'There are no sex-based rights'

[lifeissweet]

Has anyone noticed that this is the position of the month for February? I am seeing it said repeatedly on Twitter, but I am not sure what point they are trying to make.

They seem to be quoting anti-discrimination legislation to suggest that introducing equal pay laws...etc 'brought an end to sex segregation' and that the Equality Act does not confer rights on anyone.

Does that slightly shoot them in the foot, though? If women have no rights by virtue of being women (and I would argue they absolutely do - the right to be protected from discrimination is a right - as are rights around maternity, which are also women's rights) then surely, they have no rights either.

And isn't it a weird thing when people go scrabbling around trying to find legal get-out clauses to excuse transgressing boundaries? We shouldn't need statutes to make people behave with common sense and decency.

What's the best way to counter this argument?

Maybe so, but is there a clear definition making explicit the difference between 'sex' and 'gender'?

I might be mistaken but it sounds very much like men of various types trying to erode the rights of all women in order to exponentially increase the rights of all men, but mostly shouty white privileged men...

Well, yes, in the dictionary, and to feminists, and to sociologists, and to philosophers, linguists - entirely depends on context

Of course common 'polite' usage has muddled it, as did the GRA a little bit (although not as much as they'd want you to believe), and of course those with such an agenda muddle it purpose as part of their word games.

Which is why I'm always very clear that I mean sex (even to Odeon when answering a recent survey about my visit to the cinema - male and female are not genders, it's fine to use the word 'sex')

I thought the exceptions under the EA had a very explicit example of where actual sex could proportionately override a GRA legal sex - rape services for women?
I thought there was also explicit allowance for female only sport?
And, of course, the inheritance of titles. Men for sure have sex-based rights in that case, don't they.

These things do exist, but it’s a very complex distinction to try and make on Twitter, and even more so when debating with people outside the UK.

I thought the exceptions under the EA had a very explicit example of where actual sex could proportionately override a GRA legal sex - rape services for women?

They do, but they will say because that isn't guaranteed you can't call it a "right".

@drwitch

I know I'm a minority on here but I don't think sex based rights is useful framing. I would rather use protections, mitigations etc. It has a clearer fit with the equality act and does not play into the hands of being saying we are asking for something like apartheid

I get where you're coming from with that, but I don't think it's going to make much difference what words we use. If we stop saying sex-based rights and say protections, then that'll just be called a dogwhistle instead, and will be somehow twisted. Take the word 'woman'. A lot of people started trying to avoid it when trying to discuss women's issues and used 'female' instead. Now, we're being told that trans women are female too and saying 'female' is a dogwhistle. We can change our language to try not to offend anyone or have it twisted, but if the intention is there to be offended, then it's never going to work.

Now, we're being told that trans women are female too and saying 'female' is a dogwhistle.

Indeed! So much so that Adele is assumed to be anti-trans for simply using that word within a context you’d assume it would be entirely unremarkable, because the category that used that word had been removed.

@TheGreatATuin I see this but I think the difference here is clarity. Changing the meaning of the word "woman" or "female" makes it harder to express our understanding of the world (which is why the orwellian analogy is used to often).

The term sex based rights (to me) is unclear because it could imply that we have more rights than men and like dinosaurs want to hoard them . The reality is of course that the law (in the UK) gives us a) some protection against being unfairly treated because of our sex and b) some protections that mitigate against our reduced rights and freedoms in society and the economy due to the fact that we are physically weaker, give birth and (most importantly) are treated by many as second class citizens

On further inspection, it would seem that this is why it is a flavour of the month argument

rgellman.medium.com/there-is-no-such-thing-as-sex-based-rights-in-the-uk-140554a2c42c

I've just read it and it has all of the usual bollocks:

• drawing parallels with racism
• 'women have been trying to break down sex segregation and insist on being involved in politics, so therefore, they want everything to be mixed-sex, including toilets' (always toilets)
• women's right to dignity is 'a woolly concept'

But it could sound reasonable to the clueless, so I guess that's why people are emboldened to profess that women have no rights so can get back in our box.

@lifeissweet

On further inspection, it would seem that this is why it is a flavour of the month argument

rgellman.medium.com/there-is-no-such-thing-as-sex-based-rights-in-the-uk-140554a2c42c

Wow. That article.

The more experienced will proudly refer to “The Equality Act” and how it protects “single SEX spaces”, with the reader almost forced to hear the word “sex” shouted by an angry woman demanding to see the manager

Especially like this. Nice casual bit of sexism there.

The rest of it is amazing tbh. They go into quite a bit of detail about the history of single sex spaces, and then somehow conclude that the reason they exist in the first place is to discriminate against women, and it should be the work of feminists to dismantle them.

