Took no time at all - JKR's "discriminatory" service

[ZeldaFighter]

www.independent.co.uk/life-style/women/jk-rowling-women-abuse-service-b2243534.htm

I actually expected The Independent to be a little more....Independent!

I don't suppose they do. They just don't want anything that's only for women to exist. Dogs in the manger.

Hmm could it be that they are more MRA than TRA? 🤔

Flip it the other way. Would any woman in the world object to a charity funding a specific and dedicated support service for transwomen and the 'non-binary'? Charities are independent bodies, they can support who they like.

It's astonishing isn't it. TRAs have told us if we want single sex rape services to go and build it ourselves. We do and they scream blue murder.

Just shows that they had no intention of allowing female only services.

But of course this was going to set off a meltdown...as ever, in the immortal words of Lisa Muggeridge "...their identity is the only thing they can see and they can only see you as a reflection or threat to it."

^^

When that landed in my inbox this morning, I felt quite tearful. I liked very much what JKR said and SM in the two paragraphs below.

“It’s the weaponising of trauma, isn’t it? You are told your lived experience is not important. We are literally not permitted to speak about our lived experience. It's ‘too attention-seeking. You're just playing the victim.’ This is actually the language of an abuser.”

The big shock for me has been where the backlash against women’s rights has come from. In the Nineties we read Susan Faludi, who said it would come from the Evangelical Right. But here it has come from the Left’s version of identity politics.

I recall decades ago, when a Scottish friend of mine, came to England with her young son, to go to the newly opened Women's Refuge. I never would have believed a women's refuge being taken over by men who believe they are women and therefore have the right to that place. Women only spaces, always attract attention from men, who believe they have the right to police where women gather.

The analogy with the Gay Rights movement is not comparable. They never invaded women's spaces or wanted to dominate us.

I wonder what Owen Jones has to say about it all.

I’m just waiting for “Open Democracy” to explain it for us all. Their October article did such a stellar job of explaining How anti-trans activists forced Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre into lockdown after all 🤔🤨
The wee logo at the top means it’s part of their critical and in-depth coverage of gender, sexuality and social justice – worldwide.
Apparently they are working hard to track the international backlash against women's and LGBTIQ rights – and to spotlight stories of feminist resistance to those leading this backlash.

Twitter is far funnier than it should be at the moment as TRAs are having the most almighty tantrums. Unfunny, however, is the ones who are busily being vile about “oh look at how there are these potential security issues with the website”. Keeping it classy there guys, as always. Similarly classy are the innumerable screechy tweets about “genital inspections” being required for admission.

The “this is an evil transphobic plot! POLITICAL MACHINATIONS DICTATE JKR’s TIMING!” [would-be] narrative is much funnier. I mean, in a sort of “laugh rather than cry” way, but a lot of it was coming from the one Twitter user who felt no need to have any knowledge of the customs, culture, history, traditions & laws of Scotland [nor indeed the rest of the UK] before weighing in with faux- naïveté & being repeatedly told Scottish women want - & are legally entitled to - single sex services; rape crisis centres were set up by women & have now been effectively stolen by male persons (inc one who lied about their sex to get a job reserved for female people) so women are simply rebuilding.

Utterly disingenuous article cherry picking a couple of idiotic tweets for clickbait. For shame the Independent and Kate Ng. Hopefully anyone with half a brain everyone will see through this. A wonderful initiative. JKR just keeps getting better and better. You wouldn't have thought it possible because she set the bar pretty high to start with, but she does.

"Does it offer services to trans women who have suffered male violence?” one person asked on Twitter. “If so… Rowling admits trans women are women. If not… she’s discriminating and can be sued.”

Hmm, I do think it would be an amazing way to clarify the legal situation if a transwoman - ideally one with a GRC - did sue Beira's Place*.

I'm pretty sure the single sex exemptions in the Equality Act would apply, and the claim would be unsuccessful. And for once, it wouldn't be a woman having to pay to have the law clarified. I can't see how else this question can be tested in court, given that all the services which used to have single sex provision are too scared to do so now, and instead they protect themselves by observing Stonewall fake-law.

* Of course it's awful that any person - of any sex or gender - suffers sexual assault. And sueing a rape crisis service must be horrific, and take enormous courage. I don't wish that on anyone. I feel so much respect for Sarah Summers, who has found the courage to sue Brighton Rape Crisis Centre for refusing her the single sex support group she needed.

If it styles itself as a referral service then all it has to do is put a trans identifying man in touch with one of the many other places that will provide the help they need, no?

Has The Times piece on this been linked yet?
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/354015c2-79ea-11ed-8486-22782b7fe87b?shareToken=c94f424435165fb0cfc0c6ff399e6300
I like the way it uses the words 'trans-identified males'. Much easier to understand with that terminology.

It was predictable that TRAs would scream she's discriminating and she can be sued. But she's predicted the direction that particular backlash would come from. To quote the Google hit for the new service:

Section 212 of the Equality Act 2010 defines a woman as a ‘female of any age’ and Beira’s Place services are for women aged 16 and over. The service is offered in accordance with the Equality Act 2010, which permits the provision of single sex services and a single sex staffing policy in various situations where there’s a good reason for them.

