Irish Government to amend Equality Act

[saltedcaramelchocolate]

www.gov.ie/en/press-release/24864-minister-ogorman-announces-review-of-the-equality-acts/

“The review will include the existing Programme for Government commitments on the introduction of a socio-economic ground for discrimination and the amendment of the gender ground
My understanding is that the gender ground is to be amended to include gender identity or to be replaced to simply be gender identity.
Public consultation to start at any time, presumably TENI and NWCI will be involved

Oof, that sounds worrying.

Oh dear, this is not looking good. Remember how they snuck in the Self ID law without anybody noticing. Surely this won't happen again now that people are aware of where this is going.

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

This is really bad news, worried and scared for the women and girls in Ireland.

I have no problem with legislation being amended to ensure the people are not discriminated against on the grounds of their gender identity.

In an ideal world, people would not be discriminated against on the grounds of how they present themselves, but lets face it, if you have a certain accent/address/mode of dressing/ presence-or-absence of tattoos, that will work against you.

The groups facing most discrimination in Irish society are women, Travellers, and people with disabilities.
I suspect that people coming from New Irish backgrounds will increasingly feature, as we're not making a good hand of integrating people from other countries and cultures.

The notion (and I mean it in the whimsical sense) that someone who believes they can change their actual biological sex, should be prioritised over any of those groups, increasingly just gives me ire.

I think it will make little difference. With self-id enacted, and all political parties completely in favour, there is already no protection on the grounds of sex.

Women, as usual, are bottom of the pile in Ireland.

What I find mind-boggling is the lack of anyone speaking up from the medical point of view. Again, with self-id so legally accepted, why the encouragement of young people to change their bodies?

I really hope that in the end, those in charge at TENI and those in the medical profession happy to carry out experimental treatment on children will realise what they have done and have to live with the consequences. I have no hope of a proper punishment - a tribunal in 20 years will use a lot of words like "sadly" and "in hindsight" and "best practice at the time".

@Cailin66

Oh dear, this is not looking good. Remember how they snuck in the Self ID law without anybody noticing. Surely this won't happen again now that people are aware of where this is going.

Are people aware? I recall a media blackout on Barbie Kardashian. Most will not be aware, because most of the media ensures that it remains that way.

Ireland and Scotland - I grieve for you both with what is happening to the women and who else is being neglected in this push to prioritise some groups over others rather than address the yawning chasm of need of very vulnerable people.

What I find mind-boggling is the lack of anyone speaking up from the medical point of view. Again, with self-id so legally accepted, why the encouragement of young people to change their bodies?

There was a good article in the IT yesterday about the issues around medical treatment for children/teenagers, the implications of the Tavistock ruling and so on. Same week as Jonny Watterson’s piece about Laurel Hubbard… Someone in there is waking up.

www.justice.ie/en/jelr/pages/wp15000117
This is the current of interpretation of gender equality in the Equality Act. While the word gender is used it appears sex is the interpretation. The Act dates back to 2010 and predates Self ID.
Gender identity is such a vague concept, based entirely on feelings. I cannot imagine how any law can really interperet it.

@FionaMacCool

I have no problem with legislation being amended to ensure the people are not discriminated against on the grounds of their gender identity.

In an ideal world, people would not be discriminated against on the grounds of how they present themselves, but lets face it, if you have a certain accent/address/mode of dressing/ presence-or-absence of tattoos, that will work against you.

The groups facing most discrimination in Irish society are women, Travellers, and people with disabilities.
I suspect that people coming from New Irish backgrounds will increasingly feature, as we're not making a good hand of integrating people from other countries and cultures.

The notion (and I mean it in the whimsical sense) that someone who believes they can change their actual biological sex, should be prioritised over any of those groups, increasingly just gives me ire.

