RollOnFriday - law firm writes report called "Only adults? Good practices in legal gender recognition for youth"

[somebrightmorning]

RollOnFriday is a satirical online magazine for solicitors.

Dentons is a very very large law firm (but I'm not impressed because I remember them when they were merely Denton Hall....)

I commend this article from RollOnFriday to you:

www.rollonfriday.com/news-content/dentons-campaigns-kids-switch-gender-without-parental-approval

and I see RollOnFriday also reported this:

www.rollonfriday.com/news-content/lesbian-barrister-investigated-setting-lgb-group

You will like this extract:
"Critics of gender self-ID have warned that it will adversely impact women and children in many areas, including rape crisis centres, single-sex hospital wards, women’s sport and identification of discrimination. Dentons' 65-page report characterises their position in two sentences, as concerns which "normally come from women’s groups" about "female prisoners and female public toilets".

Dentons' report also describes critics of gender self-ID as 'TERFs', which began as an acronym for "trans-exclusionary radical feminists" and is understood by many of its targets as a misogynist slur.

When it was asked to comment on aspects of its report, Dentons initially offered up Atanas Politov, its Director for Pro Bono, for an interview. Then it asked for written questions in advance. When these were provided, the world's largest firm by headcount was unable to find anyone prepared to answer them, and gave a general statement instead."

My own position is that hormonal or surgical intervention on a 12 year old is prima facie child abuse and so I'm very surprised that Dentons published such a report.

[BovaryX]

Bernard,
I just can’t understand how this has happened. Who the hell are these people? How have they managed to colonise every aspect of the state while avoiding any scrutiny? They are trying to ram through policies that would never get public consent and criminalize any dissent. What the hell is going on?

[BovaryX]

I’m starting to wonder how many employees are already clandestinely implementing these underhand tactics in the BBC, the Civil Service and other organisations

I should think the BBC and the Civil Service have already been completely colonized. The regulatory capture is just off the charts

[BovaryX]

There must have been a lot of useful idiots who have allowed this to happen. I mean how large can this lobby group be? One would have thought that more people are in the animal rights movement but they haven’t managed lobbying on a scale anywhere near this.

[TimeLady]

I think one of the problems is that trustees and board members across charities and companies often seem to be interconnected and they will recruit others with similar views and objectives. I'm not sure how we break the cycle, other that through parliament putting a stop to this.

The sooner some cases for negligence come to court the better, but sadly that means there will have to be victims first

[Clymene]

Next bit - this is the 'how to get governments to do what you want without anyone noticing' bit

Good practices for NGO advocacy

1. Target youth politicians - "activists found it useful to make the point that youth politicians are the senior politicians of the future and
   

that any changes that they are in favour of will inevitably be the policies of the future and are more likely
to be on “the right side of history”."

So - appeal to the vanity of older politicans by telling them that younger ones are totally on side yeah so that they can look down wiv da kidz

1. De-medicalise the campaign - make it clear that young people don't have to have surgery if they identify as transgender. Even though that is entirely the route that's advocated as best practice by advocacy organisations
   

1. Use case studies of real people
   

But not in the UK because we've cottoned on been a bit more aware of implications of legal change than other countries. "In the UK, the debate surrounding reform of legal gender recognition laws has been politically charged and trans people have suffered more hate crime than in previous years"
So women, campaigning for women's spaces to be upheld and protected, have caused trans people to be victims of hate crimes. I won't ask for evidence - Harry can provide that I'm sure!

1. Anonymise the narratives
   

Use fudged stories where you can dramatise things further.

1. Get ahead of the government agenda and the media story
   

Now this is the key. Advance guard under the cover of night, legislation by stealth.
"NGOs need to intervene early in the legislative process and ideally before it has even started. This will give them far greater ability to shape the government agenda." and if you don't get the media involved early enough "persistent negative and pernicious narratives about the trans rights agenda may take hold in the public
imagination which will negatively influence the legislative process and the prospects for success". That tactic was the plan with Trans Media Watch I believe although I'm not sure how successful it's been.

