Maya Forstater’s appeal - discussion thread 2

[Sophoclesthefox]

I see the last thread filled up, but there might still be enough to discuss as a round up of the afternoon’s events to keep going into a second thread.

Thread one here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4228233-Maya-Forstaters-appeal-skeleton

R0wantrees
Sorry if I wasn’t being clear. I am not saying there isn’t a problem in practice with the conflation of sex and gender in the NHS. There clearly is a massive issue. What I am saying is that if this case and others following make it clear that legally the word sex means sex not gender then having a policy that requires single-sex accommodation will have to mean sex not gender because the legal distinction is increasingly clear. They will be in clear and express breach of their own policy because it will be difficult for them to argue sex really means gender when the courts say legally it doesn’t. It may then open up additional recourse via the PSED if they are trying to redefine a protected characteristic in a way that disadvantages those who hold that characteristic.

Thank you R0 I have read it and it is very useful.

@Anovaneway

Because we have to derail into ridiculous hyperbolic situations whenever possible in order to paint Maya and all those who hold GC beliefs as the devil incarnate.

No ‘we’ don’t and I don’t think Maya is the devil. It’s to highlight the unpleasantness in those that would seek to use protected belief as a cover for deliberately misgendering people and preventing people from using the facilities they are allowed to use and getting on with their lives.

You are confusing holding a belief and manifestation of the belief. Not believing in gay marriage is a protected belief. Telling gay people in your workplace they are not really married is a manifestation of the belief which is harrasment which isnt allowed. But you are allowed to discuss your beliefs with others. The fact that gay people might strongly object to them is immaterial - there is no right not to be offended.

You cannot compel others to share your beliefs, thats a basic tenet of a free society or we're back to Catholics burning Protestants.

ChazsBrilliantAttitude I understood and completely agree.

Could I just check my understanding of the EA2010 in relation to gender and sex.

So sex is sex at birth unless subsequently changed by a GRC.
Gender reassignment is a loosely defined property which people may be deemed to have if they have entered on or intend to start on a process of transition.

EHRC have confirmed that they consider the appropriate comparator for a person with the pc of gender reassignment and without a GRC to be a person of the same (birth) sex who does not have the pc of gender reassignment. I.e. unless you have a GRC your sex is still your birth sex.

The exceptions that allow you to discriminate on sex in order to provide single sex spaces generally refer to sex. Which on the face of it means letting in anyone with a GRC.
There are further exceptions that allow you to additionally discriminate by gender reassignment status in the case of people with a GRC in order to exclude them from single sex spaces if deemed to be proportionate to achieve a legitimate aim.
Legitimate aims are stated to include where it would be expected to have a single sex space for privacy & dignity, and sport.

There is no obvious exception that allows you to discriminate by gender identity and have a single /gender/ space; gender identity isn't even defined. Any definition of gender would involve more than two options so trying to offer single gender spaces would present additional challenges. Single gender spaces are in any case unenforceable because someone's gender at any given moment is whatever they say it is.

There is no protected characteristic of gender identity, there is also no definition legal or otherwise of gender identity.

A GRC provides a legal fiction which allows people who meet the criteria to obtain one to change the sex marker on their Birth Certificate, however, a GRC still comes with restrictions regarding single sex spaces and services and in those cases biological sex is the defining criteria not legal sex. The law treats sex as biological and binary as confirmed by the EHRC.

unless you have a GRC your sex is still your birth sex correct, yet this is deliberately misrepresented by certain groups with an agenda in order for it to be ignored, it needs to be enforced.

The GRA and EqA are not well written laws, hence the current mess.

People are still the sex they were born, they are entitled to get a new certificate with the GRA "recognised" gender where birth sex normally goes.

Am I right, some are saying that if Maya wins, then any organisation that states 'sex' must mean biological sex and not conflate the two. However, the law as pointed out by the EHRC is that sex is biological and gender is social, therefore the conflation of the two is not lawful, therefore it stands without Maya's case? Maya's case just adds clarity in this instance. In which case, the NHS et al are acting outside the EA

@Scepticaltank

People are still the sex they were born, they are entitled to get a new certificate with the GRA "recognised" gender where birth sex normally goes.

I've never understood this. Their birth certificate is actually amended to the sex of their choosing? What an absolute farce.

