Should 'gender' rather than 'sex' be prioritised in the workplace?

[WeeBisom]

I've just read an article by Robin White (www.internationalemploymentlawyer.com/news/rationalising-sex-and-gender-terms-workplace) arguing that gender, rather than sex, should be the prioritised characteristic in the context of the workplace. I have some problems with this, and wondered what other people think.

Robin defines sex as a 'physiological characteristic', and gender as 'the social norms or forms associated with males or females.' Robin then goes on to say that in the workplace, sex is not important. Rather, gender is. But sex does take primacy in the context of marriage, and medical care.

The reason for this is because when you get a job, the employer does not get you to prove your sex by testing your chromosomes or checking your genitals. So the term 'sex' in the equality act must refer to something other than biological sex when it comes to workplace discrimination, because employers simply aren't interested in your junk.
White then argues that social norms like separate toilets, sleeping accommodation and changing facilities are based on gender, not sex. And the gender pay gap is also to do with gender, not sex. White concludes "sex may mean different things in the registrars office, the gp surgery and the workplace. And in the workplace we may conclude that when we say sex we really mean gender."

Here are my issues with this.

1. The Equality act 2010 expressly defines 'woman' as a member of the female sex. It doesn't mention gender. So there is no reason to import the term 'gender' into the equality act. The Gender Recognition act 2004 uses sex and gender interchangeably, but that is no reason to apply this to the equality act.

2. The claim about the employer not testing your chromosomes is a straw man. The doctor or wedding registrar doesn't test chromosomes or inspect genitals either.In fact, there is no context where you have to prove your biological sex by getting a chromosome test. Sex doesn't need to be verified with an invasive test...it can be verified by looking at birth certificates (or just looking at the person.)

3. Robin is incorrect to say that separate toilets, separate changing facilities etc are differences imposed based on 'gender'. The real reason we have separate facilities is to protect female people (who are oppressed by male people) from sexual violence, and the male gaze. It is implausible to suggest that we segregate people based on how feminine or masculine they are. The true reason is sex based, and due to sex based oppression.
   Similarly, Robin's explanation of the gender pay gap is very strange. Why would socially feminine people be paid less than masculine people? The gender pay gap only makes sense when you realise that women are penalised for having babies or the assumption they will have babies...all linked to their sex.

As far as I can see, there is no reason at all to prioritise gender in the workplace over sex. Any thoughts about this?

The material differences between myself and my male coworkers are menstruation, pregnancy, and lactation. I need to deal with these biological functions while also making my valuable contribution to the workplace. My personal feelings or identity are irrelevant. Sex is the only thing an employer needs to consider.

Why does white does this to women yet identifys as a woman

It’s a bizarre thing to do

The sex you are is important. It affects you all the way through your life

Pretending it doesn’t is just lying to yourself

So no thanks white. Leave women alone. No

One year, there is a TW on the course. She started the course as a TW and has been perceived that way throughout the 3 year degree. To that extend, she has experienced the same social barriers as the women on the course.

That's just not true though @parietal

Any social barriers she has faced will be more akin to those faced by LGB people, certainly not those faced by natal females.

One year, there is a TW on the course. She started the course as a TW and has been perceived that way throughout the 3 year degree. To that extend, she has experienced the same social barriers as the women on the course.

but you've already articulated that there is a difference which is clear to everyone - so no, if everyone knows, then even outside of sex-based barriers, societal barriers will also be different.

What a surprise. Robin wants workplaces to prioritise male feelings above female reality, privacy, dignity and safety.

Classic male entitlement.

Only one of these people potentially needed the sex based protections of pregnancy/maternity as a protected characteristic under the Equality Act.

Robin's argument here seems incoherent and falls at the first hurdle. Sex is conceded to be of prime importance in medical situations, not gender?

The National Health Service (NHS) had over 1.84 million employees as of the third quarter of 2021, making it the largest public sector employer in the United Kingdom.15 Dec 2021
www.statista.com › statistics

So can the almost 2 million NHS/ private sector health workers automatically claim their sex is more significant than their gender as they work in a medical setting? Or would that only be for the patients' benefit? What if a patient was also a medic? What if you go to an outpatient appointment, is it 'gender' on the bus, 'sex' in the clinic and then "gender' again on the journey home at night?

Tl;dr Nope.

No. Just no.

gross mis conduct

@lanadelgrey

From the everyday sexism when I was a young employee, having to work out if male colleagues were interested in my ideas or my tits, being talked over or told to speak up by middle-aged men in the office, to the evident displeasure when I needed time off for maternity appointments, to fighting for 15 minutes ‘flexible’ working so I could get to the nursery, having to cover up for kids illnesses so I wouldn’t be viewed as slacking, seen to be slacking as I did get their illnesses and was too exhausted to ‘man-up’ and gulp the day nurse to continue working, a couple of miscarriages - also covered up, going part-time and then fighting really hard to get a full-time job again when the DCs were older, just getting back on track and thinking I might get a promotion when I realised I was in a young woman’s game and all my male contemporaries had steamed ahead and now being dog-tired, stiff and sleep deprived due to the menopause. All sex-based not gender, Robin. One thing that has changed is that I can and now write menopause when explaining the odd day I’ve had off due to symptoms and that’s because my workplace has moved a fair way forward in recognising how sex and biological reality affects half its employees

👏👏👏

And these are all young people age 18-22 with no parenting responsibilities, so pregnancy is not relevant.
Of course it's relevant. Jeez the time and energy I expended in trying not to get pregnant at that age! And the anxiety ..... I still break out in a sweat remembering some of those late / missed periods. My boyfriend was a nice enough guy but he didn't have a fucking clue what it was like. I don't think any man does.

