Urging change of gender to be criminalised - The Times article

[ShrillSiren]

I've just seen this article in The Times come up on Twitter.

Does anyone have a share token as this looks like huge news.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/urging-change-gender-criminalised-trans-rights-lgbtq-0vw7trcj2

My issues is self diagnosis. Or self diagnosis by proxy.

That's absolutely fine if you're gay.

It affects no one unless you're married, but that's unusual these days as homosexuality is more acceptable and mainstream.

The issue is that kids or even parents are deciding/ diagnosing trans. There are crib sheets on how to access the gatekeeping. Fake science is banded about.

I don't feel any of this is covered by the best case scenario under these flimsy proposals.

If it stifles mermaids, that's great but it's too bloody mainstream now.

@Elegaic

The other problem is that this law would get ‘gender identity’ into the statue books. So it would concretise in law the idea that we all have an innate gender identity. That seems very bad to me.

If they're going to use the phrase 'gender identity' in legislation, wouldn't they have to define it properly? And wouldn't that definition have to be a better one than the usual meaningless waffle along the lines of "a person’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth"? And surely they would have to acknowledge that most of us don't experience these feelings about gender.

They also need to explain why this "deeply felt experience of gender", which is usually based on stereotypes and not experienced at all by most people, should be seen as so important that it can't be challenged.

@RoyalCorgi

The article is very unclear and, as others have pointed out, seems to be two different articles welded together.

Persuading children to change their "gender" is one thing, persuading them to change their "gender identity" quite another. The first would cover Mermaids, the second, presumably, Transgender Trend and its supporters.

I would be very interested to know where this story has come from. Has the journalist simply misunderstood what is being proposed? Or is he being briefed - as the article suggests - by government sources in the know?

I agree that it is going to be very very difficult to draft this legislation in a way that makes any sense.

Yes. The conflation/ confusion between sex, gender and ‘gender identity’ needs total clarification before this can be legislated on.

Kids should not be persuaded to ‘change sex’. But neither should they be coerced into gender conformity.

The boy who wants to wear pink and play with dolls shouldn’t be told he mustn’t, nor should he be persuaded that he’s therefore a girl. Let him have his ‘gender identity’ as a ‘feminine’ boy.

Sex matters

twitter.com/sexmattersorg/status/1454005465818542080?s=21

Sorry has this been posted upthread?

sex-matters.org/posts/updates/conversion-therapy/

It will:
• Create a legal concept of “transgender children” based on self identification.
• Threaten parents and therapists who resist affirming their child’s declared trans identity with criminal sanctions.
• Allow Stonewall and other charities to apply for “Conversion Therapy Protection Order”, removing a child’s passport.
• Make charities that work with children afraid to employ gender critical staff.

Consultation document is here

www.gov.uk/government/consultations/banning-conversion-therapy/banning-conversion-therapy

And consultation questions appear to be seeking expert contributions that imho should have been sought prior to the formulation of this document. Anyone with expertise definitely needs to engage with this - and hope they are not drowned out by ill-informed screeching from around the world.

Putting ‘Gender Identity’ as a concept into UK law is what must be rejected and fought.

The moment GI has ‘legal status’ it will be used with regard to the Equality Act.

Gender identity is simply a belief: like Christianity or Islam or Paganism. It is not material, observable reality.
Can you imagine the consequences if, say, paganism was recognised as real under UK law?

*This is part

Further.
The proposal appears horribly under-researched and lacking in evidence, which is unusual for a consultation document. I’m not sure what to make if it tbh. It’s like the equalities office has washed their hands of the issue and said to the public, ‘you want it, you work it out’. This could go either way, very easily.

The narrative's already written for TRAs. Bracing self for the slacktivist Instagram rubbish that'll be posted about this, 'here's what the fascist government's transphobic proposals really mean...'

Surely they will have to listen to the evcidene that “watch and wait” is the best approach for children and this should be incorporated into law.

I do not hold out any hope that this will do anything other than make the questioning of those declaring themselves to be trans, a criminal offence. This will result in mental health professionals and counsellors being unable to question the trans narrative and being able to do anything other than affirm and refer to GIDS.

Haven't they been prevented from doing that since the memorandum of understanding on conversion therapy which included gender identity (which is partly why things have got as bad as they are)?
www.psychotherapy.org.uk/media/cptnc5qm/mou2-reva_0421_web.pdf

The government's going to come unstuck because to ban conversion therapy requires you to define which way the 'conversion' is going.