Yes, that's why they pass it off as "birth certificate admin, nothing to see here".

Does anyone know, does the name on the birth certificate get changed, or just the sex marker?

So much for it being illegal to give false information on a birth certificate. Now you can literally write your own.
This is mystifying to me.

I wonder how the GRC process compares with the process for gaining a new identity through witness protection or similar, in terms of regulation and administrative hoops.

@Ereshkigalangcleg

Does anyone know, does the name on the birth certificate get changed, or just the sex marker?

Both

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AimeeChallenorrShortFormmBirth_Certificate.jpg

Most people's birth certificate and passport where the field is sex correctly have female or male as per their biological/"real sex"

Some people instead have replaced their biological/ "real sex" with their aquired 'gender identity' which unfortunately is also described in the same words 'female' or 'male' but with completely different meanings

The government compounds the confusion by enabling some people's documents to mean something completely different whilst failing to make explicit the fact that this is the case.

Name, DOB and sex are primary attributes.

UKGov
What is identity
An identity is a combination of ‘attributes’ (characteristics) that belong to a person.

A single attribute is not usually enough to tell one person apart from another, but a combination of attributes might be.

Why you should check someone’s identity
The number of identities being used to commit identity fraud in the UK is growing every year. Some of the most common reasons people or criminal groups commit identity fraud are to:

access services they’re not entitled to
get benefits they’re not entitled to
steal personal, medical or financial information from other identities
enable organised crime, like human trafficking
avoid being detected by the police and other authorities
You could be affected by identity fraud if you do not check someone’s identity. This includes being targeted by someone:

using a ‘synthetic’ (made up) identity
who is pretending to be someone else (an ‘impostor’)
Synthetic identities can be fictional or based on a real identity. For example, someone who gives a false date of birth to access a gambling site is using a synthetic identity, even if their other details are correct." (continues)

www.gov.uk/government/publications/identity-proofing-and-verification-of-an-individual/how-to-prove-and-verify-someones-identity

@highame

Am I right, some are saying that if Maya wins, then any organisation that states 'sex' must mean biological sex and not conflate the two. However, the law as pointed out by the EHRC is that sex is biological and gender is social, therefore the conflation of the two is not lawful, therefore it stands without Maya's case? Maya's case just adds clarity in this instance. In which case, the NHS et al are acting outside the EA

And Stonewall has been going around spreading deliberate disinformation to the NHS and many other public bodies. I can't imagine they're thrilled with the EHRC statement.

How involved have Stonewall been in this case — do we know? They've lost in the Bell case, they lost on the census and I imagine they're looking at Allison Bailey's case and panicking. How long before someone in authority decides to start asking serious questions about what they've been up to?

serious questions about what they've been up to?

I wonder what it would take for the Charities Commission to have a quiet word or expression of mild concern?

There an ongoing project called project nettie which is a statement signed by many accredited scientists and medical professionals stating that humans are a sexually dimorphic species and sex is immutable

projectnettie.wordpress.com/

"Why ‘Project Nettie’? Sex chromosomes were, in 1905, discovered by a female geneticist called Nettie Stevens. We hope, in some small way, to honour her achievements.

The Project Nettie statement: “Biological sex” is a scientific description of the reproductive anatomies that have evolved to fulfil the function of sexual reproduction. Biological sex exists independently of humans and society. In mammals, there are two types of gamete and two classes of reproductive anatomy. The male sex class produces many small motile gametes – sperm – for transfer. The female sex class produces few large immobile gametes – ova – and gestates/delivers live young. In any individual, reproductive anatomy is almost always unambiguously male or female and observed correctly at birth, regardless of ultimate sexual function or dysfunction. Male and female reproductive anatomies differ qualitatively, not quantitatively, and there are no intrinsically-ordered states between male and female reproductive anatomies. Biological sex does not meet the defining criteria for a spectrum. Although rare, some individuals have disorders of sex development (also referred to as intersex conditions). Most of these disorders are male or female specific and do not cause ambiguous biological sex. Some individuals have reproductive anatomies with both male and female features; here, biological sex classification is a complex process with input from medical professionals and parents. Not one of these individuals represents an additional sex class. Reproductive anatomies differentiate and mature under the control of genetic and hormonal signals, and measurements of these factors have strong predictive power, but do not define the sex of an individual. Biological sex is fundamentally defined by male and female reproductive anatomy. Attempts to recast biological sex as a social construct, which then becomes a matter of chosen individual identity, are wholly ideological, scientifically inaccurate and socially irresponsible."

