Maya Forstater Tribunal March 2022- Thread 2

[Sophoclesthefox]

Forgive the presumption, @Mforstater, but you’re probably busy in the pub right now, or passing on all of the fan mail to you legal team so I’ve made a new thread to carry on the fascinating discussion.

Round up your cats, rabbits and weasels, and let’s go!

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From thread one, here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4498167-Maya-Forstater-hearing-starts-Monday

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 hmm.

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

Here we go...

We're off!

Here we go. Hello Hamid.

Evidence of Mark Plant will continue this morning.

BC returns to overall message claimant had been given about employment and why it changed.

Returns to bundle.

BC asks MP about email he sent to EM email on 4 Oct saying there should be robust discussion about renewal. BC says MP said he wanted to renew VF. Giving MF featured prominently in Gates grant.

BC asks is this when MA had his attention drawn to this?

MP: Yes

MP said in fact they had discussed making MF a senior fellow. BC asks if this reflects the message that she would be made a senior fellow.

MP: We could consider the possibility.

BC: Doesn't say that. It says you talked about making her a SF.

MP: Yes, but there is a process. No guarantee.

BC: Yes, but we are exploring strength of the message given to MF. This was, if the Gates grant goes through, we will make you a SF.

MP: I believe we said we would discuss it.

BC: Even if everyone understood a process, the message MF was that senior people in the org agreed that she would be supported.

MP: yes.

BC:

I used to hesitate to use the word patriarchy, because it sounded a little ott, I guess. But it's exactly what it is. If so many people, as you say, gleefully embrace a misogynistic ideology that lets them stick to women whilst getting pats on backs, there can be no other explanation.

Likewise. I'm naturally inclined to be somewhat sceptical of such overarching, somewhat unfalsifiable concepts. Doubly so in this case, being a man.

But having observed how this shitshow has played out, it really does require a critical mass of people that don't see women as full equally-valuable members of society.

The fact that this is tolerated reveals so much about the underlying value system.

It's not the only factor, of course, but it has to be there in the mix - this clear lower-ranking of women.

Tiny interview snippet of Jane Clare Jones on that here: "The greatest patriarchal unconcealment you can imagine"

BC: ... "you would be throwing your weight behind that process [to make MF a senior fellow]?"

MP: "Yes."

@MrsSteveMcDonald

The general gist I've got from what they've said is either: It's an error I don't know It's offensive

Missed anything?

Yeah, you missed "it wasn't me"

MP wrote in an email that MF would not be made a senior fellow because of "a shift in corporate priorities". That was reasonably clever.

BC: Reference to 'backlash' was picking up EM's reference of backlash in relation to expressino of claimant's beliefs.

MP: Correct.

BC wants to focus on renewal of the VF and the prospect of becoming a SF.

MP: Correct.

BC: So if we are looking at why that didn't happen, it's the discussion following this email, yes?

MP: Yes, that's part of it, but also the message had already been given to OB and others and to MF.

BC: Understand and we will return, but the discussion that led to not making her a SF took place after the email?

MP: Yes.

BC: Looking ahead in chronology, (back to bundle), this is an email on 19 Nov prior to meeting with MF on 21 Nov 2018. We see the email says you are emailing MA and AG saying you needed to get messages straight?

MP: yes.

BC: And you say on her position I will say we will continue as VF, but given shift in corporate priorities, we don't see possibility of making her full time. I will come back to the thinking. But after setting out reason you propose to give, you say this is a shift in the message to MF.

MP: Again, subject to processes but yes.

BC: Back in chronology. Development of discussion. Back to bundle. 1 October, LE emails EM and AG about complaints from staff, copied to MP.

Back to bundle, you are copied in, and we see MP response: you refer to fact that you had been present in some of the discussions in the London office. MP says he doesn't think her argument is inherently transphobic.

MP: Yes.

BC: You reviewed some of the tweets.

MP: yes.

BC: You recognised that the language is sensitive but thought her argument was not transphobic.

MP: Yes.

BC: You understood the essence of her argument, because you reflect on that in your witness statement? Back to witness statement: you say you understood it to be difference between sex and gender, sex based on reproductive organs, and gender being a social construct.

MP: Yes.

BC:

MP is being direct in saying he didn't take MF's tweets to be transphobic. Note here that he's relaxed about stating this because he doesn't feel there's much at stake for him over this, in contrast to LE and AG. This is privilege in action.

I think Allison Bailey's case, coming so hot on the heels of this one, will make it even more difficult for politicians such as Starter to keep the TWAW thing up. Quite how they can reverse out of that position and survive I don't know.

Hope you're right - who knows how it's even lasted this long?

One of the things that is giving me hope is that Ben Cooper is also Allison Bailey's barrister. I imagine Stonewall are quaking in their boots. If they're not, they ought to be.

