Mermaids et al are likely to fail at proving the so-called hate (& here it actually is so-called…) element of LGBA’s work, surely?
They’re not saying things like “TQ+ people are actually child-eating swamp-creatures”; nor are they (despite it frequently being alleged it is so) advocating for the removal of the human rights of trans people/the mass incarceration of trans people [in camps]/a “trans genocide”.
They do, however, have to be absolutely explicit about how [groups representing] the TQ+ and the LGB should not be viewed as a monolith; & exactly why that is. The simple fact of their existence was considered a devastating attack on trans people. They didn’t need to do or say any anything other than believe that homosexuality exists & people have a right to be homosexual to be accused of “literal violence”, threatening the existence of trans people, bigotry, transphobia etc. The UK’s current socio-cultural context means that LGBA’s work will, for now, perforce focus on clashes of rights with the TQ+ - just as much feminist energy is having to be expended in a similar fashion.
Protecting the group they represent when their interests & rights are in conflict with those of the TQ+ is defensive, not offensive. With the conversion therapy bill, for example, they were quite correct to oppose the ban on trans conversion therapy. The lack of research by the government means it was an attempt to bar something with 0 known incidences. (NB I’m not saying it’s never happened, but rather, the government’s determination to rush the legislation through contributed to there being no research done - I suspect they were aware from past experience they couldn’t run a consultation on the matter - & thus an absence of evidence on which the law was to be based.) The poor drafting meant that the Bill was inherently contradictory - banning gay conversion therapy; yet mandating affirmation therapy in gender identity services, leading to “transing the gay away”. That last is of a particular concern in the paediatric population. In opposing the ban on trans conversion therapy LGBA were advocating for LGB people. They weren’t trying to trample trans people - indeed, legislating for affirmation-only therapy was warned against by people who work in the field.
“Fighting the TRA narrative” is “supporting LGB people generally” - yesterday’s hearing demonstrated that very well in fact. The TRA narrative is that anyone can be lesbian & the actual lesbians (you know, homosexual females) are “sexual racists” if they won’t consider having sex with male persons who identify as female - certainly they shouldn’t expect to be allowed to filter by sex on dating apps. And the cotton ceiling is not real; but also completely fine and reasonable behaviour should there inconveniently be proof of it. Lesbians are not free to associate together unless they include trans women who identify as lesbian. The insistence TWAW has literally reshaped society - it is a frequently-uttered nonsense that TW have been using women’s spaces for decades & nobody realised. We all clocked that occasional “transexual” almost-invariably-awkwardly breaching our spaces; saying nothing from kindness & compassion, or sometimes fear. It feels, now, as if they were the scouting party for those who now [seek to] colonise our spaces. Women & girls are excluded from the very facilities made to accommodate them. LGBA seek to push back against that where it concerns lesbian [& bisexual] women specifically; & to offer similar protection to gay men & their traditionally homosocial spaces (eg bath houses).
Simply put, to be able to offer these protections, & to work for the benefit of the LGB population, they have to push back against the TRA narrative.