Excoriating is a good word.
Sometimes you read a review which makes you wonder whether the reviewer has a) actually read the book or b) attempted to engage with its premise. This cannot be said about Naomi Cunningham. She read it and engaged with it.
Yet, instead of engaging with the substance of her review or challenging her on factual accuracy, the Discrimination Law Association's committee felt that the "overall tone" of [Cunningham's] review of "Transgender Law" by Robin White and Nicola Newbegin published in the March edition of the DLA Briefing was "not in keeping with the DLA's position of impartiality in any debate between different protected characteristic groups". A second (much more positive) review is to be published in this month's Briefing."
Have they read the book?
A quick refresh. These are White's and Newbegin's own words when discussing the meaning of the words“man” and “woman” - an argument eerily familiar on FWR:
“The EqA 2010 definition of ‘man’ is a male of any age and ‘woman’ is a female of any age’ (EqA s212). But without a definition of ‘male’ and ‘female’ this does not help. Is a trans male (sic) a male or a trans woman female? Is a trans woman something different from a woman? But a gay woman or a black woman are still women, why not a trans woman?”
www.legalfeminist.org.uk/2021/09/02/a-practical-guide/
How cloth-eared is it that it is Naomi Cunningham's 'overall tone' that is the main issue for the Discrimination Law Association Committee rather than, for example, the overt sexism or the ugly, casual racist and homophobic othering of black and gay women - 2 'other protected characteristic groups' - of the original text.