must not violate our dignity or create an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for us. This is prohibited conduct in the EA. It's unlawful, even when done with the best of intentions.

www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/section/26

I feel very, very sorry for anyone who feels suicidal because not everyone believes they are now the opposite sex.

I do wish we could get beyond the Tinkerbell level of 'If you say TWAM, a Trans Child dies!' and into the realms of actual help for people.

Much emoting, much bids for sympathy, it's difficult, it's painful, it's absolutely definitely not a choice (hello, APG, cross dressing, Pippa Bunce, be honest about this, it's not exclusively people with dysphoria) and vague references to statistics.

What statistics? Exactly? The one that was 27 self selected teenagers? What other valid ones have been collated? Why is it that the Tavistock says suicide is extremely rare? What about comorbidities? If we're going to make knee jerk law based on suicide stats, ASD and Anorexia are higher issues statistically from what I've seen when they're compared.

And yes. She has no frigging clue about what refuges are, what they do, her privilege and her naivety is clanging.

The bottom line: some males choose to identify as women. This is fine, no one should experience discrimination on how they present. However nobody changes sex . So the limits have to be where the rights of female people to dignity, privacy and safety have to be put above requiring them to pretend a belief they do not hold, and the large percentage of women who will be excluded from services for the benefit of these males. This is discrimination. This is exclusion.

It's deeply depressing the women who have played the game of Patriarchy and won to get into these high positions have so very little mind of their own and are this unintelligent. But then I don't suppose you're allowed up the ladder if you say things that challenge male interests, as women of the calibre of Anne Ruzylo demonstrate.

I can't get past how astonishingly rude Angela Rayner was.

Also I suspect she doesn't know what the GRA is.

How dare either of these parties pledge to reform the GRA when Women & Equalities (a cross-party committee) have been sitting on an unpublished consultation of 100K+ responses for over a year.

Thick as mince and spineless.

The whole lot of them

I think the homophobia and cis-ing from Swinson is unsurprising, sadly. But tbh, the fact that she doesn't understand what refuges are for is the clearest indication that she hasn't the first clue about women's issues.

And Raynor's 'scourge of suicide among people of a transgender background' is just emotive word salad.

The homophobic thing people keep saying is you don't want to (inset vulnerable situation here) with males? Well do you object to (XXX) with lesbians then? I don't think what Swinson is saying here. She hasn't twigged that it's male bodies generally that are triggering to victims, not just the possibility of a specific male getting in. She's talking as if the only issue is preventing a specific abuser from entering.

In which case she is knowingly advocating for mixed sex refuges with added risk assessment, because if she is suggesting that a 'transwoman' could be someone's abusive husband, she is not quite the TWAW believer she claims to be.

I despair of either LibDems or Labour getting into power because they are going to throw women’s rights under the nearest bus.

Yes, she doesn't look good either way ThePurported.

It's lesbophobic to compare lesbians to men, just as its racist to compare black women to men.

Also - the data/study used most often to support the claim of 'ooh, lesbians do it (DV) too' asked only about lifetime experience of DV in a lesbian population. What wasn't asked was 'did this occur with a female partner?'

Many lesbians have experience of relationships with males (that pesky compulsory heterosexuality, innit) and so it is entirely inappropriate to extrapolate, from that particular data set, anyway, anything about DV between female partners.

Also, did I mention it's lesbophobic to compare lesbians with men ?

I also want to induce unconsciousness in myself by ramming my head against a brick wall to escape the 'imagine if it was your child' rhetoric.

Slimy, opportunistic, gross use of children to manipulate mothers and women more generally.

It's not lesbophobic to say that a woman in a refuge if not fleeing from a male partner (much the most likely) must be fleeing from a same sex one. That's just logical. In Swinson's language, she is including transwomen in those same sex partners (obviously I disagree). She thinks that we're trying to protect women from being followed into a refuge by an abusive transwoman partner. Where actually much more likely is a male non trans partner pretending to be trans, or some unrelated genuine transwoman victim whose presence would still inhibit and trigger the woman victim. For trans victims provision is needed, but for the sake of the female ones it needs to be as well as not instead of women only.

No, the 'lesbians are violent too' trope is straight out of the homophobes handbook.

It comes from the same page as 'we'll, how do you feel about lesbians in your changeroom'.