#RepealTheGRA apparently 'hails from the right

[TheShadowyFeminist]

Tweet by Ruth Serwotka

Does this have any basis in fact? I know plenty who think the GRA should be repealed. None have been right wing, ring leaning, aligned with the right or even come close to what Ruth states here.

This tweet is a flavour of what I've seen. And I think the sentiment is fairly accurate IMO.

What do others think? Do you think the GRA should be repealed? Are you or have you ever been, right wing, right leaning, right adjacent or meet the description Ruth has for women who have said the GRA should be repealed?

The GRA comes from a fundamentally flawed political response to underlying discrimination in law and society and (even it wasn’t causing fundamental problems for others in society and particularly impacting on women- which is clearly is) the GRA should be revoked for that reason alone. Its whole basis is irrational and unsound. It’s whole basis is also based on ‘hardly anyone will want to do this’ which is then used to justify maintaining poor legislation. That’s not a justifiable position to maintain when the problems are being repeatedly pointed out.

My issue isn’t that I think people’s dysphoria should not be recognised or treated, pain is pain- we need much better mental health support plus a meaningful anti-discrimination legislative framework to help everyone cope with the devastating effects of misogyny, sexism, homophobia on their lives (as well as the effects of other injustices like racism and discrimination on basis of disability). And freedom of self expression for everyone around names, clothes, hairstyles and the rest of it, is a given. It’s just not right to require anyone else to believe that this changes biological sex.

The only other solution is to find a new word for those formerly known as adult human females, and to carve out spaces reserved exclusively for those. Those will honestly not give a fuck what word is used, how demeaning or insulting or rude it is or what the fuck pronouns others wish to assign to them so long as they can access public spaces, because these have been bumped out of ANY spaces so that non cervix havers/non vulva drivers can take their preferred choice from ALL the spaces.

However that group and that space will immediately become the next target, as we all know, and things will change so that non are definitely too, and may never have boundaries.

Which brings it back to the original point: there is going to have to be eventually, when things get bad enough, backbone from government that the word 'no' is needed to protect rights for those who will not ever be willingly allowed them. The longer its left, the worse it will be.

Let's face it: if the GRA was repealed, it would practically make very little difference since it's not as if anyone can ask to see it or not having one presents much of a barrier. The answer is to give out GRAs like sweets, hurl them happily from the balconies, everyone can be who they want and expect privacy, dignity, spaces made for them that welcome them. But establish that they have specific limits and that third spaces will be provided, while retaining single sex female spaces and being willing to gatekeep, because female people need the same rights too.

GRCs sorry. The amount of jargon involved in all this is just overwhelming even when you're soaked in it all.

Let's face it: if the GRA was repealed, it would practically make very little difference since it's not as if anyone can ask to see it or not having one presents much of a barrier.

The GRA, arguably, has lead to many processes that have broken down those barriers.

The right to privacy around having a GRC has lead to a special process around DBS checks whereby not only grc holders but many with the pc of gener reassignment get to hide their sex from employees.

Without that need for privacy, sex would not need to be hidden in any situation, particularly around safeguarding.

I think we need to do away with the whole idea that identifying with a different "gender" is anything to do with your sex.

The right to privacy around having a GRC has lead to a special process around DBS checks whereby not only grc holders but many with the pc of gener reassignment get to hide their sex from employees.

But they don't do they? Back to that mistaken belief that transwomen magically 'pass'. What is does is force employers to lie, to gaslight their employees. Also those with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment but no GRC are still legally their sex observed at birth.

But they don't do they? Back to that mistaken belief that transwomen magically 'pass'. What is does is force employers to lie, to gaslight their employees. Also those with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment but no GRC are still legally their sex observed at birth.

This. It's patently obvious what sex people are in 99.5% (not a peer reviewed figure) of cases

I think the GRA must go because it’s legal recognition of a false idea that ‘changing sex’ is a real thing (on paper on your official documents) and that it then follows from this legal status change that people are asked to believe that others can ‘change sex’ in other tangible ways.

The GRA providing this enforceable legal ‘change of sex’ also then allows the GRC holder to enforce its meaning on to other people and to seek to appropriate services, spaces, opportunities, safeguards, intended for women. That’s like forcing religious observance on to non religious people. It’s unethical official gaslighting to allow someone identifying as x to forcing everyone else to recognise them as x when they reasonably know that the person is y and this has practical consequences for wider society. It’s a very luxury belief to ‘identify as’ another oppressed group and expect to get access to their support structures, opportunities etc simply based on your views of yourself.

GRA is in one sense pointless and redundant- because as we know obviously nobody can actually change sex! But, it is also used as a vehicle to try to chip away at other laws which recognise the reality of biological sex. Like the laws around motherhood on birth certificates being (unsuccessfully) challenged by Freddy McConnell, a GRC holder.
We’re all free to call ourselves a Dad if we want to but that preference shouldn’t require anyone else to validate it against their will. And nor should that have any bearing on our kids’ birth certificate.

The GRA endures as a personal validation tool (which is arguably not the business of governments to be involved in) and as useful grist to a very sexist regressive homophobic political mill. GRA can’t be amended to be innocuous because its whole principle is flawed.