1. Use human rights as a campaign point
   

They don't know why this works, but it does. It could be because countries don't want to be accused of international wrong think.

1. Tie your campaign to more popular reform
   

Bang! The "veil of protection" wherein you slip in your controversial legislative change under the guise of a really popular one.

1. Avoid excessive press coverage and exposure
   

Lobby politicians directly. Do not attract attention. Do not let the public know what you're doing. Ever. Because they will thwart you

1. Carpe diem
   

Don't hang around if you spot an opportunity! Take advantage of political turmoil, windows of opportunity, to slide in changes to gender legislation without anyone noticing

10. Work together
Fot lots of reasons but "utimately gives greater legitimacy to a national campaign and maximizes the prospects of success."

11. Be wary of compromise
In Ireland, they've got self ID through but not for young people which is a terrible mistake because it's going to take years for them to change that.

That's it in terms of overall recommendations

[Clymene]

In terms of why - I think a lot of people simply don't think this stuff through. I think they see a 'oh poor trans people' narrative, read the dodgy suicide stats (which are quoted at least three times in this document as far as I've read and I'm only 1/3 through) and also want to be 'down with the kids' (see point 1 in Good practices for Advocacy) above.

Plus I also think that most people don't really understand safeguarding. I certainly had a very vague understanding and hadn't really joined the dots until quite recently. Let's face it - this is a campaign chiefly driven by a) adults who don't have children and b) young people driven by Tumblr.

Until I had children of my own, I hadn't really thought about safeguarding ever. It had never been of concern or, I have to confess, of interest.

[Sanddancer99]

The Dentons report states the following: “..NGOs need to intervene early in the legislative process and ideally before it has even started. This will give them far greater ability to shape the government agenda and the ultimate proposal, than if they intervene after the government has already started to develop its own proposals.”
This tactic has been facilitated in the UK by the Government Equalities Office which has arranged for trans lobbyists to have preferential access to policy makers right across government, with the objective of influencing policy. This is show by the following extract from the GEO’s written submission to the House of Commons Women and Equalities Committee enquiry (2016) on transgender equality.
“GEO works across Government in order to influence and support other Government departments, bringing the voice of transgender people into Government policy-making. GEO seeks to help other Government departments understand the experience of transgender people so that policy can properly take into account the specific needs of transgender people. GEO also aims to facilitate dialogue between Government departments and transgender stakeholders so that stakeholders can directly access those responsible for the relevant policy...”
In order to ensure we understand the needs of transgender people and fully understand any associated issues, GEO maintains a regular dialogue with a wide range of stakeholders. GEO meets regularly with transgender stakeholders to discuss key issues of concern and the possible solutions to resolve those issues. In addition, the GEO engages through sector-wide fora, which have representation from transgender organisations, to identify and clarify the key issues of concern.”

Giving lobbyists preferential access to policy makers, and excluding other groups that could be impacted by those policies, is a recipe for policy capture. Any civil servant (or regulator) should know this.

[BovaryX]

Target youth politicians, human rights, hate crime, get ahead of the government agenda. This sinister lobby group have managed to colonise state institutions and NGOs so quickly because of the craven posturing of politicos who have failed to defend freedom of speech and thought. They have managed to present themselves as the very apex of a hierarchy of oppression whilst infiltrating every aspect of state power. Including the police!

[BovaryX]

Another poster up thread mentioned law firms are frightened of being on the receiving end of a Twitter tirade. That has been another successful tactic. Trawling social media and stamping on anyone who questions this insanity. Bullying is at the core of this and people are too frightened to speak out. It’s just unbelievable

[BovaryX]

This tactic has been facilitated in the UK by the Government Equalities Office which has arranged for trans lobbyists to have preferential access to policy makers right across government

Profoundly anti democratic. The more I read about this, the more contempt I feel for the utterly useless, craven politicians who have pandered to this.

