The decision to shelve the guidance was welcomed by groups that believe trans women should not be afforded full women’s rights or be given equal protection from discrimination as lesbian, gay and bisexual people.
Oh ffs.
Running that through the universal bullshit translator, let's actually confront the real issue here.
It is a very sad reality of transition that however a male born and male bodied person perceives themselves, and however much people wish to support the male person's freedom and rights to be themselves, there are limits as to how far this can be taken when female people are in a state of vulnerability and undress.
Female people cannot be compelled to view a male person as not male if this goes against their independent, objective perception, because compelled speech and thought isn't a thing in the UK and shouldn't be.
The distress of female people who may be ill, immobile, undressed, in a state of acute indignity and vulnerability, cannot be waved away on the grounds that the male person's wishes to be in their presence regardless of impact on them is more important. Because the inequality and unfairness of this is blatantly obvious.
The need of female people for female only facilities is unquestioned; it cannot be made conditional on a male patient not wanting to be among female patients for their own needs.
It is perfectly possible to accomodate a male patient away from male wards if this is their choice and preference; such options should be increased. However the right to have identity respected and different accomodation to other males offered when needed does NOT have to automatically equate to removal of right of privacy, dignity and single sex provision for all females, unless this is not about the right to have identity recognised and catered for, but instead about the right to be among females whether or not those females consent. Two different things that should not be conflated.
Stonewall believe that the wishes and feelings of TW should always be held as more important than the needs of any female, and that any female not willing to subordinate their own needs and feelings or any female whose disability, trauma or culture/faith means they cannot do so, should rightfully be warned, if necessary excluded and this should go to the extent of them being refused medical care as punishment for their intransigence.
Let's be honest about the issues here in plain bloody English like grown ups.