It was part of FGs Programme for Government so probably not a huge surprise really. I noticed in the It article yesterday that it was FG LGBT group that influenced the WPATH guidelines being used to guide Transgender care in Ireland, www.finegael.ie/progressive-programme-for-government-will-improve-rights-and-equality-for-lgbti-people/ The level of detail in this plan is amazing. For example I was scratching my head at what pedestrian crossings had to do with LBGTI rights. <a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.98fm.com/news/pride-pedestrian-crossing-unveiled-on-capel-street-1212780&ved=2ahUKEwjS1dzX2rfxAhXhCGMBHUxaB2EQFnoECAgQAg&usg=AOvVaw03ZqJis-SORwLrNFI-ml5b" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.98fm.com/news/pride-pedestrian-crossing-unveiled-on-capel-street-1212780&ved=2ahUKEwjS1dzX2rfxAhXhCGMBHUxaB2EQFnoECAgQAg&usg=AOvVaw03ZqJis-SORwLrNFI-ml5b The pedestrian crossings are fine but to actually include them in the Programme for Government?

This just makes me so angry, and disheartened. How did we get this far down the rabbit hole. Our government is such a sh!tshow.

You are right OP that the conflation of gender and sex is the problem.

I remember reading about our gender recognition act legislation and it does confirm that with a GRC the person would for all legal purposes be treated as the opposite sex. So you fill out a 2 page form, pay your €20 or whatever, and you are magically the opposite sex .

I wonder if it is a hangover from conservative catholic mindset that they don't want to use the word sex, so gender is substituted. Which was fair enough, until anyone could identify into whatever gender they pleased. Which makes the whole thing nonsense. How can you have gender equality and protect women and girls if you can't even properly define them? grrr.

It does say this The first phase of a public consultation process will be launched in the coming days, inviting the views of the public and interested organisations on their own experience of the legislation and where they would recommend amendments.

We should organise a response to this.

We should organise a response to this.

Yes. I 100% agree. Ideally, including sex as a protected characteristic would be a good start but I fear that ship has sailed.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

The inclusion of sex would be useful. It is the protected characteristic of sex that has resulted in women from the UK in achieving pushback.
I can't see FG or the Greens going for it. Or the NWCI.
I am not sure what FFs position is.

Absolutely the approach should be to push for the inclusion of sex as a protected characteristic. Let them be the ones to explain why they'd be against it. I'm sick of the whole discussion being framed around the idea of 'trans rights', as if women have no stake of our own in how sex and gender are treated in law. If there's a campaign to include 'sex' as a protected characteristic, that puts the onus on those who object to explain why their so-called intersectionality doesn't extend to recognising female biology as an axis of oppression.

I agree, although the cynical part of me feels, like PP that the ship has sailed.

What gets me though is that the vast majority of Irish people would not support this if they really knew what it meant. The voting public at large would not go for this, no way. I feel that is why self id was pushed though sneakily, as they knew it would not get support. And now it is the foundation for everything else, because it's so hard to change without massive pushback.

I read this article in the Times this morning - www.thetimes.co.uk/article/just-one-complaint-out-of-232-by-female-prisoners-upheld-in-three-years-zd3wx2vtj

(Sorry I don't know how to do a share token, even though I've been shown before )

But anyway, that article chilled my blood. How many of these women were victimised and felt they couldn't speak up, and when they did their complaint was just ignored. They are already in a vulnerable situation, and it's made so much worse that a male bodied person could be placed in with them without their consent.

This is a quote from the article: Hildegarde Naughton, junior minister for justice, said in response: “The Prison Service is acutely aware of the fact that women prisoners are a vulnerable group within the prison system and is aware that the support for female offenders and their rehabilitative needs are very different to male offenders.”

So they acknowledge that male and female prisoners are different now...but if one of those male prisoners filled out a 2 page GRC, they are now somehow a woman and should be treated as such. How can rational people no see the incongruence here? The cognitive dissonance involved in all this is astounding!

Sorry I know it's probably a slightly different topic for another thread but i just feel so sad for those female prisoners who are being left to deal with this .

So what do you all think we should do?

Probably not much point in writing to O'Gorman as this is green party policy:

The Green Party supports the amendment of the Gender Recognition Act 2015 to include recognition of non-binary and non-gendered individuals, and to facilitate gender recognition for people under the age of 18. We believe that further policies need to be implemented to support transgender and intersex people in Ireland, including better education to reduce transphobic bullying in schools.

Well you may as well forget about FG. And I say this as someone who has always voted FG in the past. But unless they take serious action to protect the rights of women and girls I will never again vote for them.
I can't see much from FF on the issue. I suspect that they were so anxious to get into government that they would have agreed to anything.

