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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Chair of LGBT APPG complains that deals worked out behind the scenes not adhered too

251 replies

Kit19 · 23/09/2020 10:33

“In privately agreeing a way forward with the wider LGBT+ lobby both in parliament & outside”

Nice to have it confirmed that this was all being sewn up behind closed doors

Chair of LGBT APPG complains that deals worked out behind the scenes not adhered too
OP posts:
CharlieParley · 25/09/2020 00:08

Every time someone says we should centre women in our thinking and other groups can take care of themselves they are making the argument for other groups to take the same approach.

Yes, and why is that wrong? Besides, that's not quite the argument we are making. We are saying that we should centre women in the women's rights movement in response to the ludicrous claims that if our feminism doesn't include fighting for the rights of males who identify as trans it's not feminism. Our argument is that feminism should centre women and males who identify as trans should have their own rights movement.

But if they are going to lobby for a particular right for men, because having thought about it they think it would be good for them or solve some problem men have, they need to be considering what the wider effects of that policy would be. If it would mean more children in poverty for example, or less recourse for domestic abuse, or create bias in career hiring, that's a problem and they maybe should consider that their idea is unfair, however good it is for men as a group.

Rights movements, whoever they centre, have only one function: to advocate for the needs and rights of the particular group of people they focus on. The Royal Association for Deaf people has no obligation whatsoever to consider what impact something they are calling for has on others, not even other protected groups. They can legitimately draw up policies they'd like to be implemented and focus entirely on deaf people.

I think your example is probably not working too well, because men as a class are the default that underlies policymaking. In our patriarchal societies they are an oppressor class. Those campaigning for the rights of the oppressed have to fight to be considered at all. Any additional rights or privileges implemented for the benefit of men would in all likelihood negatively impact on others, which is why we would expect them to consider the impact on disadvantaged groups. But they wouldn't. No oppressor class does.

However it does not follow that campaigners for the oppressed or disadvantaged can only legitimately advocate for their needs after considering the impact on all others, which would then obviously also include the oppressor class.

For starters, it would make effective advocacy all but impossible - most of these groups are run by volunteers with no funding. They also often understand only one issue deep down to the minutest detail as well as the latest developments - their own. Often they genuinely cannot even know what the impact on other groups would be.

That is why it is vitally important that all organisations and groups who advocate for protected groups are allowed to publicly make their case and to take part in any debate that arises where rights may come into conflict. Because then one campaign group's proposal would be reviewed by other groups who might respond by highlighting any negative impact on them and maybe making alternative proposals.

And that is why it is vitally important that we have a legal framework - the Equality Act 2010 - which helps policymakers and legislators to consider the merits and drawbacks of any policy proposals or legal reform proposals put before them by campaigners.

Of course, sometimes the system fails us, but that's not because campaign groups focus on their own campaign. That's what happens when only one side is allowed to campaign freely and given access to policymakers and legislators. As happened here.

We wouldn't be any more successful, only less, if we couldn't simply point to the negative impact on us of their proposals, if we couldn't simply advocate for what we need instead of having to do the heavy lifting for the other side as well. It's not our job to find solutions to the problems males who identify as trans have because of how other males treat them. It's theirs.

Our job is to stand up for women.

Goosefoot · 25/09/2020 00:27

CharleyParley

Actually in my experience 9 times out of 10 on this board when someone tells someone else that they aren't centering women, it's not because they are saying feminists need to advocate for anyone else. It's because they have suggested that some idea being proposed would have unacceptable results for other people.

I haven't suggested a need for people to be experts on everything. I am saying that if people really think it is ok for advocacy groups to pursue policies that are only good for their group, and will be detrimental to others, and to not care about that, they have zero reason to complain about the types of policies trans advocates ask for, or men's rights people, or any other group that clearly doesn't care about the rights or needs of others. That is exactly what they should be doing.

CharlieParley · 25/09/2020 02:04

I'm not equating advocating for your own group's needs without first considering every possible impact on countless groups with

a) not caring about any actual negative impacts happening to others and

b) negative impacts on others always outweighing the needs of your own group so that we must abandon our aim and

c) negative impacts on your own group of not meeting your needs being outweighed by negative impacts on others.

I'm not sure why you do? Especially because that isn't what has happened in the context of this debate. And especially because when we navigate this debate, we have always acknowledged that some people do need special protections and have suggested a whole range of alternative solutions to give them that protection. To no avail.

There are legitimate reasons for looking at the potential negative impact on others and going ahead anyway, especially with a framework like the Equality Act 2010 to help us minimise the negative impact.

