Maya Forstater hearing starts Monday

[MForstater]

Hi all,

Thank you so much for all your support: emotional, intellectual, financial, spiritual(!) reading the Mumsnet feminism board is where this all started for me!

The case starts tomorrow.

It is all online. If you want to watch you need to email the tribunal for a log in to [email protected]

It kicks off at 10am - the first bit will be "admin" between the judges and the lawyers working out the timings, issues and any reporting restrictions .

Once that is all sorted the judge and the panel will go away to read (probably for the rest of Monday and all of Tuesday)

I will most likely give evidence Wednesday and Thursday.

@tribunaltweets will be tweeting the whole thing (assuming they get permission from the judge)

Links to papers will go up throughout the case at www.hiyamaya.net.

Any other questions I am happy to answer them (apart from the ones where I have to say "that is for the tribunal to hear"...)

I have made a spectators guide with FAQs etc here

Lots of love

Maya

The essence of CGD's case seems to be that some people could find what Maya said, in her tweets and on the work Slack channel, to be offensive. In particular, the criticism goes repeatedly to the "tone" that would be perceived.

@nauticant

The essence of CGD's case seems to be that some people could find what Maya said, in her tweets and on the work Slack channel, to be offensive. In particular, the criticism goes repeatedly to the "tone" that would be perceived.

Also barrister is having to work really hard to make Maya's tweets sound much worse by rephrasing each tweet to say something that it doesn't say.

Oh god, the Tone Police, telling women to 'watch your tone' through the ages. I remember Matt Hancock doing it to Rosena Allin-Khan MP in the House of Commons.

What's going to be interesting is when the examination of the Tribunal moves over onto CGD's decision-making about letting Maya go, and whether the tone of these tweets and Slack messages was significant to that. Or whether they made their decision for whatever reasons and now in the Tribunal they're applying ex post facto justification.

The essence of CGD's case seems to be that some people could find what Maya said, in her tweets and on the work Slack channel, to be offensive.

Super, but don't they believe in inclusion and tolerance? Are they making the argument that they had to exclude her because of intolerant staff?

We've establish she has protected beliefs - saying that you have staff intolerant of protected beliefs being expressed isn't good enough.

Otherwise you can be justified in sacking people campaigning about gay rights if you have staff who are offended by that.

The point of the Equalities Act was to prevent that sort of thing.

CGD's barrister saying a cross-dresser isn't trans. Hard to answer that one categorically but Stonewall certainly say cross-dressing comes under the trans umbrella.

They didn't let Maya go. They decided they didn't want her as a member of staff rather than just a contractor because of her handing out what is perceived as transphobic leaflets at work ( according to news reports today ). Having the belief is one thing, bringing into the workplace to attack a group of people who are a protected characteristic under the equality act is another. Its not going well for Maya and its not going to get better.

But those who disagreed with her - holding the opposing belief - also brought it into the workplace, didn't they? Why do they get to discuss their beliefs and MF doesn't?

Interesting section just then in which Olivia Dobbie (counsel for CGD) went through an internal discussion in CGD about how those tweets of Maya they received complaints about were not transphobic. She's doing this to remove the sting of this being used by Maya's counsel. And also to show that CGD went into their decision-making with an open mind. I can see what she's doing but it does render her argument about "offensive tone" incoherent.

Of course, one "CGD person" did express concerns, a DE&I person who seems to be in the US.

her handing out what is perceived as transphobic leaflets at work ( according to news reports today ).

That's an inaccurate statement of what was on the stream about an hour ago.

@tabbycatstripy

But those who disagreed with her - holding the opposing belief - also brought it into the workplace, didn't they? Why do they get to discuss their beliefs and MF doesn't?

This. The double standards need pinning down.

There is an ongoing attempt to reframe Maya's previous win as 'ok, ok, you have the right to hold those beliefs, but you must never actually voice them or show them (consenting adults can do what they like behind closed doors if they don't hurt anybody). But bring your whole self to work, and here's a rainbow day/week/month with flags and training courses on other beliefs.'

This is absolutely hilarious:

twitter.com/tribunaltweets/status/1502234723384504320?s=21

Opposition misgendered someone.

Having the belief is one thing, bringing into the workplace to attack a group of people who are a protected characteristic under the equality act is another.

Only one set of people did that here, and Maya was their target.

'There is an ongoing attempt to reframe Maya's previous win as 'ok, ok, you have the right to hold those beliefs, but you must never actually voice them or show them...'

Exactly. The legal protection isn't so she can believe what she likes - no law could prevent her doing so and nobody could subject her to detriment unless she expressed them. The legal protection is so she can be known to hold these beliefs, without detriment, providing she doesn't commit misconduct or harass someone.