*. The following measures were included in Fine Gael LGBT’s Submission to the Programme for Government Negotiators:

Permit persons aged 16 and 17 years to self-determine their legal gender with no requirement for medical certification and no court order in line with international best practice.
Allow a person who has reached the age of 16 to apply for legal recognition of their preferred gender without the need for parental consent, court order or medical certification.
Make provision by amendment to the Act to permit children aged under 16 years of age to secure legal recognition of gender by removing the criterion relating to minimum age.
Ensure that parents/ surviving parents or guardians can make an application for a legal recognition of gender on behalf of their children.
Allow for the recognition of a gender other than male or female in law.
Amend legislation governing the issuing of passports to allow ‘X’ marker on passports *
. Commit to publishing a similar Bill to the Provision of Objective Sex Education so that the Department of Education can begin preparation for its implementation as early as September 2021.

@saltedcaramelchocolate

Well you may as well forget about FG. And I say this as someone who has always voted FG in the past. But unless they take serious action to protect the rights of women and girls I will never again vote for them. I can't see much from FF on the issue. I suspect that they were so anxious to get into government that they would have agreed to anything.

*. The following measures were included in Fine Gael LGBT’s Submission to the Programme for Government Negotiators:

Permit persons aged 16 and 17 years to self-determine their legal gender with no requirement for medical certification and no court order in line with international best practice.
Allow a person who has reached the age of 16 to apply for legal recognition of their preferred gender without the need for parental consent, court order or medical certification.
Make provision by amendment to the Act to permit children aged under 16 years of age to secure legal recognition of gender by removing the criterion relating to minimum age.
Ensure that parents/ surviving parents or guardians can make an application for a legal recognition of gender on behalf of their children.
Allow for the recognition of a gender other than male or female in law.
Amend legislation governing the issuing of passports to allow ‘X’ marker on passports *
. Commit to publishing a similar Bill to the Provision of Objective Sex Education so that the Department of Education can begin preparation for its implementation as early as September 2021.

Christ. And I assume labour are similar?

I have never voted for FF but suspect they may be the more open party wrt sex based rights.

For the first time ever, I think it will be almost impossible for me to vote next time out. It's funny, I was a student not long after Ivana Bacik and I thought she was great but I couldn't vote for her now (even if I was in the constituency).

I think SF may be TWAW as well.
Though I can't see them supporting the Hate speech legislation, considering the fact that they were banned from the airwaves for years.

@PleasantBirthday

For the first time ever, I think it will be almost impossible for me to vote next time out. It's funny, I was a student not long after Ivana Bacik and I thought she was great but I couldn't vote for her now (even if I was in the constituency).

Same. I used to love her. She was such a brilliant feminist.

Can anyone contribute to the public consultation?

I’m an Irish citizen but living in NI, but I’d be worried my contribution wouldn’t be viewed similarly to someone currently living in the state.

Permit persons aged 16 and 17 years to self-determine their legal gender with no requirement for medical certification and no court order in line with international best practice.

Allow a person who has reached the age of 16 to apply for legal recognition of their preferred gender without the need for parental consent, court order or medical certification.

Make provision by amendment to the Act to permit children aged under 16 years of age to secure legal recognition of gender by removing the criterion relating to minimum age.

I have to wonder why they are so desperate to keep reducing the age of consent here, and worryingly why they want parental consent removed.
We don't let 16 year olds drink or smoke or do other things that we as a society think may harm them, so why is this being pushed through? I don't understand the urgency here. Who is behind pushing this through so aggresively.
There are far better ways to help young people - better mental health services in general, better educational support, better funding for youth services..etc etc.

Also 'international best practice' - do they mean the Yokakarta principles? They are not best practice by any stretch.

I can only think that this will push more and more young people down the road of hormones and surgery.

@TerribleCustomerCervix. As an Irish citizen there isn't any reason that you can't contribute to the public consultation. The more voices that make themselves heard the better.

And yes I was thinking Sinn Féin, only because they tend to take a stance against FG & FF on other social issues.

But somehow I think this is the one issue that all political parties somehow agree on ....why is that?