I mean the whole thing is just full of situations where protecting one group has a negative impact on others. But it's carefully limited where and when that is allowed, and there are plenty of circumstances where a group negatively impacted on in one situation is negatively impacting on that group (or another) in the next situation.

Things are rarely straightforward when it comes to exercising your rights. And we're not operating in the Wild West where we get to just do and take and damn the consequences. We're here, advocating for our rights, yes, and regardless of whether we consider negative impacts or not, we do not just get to do and take what we want. We still have to work within the law, and when it comes to policies or laws, there are people whose job it is to consider if there are possible negative impacts and who then consider what to do about it.

Maybe I'm simply not getting your point, but after having been involved in the defence of our rights, I can tell you that we have been most successful when we focused entirely on explaining the needs of women and girls and asserting our rights without engaging in any sort of discussion about the needs of the other side. Because then you get bogged down in various interest groups having various arguments raging in their community. You inevitably offend some of them, whatever you do or say. And the focus is, once again, not on the rights and needs of female people but on males who identify as trans.

Allowing the focus in a women's rights campaigners to rest on the needs of males is counterproductive in my view. We get little enough time to make our case, we need it to spend it on us.

CharlieParley · 25/09/2020 02:06

Allowing the focus in a women's rights campaign to rest on the needs of males is counterproductive in my view. We get little enough time to make our case, we need to spend it on us.

(My last paragraph corrected)

ChattyLion · 25/09/2020 08:23

There is a real balancing act required in looking at special interest groups particular needs and balancing them with those of others.

Goosefoot I agree with this. Which means it needs to be done fairly and transparently. Fair consideration doesn’t prejudice any particular outcome and it takes into account the quality of arguments and information that are given and it scrutinises them with other views also considered in public on the record. APPGs are specific interest groups and that’s one thing, but anything that civil servants or regulators like EHRC or MPs touch on the floor of the house or in committee or in response to lobbying* must be done with probity and that’s why regulatory/institutional capture is such a worry.

*including lobbying from APPGs who usually have a secretariat run by an external group like a charity or a public affairs company and the content of the meetings are provided by external stakeholders to Parliament to inform MPs. Nothing wrong with any of that, MPs need to hear things from the horses’ mouth, or the representative groups for horses, but the same scrupulous handling must be given to APPG lobbying of MPs and Peers when it comes to actually making decisions about contested issues.

DickKerrLadies · 25/09/2020 09:22

And yet the LD have told us we must not be bad women & suggest there’s anything like a trans lobby....

Maybe they weren't invited to be part of it?

Like Martin in Cabin Pressure saying that no, there weren't any secret clubs at his school Grin

Kit19 · 27/09/2020 21:41

This is the report the APPG submitted

www.appglgbt.org/news/delivering-respect-and-reassurance-around-trans-equality-in-the-uk

And a thread on the ‘highlights’

twitter.com/stilltish/status/1309957642505392128?s=21

OP posts:
JamieLeeCurtains · 27/09/2020 21:49

[quote Kit19]This is the report the APPG submitted

www.appglgbt.org/news/delivering-respect-and-reassurance-around-trans-equality-in-the-uk

And a thread on the ‘highlights’

twitter.com/stilltish/status/1309957642505392128?s=21[/quote]
Oh my fucking god, the material in that thread .... those poor women in those prisons. What do we do?

CharlieParley · 27/09/2020 21:50

Daft question, but how does that qualify as a report? I read it earlier and thought it was poor, I definitely wouldn't be crowing about it, let alone demand government adhere to its demands. It's what, just over 3000 words, and most of it emotive language, dubious statistics and not a reference in sight.

JamieLeeCurtains · 27/09/2020 21:56

Back in the day, we'd turn to Amnesty International about prison scandals around the world.

Then Amnesty went full pimp.

We need an Amnesty Female International. These female prisoners held against their will with prisoners capable of raping and impregnating them, and being issued with contraceptive pills by the state are political prisoners now, in my view.

That APPG 'report' is an essay in abuse excuse.

Abitofalark · 27/09/2020 23:19

[quote Kit19]This is the report the APPG submitted

www.appglgbt.org/news/delivering-respect-and-reassurance-around-trans-equality-in-the-uk

And a thread on the ‘highlights’

twitter.com/stilltish/status/1309957642505392128?s=21[/quote]
That report is dated 22 September. Where has it come from? I understood there was supposed to be some secret document from earlier, sent to Liz Truss before she and the government decided what to do following the consultation.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 27/09/2020 23:57

From the APPG report

"to allow for proper support to be given to trans people by GIDS, private or NHS, if they are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes."

Why? I can't see any justification for making this controversial service immune from litigation. Surely it should be on a case by case basis? If they're getting it wrong on a regular basis, big questions need to be asked.

