Since then, I have been in extensive correspondence with people including Roger Halliday the Chief Statistician (who thought “if a person considers himself a male and is most comfortable referring to his personal gender in masculine terms, then his gender identity is male” was a suitable explanation for children), Shirley-Anne Somerville (who could also only mention stereotypes such as clothing and mannerisms when asked about the attributes of gender identity), and the Department for Statistics Regulation who are at the moment conducting a review into the gender identity question in the Scottish Household Survey as a result of my correspondence with them.
I am astounded not only by the lack of clarity here, particularly when children and young people are involved, but also by the refusal to acknowledge that clarity might be important at all.
The Scottish Government have completely corrupted the meaning of boy and girl, so that a boy is no longer a child born male, but is now one with an identity of a 'boy'. But this still requires 'boy' to have some kind of meaning in order to be adopted as an identity, and none is being offered. 'Boy' has been completely hollowed out as a meaningful concept for children and they have been provided with absolutely nothing of substance with which to fill it up again. In and of itself that is troubling enough but it is even more so when you consider that the understanding children form around these ideas can set them towards life changing decisions about their bodies and if this Bill becomes law, legal implications including potential criminalisation.
Absolute muppets. I wonder which they would rather be thought of? As dangerous, frothing, ideologically driven zealots, unmoored from reality and happy to utilise vulnerable women and children as dispensable props.
Or power crazy, deceitful, self serving zealots, cynically utilising vulnerable women and children as dispensable props to further their power grab.