[Kit19]

I know someone who had to work with an internal trans group as part of their job. They said it was relentless - whereas when people normally disagree at work there are rules, with this group they went nuclear straight away. There was no compromise, no finding common ground. They were bombarded with emails, meetings were very aggressive, & left endless voice mails. In the end it just became easier to say yes than to fight especially as their organisation just wanted it to go away.

[LangCleg]

And this is all complicated by the blurring between charities (doing precious little actual charity work) and lobbying.

The entire Third Sector Industrial Complex needs to go. The Charity Commission needs beefing up and charities not spending the bulk of their income on actual services for their constituencies need to have charitable status revoked.

Lobbying is a £2 billion a year industry. It should be nowhere near charitable status.

[Uncompromisingwoman]

Using the Government Equalities Office and the EHRC as 'enforcers' of this is a genius move. With the Civil service as the useful idiots who ensure that the ideology is present absolutely everywhere that government touches alongside a sizeable dose of bullying of anyone who fails to conform.
Does anyone remember that chilling thread from a woman civil servant about a training session where a woman was publicly criticised for walking back out out of a toilet that a transgender woman was in? I recall women were given advice about the correct facial expression and behaviour to adopt. Coercive control writ large

[BovaryX]

with this group they went nuclear straight away. There was no compromise, no finding common ground. They were bombarded with emails, meetings were very aggressive, & left endless voice mails. In the end it just became easier to say yes

This is because they are bullies and it’s a tactic they use to bulldoze through. But it is the environment which enables this, and it’s an environment where it is becoming impossible to acknowledge objective reality. It’s actually very frightening

[BovaryX]

I recall women were given advice about the correct facial expression and behaviour to adopt. Coercive control writ large

Blimey, I had not heard of that. It’s just outrageous. Who the hell are these people? What is their ultimate agenda? They seem to have colonised most Western countries and did I read on this board that Mexico is introducing self ID? Mexico?

[Clymene]

Catholic counties are big on self ID. It is no accident that Malta and Ireland are the first European countries to introduce it.

They abhor homosexuality and aren't that keen on women so can't imagine any man would seriously want to be one.

[Goosefoot]

6. Use human rights as a campaign point They don't know why this works, but it does. It could be because countries don't want to be accused of international wrong think.

I've seen this in a many different types of campaigns. Rather than try and make the social case for something, the idea is to somehow present it as a rights violation, and that will convince some people right away. If you can convince enough of the right ones then you may even be able to get it dealt with through the court system.

The key is to somehow define your group as one that exists as a sort of natural entity, some sort of defined group with a particular characteristic. At that point then you can claim that something is excluding you or discrimination against that characteristic.

[BovaryX]

Clymene, that’s an interesting take on it. It’s such a regressive doctrine

[TimeLady]

The parliamentary select committee has already jumped the gun

www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/women-and-equalities-committee/role/


The Women and Equalities Committee was appointed by the House of Commons on 3 June 2015 to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of the Government Equalities Office (GEO).

The Committee fills "a gap" in previous accountability arrangements - the Minister for Women and Equalities and the GEO will now be held to account by a select committee for the Government's performance on equalities (sex, age, race, religion or belief, sexual orientation, disability, gender identity, pregnancy and maternity, marriage or civil partnership status) issues. The Committee joins more than thirty Parliaments worldwide with dedicated equalities committees.

The creation of an Equalities Committee was recommended by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Women in Parliament in their July 2014 report on Improving Parliament: Creating a better and more representative House (PDF 3.8 MB).

I have complained. Perhaps others might like to do so too?

[Michelleoftheresistance]

this group they went nuclear straight away. There was no compromise, no finding common ground. They were bombarded with emails, meetings were very aggressive, & left endless voice mails. In the end it just became easier to say yes than to fight

There were some detailed discussions on the relationship boards a few years ago about how certain personality disorders were leading to LAs and agencies being massively and disproportionately tied up by a few service users.

