New Statesman - Inside Labour's clusterf*** on trans rights

[Popuptent]

www.newstatesman.com/politics/labour/2022/04/inside-labours-clusterfuck-week-on-trans-rights

One useful outcome of the "can a woman have a penis?" question being asked of politicians is that some of the journalists reporting on this are political correspondents rather than media or society correspondents, and the political correspondents seem to be far more hard-nosed about what voters hear when politicians speak.

Even here, the journalist, Ailbhe Rea, who's a she/her, is including stuff like this in her report:

The Sun dubbed the Labour leader a “todger dodger,” to the great amusement of those in his office.

you can make any position sound ridiculous if you start asking about penises and cervixes

And that would be because it is ridiculous.

Look. It's really easy.

Everyone gets to be whoever they want to be. It's great. Go for it. The boundary however is other people's rights. Don't be a dick and try and take rights and access off others and frankly no one cares what anyone wears, the length of their hair, or the choice of their name.

And from a Labour insider:

I think if people knew how uncomfortable Labour politicians are defending LGBTQ rights they’d be really upset

My heart bleeds, pal.

Women are constantly trying to explain how uncomfortable they are having to defend their rights and access and equality and they are really upset. No one gives a fuck.

Really no energy left to give to help Labour politicians through the trauma of trying to face up to the fact they are behaving like a bunch of snooty metropolitan misogynists.

@Artichokeleaves

And from a Labour insider:

I think if people knew how uncomfortable Labour politicians are defending LGBTQ rights they’d be really upset

My heart bleeds, pal.

Women are constantly trying to explain how uncomfortable they are having to defend their rights and access and equality and they are really upset. No one gives a fuck.

Really no energy left to give to help Labour politicians through the trauma of trying to face up to the fact they are behaving like a bunch of snooty metropolitan misogynists.

This is why MN needs a Like button 👏👏👏

It still frames it as trans rights but what's actually the problem is women's rights. That's what the problem is.

^Note to self, pay more attention when editing a longer rantier post.

Labour don't really get it do they. quote from the article
the squeamishness they feel talking about genitals but Lisa Nandy and co are quite happy for female prisoners to be housed in the same cell as a TW with male genitals, with a high chance that TW with male genitals has been charged with rape.

. I think if people knew how uncomfortable Labour politicians are defending LGBTQ rights they’d be really upset.

Yes but not as uncomfortable as they seem to be about defending women's rights.

They also see it as a diversion tactic when voters are breaking down in tears about the cost-of-living crisis in focus groups and never bring up trans issues in such settings

This perfectly encapsulates Labour's incompetence on the issue.

Firstly, the assumption that women's rights are a low priority nice-to-have, to be addressed once every other problem in the world is sorted, when instead, they are fundamental to the solving of those problems, as well of being an issue of equal moral value to poverty etc. We've been hearing this since the first campaigns for suffrage - 'Pipe down, Ladies - we'll get to you once we've solved the economy, war, famine, nuclear fusion and razor rash'.

Secondly, the lack of awareness about why the issue is rarely raised in focus groups. Labour has been at the forefront of the No Debate movement. Its flying monkeys launch at anyone who dares to speak up for women in the mildest way - as Rosie Duffield knows to her cost. What a fucking shock that women aren't going to volunteer for a public shaming for transphobia, at the hands of some green-haired focus group convener.

Unluckily for Labour, the ballot box is still private.

Personally I will never forgive or forget Lisa Nandy's cruelty towards women and girls, and that of those who have enabled her for so long to spew her bilge about prisons.

Labour should be piling on to the Government about prisons, school indocrination, refuges and hospitals/Annexe B like a tonne of rocks. But Labour isn't. Unforgiveable.

So the Tory Government says words (but doesn't actually act) while Labour does neither, and actual ordinary women have to privately crowd fund millions of pounds to protect our liberty.

They still don't get it. They are saying the access issues can be handled on a case by case basis. No they can't and they need to understand why.

And everyone is aware of the competing tensions the party must manage: the squeamishness they feel talking about genitals, the concern they feel about causing hurt to the trans community and the desire to say something pithy and with common sense

women's rights and feelings are nowhere in the list of competing tensions then?

it fucking shows

fuck you labour

@nauticant

One useful outcome of the "can a woman have a penis?" question being asked of politicians is that some of the journalists reporting on this are political correspondents rather than media or society correspondents, and the political correspondents seem to be far more hard-nosed about what voters hear when politicians speak.

Even here, the journalist, Ailbhe Rea, who's a she/her, is including stuff like this in her report:

The Sun dubbed the Labour leader a “todger dodger,” to the great amusement of those in his office.

Todger Dodger.

😆😂🤣

I lufs it.

^Women are constantly trying to explain how uncomfortable they are having to defend their rights and access and equality and they are really upset. No one gives a fuck.

Really no energy left to give to help Labour politicians through the trauma of trying to face up to the fact they are behaving like a bunch of snooty metropolitan misogynists.^

So much this....

do you think any of the political parties wander over here and read our rants? or are we just seen as extremists to be ignored?