The problem we have is that they are seeming to decide that one belief (GC belief) is 'problematic' in the workplace and the other belief (theirs) isn't. And they acted accordingly without awareness that her belief was protected.

@DisgustedofManchester

They didn't let Maya go. They decided they didn't want her as a member of staff rather than just a contractor because of her handing out what is perceived as transphobic leaflets at work ( according to news reports today ). Having the belief is one thing, bringing into the workplace to attack a group of people who are a protected characteristic under the equality act is another. Its not going well for Maya and its not going to get better.

A tiny bit premature. We've only heard half of the Claimant's evidence at this point. The respondents haven't even opened their case yet. There is a reason that the tribunal will listen to all of the evidence before making a decision.

*respondent hasn't

They decided they didn't want her as a member of staff rather than just a contractor because of her handing out what is perceived as transphobic leaflets at work ( according to news reports today ).

This is what was said in the tribunal about the leaflet.

EJ: why was it in the office?
MF: I'd picked it up that morning at the demonstration and talked about and they asked questions. They asked why it was important to me and I said I've got this leaflet if anyone wants to read it

twitter.com/tribunaltweets/status/1502225736056377344

Olivia Dobbie (counsel for CGD) returns again and again to the problem being that people are offended. But this alone can't be enough, if you had a number of men in an office who were offended at having a woman as a colleague that would be unreasonable.

"Offended" cannot exist in isolation, it must exist in the context of holding gender critical beliefs being a protected characteristic as decided in the High Court. What this means is that OD is continually trying to wriggle out of the confines of the High Court decision.

Olivia Dobby hasn't accepted that Maya's beliefs have any protection whatsoever. Her argument is, 'But you could just have agreed not to express your [legally protected] belief in the workplace, and gone along with the "workplace culture" of forcing you to participate in and express a belief in gender identity.'

Sure, Olivia. That makes sense.

OldCrone, as I remember the exchange, MF was saying that in a context of these matters having been discussed at work and that there had been a discussion of her having been at a "gender critical meeting", MF said "I have a leaflet, if anyone would be interested in looking at it I'll leave it here on the filing cabinet near my desk".

As usual, DisgustedofManchester will misrepresent in order to discredit. They really dislike the fact that this issue is being debated here.

Offended" cannot exist in isolation, it must exist in the context of holding gender critical beliefs being a protected characteristic as decided in the High Court

I am not so sure about that. Are there not other beliefs covered by protected characteristics of religion for example which many people would find unacceptable if expressed in the work place?
eg A person is entitled to believe that only sexual activity which takes place between a male and a female in the context of a marriage is acceptable, or that men are superior to women or that men can beat their wives because these are all beliefs covered by the protected characteristic of religion.

But if that person were to voice those beliefs at work that would be considered unacceptable.

@tabbycatstripy

Olivia Dobby hasn't accepted that Maya's beliefs have any protection whatsoever. Her argument is, 'But you could just have agreed not to express your [legally protected] belief in the workplace, and gone along with the "workplace culture" of forcing you to participate in and express a belief in gender identity.'

Sure, Olivia. That makes sense.

It still frames this as good, worthy, right beliefs and wrong beliefs.

It is not ok for homophobic people to express homophobic views if they're a majority and they find a gay member of staff offensive. (And this happens. As a lesbian, I've encountered more homophobia from those claiming to speak for LGBT+ and finding my excluding males from my sexuality unacceptable complete with threats and shunning than I every have from anyone else). It's not ok for staff of one religion to require staff to adhere to and enact a pretense of holding the beliefs on the grounds of finding atheism offensive to them.

Either no one's views are shared and the workplace stays neutral - and that means no flags, no training on partisan beliefs, no celebration days - or mutual tolerance is required with equal standards. It's one or the other.

This political movement has a major problem with their tolerance of others, and it's not acceptable. There are not going to be special rules for special people, and that's what this always boils down to. Either everyone is welcome to talk about this stuff and it's ok that different people believe different things, or no one is. Either everyone is entitled to choose their own language and definitions (including to reject 'cis' and say no to sharing their pronouns) or no one is.

Why would you rely on ''news reports'' when a public tribunal is going on right now?

@DisgustedofManchester

They didn't let Maya go. They decided they didn't want her as a member of staff rather than just a contractor because of her handing out what is perceived as transphobic leaflets at work ( according to news reports today ). Having the belief is one thing, bringing into the workplace to attack a group of people who are a protected characteristic under the equality act is another. Its not going well for Maya and its not going to get better.

As A matter of interest, I wonder what the impartial news source is for this thoroughly scrutinised and validated interpretation of an alleged event that is in no way a scenario or partial interpretation?