How involved have Stonewall been in this case — do we know?

I've not seen any evidence of them being directly involved. But their fingerprints are all over it.

The Equal Treatment Bench Book was repeatedly referred to by the original judge, and CGD in this hearing.

Quick search shows Stonewall's name appearing 27 times in that as references.

www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Equal-Treatment-Bench-Book-February-2021-1.pdf

They're not credited with hands-on input, so any resemblance between the contents of that document and Stonewall's views could be coincidental.

For comparison, Fawcett gets 3 references.

It might be interesting to try a bar chart to see how many references there are for organisations representing each of the protected characteristics.

They're not credited with hands-on input, so any resemblance between the contents of that document and Stonewall's views could be coincidental.

This is the difficulty when people/organisations outsource the expertise and responsibility for something without performing due diligence to check it.

outsource the expertise and responsibility

Well, in this case it's error on top of error - not only is the document itself not sound, they shouldn't even be referring to it!

It's guidelines for running courts, not fucking law!

The HR department doesn't make law, the government does!

This is a general Woke thing though - get into those support functions and disrupt normal power flows and procedures to get what you want without proper consultation or broad support.

How long before someone in authority decides to start asking serious questions?

Baroness Nicholson is apparently working on a public enquiry into the capture that has happened. She says she has loads of superb people 'on standby', and replied to someone that looking into lobbying especially is 'very important'.

I really hope she can make it happen 🤞

The Equal Treatment Bench Book was repeatedly referred to by the original judge, and CGD in this hearing.

Times
1st April 2021
'Victoria McCloud, a transgender judge, wants a more diverse judiciary
The Queen’s Bench Master marks international transgender day of visibility by encouraging trans lawyers to consider becoming judges'
(extract)
"McCloud, who has now spent almost half her life and virtually all of her legal career as a woman, says: “ I positively identify as female and always have .” She has “slightly reluctantly” taken to using terms such as “trans” or “transgender” when the context makes it necessary, accepting her “duty to be willing to be somewhat visible”.
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/victoria-mccloud-a-transgender-judge-wants-a-more-diverse-judiciary-jc7rqhbc9

Times list - Women of the Year 2020.
Victoria McCloud
Judge
"In a ruling published online in February, the High Court judge demonstrated the importance of representation, as Britain’s most senior public figure to have transitioned from male to female stood up for trans rights in a meaningful way. Hailed as a pioneer by equality campaigners, McCloud, 51, argued that the process of changing your name by deed poll needed “close attention” to ensure that trans people are not being outed against their will. (continues)
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/women-of-the-year-2020-jp770mptk?region=global&ni-statuscode=acsaz-307

Oxford Law Faculty
Victoria McCloud
"Headlines: 70s six year old meets mainframe and teleprinter. Becomes 80s geek game-coding trans nerd, then 90s neural net, distributed learning and cell simulation obsessive. Turns AI/brain researcher, millennial lawyer, author and judge but with feet (and other peripherals) still planted in academic things, the internet and the future of humanity.

Associate Fellow, Global Network on Extremism and Technology, GNET, King's College University of London.
Affiliate of the CSLS Swiss Re Programme for Civil Justice Systems
Expert Advisor, All Party Parliamentary Group on Artificial Intelligence
Judge, Master of the Senior Courts Queen's Bench Division
Law Faculty Athena SWAN website committee, Oxford
Equal Treatment Bench Book committee, HM Judiciary
One of the 100 Women (1919-2019) in the First 100 Years exhibit and archive
Chartered Psychologist of the British Psychological Society (BPS)
Chartered Psychologist of the Psychological Society of Ireland (PsSI)
International affiliate member of the American Psychological Association (APA)
Core interests: Law and Artificial Intelligence, Social Media Regulation, Ethical Business Regulation, Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and sustainable development especially in technological contexts.(continues)
www.law.ox.ac.uk/people/victoria-mccloud

relevant thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4208155-The-Times-Law-section-Thursday-1st-April-Trans-judge-wants-a-more-diverse-judiciary