That article is really quite remarkable in how little it actually focuses on women or women's rights. Vaginas and penises get quite a few mentions. Trans rights quite a few mentions. Labour's sorrow that 'people aren't happy about LGBT+ rights being talked about' is mentioned. As is the over used trope (autocorrected to tripe there which seems rather apt) about there being other things to worry about.

A couple of mentions of 'single sex spaces' without any discussion about what that means, the legislation behind it or the impact of the erosion of such spaces.

As I said, quite remarkable. Just not in a good way.

Firstly, the assumption that women's rights are a low priority nice-to-have, to be addressed once every other problem in the world is sorted, when instead, they are fundamental to the solving of those problems, as well of being an issue of equal moral value to poverty etc. We've been hearing this since the first campaigns for suffrage - 'Pipe down, Ladies - we'll get to you once we've solved the economy, war, famine, nuclear fusion and razor rash this absolutely. I've seen quite a few posts today berating posters for wanting to be concerned about sex based rights and be called privileged and cruel and the 'you'd be happy for people to die' wouldn't you trotted out.

Why do they keep on like this, when women make up 51% of the population and TRAs a tiny proportion? Do they not believe women will demonstrate their disgust at the ballot box, or do they just not care? And if they don't care about winning votes and getting elected, what's even the point of them anyway?

Do those at the top of the Labour Party really believe that they are in the ‘same place as the British public’ on this?

I think they are deluded. Every person I’ve spoken with about this think Labour have lost the plot. My 75-year-old mother will - for the first time her life - not be voting for them.

They are losing their voter base. The tories will remain in power, and it’s all thoroughly depressing

Those at the top of the Labour Party believe that, despite the difficult media environment on trans issues, they are in the same place as the British public, who generally take a compassionate, “live and let live” approach to the question. While the public debate rages with ferocity, however, the divisions within Labour are still bubbling under the surface. Some people are at odds with the party’s position, others hurt by the discomfort with which they are defending it. “Everyone wants it to go away, but it won’t go away while we look so scared about it,” one figure said.

So they have learned absolutely nothing and cannot see that if TWAW you cannot effectively protect single sex-based rights and that children are in danger from medical experiments.

It would be interesting to see what would happen if Labour did get a grip and say that women's rights would be protected and they were going to push for separate, protected provisions for trans people. Would there be the posts complaining that trans people should stop moaning about their rights and focus on the economy and disabled people's rights? That they shouldn't be single issue voters?

@Artichokeleaves

And from a Labour insider:

I think if people knew how uncomfortable Labour politicians are defending LGBTQ rights they’d be really upset

My heart bleeds, pal.

Women are constantly trying to explain how uncomfortable they are having to defend their rights and access and equality and they are really upset. No one gives a fuck.

Really no energy left to give to help Labour politicians through the trauma of trying to face up to the fact they are behaving like a bunch of snooty metropolitan misogynists.

Absolutely- this should be sent to every politician

@Artichokeleaves

And from a Labour insider:

I think if people knew how uncomfortable Labour politicians are defending LGBTQ rights they’d be really upset

My heart bleeds, pal.

Women are constantly trying to explain how uncomfortable they are having to defend their rights and access and equality and they are really upset. No one gives a fuck.

Really no energy left to give to help Labour politicians through the trauma of trying to face up to the fact they are behaving like a bunch of snooty metropolitan misogynists.

I'm an adult human dale sexually attracted to other adult human females - an actual lesbian and they ain't defending my rights with their homophobic biology cancelling shit.

Female not dale

Now I've stopped laughing over "todger dodger" ...

From the article:

part of a wider, fractious public debate around trans rights that tends to stray far beyond the legal technicalities of provisions for trans people and same-sex spaces, and into a heated discussion about the legitimacy of trans identities and the philosophical fundamentals of sex and gender.

Well, if you decide to support legislative reform that allow people to self identify into a category with certain legal protections, you are going to get questions about the parameters of those categories and what defines those categories on a philosophical level.

But equally I don’t think this would be happening with any other form of discrimination.

Of course it would. If Labour supported self-id on age, disability or maternity, the exact same thing would have occurred. People would have said: "Err, wait a minute, if you allow people to self-certify their MAT B1 form, and no one is allowed to question whether they are indeed pregnant or not, aren't you going to get people taking advantage of that for dodgy reasons?"

they are in the same place as the British public, who generally take a compassionate, “live and let live” approach to the question.

This is a huge misunderstanding of how people actually approach issues. "Live and let live" usually means "Live and let live ... so long as it doesn't impact radically upon my own life." Once stuff does, that's when people start to get annoyed, and redefining the political, cultural, and social understanding of the word "man" and "woman" certainly does impact on a lot of peoples' lives.

it’s a fundamental thing about whether we speak a language voters understand

If you are not speaking a language that voters understand, you are not a national political party; you are, at best, a think tank or, at worst, a political sect.