Robert Colville in the Times

[Igneococcus]

Very confused about it all

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ccc1a6e2-b29c-11ec-9af1-7ee554784c95?shareToken=5edbcbe74ca83ca1b2b3f04e0cc4da95 :

I don’t think that’s bad. The UK is a tolerant country.

I agree with @tabbycatstripy. I think that's a fair analysis. Are we not all starting from a position of everyone deserving respect?

As I see it, the issue is more about agreeing the balance of how to protect trans people from discrimination and abuse whilst also e.g. protecting women and girls from predatory males (whatever their gender).

Obviously there are extreme voices with a lot of influence in this, but in terms of the general public and I hope policymakers, on the whole people are fairly open minded and want a fair and inclusive society.

It's a balanced article and highlights the place that many of us are in.

Unfortunately that position is considered transphobic by TRA's and they are very very loud.

I agree, a fair analysis, roughly where I am I think.
I wonder about the leak. I think it has proved useful as it has allowed a u turn on conversion therapy for LGB which majority agree with and then a separate future discussion about the T which I also think is fair as they are two different things and should not be conflated ( as we all already argue here)

I thought it was good (not perfect but then I'm not interested in perfect because that level of purity is unsustainable) because the main message is that what's going on, ie the resistance, is not transphobia.

If trans activists had the stick of "transphobia" neutralised, how would they then argue?

I'm not saying it's bad but I also don't think RC has fully understood that a balanced view gets female commentators shouted at on social media and that it took a lot of effort, at personal cost to some women (and men too) to get to the point where a balance of rigths is even discussed in public and in government.

@Igneococcus

I'm not saying it's bad but I also don't think RC has fully understood that a balanced view gets female commentators shouted at on social media and that it took a lot of effort, at personal cost to some women (and men too) to get to the point where a balance of rigths is even discussed in public and in government.

Tsk, tsk. The issue didn't exist before people like RC stumbled across it: it's unrealistic to expect RC to research that assumption and discover whether or not there are people RC might speak to to develop a more informed overview of this contested area.

It is still shocking that, for example, more than two in five LGBT people told a recent government survey that they had experienced verbal harassment or physical violence in the past 12 months.

As for this, my observation is that a substantial majority of women are harassed or experience physical violence: what happens to this statistic if it's adjusted for women's routine experience? As always with these surveys, it's a matter of definitions and appropriate comparators, yet again.

I often wonder with the harassment is what the difference is between transmem and trans women

I have read lots of anecdotal evidence that women who transition find it a relief that they are less harassed

It is still shocking that, for example, more than two in five LGBT people told a recent government survey that they had experienced verbal harassment or physical violence in the past 12 months.

A significant part of this is the evidence that the T are harassing the L.

A significant part of this is the evidence that the T are harassing the L

yes indeed.

a gay man was 'evicted' from pride for wearing a t shirt bearing the logo of he LGB Alliance which campaigns for gay rights. clear homophobia

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/whats-on/man-evicted-manchester-pride-protest-21438362

good article from RC by the way, for all the reasons noted above

The title of the article is "Beneath all the shouting and vitriol is a simple truth: the whole country supports trans rights", which to me indicates rather a bit of spin going on.

And the conflation of one set of rights with another, already in place courtesy of Stonewall, comes in handy for the harassment statistics and general positioning.

I'd like to see the poll or polls which would justify any notion of unconditional support among the public:
"Polling on trans rights, for example, shows overwhelming support for adults’ right to identify as they wish: to choose their name, their clothing and their pronouns, and to pursue surgical intervention if they so desire."

He adds after:
" But voters also think changing gender should be a serious and considered process, involving a doctor’s approval and a trial period of living in your new gender; that it is unfair for transgender women to take part in women’s sporting events; and they are conflicted on whether trans women should be excluded from certain women-only spaces, especially if they have not had gender reassignment surgery."

Are voters and those polled aware that things are being implemented everywhere, regardless of doctors, process, law or rights and that that is what is being demanded as 'rights'? A significant omission from his account.

The explanation of the government's position and turnabout on conversion therapy is clear and useful. It's rational to recognise a difference between one case and the other, hence a real difficulty to grapple with. Why that should cause an outcry, is another thing.

What actual 'outcry' was there, apart from a leak to stir up trouble and a media gotcha and fuss got up by them and some lobbies who strike fear into panicky MPs? Was the wide public up in arms, marching on Downing Street, crying foul?

Is what counts as important any passing storm the media can create but should the media happen to ignore actual important issues such as women's rights, the government and our precious MPs can also ignore them? That's a sorry state of affairs which seems to be where we've ended up and if the government had a rational and genuine case, why has it failed to deal with it in Bill committees, in Parliament, in its communications to MPs and the public and stand up and defend it? Incompetence on their part.

Anyway, a further question that hasn't even been raised in the article on the conversion therapy issue because of fundamental prior assumptions built in, is whether what is going on in schools, clinics and other places isn't itself the promotion and practice of a form of conversion therapy? Has that not occurred to him?

That too, by omission, part of the framing that the article adopts in locating present activities firmly in the camp of historical tolerant progress towards Happy Clappy Everafter.

I really liked that article actually. I think it does reflect how most people, including me, actually feel. Most of us (in the country, and I think on this board too) are very supportive of trans adults getting on with their lives free from harassment. Just as our country is now mostly supportive of gay people. We are mostly a tolerant country and that's a great thing.

But most people don't want any old bloke deciding to wander into women's sports or women's spaces, and don't want to see children rushing into irreversible medical decisions.

We need different types of articles that will be read and absorbed by different audiences. Robert Colville is not trying to reach radical feminists, other authors can write articles to reach them.

There will never be one perfect article that will convince everyone, but that's fine because #yesdebate will involve a lot of different kinds of conversations happening between different groups. An example of this is how Lia Thomas has drawn men into this debate. I met up with my (completely non-political) brother the other week for the first time since Christmas and just in chit-chatting he raised the subject of transwomen in sport. That got through to him in a way that much of the other stuff would not have. But he'll now be more open to the other stuff.

I think my issue might be that the headline suggests there is shouting and vitriol from both sides and then he goes on to describe pretty much exactly what every GC woman says as the majority view in the country. He might not have written the headline though.

That’s true. He even gets praise from some of the TRA-adjacent woke bros.

I think my issue might be that the headline suggests there is shouting and vitriol from both sides and then he goes on to describe pretty much exactly what every GC woman says as the majority view in the country

True - but I think maybe he's more likely to get through to people this way! At least to those who are on the fence or hadn't thought about it much.

I'm not too keen on describing myself as GC - even though I pretty much agree with all the GC people on here - because I think some people (mistakenly) think it means bigoted, so are less likely to listen to what you have to say

I think the headline is quite clever - seems like a less confrontational way of saying "what rights do trans people not already have?"