Robin defines sex as a 'physiological characteristic', and gender as 'the social norms or forms associated with males or females.' Robin then goes on to say that in the workplace, sex is not important. Rather, gender is.

I'm struggling to think of any 'norm or form associated with males or females' (as opposed to anything defined by sex) that should still be applicable in the workplace. The one that says women are the default parent, maybe? No, we don't want that. The one that says women should wear heels and skirts? Nope.

No.
Pregnancy, maternity, breastfeeding, caring responsibilities.
There are 'gender' biases it's true, but there a physical realities of being female that need specific recognition and protection in the workplace.
A company could (in theory) employ no women of reproductive age, or pay women less than men, and it wouldn't show in data if there were enough transwomen to haze the data. The female 'gender' would count.
It's important to have a comparator in law. Women could lose any recourse to argue they were being discriminated against on the basis of their sex (eg requiring room/time to pump etc) as there would be men included in their 'gender' that didn't need that.
Employers could discriminate against women and there would be no way of fighting this.

There are 'gender' biases it's true

Are there? Or are they all actually sex related biases? Do any of the issues that might be called 'gender biases' really apply to transwomen, or would they be more likely to be applied to transmen?

Oh look, male entitlement

(As someone, I'm sorry, I forgot who, pointed out on another thread earlier in the week...)

Sex is something that I am.. I have to live with the consequences of that. I do not wish anyone to make sex based stereotypes about me because of my biological sex.

People do.. if I speak in a meeting, my ideas are stolen, if I write and email, people feel it’s OK not to reply, to treat my requests as less important than my male colleagues and to reply assuming that I am more junior than I am and suggest I need to find this out for myself but when George asks the same questions, people respond. People ask me ‘who will look after your kids when you travel to New York next week’, they never ask George who has younger children than I do. People ask me if I would like to go home and talk to my husband about possible career moves.. they don’t ask George.

By using gender rather than sex runs the real risk that people will assume even more that I need the technical complexities explained to me and that I am happy to take the minutes, arrange the accommodation, the social events, take on the housekeeping tasks, the audits, the liaising with other departments but not the high profile projects. When I do better, do more, get better results, have a better functioning team.. I still don’t get invited to play golf with the sales director, get asked to speak to prospective clients or get offered to network, but I do get to look after the graduates, be on the pension council and buy the presents for the leavers... it’s about being a team player Chateaux! It’s all noted.. yes it’s all noted that females take the load and men make the decisions.

Aaarrggghh..... rant... sorry!!

Gender has no concrete definition but the sex based stereotypes are not going away. They will not go away if we replace sex with gender. I do not want to have to identify as a man to get equal respect at work!

Bloody hell what an ignorant prat
The main reason wonen are disadvantaged in the workplace is because we can have babies. So we lose out on career opportunities while on maternity leave/career break. Or employers are reluctant to employ us in the first place because they don't want to deal with the cost of maternity leave and other increased absence. After mat leave ends, women typically become the primary caregivers and are more likely to need part time/flexible working.

Oh, and if we work in a job requiring uniform or safety equipment, it will be designed with larger male bodies in mind. So we will be less safe than male people, however they identify.

And that's without going into menopause.

Workplace discrimination and disadvantage has everything to do with being a biological female and nothing to do with wearing skirts and lipstick.

I can't think of a single think that would mean I was grouped with a transwoman and wouldn't include any other male
The only thing I have in common with every other female on the planet is our shared biology
Everything else is down to personality, to personal likes and dislikes, upbringing or culture

Thing not think

Most female people don't perform sex based stereotypes much, and present in a very, very wide range of ways without stopping being women. This is a whole lot of disingenuous nonsense, since if you offered White the option of a facility of male people performing feminine stereotypes White would not want that. White would then twist language through new hoops and bend it around corners because what White actually wants is to be a male among female people, it is the sex part that is important and not the gender stereotypes being enacted.

If it actually was, then we'd have to have set lists of performance requirements for each space, which some agency would have to set (hair below your collar plus heels more than an inch two points, skirt another two points etc etc) and most females would be wobbling about between the two and declared not women.

This is purely and simply wanting to do away with boundaries protecting female spaces because some males find them really inconvenient.

It’s gender that is the malleable inconstant-inconsistent, not sex: one woman may experience an enormous amount of sex-based discrimination in her lifetime partly because ideas about gender are culturally mediated & as such ideas about vary over time & place. It is our sex that determines our “gendered” experiences - we can push back, to a degree (eg playing with “boys toys”) but it is a nonsense (borne of incredible privilege) to try to pretend that the construct of gender matters more than the reality of sex.