Sunday Times: PM to scrap plan to make gender change easier

[HeyBells]

Just seen this on Twitter. Anyone got a sharetoken please?

I am concerned about hate crime in terms of legislation.

The problem with it is it depends entirely on who is in power and who defines it. The possibility of using it against the very people it's supposed to protect is high unfortunately. Purely because its about the power of the censor and who the censor is. That makes it extremely top down in how power is exerted. Which if the system is white and male inadvertently favours white and male. The definition of what misogyny is and isn't make it a particular problem. Together with just how ingrained it is within society and how often people use misogyny without even realising it.

Whilst its good to be having a public discussion and awareness of what it is, I wonder about enforcement and unintended consequences of that with some concern.

The attempt to prosecute Mirander Yardley for transphobia is what sticks in my mind here.

Making the police record Sex based hate crime has been tabled as an amendment tI the Domestic Abuse Bill (amendment 84)
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-53012585

@RedToothBrush

I am concerned about hate crime in terms of legislation.

The problem with it is it depends entirely on who is in power and who defines it. The possibility of using it against the very people it's supposed to protect is high unfortunately. Purely because its about the power of the censor and who the censor is. That makes it extremely top down in how power is exerted. Which if the system is white and male inadvertently favours white and male. The definition of what misogyny is and isn't make it a particular problem. Together with just how ingrained it is within society and how often people use misogyny without even realising it.

Whilst its good to be having a public discussion and awareness of what it is, I wonder about enforcement and unintended consequences of that with some concern.

The attempt to prosecute Mirander Yardley for transphobia is what sticks in my mind here.

Agreed. I'm also concerned about how it would be defined and whether we will see women prosecuted for misogynistic 'hate crime' against men who have identities other than man.

@nettie434

Here we are EyesOpening

www.gov.uk/government/consultations/reform-of-the-gender-recognition-act-2004

I'm glad you asked this because after reading about all the pro reformers insisting that the 70:30 split means reform must take place, I see there were a total of 53k responses. Yes, that's a lot for a consultation (but we know why replies were artificially inflated), but it's not a democratic mandate for a country of 60 odd million people.

Hi thank you for replying and the link, I can’t seem to find what I’m looking for on there though. I read people saying there were proposals such as only having to live as the gender you want to be for 3 months instead of 2 years, could anyone help me please. Also I’d be grateful to see what others put in their letters to MPs to give me ideas on mine. On that link though, I saw something that got me thinking “ When we are born, our parents say that we are either male or female. This is recorded on our birth certificate” so I could have said my child was female when he was male?

EyesOpening
The changes being considered are in the consultation document here, starting on p30:
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/721725/GRA-Consultation-document.pdf

On that link though, I saw something that got me thinking “ When we are born, our parents say that we are either male or female. This is recorded on our birth certificate” so I could have said my child was female when he was male?

It's a long time since I had a baby so I can't remember whether there is any proof of birth you have to present at the register office. I don't think so because my last 2 were home births so no hospital records (unless the community midwives gave me something that recorded sex).

In theory perhaps yes, you could turn up with a newborn and register it in the opposite sex to reality. Nobody could tell just by looking at a clothed newborn and it isn't a requirement that mother or baby be present (if married). My DH registered the last two on his own.

Maybe the register office never considered the possibility that any new parents would lie - and it's likely nobody has as yet but you never quite know now!

Anyone had a baby more recently and can remember if evidence is required on registering a birth?

I would suspect once the register office has experience of a muppet trying that boundary it will be tightened as needed.

But it affirms, yet again, sex is a fact and everybody knows it and lives around it, save for very specific situations where everyone must pretend that it doesn't. (While still acting according to it.)

It’s been a long old while since I registered a baby but I seem to recall the red book having some significance?

@DuDuDuLangaLangaBingBong

It’s been a long old while since I registered a baby but I seem to recall the red book having some significance?

Perhaps that was it. It strikes me there must be some form of proof otherwise anyone could register a fictitious person for the purpose of all manner of fraud.

Yes, and there must be some kind of system that makes it very hard for newborns to be disappeared between birth and registration.

Like, if you don’t register in the allotted time frame there must be a way for that to be flagged to child protection?

I would suspect once the register office has experience of a muppet trying that boundary it will be tightened as needed.

Hmmm. IF ONLY there was a quick and easy way to check this biological fact...

@DuDuDuLangaLangaBingBong

Yes, and there must be some kind of system that makes it very hard for newborns to be disappeared between birth and registration.

Like, if you don’t register in the allotted time frame there must be a way for that to be flagged to child protection?

Yes that's true. You have 6 weeks to register a birth so there has to be some safeguards built in.

I am concerned about hate crime in terms of legislation.

Me too. Let's not add to the mess it has become. Focus on proper investigation, prosecution and sentencing.
As for hate 'incidents', I'm not desperate to report people for posting rude poetry about women.

It pisses me off that MPs and orgs like Women's Aid find time for this while staying silent on the erasure of women year in year out.

It's only been two years for me but the memory is still hazy... I think we had a piece of paper from the hospital which included date and time of birth and sex which we had to take to register DS?

The first 6 weeks after giving birth are a hazy time!

I think that bit of paper used fo be part of the red book, and now that the red book is a digital thing rather than an actual object, you get the paper (the paper records the facts of the birth, date, location, mother’s name, baby’s sex, time of birth for twins and multiples, maybe an NHS number for the baby)?

Been trying to google but I don’t suppose it would be a good thing to explain the entire system as that could make it easier for nefarious people to find the weakest spots!

I've been out of midwifery for a long time, but the midwives send an electronic birth notification which does include the sex of the baby.

I can't remember what happens when you go along to register the birth it having been twenty odd years but I assume the registrar ties up your details with the birth notification sent by the hospital.

What happens if someone fails to register the birth in the requisite six weeks I have no idea.

@Musicforsmorks

So, yal’ll tory friends again now.

Don't Labour, the Lib Dems and SNP want to be friends to women, children and gender dysphoric trans people (yes, the sort of trans people who can actually get a GRC because they qualify under the terms laid out in a law. If other people want to qualify legally as the opposite sex, let them get a law passed... or can't they get that into law? )?

Years ago I worked in an office issuing red books and recording health visitors works and vaccinations
We got the birth lists from hospitals and issued the books from that. I'm sure it's more high tech now but I imagine a similar process

I'm struggling to remember exact details but I had my youngest child at home and our rural district doesn't have a hospital.

I think we had to provide details to the registrars ahead of the appt so that they could be cross referenced with hospital data.

Edit. By hospital data i meant that provided by community midwives too.

Just asked DH and we definitely had a piece of paper from the hospital to take to the registrar along with our marriage cert and passports.

DS has a physical red book (didn't know they were online now!) which we were also given in hospital, along with his NHS number, both of which we had to take to register him with the GP. The registrars paper was separate, but in the same bundle.

Midwives and HVs all knew he'd been born so someone at the hospital obviously does a wodge of paperwork. I assume this would include notifying whichever authority would come chasing had he not been registered in time?

@ChazsBrilliantAttitude I'm catching up on the last day or so's posts. I emailed amnesty. What a crock

I recently looked at the ID bracelet things that they put on my children and it states their sex, although this was a long time ago, so I assume they must cross-reference it as they do contact you if you haven't registered the birth within the 6 weeks. I read about some celebrity not doing so, fairly recently and it said they had been contacted. I just thought it was a strange thing to put on a governmental document, it was more like from a children's book!

[quote OldCrone]EyesOpening
The changes being considered are in the consultation document here, starting on p30:
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/721725/GRA-Consultation-document.pdf[/quote]
Thank you OldCrone