It's one of the most arse-about-face articles I've ever seen.

The gaslighting is not a bug, it's a feature. You could read a hundred blog posts like that.

women's right to dignity is 'a woolly concept'

Just when you think you've seen this political movement reached the zenith of misogyny, gynephobia and absolute determination to use female humans and destroy all boundaries in their way to do so...

they take it one step further.

Done with 'kind'. Done with 'dogwhistle'. Done with the whole damn mess of bullshit. No.

This is the escalating trans activist batshit overreach. It's extremist anti women stuff and centres creeps who are determined to override women and girl's boundaries.

Another one saying No.

And while I'm sitting with my mouth open wondering what exactly was that person smoking, I'd like to know do they extend it to TW's right to dignity being debatable?

Or did they say the word 'women' meaning only 'adult human females'?

And this is exactly why the fuckwittery that is going on with language needs to be nailed down.
If we can't define a woman as an adult human female (and we all know what that means) in LAW then this shitshow will go on and on.
If we have no definition then we have no rights of our own, as anyone can become a woman.

The rest would follow naturally if the meaning of the word woman was protected and defined.

Can I walk into a nursery and declare that I'm now 3 years old? Why not? Why do we tryst the evidence of our eyes in that situation but not in this one?

As for the man who declared himself a wrongly identified woman at birth - this is what happens when these illnesses are allowed to flourish and are actually encouraged by the medical establishment.

And as for those chanting that there are no sex based rights - carry on. It shows you up for the mysogynistic woman hating jealous bitter little brainwashed lemmings that you are, and turns a lot of otherwise neutral women onto what is happening here.

The most egregious example of this type of gaslighting I can think of is when Peter Dunne of Bristol University contributed to the Scottish government report on changes to GRA to allow self identity.

I quote:

“It would be unthinkable that general discomfort could prevent a cisgender woman from using segregated showering facilities after she had a double mastectomy. In reality, UK law tolerates a considerable amount of bodily diversity when cisgender and intersex persons use single-gender spaces. Why are trans persons treated differently? … If cisgender and intersex persons can use women-only and men-only services, even when they have non-normative bodies, concerns about bodily diversity do not justify the current legal position under the 2010 Act.”

The idea that women with post mastectomy bodies are "tolerated" in female spaces is horrible in and of itself, but then look what they make flow from it.

Wow, Ereshkigalangcleg, I hadn't heard that. That's awful.

@Ereshkigalangcleg

The most egregious example of this type of gaslighting I can think of is when Peter Dunne of Bristol University contributed to the Scottish government report on changes to GRA to allow self identity.

I quote:

“It would be unthinkable that general discomfort could prevent a cisgender woman from using segregated showering facilities after she had a double mastectomy. In reality, UK law tolerates a considerable amount of bodily diversity when cisgender and intersex persons use single-gender spaces. Why are trans persons treated differently? … If cisgender and intersex persons can use women-only and men-only services, even when they have non-normative bodies, concerns about bodily diversity do not justify the current legal position under the 2010 Act.”

Good grief. That's hideous. What a nasty little man.

Yeah, "non-comformative" bodies - people who have disfigurements, surgery scars, birth defects or conditions, tattoos, piercings, body modifications, artificial or missing limbs, medical conditions that affect the appearance of their body..................who gives a crap.

They are are still sharing the facilities OF THEIR OWN SEX CLASS.

Also, you odious little Oik, intersex people still belong in a SEX CLASS, either male or female, very few have ambiguous genitals and even if they did, they are still male OR female.

Trans women have nothing "wrong" with their bodies, they are in perfectly healthy MALE bodies and should use the facilities of their MALE sex group with the other MALES.

Why are trans people so different you ask? Could it be that 99% of trans women KEEP their male genitalia (wonder why?). Could it be that they belong in a different sex class?

How about we start letting grown men shower with children and teenage girls? Why not?
It's just body diversity people!

Forgot to link any sources:

www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5149172/snp-breast-cancer-patients-id-row-mastectomies/amp/

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3788251-Scottish-GRA-consultation

www.womenarehuman.com/women-outraged-after-academic-compares-breast-cancer-survivors-to-male-bodies/

Isn't this just magical thinking?

I thought people grew out of that around the age they start school.

@Snugglepumpkin

Isn't this just magical thinking?

I thought people grew out of that around the age they start school.

In the "olden days" (circa 10 years ago) yes. But now we have "positive affirmation". We are actively encouraging this shite in schools. Children are not being told "no" anymore, or "that's impossible".

And this is where it leads us. Magical thinking.

'There is no such thing as sex-based rights' has long been an MRA chant over on Reddit, the idea you might have the legal right to breastfeed or not be sacked for being pregnant seems to make them angry.