Women and girls' sex-based rights

[StephanieSuperpowers]

Well, here we are...

Great badges @dollymixedup !

What did you answer on your survey @BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn ? I usually just totally abandon the form when I get to that sort of thing... or tick "prefer not to say" on every question. It's particularly annoying when it's something that I can't abandon or refuse to answer, e.g. the DC's flu vaccinations had Gender as a compulsory field with male/female/other. No choice but to play along with the foolishness if you want to receive your (the irony!) medical care.

I now wonder why I put up with it for so long

I think it's really common for women to put up with appalling behaviour from others, we're taught from an early age that our role is to please and to keep the peace. Some of the stuff I've read on here in Relationships and AIBU describing what women are putting up with is absolutely shocking.

I agree. I have a few student friends with families and I was surprised by some of the things they put up with but that seem to be totally normalised. There was a residential lab course we were given the option of attending but some of the women didn’t go because their husbands wouldn’t know how to sort things for the kids, or because their husbands ‘don’t do the childcare side of things’. It’s subtle because it’s so common, but it shouldn’t be subtle at all. It’s shit.

I’m also struck by the court case at the moment re 18 week waiting times. I’m involved in gynaecological healthcare and almost all of the women I speak to have been waiting two years or more for treatment for extremely painful medical conditions, the symptoms of which are commonly dismissed by doctors for years. And it’s been like this since long before Covid. I’m not suggesting it should be a race to the bottom, but where is the fuss about that, and why isn’t anyone doing anything about it?

I now wonder why I put up with it for so long, despite my misgivings. We were treated appallingly and nodded along with it, as if grateful to be allowed to speak about the subject at all.

I think that's fairly reasonable given that women were booted off Twitter for naming specific men as men, women's meetings are routinely protested against, women have lost jobs/opportunities etc etc

Speech is much more consistently policed on this site. I definitely can't use the still perfectly reasonable phrases I would use in real life, but I can say everything I need to say by carefully following the rules.

You are not allowed to be bad tempered on this bit of mumsnet, other bits that are less controversial in general are less restrictive,

I now wonder why I put up with it for so long

I did personally appreciate the complete freedom of language; being able simply to speak of "men" and "women" without having to prefix either with anything, and not having to either avoid or misuse pronouns. (Shall have to be a bit more careful Over Here obviously).

On the other hand that's probably the sort of thing that eventually led to the booting out. Ah well.

I’m also struck by the court case at the moment re 18 week waiting times.

It was heartening to see Eleanor Grey KC (for NHS England) referring to the Cass Review's interim report on a number of occasion. And striking that David Lock (for Gendered Intelligence et al) twice, that I noticed, suggested to the court that "gender services" should be put back to GPs instead of being a specialist service. He did, to be fair, say that that might not be suitable for children (with a massive "yet" hanging in the air). But it was interesting to see the direction that the lobby groups are planning to take, post-Cass.

The questions weren't optional, and I had a lot of other things that I thought warranted raising, so I answered, deleted and re-answered multiple times before settling on 'female' and 'no'. I considered 'prefer to self describe' but decided that would probably end up stuck into the trans bit of the graph regardless of the second question.

I was expecting a free text section at the end of the survey - we've always had one before - but no stray opinons were permitted this time.

I'm currently considering whether to raise it as a question at the next all staff meeting (from which they recently removed the facility for asking anonymous questions).

I can't believe all the blokes who get away with being all feeble: "Ooh, I dunno how to change a nappy, I might drop the baby."

I have plenty of friends who do as much as they can, on looking after their own kids side of things. Once my daughter was weaned, I took her out all day, when my wife laid round the house / visited her mates.

I even managed to fill the grab bag wit a towel, nappies, fruit, snacks, drinks, wet wipes, spare clothes, cuddly toy etc. Any bloke who can't even manage looking after his own kids for the day ought to have unpleasant things done to him, until he is capable.

It's fucking risible. And yes, I'd changed a fair few babies, but when mine was newborn, I was worried that I'd hurt her. My wife said, "Don't worry, she won't break."

Somehow, she didn't break, just in case any lazy deadbeats are reading this.

Like

The arrant stupidity of it! I'm not referring to the patient as it, btw, but what they came out with.

If you're seriously ill and are aware that there is something about you that might have an impact on how that illness will affect you then you tell the medical staff. The majority of us know that there are health issues that affect men and women differently, heart attacks being one but many others. If I was passing as a man and found myself in a hospital at death's door I think I'd tell the medical staff very quickly indeed that I was in actual fact a woman. And imagine if we all just thought that doctors should guess our sex and then they had the temerity to get it wrong. Or, in fact, to get it right and then be faced with a lawsuit because they were "misgendering" a patient.