I don’t think it really matters how many more people get a GRC and whether they do that frivolously or seriously- it’s still a potent tool to seek to change other laws. GRA should be debated in public and Parliament to check for any unintended consequences in repeal, and GRA repealed (plus any further legal mitigations put in place that would be needed to protect existing GRC holders).

Lol. I haven't RTFT but right now, everything 'hails from the right'. It just has to be something certain activists disagree with, don't understand, haven't read, don't want to debate or just kind of feel it might be.

And yes, I agree that the GRA needs to be repealed. If you'd asked me even six months ago, I might have said no, but it's clear it wasn't thought through and has serious and negative consequences for women's rights.
And I'm as leftwing as they come.

One of the problems with legitimising a ' change of sex' via GRCs is that they are irrelevant in the holders' interactions with society. If you cannot require an individual you recognise as male to prove that they are legally female, then, as PPs have pointed out, effectively you have self-ID.

But why should a person not be required to prove their identity to access services and places? We already have to prove that we have the right to access services in many situations, whether it be our address, age, nationality or financial stability. Why should not an individual be required to prove their sex in order to access a sex-segregated space or service?

Ruth.

I'm SO absolutely disappointed in you.

For fucks sake woman.

Havent RTFT so apologies if its gone off on other tangents.

But I am always very bemused when the comments made about this being from the Far Right.

Have these proud lefties had a bit of check about what the Far Left has been/is up to - I refer you to China, the USSR, Cambodia....all shining examples of leftist ideology.

I am genuinely perplexed how people live Owen Jones can't see this when he comments about Far Right ideology associations. His ideology is associated with the shining beacon of human rights that is China...

Yes.

Far Right.

Far Left.

All nasty Bro' dudes.

So funny - something happens that has a huge impact on women, so women start talking about it, offering up various ideas, theories, suggestions and rejections ... and the world spends vast amounts of time arguing about whether the noise is coming from 'the right'. It's coming from WOMEN. In twos and three, in ones or in thousands, as women realise this impacts on them, they SAY THINGS and DO THINGS.

Putting the individual first as genderideology does surely is right wing?

PS and the objections come from people who don't like women making a noise - you get them left, right and centre, too.

Calling feminists rightwing is an absolutely standard smear by the men’s rights activists who, in Britain, like to call themselves leftwing or anarchist.

why should a person not be required to prove their identity to access services and places? We already have to prove that we have the right to access services in many situations, whether it be our address, age, nationality or financial stability.

Good point, JellySlice. But unfortunately far too logical to convince those who shout “bigot” to save themselves the trouble of thinking.

And definitely the GRA should be repealed. It’s a ludicrous mess, ill-conceived and unworkable.

I’m a lifelong socialist and feminist. Those beliefs have never come in conflict with each other — though I’ve often had to defend feminism against leftie men.

Sometimes Far Right and Far Left both go so far that they meet on the other sided of the political sphere and become indistinguishable from each other.

Consider how much they have in common when they reach this point: controlling people's speech, policing people's thoughts, supporting informers, punishing non-conformists and reactionaries by removing their livelihoods.

This is not surprising from Ruth. While most FWR women would consider themselves as at least left of centre, perhaps even socialist on the economics, Ruth is is socialist in the feminist sense as well. This means that there is plenty of overlap with genderism in her views. For example, she agrees with them about heteronormativity being A Very Bad Thing and with BLM that the family is an irretrievably patriarchal institution that should be abolished.

See, for example, this tweet

twitter.com/ruthserwotka/status/1412489298180517890

The right want to limit women's reproductive rights and enforce a family model on women which is oppressive. women's liberation is about more than one issue.

And this quote from one of her FB posts:

As feminists we should consider the family a repressive institution which often upholds patriarchal roles of male dominance and subjugates women to a lifetime of caring for others.

She honestly thinks the family is a right wing construct.

I’m a left leaning remain voter and I want the GRA repealed. Happy for anyone to identify however they please but a man is not and never can be a woman. Genetically they are always men and they commit crime at the same rate and in the same ways as men and women need protection from men. The GRA opens the door for predatory men who can just say they’re ‘intending to transition’. Just playing dress up doesn’t make a man a woman. Ridiculous law!

Her Twitter is saying we (the alleged right wingers) don't understand politics. Her 'left' have understood and capitalised on that understanding, yes?

mobile.twitter.com/ruthserwotka/status/1412498369184944131

[quote MiladyBerserko]Her Twitter is saying we (the alleged right wingers) don't understand politics. Her 'left' have understood and capitalised on that understanding, yes?

mobile.twitter.com/ruthserwotka/status/1412498369184944131[/quote]
Well that's an unfortunately telling typo in the original tweet saying reforming the GRA instead of repealing.

Nah, done with the mealy mouthed sell out politicos who will trample on the women they don't approve of to press a political agenda with compromises they approve of.
Not your call anymore, Ruth. Navel gaze all you want, the issue has moved way past your appeasement policies.

Oh piss off Ruth.