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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Womens and Equalities report on GRA to be published tomorrow 21 Dec

250 replies

Imnobody4 · 20/12/2021 18:51

twitter.com/Commonswomequ/status/1472915228392398855?t=fm9kVI9s31fOBPCnBSNYqg&s=19

Our report into the Reform of the Gender Recognition Act is being published tomorrow. Take a look at the work we have done relating to this inquiry over the past year: t.co/uOlY23nhuN t.co/l123I2UQyQ

Still haven't published my evidence. Is this usual? Sneaking it out befote Xmas - suspicious or what?

OP posts:
Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:17

I thought Keira’s team was led by Hyam too.

Oh I get it now. QC’s are incapable of representing anyone unless their views politically align.

barleybadminton · 22/12/2021 22:24

@OldCrone

Trans women represent somewhere between 0.1 and 0.3% of women. The impact on pay gap reporting is so low it is inconsequential.

How does it help the women at Credit Suisse if Philip Bunce is counted as a 'woman'?

One highly paid individual can skew the average a lot. Counting men like Bunce as 'women' is not 'inconsequential'.

I'm sure there are plenty of women at Credit Suisse paid just as much as Bunce.

How does it help the women at Credit Suisse if gender pay gap reporting is abandoned becaise of Bunce? Ever heard of cutting off your nose to spite your face? Except it's not just your noses you are cutting off, it's all womens, and a growing number of women resent that.

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:24

The point is that even if you don't accept trans women are women this remains a valuable, and accurate tool for tracking pay disparities between the sexes and many women don't want to see it abandoned simply to score a point in the culture war against trans women

Who the fuck wants the reporting abandoned? We want it to record what it is meant to record. Just like the Census.

And in an individual workplace, this can have impact. Of course it can and it is ridiculous to say that it doesn’t. It can show an improvement at an organisational level where there is none. Even in large organisations, when an assessment is done at different pay levels, male data can skew the reality and hide deterioration. Of course, organisations are being assessed on their improvement.

And if you want accurate figures for discrimination reporting for trans people, you also need to have that data disaggregated too.

So, no. I don’t agree with it being abolished, but I also don’t agree that it remains useful with male data included. Considering just how many females are in low pay, part time or flexible roles due to caring requirements, it is important to maintain data integrity.

Or shall we just go back to finger in the air, ball park figures.

At what point of the rapid increase of transitioners will be enough to be considered a difference? Is it another n+1 scenario?

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:25

I'm sure there are plenty of women at Credit Suisse paid just as much as Bunce.

You know this for a fact? Or you just will say this for proving your point.

barleybadminton · 22/12/2021 22:25

@Helleofabore

I thought Keira’s team was led by Hyam too.

Oh I get it now. QC’s are incapable of representing anyone unless their views politically align.

Solicitors run cases, not Barristers, they just turn up in court and show off.
Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/12/2021 22:26

Trans women represent somewhere between 0.1 and 0.3% of women

They represent zero per cent of women.

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:27

And argue the case in front of the court.

You cannot have it both ways here.

Either Hyam has an ulterior motive because he is seen as the skill in arguing the case, or you are grasping at connections to prove your far fetched point based in twitter rhetoric.

Cuck00soup · 22/12/2021 22:29

This is real. Gender pay gap reporting is a powerful tool to ensure women are being paid fairly

This is real. Sex pay gap reporting is a powerful tool to ensure women are being paid fairly.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/12/2021 22:29

instead of having a massive row about what constitutes a woman ...can we not just be a little bit kinder and figure out how to make life easier for trans people?"

What an inane thing to say. This isn't about making things easier or difficult for them, it's about women's sex-based rights.

Blibbyblobby · 22/12/2021 22:31

the aim to remove any social acknowledgement of people's gender indentity

Nice reverse.

You imply that there is a movement to "remove" the social acknowledgement of gender identity as if the latter was a generally accepted fact.

The reality is that gender identity as the default is not the current state, and that there is a movement to remove any social acknowledgement, not of gender but of sex with the aim of replacing sex as a social differentiator in all practical purposes - spaces, laws, statistics, sports, even private conversation - with gender identity.

And this despite the fact that sex is real, observable and demonstrably linked to the social disadvantages faced by female people in a sexist society and gender identity is unproven, undefined and literally unknowable - the latter being the entire reason Self Id is considered an essential aspect of genderism.

Can you explain why sex, which has an undeniable material impact on female (and male) lives, is less relevant in society than a gender identity which many do not experience and for those who do, it can only be known if they themselves disclose it?

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:33

So a quick run down.

Keira Bell is NOT an anti-vaxxer.
Hyam is NOT evangelical it seems except about law, and all a solicitor does is provide research and other support. So, the barrister would also direct what was needed for their case and ultimately would decide on what they present.

