HCPC collecting diversity data and have 'forgotten' to ask about sex.

[CircleofWillis]

I have just taken part in a major survey on diversity by the HCPC. It asked me in detail about my age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender and trans status but didn't ask a single question about my sex. How is that reasonable or responsible? How on earth can they publish the findings and consider it to be comprehensive? The confounding variable of gender tells them nothing at all about the distribution of women vs men but they will be able to tell you all about trans women vs trans men and non binary people. This is shocking and utterly ridiculous!

The only saving grace is that the word "cis" did not make an appearance.

[quote TalkingtoLangClegintheDark]How can they make this statement and then completely ignore the possibility of sex based challenges? It really is shocking and indefensible.

You might want to look at this thread... makes some sense of the nonsense:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4169150-Pseudo-realities-Power-and-Language-Games[/quote]
Thank you for the link. I'm still thinking about the ideas in the quotes that these pseudo realities are driven by states of mental unwellness at their core. But they are spread and maintained by well meaning converts who do not necessarily wholly believe but are carried along on the wave. (Have I understood that correctly?)

This quote from the thread resonated with me.

Pseudo-realities are always social fictions, which, in light of the above, means political fictions. That is, they are maintained not because they are true, in the sense that they correspond to reality, either material or human, but because a sufficient quantity of people in the society they attack either believe them or refuse to challenge them.

I would add to that there is a state between believing and refusing to challenge that many of the people I know exist in. They don't truly believe in the pseudo reality and they are not against it so have no need to challenge. Instead,

1. They are benefitting socially from adopting what is currently seen as the moral position.
2. They are benefitting mentally by seeing themselves as moral crusaders against dark forces.
3. They are experiencing visceral enjoyment at having a clearly sanctioned enemy to oppose (how can you be a superhero without an evil to combat?)
4. They are gaining approbation from a tribe with whom they are happy to be affiliated.
5. Both organisations and individuals are avoiding being cast out and vilified alongside the sanctioned enemy by actively aligning themselves with the pseudo reality.

I think that I am finding all of this so hard to accept as I believe most people subscribing to this particular pseudo reality are in the third group. They do not truly believe and know they do not believe but are going along with it for any or all of the reasons I have listed.

At what stage does this group stop and start to consider the long term damage of individual actions?

At what stage does this group stop and start to consider the long term damage of individual actions? I can only think of what has happened in the past. Once fear is broken down, so that the vilified group (GC women e.g.) starts to be heard, there seems to be a gradual process back to the middle ground. The issue is, that if society at large starts to back the vilified group (as now) the pendulum can swing too far.

In a similar note, the College of Paramedics has published their belonging and inclusion strategy, but it declares gender instead of sex as a protected characteristic

collegeofparamedics.co.uk/COP/News/launch_of_the_college_of_paramedics_belonging_and_inclusion_strategy_2021.aspx

It is ridiculous isn't it.

Given the way that Covid affects one sex more than the other it's important information to collect.

Even our bloody risk assessment at work ( healthcare) had gender....how can you effectively assess risk if you don't look at the correct variable ( yes I did point it out but nothing has changed).

On a positive note but not related to this survey, am very pleased to see the form we use to enter our lateral flow results asks for sex, and its NHS.