Typical Guardian piece by Zoe Williams: "Who do the Tory leadership candidates think they are impressing with their spiteful posturing on trans issues?"

[TheBiologyStupid]

You would think after the recent judgements in Maya Forstater and Allison Bailey's cases, the publication of the interim report of the Cass Review, and the decision to close down the NHS Tavistock clinic that the penny would have dropped that opposition to Stonewall and gender ideology isn't "spiteful posturing". But sadly, apparently not:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/aug/01/the-tory-leadership-candidates-have-been-cynically-posturing-on-trans-issues-but-who-are-they-impressing-with-their-spite

Dear The Guardian,

'Member back when you were anticapitalist? Now you're actually paying money in the middle of a mad recession for this whole dope to generate weird bigoted clickbait that seems.... less outraged (as is the tradition) than just dull, tired, unoriginal, behind-the-Times (literally!) and not really trying. Worse, this particular piece treats BOTH women and trans people as acceptable collateral damage.

What's actually even in here that's of any substance, provides and useful or new or even accurate information, provokes critical and constructive thought? Let's see ...

...a venue with gender-neutral toilets, but by the time her team arrived, handmade paper signs saying “men” and “ladies” had been stuck on the doors – underlining the point that, with her in charge, no one would ever have to suffer the indignity of the unisex toilet again... How is this Badenoch's responsibility? It's little hand-written slips of paper like my granddad would make (he doesn't like computers). Not even dastardly stickers! Anyone could have placed them there. (Also, if Zoe had proper respect for TRAs, she wouldn't be conflating gender and sex.)

Mordaunt referenced Thatcher’s “every prime minister needs a Willie” remark, giving it a new twist: “A woman like me doesn’t have one.” Look, here's Thatcher! You like Thatcher! Thatcher was a woman, and so am I!! Mordaunt may be guilty of something here, but it's hardly trans-baiting. Stop dragging innocent people in to generate outrage clicks whilst... checks notes ... hypocritically berating others for... um... the "cynical unkindness of using a minority group ... as a talking point".

Liz Truss wowed an audience of Leeds Tories by telling them “a woman is a woman”... and? Nothing specifically to do with Trans people. Stop othering everybody, Zoe!! ...while Rishi Sunak pledged in the Mail on Sunday that he would reverse the “recent trends to erase women via the use of clumsy, gender-neutral language”. Is Zoe equating misogyny with trans people now? Or blaming trans people for it? Why? (Oh, wait: $$$$$$$$$$$$$).

Even if we park (and I’m loth to) the sheer, cynical unkindness of using a minority group’s right to exist as a talking point in a popularity contest... You certainly ARE "loth" to stop using a minority group irrelevantly for your own gain, Zoe, as you've been doing it for almost a page now!

How could any person of serious intent be concentrating on “clumsy, gender-neutral language”? How could they not be?

Trans issues, which had been posed as two separate questions (participation in sport and rights more generally), came in at 26th and 27th, in a list of 28. But we're not talking about trans issues here, are we, Zoe? At least, the leadership candidates aren't. Based on your selected examples, they're mainly talking about equality and women's rights. YOU'RE talking about trans people. Ignorantly.

It’s just a tawdry play to divide the left, so that instead of building a coherent critique of this shambles of a government, instead of laying out a platform on which they are united, Labour MPs are signing open letters to each other about drivel. If the Conservatives are shambolically bad, why is that not GOOD for Labour? And while we're on the subject, what's the purpose of YOUR "tawdry ploy"? (Oh, never mind, here it is: to make a buck for me - fuck everybody else).

Even the pic on the article is confused: "Bad news for Badenoch: gender-neutral toilets" with a pic of someone opening a door with symbols of a 1950s-era stylised stick figure in a dress next to another in Star Trek pyjamas. That's anything BUT "gender-neutral".

I'd hire an editor and a fact-checker, The Guardian - bin Zoe's column to pay for it; I'll be happy to look at Shutterstock cat pictures instead and your readers would benefit and well.

Best,
Serena

...a venue with gender-neutral toilets, but by the time her team arrived, handmade paper signs saying “men” and “ladies” had been stuck on the doors – underlining the point that, with her in charge, no one would ever have to suffer the indignity of the unisex toilet again... How is this Badenoch's responsibility? It's little hand-written slips of paper like my granddad would make (he doesn't like computers). Not even dastardly stickers! Anyone could have placed them there. (Also, if Zoe had proper respect for TRAs, she wouldn't be conflating gender and sex.)

The place in question was apparently a think tank where Maya Forstater had been based leading up to her ET judgment last month, and she says that the labels had been there for weeks, nothing to do with Kemi.

Australia are about 2-3 years behind the U.K. on this conversation imo ( partly as they don’t have a Mumsnet!)
Generally the public debate in the U.K. on gender ideology is more advanced than the rest of the world ( hence the “ Terf Island”attacks) although the rest of the world is watching.
It be a much bigger and more contested issue in the next Australian election imo.