So really, another far fetched negative generalisation, this time directed at a detransitioner.

MrsOvertonsWindow · 22/12/2021 22:35

Solicitors run cases, not Barristers, they just turn up in court and show off.

Ah - a legal expert as well as a safeguarding expert Grin Grin

barleybadminton · 22/12/2021 22:49

@Helleofabore

So a quick run down.

Keira Bell is NOT an anti-vaxxer.
Hyam is NOT evangelical it seems except about law, and all a solicitor does is provide research and other support. So, the barrister would also direct what was needed for their case and ultimately would decide on what they present.

So really, another far fetched negative generalisation, this time directed at a detransitioner.

twitter.com/KLBfax/status/1469397719148027909

i.redd.it/i1dln05tcuh71.png

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 22:57

You see when I talk to friends no-one is experiencing this.

Ever wondered if your friends would ever be truthful about it around you?

A majority of Britons (57%) say they have, at least sometimes, found themselves stopping themselves from expressing their political or social views for fear of judgement or negative responses from others.

yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2021/12/22/cancel-culture-what-views-are-britons-afraid-expre

It seems that many of us are not forthcoming in real life. Strangely enough, at the start of this year I would have discussed this with very few people outside a very small group. I might have said something about sports or whatever, but just in passing. Now it is usually someone mentioning it to me. But the majority of my friends recognise the issues now. Hubbard, the hatred directed at Joanne Rowling, Kiera Bell’s case. People are talking and finding issue with it.

I like your attempt, repeated from other threads, to minimise that the majority of people can see issues. I mean, mention that a male has retained their penis and you see the opinion changes quite dramatically.

But crack on. You haven’t managed to convince anyone that the majority of females have issues allowing males access to single sex spaces, regardless of their gender.

OldCrone · 22/12/2021 22:59

Is that all you've got @barleybadminton?

Keira said herself that she's not anti-vax (I posted this earlier, but you seem to have missed it):
No I'm not Anti vax. But no, it's not surprising that a working class black woman who's had her body fucked for life by an institution supposed to help is distrustful of insitutions
twitter.com/KLBfax/status/1469399777091764230

But even if she was, what does that have to do with this discussion?

Helleofabore · 22/12/2021 23:00

That is all barley has.

barleybadminton · 22/12/2021 23:06

@OldCrone

Is that all you've got *@barleybadminton*?

Keira said herself that she's not anti-vax (I posted this earlier, but you seem to have missed it):
No I'm not Anti vax. But no, it's not surprising that a working class black woman who's had her body fucked for life by an institution supposed to help is distrustful of insitutions
twitter.com/KLBfax/status/1469399777091764230

But even if she was, what does that have to do with this discussion?

I'm sorry but she literally said that vaccines are 'unnecessary at best'. Vaccines that saved thousands of lives rhis Summer,
OldCrone · 22/12/2021 23:12

I suggest you start your thread about vaccines here, barley.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus

This thread is discussing the Womens and Equalities report on the GRA. Can you try to stay on topic?

VestofAbsurdity · 22/12/2021 23:16

@MrsOvertonsWindow

Solicitors run cases, not Barristers, they just turn up in court and show off.

Ah - a legal expert as well as a safeguarding expert Grin Grin

It really is something else when you have someone who knows so little about either topic grandstanding as if they do.

So far said poster knows little to nothing about:

Safeguarding
The UK Legal system
The UK Court system vis a vis Barristers and Solicitors
UK Politics and the left/right political divide in the UK
Statistics and data collection and how results can be skewed
UK adherence to/interest in religion

Classic case of know-all knows fuck all.

Helleofabore · 23/12/2021 00:00

You haven’t managed to convince anyone that the majority of females have issues allowing males access to single sex spaces, regardless of their gender.

Should be

You haven’t managed to convince anyone that the majority of females have no issues allowing males access to single sex spaces, regardless of their gender.

CharlieParley · 23/12/2021 00:41

Additionally, said poster knows little to nothing about:

How statistics work. Reporting on the sex pay gap is useless on a population level, where the overall percentage of male members of the trans community may be negligible. This reporting is instead industry-specific and company-specific. And the vast majority of male members of the trans community are late-transitioners, who are typically middle-class with a median age at transition of mid-40s to mid-50z - in other words, employees at an age where the pay gap is most noticeable and where even one transitioner in a mid or upper management level can skew the data significantly.

And actually the whole issue of the sex pay gap is not that simple anymore. We have laws in the UK that ensure that men and women are paid the same for the same work. As of this year and thanks to a judgement at the European Court of Human Rights, we have now also got the right to equal pay for similar work. And if unequal pay for equal work was all the pay gap was about, the reporting would now focus on making sure that the laws are upheld.

But the majority of the pay gap now has nothing to do with unequal pay, but with motherhood. Which is why we probably ought to talk about the motherhood penalty instead of the sex pay gap.