So as a society we now (rightly!) agree that gay people are 'really' gay, and trying to convert them into being straight is wrong. (Broadly speaking - obviously lesbians need to be converted to loving some sorts of penis to save them from their own bigotry.)

But which was is 'conversion' for dysphoric and/or trans kids? Are they 'really' their natal sex and so any support or encouragement to transition is 'converting' them into trans people? Or are they 'really' the gender they say they are, in which case encouraging to desist and/or think through other causes of their dysphoria is trying to 'convert' them into being 'cis'.

The best outcome would be to say that dysphoric children / children with gender issues need gentle supportive therapy to find out why that might be and whether it is something that will or can be resolved, or whether they will eventually want to pursue some form of transition. I'm not sure you can legislate for that, though.

BBC reporting it too (Eleanor Lawrie).

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59066204

A six-week public consultation opens on Friday over how best to end conversion therapy, which is described by health bodies as an attempt to change or suppress someone's sexual orientation or gender identity.

This generally entails trying to stop or suppress someone from being gay, or from living as a different gender to their sex recorded at birth.

The consultation also adds that psychologists, counsellors and other clinicians and healthcare staff shouldn't be prevented from "providing legitimate support for those who may be questioning if they are LGBT".

Apparently Keira has said the very idea of "gender identity" is conversion.

@MinervaBoudicca

Putting ‘Gender Identity’ as a concept into UK law is what must be rejected and fought.

The moment GI has ‘legal status’ it will be used with regard to the Equality Act.

Gender identity is simply a belief: like Christianity or Islam or Paganism. It is not material, observable reality.
Can you imagine the consequences if, say, paganism was recognised as real under UK law?

*This is part

Totally this.

And yes, both Keira Bell and Allison Bailey have said as much.

This sounds very worrying to me. I would suggest they scrap the gender identity part of the bill completely because it’s going to be a disaster and just make the bill against conversion therapy for gay people. And let the Cass report guide the way for treating children with gender dysphoria.

@WarriorN

Apparently Keira has said the very idea of "gender identity" is conversion.

Keira is correct

I'm not convinced that it makes any sense to consider gender and sexuality together, as if "conversion therapy" is the same kind of thing. While the origins of sexuality aren't well understood, the concept of gender identity and "being trans" is much, much less well established, and usually involves medical interventions on a healthy body, which is a totally different scenario.

That being said, it does seem like there has been some thought put into crafting this. With a desire to keep lobbyists and non-professionals out of it, to make sure parents aren't being over-ridden, and to avoid preventing adults from perusing their own therapy goals or exploring things like traumas, or making therapy impossible unless people give up their belief systems.

But without more clarity on gender ideology and medicine it's going to be tricky.

I'm unsure if the link I've posted above from sex matters is the updated briefing or not, I'd keep an eye on Twitter for updates

The consultation also refers to the memorandum of understanding which is problematic.

Precisely lobster.

You don't need to see hcps and have any sort of therapy to be same sex attracted.

With trans you do.

Unless you self Id of course...

The government info does read as "you can't tell someone they aren't what they say they are". I suppose the next point; can medical treatment be provided because in the old use of English that is then a conversion? Something that on the face of it seems so simple is very complicated, because definitions have been altered (by some, not by others) and beliefs are involved. I'm assuming there is no objective diagnostic test that confirms gender identity? The part I find very scary is that beliefs change and can be strongly influenced by social groups. Providing life altering medication and surgery to children on the basis of a belief formed at the most impressionable and incomprehensible time of life (adolescence) is terrifying.

I feel that Lisa Littmans recent research would be of benefit for the consultation

Individuals Treated for Gender Dysphoria with Medical and/or Surgical Transition Who Subsequently Detransitioned: A Survey of 100 Detransitioners
Lisa Littman1
Received: 5 October 2020 / Revised: 17 September 2021 / Accepted: 20 September 2021

link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s10508-021-02163-w.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3l4aDOVTep8xeaVB7GEZOTqm1KPj5N9KqEt3Da_k97wBnU45iCOKiWjB4#page17

Silly question but why don’t government have a preliminary meeting with experts like Sex Matters on these things before the consultation goes public?!

I know that’s unrealistic but I’m sick of government incompetence.