No comments allowed of course.

I don't think they have allowed comments on trans articles since about 2015. Even on OALA. (Opinions Are Like Arseholes)

I'm sick to death of the "denying out right to exist" trope. What the fuck does that even mean? Does because I don't think you can change sex doesn't mean I don't think that someone has no right to exist. Same as with the "Trans Genocide" hyperbolic BS.

I think these TRA are so out there that they believe unless you too go along with TWAW then that must mean you don't regard them as women - ergo you wish them out of existence. All these people must be 5.

Pretty sure I saw a tweet at the time pointing out these signs had been there for a while.

Which I thought was far more interesting than trying to say it was Kemi.

It suggests (to me, anyway) that

1.someone who worked at the venue was peeved enough at mixed-sex loos to rebel and put the signs up

and

1. Nobody at the venue cared enough to remove the signs.

Katherine Deves got a very decent vote result for someone going against Zali Steggal and who had been ripped to shreds in the media.

Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuude.

If you genuinely do not know why Scott Morrison was ousted, I suspect you probs do not have any kind of qualifications to be posting on a board about feminist topics.

🍆🎩😀👔👖👞👞👞👞👞

minority group’s right to exist

Oh do fuck off Zoe.

Yes, the claim about the toilet signs has been debunked. Surely Zoe can do some fact checking?

Nice one dude....!!

Care to explain hearache how the situation in the Australian election is comparative to the UK?

I am all ears to hear this one.

the link to the Opinium poll she quoted was just to someone on twitter saying they had a leaked copy. So no, fact checking and source checking are not part of her skill set.

Even her last sentence “Sun Tzu doubtless puts this more pithily, but progressives, everywhere: if you are chasing a stick Liz Truss threw for you, you are chasing the wrong stick.” - see what she did? Can’t be bothered to find a Sun Tzu quote so she sort of makes one up and implies that hers is in Sun Tzu’s class anyway.

Williams is a fine example of hubris. Like Christine Hamilton.

Why break the habit of a lifetime?

She doesn't care whether she is accurate or not, unless she's proven wrong and even then she will just block the poster on Twitter.

Yes.

This poster has a habit of plopping down a ‘gotcha’ that never quite shows what they think it shows.

Any poster who thinks that the quick shoe horning in of Katherine Deves as a Lib candidate in Tony Abbott’s old electorate when Katherine was not even a member of the liberal party before hand and the very adversarial nature of the Australian press at election time is comparative in anyway to the current UK situation has a very superficial understanding of the situation. (That has not stopped posters before though)

Anyone who understands that Australians are actually majority supporting of women’s sexed based rights being kept for females, and that there really is not yet the ratio of young females identifying as trans in schools so the conversations are only just starting, knows that Australia is behind the UK in timing but it doesn’t mean Australia has any more support than the UK for the changes that are happening there either.

It is just another failed ‘gotcha’ really.

She did indeed.

And in my month back in Oz talking to women from across the political spectrum and from all walks of life, they all agreed that her points were valid. Maybe not voiced in a way that wins votes, but still everyone agreed that I spoke to.

Would they have voted for her… maybe not, but they still agreed with her points on these specific issues.

Thing is, the Tories aren't pro women, they're anti trans, these things are very different.

I think the "right to exist" claim is hugely ideological. It is saying "There exist women who are trans women (who are, because TWAW, literally women)." So not recognising that TWAW is denying the existence of trans women - because look, here they are!

It's a total mind bender because to see it that way you have to accept TWAW as a literal truth. And from that position it's very difficult to engage with anyone who says "yes, I accept trans women exist but I don't think they are literally (biological) women" because it just doesn't compute. Either the speaker doesn't understand that there are trans women or they are being transphobic and excluding a marginalised group of women from the "women" category.

So basically, it's a restatement of the TWAW thought-terminating cliche.

I've not read the article but I did catch this on Twitter last night - Zoe Williams referring to Julie Bindel and Claire Fox as 'skirting alt right' and critiquing their dress sense. Sorry I couldn't get it to screenshot but the link should work (unless Williams deletes of course):

twitter.com/bindelj/status/1554189162743570433

What is her spiteful posturing doing?

I’m glad other excellent female journalists have left The Guardian

The paper is rubbish these days

I think the swell against the changes being forced through the state governments will grow very quickly now. And I notice that Albanese has not thrown much out in support specifically.

The court cases and the progress made in health care and rights has in the UK will mean things will happen a little more quickly in Australia as they have something to base the pushback on. Unlike the UK which is fighting from the very back foot.

The changes in the Scandinavian countries and the USA clinicians speaking out will also strengthen the pace around health care.

What a load of hyperbolic histrionics! I'd prefer it if she didn't exploit the catastrophic cost of living crisis to try to push for her extremely unpopular agenda. We have to concentrate on the important things now imo and trans is a luxury belief we can't afford.

Is Hadley Freeman still there?