It's all about pregnancy, maternity and taking time away from workplaces to raise our children. And pregnancy and maternity, well that's all about biology. Female biology. Women's bodies.

Good luck tackling that without acknowledging the reality of women's lives.
Men don't get pregnant. Men don't need to recover from pregnancy, from birth or from birth injuries. Men don't nurse.

And the poster seems to have no clue what the UK public thinks about reforming the GRA to bring in self-id (majority opposed, small minority for)

Or the impact the adoption of self-id policies has had on women and girls in the UK who need single-sex provisions and who are being harmed by these policies, myself included. And what frontline workers as well as many managers think of these policies. I don't think the poster is at all aware of the parliamentary meetings on the issue where those providers of single-sex services told politicians what harm self-id policies are doing to vulnerable women and children.

Or the impact it has when VAWAG sector organisations saw off the branch they're sitting on by arguing against single-sex provisions. Councils across the country are now happily defunding specialist VAWAG sector organisations, because they've given up on the exclusively WAG part. Non-specialist organisations are much cheaper, but in the past councils couldn't go to them because the entire VAWAG sector argued that their services were female-only and had to be female-only because female victims of male violence needed that specialist service. And that, naturally, cost more money, as specialist services always do. Well, the VAWAG sector no longer argues that, so now, surprise surprise, councils look to cheaper non-specialist providers instead. In the history books this will go under the heading of self-sabotage.

What that poster seems unable to grasp is that we argue against the doctrine of gender identity because sex matters for women's rights. If women cannot be defined as the coherent biological group they are, they cannot be a political group arguing for rights on the basis of their sex-based needs.

Men do not need abortions. Women and girls do. There is one and only one reason why women still have to fight for their the reproductive rights and that is because we live in a male-dominated world and giving us the power to decide whether we are carrying a baby to term or not is not in the interests of the men in power.

But abortion is a people issue now, and we can't even reliably restrict ourselves to talking about the needs of female people or female reproductive systems because even the word female is now being claimed for males.

Good luck with fighting for the reproductive rights of people! That's a surefire way to grant men the right to procreate and that never ends well for us.

Datun · 23/12/2021 05:50

@CharlieParley

Additionally, said poster knows little to nothing about:

How statistics work. Reporting on the sex pay gap is useless on a population level, where the overall percentage of male members of the trans community may be negligible. This reporting is instead industry-specific and company-specific. And the vast majority of male members of the trans community are late-transitioners, who are typically middle-class with a median age at transition of mid-40s to mid-50z - in other words, employees at an age where the pay gap is most noticeable and where even one transitioner in a mid or upper management level can skew the data significantly.

And actually the whole issue of the sex pay gap is not that simple anymore. We have laws in the UK that ensure that men and women are paid the same for the same work. As of this year and thanks to a judgement at the European Court of Human Rights, we have now also got the right to equal pay for similar work. And if unequal pay for equal work was all the pay gap was about, the reporting would now focus on making sure that the laws are upheld.

But the majority of the pay gap now has nothing to do with unequal pay, but with motherhood. Which is why we probably ought to talk about the motherhood penalty instead of the sex pay gap.

It's all about pregnancy, maternity and taking time away from workplaces to raise our children. And pregnancy and maternity, well that's all about biology. Female biology. Women's bodies.

Good luck tackling that without acknowledging the reality of women's lives.
Men don't get pregnant. Men don't need to recover from pregnancy, from birth or from birth injuries. Men don't nurse.

And the poster seems to have no clue what the UK public thinks about reforming the GRA to bring in self-id (majority opposed, small minority for)

Or the impact the adoption of self-id policies has had on women and girls in the UK who need single-sex provisions and who are being harmed by these policies, myself included. And what frontline workers as well as many managers think of these policies. I don't think the poster is at all aware of the parliamentary meetings on the issue where those providers of single-sex services told politicians what harm self-id policies are doing to vulnerable women and children.

Or the impact it has when VAWAG sector organisations saw off the branch they're sitting on by arguing against single-sex provisions. Councils across the country are now happily defunding specialist VAWAG sector organisations, because they've given up on the exclusively WAG part. Non-specialist organisations are much cheaper, but in the past councils couldn't go to them because the entire VAWAG sector argued that their services were female-only and had to be female-only because female victims of male violence needed that specialist service. And that, naturally, cost more money, as specialist services always do. Well, the VAWAG sector no longer argues that, so now, surprise surprise, councils look to cheaper non-specialist providers instead. In the history books this will go under the heading of self-sabotage.

What that poster seems unable to grasp is that we argue against the doctrine of gender identity because sex matters for women's rights. If women cannot be defined as the coherent biological group they are, they cannot be a political group arguing for rights on the basis of their sex-based needs.