She/he/they/them would have deserved a Darwin award if she'd died because she thought it was cute to be seen as a man even though that meant the medics got her diagnosis wrong because FFS!

Link and donation button for those who can for Adult Human Female .

Haven’t watched it yet, but will this weekend.

Here's something most of us knew:
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11492797/Four-10-transgender-criminals-prison-guilty-sex-crimes-new-data-shows.html

That's 44 rapists and 17 paedophiles.

Former Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill, who obtained the new breakdown in a Parliamentary answer, last night said: ‘These statistics show that the fears of women’s rights campaigners are right and governments north and south of the border are endangering vulnerable women.

I do wonder if Sturgeon may actually finally take notice and come to her senses, but I'm not holding my breath.

My fear is that they now can't afford to take any notice, given how far it's all gone.

Four in ten is double the usual rate for men's prisons, where "only" about 20% are in for sex crimes (which is a frankly horrifying rate in itself).

Even more horrifying when you consider the low conviction rate for many sex crimes.

Gonners

Four in ten is double the usual rate for men's prisons, where "only" about 20% are in for sex crimes (which is a frankly horrifying rate in itself).

Well, yes and as Bint says, compared to the conviction rate....

Read this and was reminded very much of how things were at the other place. thecritic.co.uk/the-labour-party-and-gender-critical-women/

I agree Tri - the language reported is that wriggly "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" "Oh noes, Bad People" word-salad.

There's a thread about the article here:
www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4689325-labours-silencing-of-women

3 a.m. isn't a good time to think about anything at all, in my experience. But especially gender ideology. Is is particularly difficult for those in the life sciences, healthcare and medicine, do you think?

Sometimes, I simply can't believe that huge swathes of apparently intelligent people believe this stuff - but then, is it me? Spending most of my education in genetics? I mean, actually working with chromosomes and DNA for about 7 years? And (a delight) eventually settling in medical education?

[an aside - I just managed, by the skin of my teeth, to avoid having to change all "mother"s to "pregnant people" in a fairly big piece of work. Some people seemed to think that this would be a virtuous change and reflect well on them as managers; but I could practically touch the unspoken "ffs" from the clinicians.]

I'm not sure what is worse - the misogyny, the contempt for women, or the rejection of science and objective reality. Nothing bodes well. In fact it bodes badly, boding away like anything.

On "hostage statements": to me, they read like Cultural Revolution self-criticisms. The shrieking (twitter)mobs that accompany any deviation from rightthink reinforce this impression in me.

Thanks for posting that link, I've just watched it from start to finish and it's your fault I'm starting my work an hour late! I was really pleased to see that they've made it free to watch (though I will chip in a few quid) because as many people as possible ought to see it. There will be nothing much new for followers of Bad Threads but for people unfamiliar with this territory, it's all there. I really enjoyed seeing several women (and one gay man) who I read regularly on Twitter and / or in articles, actually speaking on camera. In most cases, I'd only ever seen their printed words and this just brought everything to life - including their frustration, anger, and determination. One remark (I think it was Jane Clare Jones but I was wandering around the kitchen sometimes listening without watching) caught me (although again not really new) - the idea that trans ideology is leftwing is just wrong, it's actually a form of neoliberal individualism. (Or maybe hyper-individualism though I may have added that prefix subconsciously.)

Anyway, if a bunch of mostly leftwing gender-critical feminists who really aren't for backing down just happens to be your bag, I'd recommend you watch it.

Oh, another thing which made it a joy to watch - just like being on this thread rather than the old one - a complete absence of Sealions, and a space for the GC people just to express how they really feel, warts and all.

Justice minister Damian Hinds said: ‘We are not obliged to allocate transgender prisoners according to their wishes, and we are strengthening our policy on transgender prisoners so that transgender women who have committed sexual offences cannot be held in the general women’s estate, subject to an exemption policy for truly exceptional cases.’

Not obliged - so why do it then?

Truly exceptional cases - what would they be then?

FFS just grow a pair and mandate that NO male prisoners, trans or otherwise are put in the female estate - just a flat out NO. Make other arrangements within the MALE prison estate.

I agree wholeheartedly.

Indeed, as is mentioned in that film, and as has been said many times before in our discussions and elsewhere, women prisoners are likely to be vulnerable/ traumatised and to be victims of male violence. Just keep males out, the end.