Aesopfable · 28/09/2020 00:13

@Ereshkigalangcleg

From the APPG report

"to allow for proper support to be given to trans people by GIDS, private or NHS, if they are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes."

Why? I can't see any justification for making this controversial service immune from litigation. Surely it should be on a case by case basis? If they're getting it wrong on a regular basis, big questions need to be asked.

Experimental medication, surgery with complication rates as high as 90%, lack of evidence, lack of safeguarding, refusal to learn from detransitioners, no counselling prior to life-changing decision, consent to life-changing decisions expected from prepubescent children, treatments which dramatically increase suicide risk and show no benefit, treatments which result on 80% of patients unnecessarily becoming medical patients for life, sterility, sexual dysfunction, reduced IQ, binders which cause harm, teachers encouraged to transition children behind parents backs, no investigation into comorbidities... and now they want the people doing this to be exempt from litigation???

Why are these TRA advocating so much harm and removing all protection from these children?

JamieLeeCurtains · 28/09/2020 00:14

They're unhinged.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 28/09/2020 00:16

I completely agree with both of you.

Cocothefirst · 28/09/2020 06:10

@Ereshkigalangcleg

From the APPG report

"to allow for proper support to be given to trans people by GIDS, private or NHS, if they are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes."

Why? I can't see any justification for making this controversial service immune from litigation. Surely it should be on a case by case basis? If they're getting it wrong on a regular basis, big questions need to be asked.

Perhaps they own shares in a clinic or pharmaceutical company?
PearPickingPorky · 28/09/2020 07:06

@Ereshkigalangcleg

From the APPG report

"to allow for proper support to be given to trans people by GIDS, private or NHS, if they are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes."

Why? I can't see any justification for making this controversial service immune from litigation. Surely it should be on a case by case basis? If they're getting it wrong on a regular basis, big questions need to be asked.

Amazing how, despite thr GIDS admitting this treatment is effectively experimental, and their own report suggesting they were not sure the outcomes were positive, and they have CHOSEN NOT TO follow-up with their patients into adulthood, to properly see the outcome of their "experiment". Surely the whole point of an experiment is to see the outcome?

And now Crispin also wants them to be immune from the legal action as a result of their own negligence too?

What. The. Fuck.

FindTheTruth · 28/09/2020 07:37

if GIDS are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes.

Tactics - hide the truth, minimise exposure, block the sunlight, do back room deals, silence real people's voices, shame people, enact the ideology in secret, get the ideology into law in secret, present critical thinking as cruel,

ChattyLion · 28/09/2020 09:20

Crispin Blunt has some stupid and dangerous ideas. NHS trusts should not be immune from legal action because they are regulated. So patients should never be able to bring a case against anyone providing social care and health care in UK, because the provider is already subject to regulation by CQC. Yeah right.

Datun · 28/09/2020 09:35

to allow for proper support to be given to trans people by GIDS, private or NHS, if they are regulated by the CQC, they should be exempt from litigation from wherever it comes

Quite apart from the odd concept that being unaccountable means you can offer more support, that paragraph just shrieks dodgy vested interest.

Escapeplanning · 28/09/2020 11:57

An anxiety that has been reinforced by a narrowly, but strongly held view, that trans people demanding acceptance is an in-principle contradiction of sex and gender being in the reality the same.

What does trans mean?

“Trans is a general term for people whose gender is different from the gender assigned to them at birth. For example, a trans man is someone that transitioned from woman to man. Trans people do not feel comfortable living as the gender that they were born with. They take serious, life-changing steps to change their gender permanently.” 2018 Government Equalities Office Factsheet, Trans People in the UK. There are an estimated 200,000 to 500,000 trans people in the UK.

Isn't the second paragraph a contradiction of the first? The meaning of the first isn't particularly clear.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 28/09/2020 13:17

Isn't the second paragraph a contradiction of the first? The meaning of the first isn't particularly clear.

Agree, that first paragraph is really poorly written, possibly to obfuscate?

Shedbuilder · 28/09/2020 14:03

Sorry, in a bit of a rush and no time to read back and back and inform myself, but...

This mention of protection against litigation, when was that first written/ voiced? Was it part of the back-room deal Crispin though he'd done with Maria Miller or is that new — just as the law companies start offering clients the opportunity to sue?

Escapeplanning · 28/09/2020 14:40

I expect the protection from litigation is to try to get more surgeons and prescribing clinical staff into the trans area.

MaryBCH · 07/03/2021 18:38

And if it is not an illness, either physical or mental, then there is not an argument in the world that the public should fund any body modification through the NHS. People should save up and pay for it themselves, like they do with a car or a house, if they are so determined to go through with transitioning.