GRA Reform, Legal Self Declaration, has no effect on access to spaces

[ool0n]

I'm wondering given the recent convincing defeat of gender critical ideology in the high court vs EHRC - if the Mumsnet gender critical people finally accept the fact that having a GRC has no effect on access to spaces?

People on the other side of the debate like myself have been explaining to GC people on Twitter for years that having a GRC has no effect on access to spaces so their objection to GRA reform is/was unfounded. I/we based this on -

1. English government legal analysis that stated having a GRC has no effect on access to spaces
2. Scottish government legal analysis ... ditto ...
3. The EA 2010 and GA 2004 text
4. The practical impossibility that a BC (Not an ID document) could be of any use in deciding access

now we have

1. Gender critical crowdfunded challenge to EHRC guidance that says having a GRC has no effect on access to spaces. Comprehensively lost, not even passed the very low bar to even be considered for a Judicial Review.

Given this is the case will gender critical people be reevaluating their assertion "Self ID", as in GRA Reform, must be opposed as it effects access to spaces? Trans people have always been able to "Self ID", in the colloquial sense, into men's and women's spaces. So making it easier for trans people to change their birth certificates only helps them, has no effect on GC feminists, and/or cisgender women and spaces.

(I also wonder if there'll be any introspection as to why an obviously incorrect interpretation of the law was able to become so prevalent in gender critical circles. Maybe listen to groups outside of GC circles a bit more?)

@WeeBisom

I saw a video of the Chinese athletes being interviewed, and they totally were men though.

One has been hounded in China too, so much so she's posted pics of herself with ... her baby. "We can always tell"? So much for that scientific gait, facial and voice analysis.

@ool0n

I suspect you didn't read my link. The parallels are very clear.

@ool0n
It's quite clear in this document that the government believes it's legal to treat prisoners who identify as transgender differently depending on whether or not they have a GRC. Have they also misunderstood the law?

www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-care-and-management-of-individuals-who-are-transgender

From the government document about trans prisoners:
all individuals who are transgender must be initially allocated to part of the estate which matches their legally recognised gender

So a male with a GRC will be initially allocated to the female estate and a male who identifies as a transwoman but has no GRC will be sent to a male prison.

@ool0n are you arguing that the judge in the Ann Sinnott case has ruled that this difference in treatment is unlawful? Do you think that all male prisoners who identify as transgender should be in women's prisons, or that none of them should, if they all have to be treated the same regardless of GRC status?

I really think this is so sad.

Most people out there don’t know that transwomen in 90% of the cases keeps their penises. And that many are attracted to women. That is something we need a huge amount of sunlight on.

The fact some post here and appears to enjoy the thought of these people with penises in female spaces will hopefully make more women realise what’s going on.

I think that another point is that the spaces the women here are concerned about are the spaces where there are vulnerable women. Prisons, mental health wards.

We are also concerned about female sports.

And young girls forced to share toilets (or changing rooms) with people with penises if those people say that they are women. It is hugely embarrassing for a young girl who just have got her period to change a pad even surrounded by biological girls. To do that around people with penises who never will understand how traumatic a first period can be is just...awful. And then you have people like Jessica Yaniv who really makes me beyond uncomfortable and that also needs to out there in the open.

But fundamentally, the women on this board are unlikely to have to share their spaces with biological males.

We are unlikely to end up in prison or mental health wards.

Sometimes I wonder if that is why some posters are here arguing with us and trying to silence us? Because there is no way anyone on this board would stand for any intrusion in real life.

Ool0n, I see this thread is still going with the same arguments as always. Has your question in the OP been answered that no, women will not accept people of the opposite sex in their single sex facilities and sports and we will keep objecting and demonstrating the risks and providing facts why this is unfair and mistreatment of women.

The answer is a simple 'no'. And the more you disregard our boundaries, the more we will pushback.

That’s why the debate always, always has to be dragged back into the toilets, because that’s the only female space that can realistically be said to have “always had transwomen in it”.

By exception. By courtesy. With discomfort.

It’s quite a weird way to try to gain greater acceptance for a population by encouraging them to shout “fuck you, you never had any rights anyway!”, but hey, you do you, I suppose.