Typical behaviour (and I witnessed this in a previous job) was to send long, endless emails, often multiple per day. Multiple phone calls, often the same issue taken to several people one after the other with no mention they'd already had the conversation, so multiple hares started in different directions. Involved and initiated multiple complaints, often having several running at the same time, to insist on top manager level dealing with them and not speaking to anyone lower, or fixing on one particular member of staff and bombarding them with engagement, multiple bullet pointed issues they wanted replies to, chasing and demanding responses immediately. Endless threats of legal involvement or punishment, lots of meetings where largely the point was to shout at and lecture everyone at length without allowing anyone to speak (often on issues that weren't issues at all or had been solved).

It frequently results in members of staff going off ill with stress, and huge amounts of time, money and resources being poured onto trying to deal with these people as if they were reasonable people . It didn't work. Because for those few service users, the satisfaction and reward was in the behaviour and the reaction/engagement of others. It was often framed as a crusade, as brave people fighting the system, but was actually often no substance and a lot of enjoyment of drama, fights and attention of people trying to soothe, placate, listen and help.

There was one agency who had drawn up processes to identify a vexatious complainant (basically the signs of this client type) and after exhausting two rounds of normal process to prove clearly it was vexatious, then adopt a different system of handling person and complaint which shut down the complaint and refused further engagement.

LAs and all systems need training and systems in this. The behaviour needs to be recognised and separated out from genuine issues and process: as the relationships board often says, you cannot solve a problem by being reasonable with someone incapable of being reasonable. Agencies need boundaries. And to learn how to say no, and stand up to people being sad, angry, critical, without becoming panicked.

Anyone interested in this: take a look at the Issendai blog, she often deconstructs this dynamic and points out why engagement turns out to be pointless.

[Kit19]

@michelleoftheresistance

Oh god that sounds soooo familiar from another job I had and yes! Those are the exact tactics and it is 100% predicated on the ‘other side’ responding in a ‘reasonable’ way rather than fighting fire with fire.

[Oncewasblueandyellowtwo]

Just going to add a thread in here, it's about gender recognition for 16/17 year olds in Ireland. Amnesty International put out a statement and in part of it they raise concerns about the parental consent that's needed.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3758764-Gender-recognition-process-to-be-simplified-for-teenagers-in-Ireland

[theflushedzebra]

This is... horrifying.

I mean, we knew something along these lines was happening, didn't we? But to see it - written out like that - as a policy document.

Proof that the public at large is not behind these law changes - proof that they are being pushed through on the sly.

And proof that the feminists in the UK have done a fantastic job in getting this out in the open! In fact, every single one of us - who have done anything to raise awareness, signed a petition, donated to a crowdfunder, written to our MP, posted on social media - have all helped.

PROOF that the silencing of women was a deliberate strategy.

[Sanddancer99]

Policy makers and regulators are subject to the Seven Principles of Public Life (Nolan Principles). These principles are very important to a democratic society and they are not optional. One of the reasons why these principles exist is to avoid policy and regulatory capture.
According to these principles policy makers and regulators must act and take decisions impartially, using the best evidence and without discrimination or bias. There should also be a level playing field for all the stakeholders that could be impacted by policy and regulatory decisions. The principles also require policy makers and regulators to be accountable and transparent about their decisions and actions. This includes accountability to the public.
The “behind closed doors” approach to policy making is in serious contravention with the Nolan Principles. Its results in the wider implications of policy being missed. It results in the unquestioning acceptance of biased data from lobby groups. It results in totally inadequate (or non-existent) research in support of policy. Its results in failure to carry out equality impact assessments in contravention with the PSED. It results in the human rights of women and girls being ignored. It results in attempts to drive through policies without any accountability or transparency. This all contributes to a lack of public confidence in government (and regulators).
The huge public backlash about the GRA consultation, and about the current flaunting of the Equality Act, is not due to transphobia as TRA claim. It is a direct consequence of the total failure of policy makers to comply with the Nolan Principles.

[somebrightmorning]

I am pretty sure that the Dentons authors were not high-up in Dentons (you can be a partner without much real clout).

I suspect that there was a meeting where someone who matters was asked to approve a document about "LGBT" rights and said "sure".

Thinking it wouldn't be controversial......