Men do not need abortions. Women and girls do. There is one and only one reason why women still have to fight for their the reproductive rights and that is because we live in a male-dominated world and giving us the power to decide whether we are carrying a baby to term or not is not in the interests of the men in power.

But abortion is a people issue now, and we can't even reliably restrict ourselves to talking about the needs of female people or female reproductive systems because even the word female is now being claimed for males.

Good luck with fighting for the reproductive rights of people! That's a surefire way to grant men the right to procreate and that never ends well for us.

👏 brilliant as usual Charlie.

You see when I talk to friends no-one is experiencing this.

This made me laugh, badminton. Don't you ever wonder why constantly belittling women for their opinions means you stop being told them??

Needmoresleep · 23/12/2021 06:24

This idea of purity, that you have to think “correctly” on a whole raft of topics otherwise you are a bad person, is weird.

I agree with Keira on gender, I probably don’t, depending on what she is saying, on vaccination, and have no idea whether we have common ground on Brexit. That does not stop me admiring her courage and honesty. I would be happy to listen to her views on different thing, share mine, and perhaps agree, or agree to differ. Isn’t that what being adult is about.

I recently saw someone who was involved in my late mother’s care and who I admire as a thoughtful wise and intelligent woman, to discover she is a fervent antivaxer, conspiracy theories and all. It was a side to her I had not expected, indeed seemed to come out of nowhere. I still owe her a huge amount, and would seek her advice, particularly on her areas of expertise, but would now be more questioning. But isn’t that what life is about. You listen, you weigh up the credibility of your source, and your own experience, and take on board what you need. My friend has less credibility than before, JKR has more, the Guardian and BBC have less, the Mail has more (though massive pinches of salt and a filter of “they would say that wouldn’t they”), ditto with posters here.

So all views my own, but based on listening, observing and weighing up, evidence, and I remain open to revising my views if I can’t justify them when challenged.

Pity the Committee seem to have failed to do the same. The evidence was there, they could have listened. Instead they seem to have walked in either with the Party line or their brand of “right think”, and to have cobbled together a mish mash of policy proposals based on a mantra that TWAW simply because they say they are. If a Lia Thomas, a Fallon Fox, a Pips Bunce, or a six foot four 18 stone ‘female’ prisoner, comes along to challenge the underlying assumption, the whole edifice is under threat.

Helleofabore · 23/12/2021 08:26

in other words, employees at an age where the pay gap is most noticeable and where even one transitioner in a mid or upper management level can skew the data significantly.

Yes, I noticed that they dropped the topic when this was pointed out. It is almost like some posters believe they are making points we haven’t seen before.

However, reading the ‘lurker’ thread is very satisfying. It keeps me focused on making sure even the most tropish of points are countered. No one will convince a poster who is obviously so heavily invested, and most likely personally invested, in bringing forth whatever they have read on twitter as a defence. However, it is the countering and linking up evidence to rebut that will be read by the lurkers

It makes some posters very useful in making threads more informative, but it is rarely the direction they want.

Helleofabore · 23/12/2021 08:56

I agree with Keira on gender, I probably don’t, depending on what she is saying, on vaccination

I have not followed Keira’s tweets closely for the past while as I have cut down my twitter reading list. However, from what barley produced as evidence is that a young woman who has been let down by the government and the health system has reservations. She has been let down badly by the system supposedly set up to provide protection for children and teens.

Instead she was placed on a medical track that was experimental and not provided with comprehensive details about that treatment.

Any fool can see from Keira’s tweets that she is expressing reservations about the experimental side of the current vaccines and how the restrictions are applied. Many of us have expressed similar degrees of this sentiment in the past, I am sure.

And we don’t have her experience as a young person to have been a) let down so badly and not given the appropriate treatment (something we are seeing is quite common in many detransitioners) and b) faced a barrage of hate, constant abuse and the sheer personal effort of fighting that institution to hold them accountable for their neglect.

Imagine being told by the government that you are getting world class treatment, gold standard, and then finding out it is experimental because there is no time to do the rigorous testing to make sure it is fully appropriate for use.

And then there is the irreversible damage done to young female bodies by testosterone, even just a year or two! That affirming only treatment plans support because many detransitioners report not receiving the depth of mental health treatments they needed prior to prescription. This is the danger of ‘affirming only’ treatments. Which are ….. experimental!

I am sure barley will be along any minute to provide the extensive list of long term effects of puberty blockers when used on children.

And the extensive long term side effects known, and I mean with 95% confidence, for the current vaccination.

I won’t hold my breath because those won’t be forthcoming.

But thank you barley for providing another opportunity to explain how experimental puberty blocker and affirming only treatment is for children and teens. And how irreversible the impact of testosterone is on females.

Always a good moment to point those out. Thanks barley.