MP: "people can take offence inadvertently at MF's tweets"

MP is washing his hands of all of the "OMG, transphobia!" stuff and is really committed to the smooth running of the workplace and no firm intention to employee MF lines.

Well, yes, MP. But the argument will never be well understood if people aren't allowed to discuss it or the language they are expected to us is not feasible for discussion purposes.

Understanding that sex is binary, immutable and important is so so very complicated.

@nauticant

MP is being direct in saying he didn't take MF's tweets to be transphobic. Note here that he's relaxed about stating this because he doesn't feel there's much at stake for him over this, in contrast to LE and AG. This is privilege in action.

Sorry to be dim, but I don't understand this point @nauticant - could you explain more to me what you mean about this being privilege in action?

How do you take offence 'inadvertently'?!

BC: back to bundle. MA expressed a view then indicating that he hadn't focused on the debate, but thinking that the issue should be a broader discussion about social media use.

MP: Yes.

BC: so senior members of org had given views, and consensus was it was a sensitive topic, and should be about social media policy.

MP: That was my posotion.

BC: In retrospect, that would have been a sensible place to leave it? Is senior management had stuck to your guns, we wouldn't be there.

MP: I don't think we could. There were complaints from staff and it raised broader issues, and we had to discuss those in the context of what MF was doing. We had to deal with it.

BC: With LE, went through process of the change in tone, prompted by Ms Schulman and the QI review. You weren't closely involved?

MP: No.

BC: And picking up at your next involvement, you were sent draft email LE was going to send to MF and you proposed amendments. You seem to be endorsing the view that the claimant's tweets had been inflammatory and exclusionary.

MP: It is a statement that... didn't hear. We go on to say problematic (several tweets). Problematic means it poses problems.

BC: Do you agree that the claimant's statement (MF's core beliefs) is part of her statement of the nuanced argument we have agreed you didn't think was inherently transphobic?

MP: I think it is a statement people have a difficult time understanding and that can be inflammatory and we have to be sensitive.

BC: Back to bundle. You contribute that you felt MF needed to be held to task for denying feelings. Do you agree that if you actually look at her tweets, she doesn't deny feelings? She says feelings arent reality.

MP: Now I do. The tweets are complicated and require a subtlety, so communication has to be very careful. I didn't have a concept of all of this.

BC: Do you agree with me that, because an argument may be nuanced and require care and thought, and some people may not understand it and wrongly take offence, is not a good reason to restrict someone's ability to engage?

MP: Correct, they shouldn't be restricted, but care has to be taken, so it is clear it is their belief and the belief isn't meant to denigrate others.

BC: The reality is as LE says, people at CGD expressed views on controversies all the time?

MP: Yes, within the sphere of CGD's work. This is outside that. It's taking people into a new and very sensitive area, which is not well understood. It took me a while to understand.

BC: But we have agreed that MF hadn't been told she couldn't tweet about this and identify her CGD affiliation?

MP: Correct

BC: Lots of senior researchers did this, didn't they? Subjects unrelated to work.

MP: Yes. I think if staff had come to us and complained, we would have taken notice. We did that. While she put a disclaimer on eventually, she was a VF, and we need to understand the conversations and the impact, and make sure conversation is appropriate for the institution. At this point we were one or two days in and we were learning.

BC: Sure. If you are making this an issue internally, MF can't be criticised for helping you to understand her argument?

MP: I agree.

BC: Email then goes to MF.

I find it curious that when it comes to people with religious beliefs (I'm thinking particularly of Muslims and their belief that images of the prophet are offensive) the line most people take is "you don't have a right not to be offended", but when it comes to trans issues the prevailing view seems to be that they do have a right not to be offended, even if what they are offended by is biology.

So MP line is basically “look I think all the ZOMG she’s so transphobic stuff is ridiculous but everyone was in a right old state & honestly I just decided that MF wasn’t worth dying on a hill for. Far easier just to get rid, what can I do - I have to manage idiots!” ??

MP is a very senior well-networked white bloke in a position of power in a system that rewards those characteristics and so he has much more freedom not to have to toe the line of "gender critical = Neo Nazi" that LE and AG seem compelled to follow BIWI.

MP: Yes, within the sphere of CGD's work. This is outside that. It's taking people into a new and very sensitive area, which is not well understood. It took me a while to understand.

I'm guessing what he means here is ' I know that men aren't women but it took me a while to understand what the correct political opinion to take on this is according to my tribe'

By being more inclined to classical liberal values MP is making this cross-examination a far more comfortable ride than LE or AG had. So far.

Ah, OK. Thanks @nauticant.

But stifling people talking about this - especially intelligent people like Maya who are willing to engage and explain - is WHY general understanding of the issues surrounding gender and self ID was so poor.

We see it all the time here on FWR - 'my default position was be kind, live and let live.' It's a maintaining a deception.

MP is going back to how it was said, not what was said. Again.