The MRA can throw as many tantrums on Twitter as they want. Single-sex spaces are perfectly legal.

The website for Beira's Place notes that they are a registered company, not a charitable organization. Guess that puts paid to Mermaids setting the Charitable Commission on them. That's if they haven't already been put off by their attack-dog biting their own ankles. Own goal: 0-1.

Officials at Rape Crisis Scotland have called on JK Rowling to open her new women’s refuge to trans and non-binary people

Officials at Rape Crisis Scotland said what? Are they mad?

The whole point of this is to provide somewhere to meet the unmet need of females needing female only care.

They've got the mixed sex/male focused care covered.

What a mean, shitty little article that is. An agenda that can be seen from space, and a very grudging sentence and a half right at the end 'however, some women...' Pah!

Officials at Rape Crisis Scotland have called on JK Rowling to open her new women’s refuge to trans and non-binary people, adding that it had been offering rape crisis services to trans women for 15 years and there had “not been a single incident of anyone abusing this”.

I wouldn’t trust RC Scotland at all on this. But it is clear that they don’t even pretend to understand.

They have no idea how many women have self excluded and I don’t believe they have even cared to find out.

Even better, they cannot report Beira to the charity commission either. All those tricks will simply not work. Imagine if this service goes so well that a network of them (probably as charities and not all funded by Joanne) can be opened. It will blow this crap to smithereens.

Imagine, the research that can be sensitively done as well! That will provide the evidence that is now lacking in the form of published statistics.

The anecdotal evidence that seems to have been ignored will become supported by statistics and become a solid block of evidence that will hopefully be used across the world.

I'm pretty sure the single sex exemptions in the Equality Act would apply, and the claim would be unsuccessful. And for once, it wouldn't be a woman having to pay to have the law clarified.

Would it even get past the first meeting with a solicitor, considering the EA2010 uses this exact situation as an example of when it's lawful to exclude males?

Oh, a new bad-faith take on Twitteroo: but what about an abuses mother who has at least one child who is a boy? Is she not welcome?

Yeah, if he is under 16. Surely.

Well, it's not a refuge service, I don't think. I can't imagine women would take their children to rape counselling sessions, on the whole. Unless it's specifically family counselling.

Officials at Rape Crisis Scotland have called on JK Rowling to open her new women’s refuge to trans and non-binary people, adding that it had been offering rape crisis services to trans women for 15 years and there had “not been a single incident of anyone abusing this”.

The the very presence of a sexist man in a rape crisis centre is abuse of the system.

I don't suppose J. K. Rowling will get involved in this kind of nitty-gritty, but personally I'd like to see a total of all the female only places were men are welcome, despite women's objections, compared to this single, solitary place, where they are not.

On the plus side, as a previous poster has said, boy, is this absolutely neon lighting their agenda.

Nasty little twats.

I see several of us were particularly struck by the same part of the article…

I’ve less than no faith in their claim they’ve had no issues. I mean, it ignores the women who self-exclude because they need a single-sex service, just for a start. Then they’ve made it clear the space is not one in which complaints about TW would - reframe your trauma remember everyone - be entertained. And do they keep track of what happens after people stop engaging with services?

I suppose when you are roaring like an overindulged child being told “no” it’s impossible not to say the quiet parts out loud. Along of everything else.

The self-absorption really does know no bounds - petulant foot-stamping “I want!”
”gimme!” “MIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNEEEEE!!!” (the last, of course, usually comes as they wrest a precious treasure, like Hampstead Women’s Ponds, from the - smaller, weaker [because biology] - female holding it & run away).

Gloriously, though, the Mirror of Erised denies them this most precious of treasures. Over & over & over.

'The...very presence of a sexist man in a rape crisis centre is abuse of the system.'

Quite so, especially one who lied to get his position and has no GRC.

I doubt anyone who lied about having a food hygiene certificate would be allowed to remain working in the ERC kitchen, but hey, special privileges for Speshul ladies, eh.

Officials at Rape Crisis Scotland have called on JK Rowling to open her new women’s refuge to trans and non-binary people, adding that it had been offering rape crisis services to trans women for 15 years and there had “not been a single incident of anyone abusing this”.

How come the Independent's journalism standards have fallen so far that it now conflates refuges (as in, emergency accommodation) and rape counselling provision?

Gloriously, though, the Mirror of Erised denies them this most precious of treasures. Over & over & over.

Desires that are impossible to fulfil are the strongest ones.

I do wonder what they'll do when the inevitable happens and a TW with a GRC rocks up claiming to be female. Claiming it's logistically impossible to exclude them is the only argument the TRAs have. It relies on a baseline assumption that TW are awful people who won't tell the truth or respect women's boundaries, but then lots of them clearly are. I guess they could simply not say anything but refer them on to trans inclusive services?

I’m very interested that Rape Crisis Scotland is calling on Beira to accept Trans & NB people too.

Why?

Thought they had that covered.

Do they fear that too many support humans (aka women) will decamp to the enemy leaving their preferred clients invalidated?

Or do they secretly realise that a lot of women have self excluded from their services & are afraid to find out just how many?