Equality Act petition and Scotland

[scratchedbymycat]

I was looking at the heat map generated by the equality act petition. Scotland is on fire. It struck me that it's a visual representation of Scottish women literally asking Westminster for help, to protect them from harms caused by the Scottish government.

How does this help promote independence?

I can't figure out what Sturgeon was thinking - strategically, I mean. How can she spin this?

I’m in Scotland and desperately want intervention on this from Westminster. I’m traditionally a labour voter but was warming to the SNP and independence prior to this debacle but now they have shown me how little regard they have for women I’m very much against them and like many women in Scotland whose politics are generally left wing I feel politically homeless these days.

As a woman I don’t want to share single sex safe spaces with male bodied people and like many women I’ll probably just withdraw from those spaces altogether, which doesn’t seem fair at all. In fact it feels like erasure. I can’t understand how one groups need for validation or safety trumps another groups genuine need for safety? Why not bring in separate spaces for trans people? Why not make it a separate thing as opposed to taking hard won rights and access to safe spaces away from women? We truly don’t matter do we? The Scottish government in their consultation for this legal didn’t even take evidence from women’s groups who were critical of these changes, they only listen to pro trans activists. I don’t hate trans people, I want them to be safe and not to be discriminated against but that shouldn’t be at the expense of women’s safety and women’s rights but it looks very much like the SNP is very much prepared to sacrifice women in order to push their own agenda whatever the hell that it, creation of a wedge issue perhaps? I hope it blows up in their face.

This describes me to a 't'. I was opposed to Indy for economic reasons but Brexit had me looking at it again. (Sadly, as much as I wish it was a solution to Brexit I still think the economic hit would be too brutal.) My SIL and her friends all similar - generally labour supporting, left-leaning etc.

I can't say I've ever warmed to the SNP though. During the Indy ref, their tactics for dealing with opposing debate in committees sickened me and seemed quite undemocratic. Similar tactics repeated during the GRR process. It's now confirmed fir me that that is simply who they are: democratic and progressive only when it suits them, but bloody unfair and lying when it doesn't. And no, I don't think this is true if all parties. There's a lack of transparency that shocks me.

And then there was their other 'bad law' that they had to back away from: the names person debacle.

All the above combined I've just started to seriously question the intelligence / calibre of Holyrood politicians. It just blows my mind this has been shoved through with blatant lies to constituents. Do they really believe these lies themselves, or are they that stupid?

This is an extract from an email a friend was sent by an MSP:

"the Bill itself will not change any of the protections or definitions set out in the Equality Act 2010, including the ability to exclude trans people from single-sex services where proportionate and appropriate. The committee is further satisfied that the Bill will not change or remove women’s rights, make changes to how toilets and changing rooms operate, redefine what a man or a woman is, nor change or expand trans people’s rights. "

And then there's something my SIL can't get over, that for the first time ever in her life she's been cast as a hateful bigot for her views. We're talking about a group of women who have spent their lives being thoroughly decent, fair, liberal, progressive, standing up for human rights etc now silenced and ignored - not with argument or reason- but with sexism.

I just can't see how this furthers independence at all...?