But no, it is not true to say that women have never had single sex spaces because transwomen have always been in them. Sport, prisons, hospital wards, rape crisis centres. Single sex. Set up on the assumption that sex meant something, and unfortunately that has left them vulnerable to an extent, because until very recently, the idea that swathes of society would declare that the categories of male and female were porous to this extent just didn’t exist.

It’s too early to say that any side of the debate here has “won”, because the terms of the debate are just being set by cases like this. So do go ahead and yuck it up on Twitter. Just don’t be surprised when women wake up and go “eh? What? I thought single sex spaces were part of the deal. That IS what I want, so let’s make that happen”.

Ooh I know! Let's do away with birth certificates and GRCs and replace them with photos of people holding a baby.

“As much as GCs would love to make out that bearded men are wandering around shouting "I'M A LADY" and demanding to get into breast feeding areas, that isn't actually happening in real life.”

But it is. My SIL is unable to use the women’s toilets in one of her work buildings because a male bodied person who identifies as a woman uses it. HR have said that there’s nothing they can do. Fortunately, SIL has access to another facility, but that isn’t the case for everyone.

@ool0n Your post directed at me reveals how little you have understood this debate. So I would ask respectfully that you read what I have to say with an open mind and resist running to Twitter to post screengrabs.

The whole point of the post is that it doesn't affect you, GRA reform was never going to. The "big lie" of the gender critical movement has been exposed by You are looking at a very small piece of a very big picture. The pushback is not just about the GRA - it is about the way that lobbyists have very rapidly been able to dismantle women's rights to single sex spaces, often through peddling inaccurate information. In order to counteract this, it is important to work out what exactly the GRC is used for. This is not the end of the debate it is only the beginning. We are seeing that single sex provision has been introduced by stealth and we need to sort this out.

Yes I laughed at the ridiculously sexist idea that men and women have such different gaits you can "sex" them from it.
Well I laugh at your ignorance. Has it not occurred to you that women are better at working out who is male than men are? This is evolution 101. Moreover, if you had looked into this even a bit you would have found that there are actually classes running which teach TW (among other things) how to walk to seem more female. I wonder why they would do that if there were no difference in gait? Frankly, you can also notice this by just looking at ten people walking along the street. It is not our fault that you are so unobservant.

I also laughed at the absurd idea that a pile of cremated @oolon atoms has an "immutable sex" Well you cherry-picked part of that whole discussion to make it seem absurd. What was actually said was that sex does not change. You are born one sex and that never changes throughout your life. Which is true.

You absolutely have the right to assert your own boundaries, but if those boundaries involve telling marginalised groups of people they can't use public spaces they've always used then that's going to be a problem What you are seeing is a problem caused by men. Yes, we did used to share some of our spaces with transexuals - which seem to be the only people you are advocating for. Why's that? Now that TW includes anyone who self-declares the consequences are more serious. Apparently you have two daughters. Answer me this: would you be happy for your daughter to go into a public toilet if you had just seen a man walk in or would you be worried for her safety? If not, why not? If you would do it without a problem - did you know that most women have been sexually assaulted in some way?

Has it ever occurred to you that we are not arguing about this to be mean or because we love a good debate but because we realise that there are actually consequences for us and for our daughters?

You absolutely have the right to assert your own boundaries, but if those boundaries involve telling marginalised groups of people they can't use public spaces they've always used then that's going to be a problem

Imagine being so self righteous that you’re unaware of the irony here.

@SunsetBeetch

Ooh I know! Let's do away with birth certificates and GRCs and replace them with photos of people holding a baby.

Yes, and if it isn't posted on Twitter within 48 hours then it didn't happen.

This is a thread I link a lot on Twitter, butch women are often abused for looking "male", maybe reinforcing that view isn't a good strategy for a movement that purports to want to break down gendered stereotypes?
twitter.com/kirstylogan/status/1144709581437833217

What really strikes me here is how backwards you have got this. This woman looks ...like a woman. In fact she looks similar to me, albeit younger, and I have never had anyone suggest I am not a woman! I wouldn't even say she looks particularly "butch" whatever that means. Feminists are saying that women are adult human females. That's it. There is no particular way you have to dress to be a woman. It is the gender ideologists that are pushing the idea that being a woman is all about presenting as feminine.

@SunsetBeetch

Ooh I know! Let's do away with birth certificates and GRCs and replace them with photos of people holding a baby.

First born females missing out on a peerage could show a photo showing no baby to prove they are actually male and therefore worthy.