Why is Wales jumping on the self ID bandwagon?

[MoirasSaggyBundles]

The latest discussion from the people of Spiked Online, including the excellent Ella Whelan, who was so good on Question Time the other week. Wales is seeking permission to pursue its own gender reform to bring about self ID.

I really don't understand how any political party is pursuing this policy in good faith, now that everyone has seen in real life situations the logical conclusion of allowing bad faith actors access to female spaces via self ID. Nor do I understand how any devolved government thinks this policy helps them to sell independence, after the clusterfuck brought about by the SNP's GRR Bill, and the ensuing trigger of section 35. And on top of that, it's leading to huge ideological rifts within parties, leading to women like Rosie Duffield feeling unsafe within her own party - how is that giving voters confidence in their politicians?

Any Welsh posters here? Is there widespread, grass roots support for these policies? Why? Just Why is the Welsh Government - why are any politicians - pursing this?

Given the co-morbidities that a great many young people have and that fact that it's now accepted that the vast majority of older transitioners are men with a GP, which is sexually motivated, I'm not sure your theory stands up. It assumes a level of rationality from our leaders that doesn't fit with their TWAW attitude.

Also Welsh, live in a valleys constituency so Labour that if they stuck a red rosette on a dog folks would vote for it. Also so confident of victory that they don’t often do doorstepping, we get the occasional leaflet.

I always voted Plaid, because their grass roots work was generally good. Not now though.
I am honestly in despair! How can we make them open their bloody ears and listen?

Any Welsh posters here? Is there widespread, grass roots support for these policies? Why? Just Why is the Welsh Government - why are any politicians - pursing this?

Not Welsh but have spent more than half my (fairly long) adult life here. I've been leafleting and talking to people in public places around South Wales from Newport to Pembroke since 2017 and I would say that for every 20-25 people who stop and indicate what you might call GC support for things like single-sex spaces there may be one person who brushes past with a scowl or who stops to tell me they disagree. Most people now have an idea what we're talking. Early on there was a lot of ignorance and confusion. But even then few people thought it was right for men to be in women's sport or in women's changing rooms. And we forget that years people assumed that being transgender meant having full sexual reassignment surgery. But showing them a photo of Alex Drummond proved very useful.

TBH I was thinking more of the support actors - e.g. student population who aren't trans themselves, but enjoy the whole NB, rainbow bullshit world view, and who are "saviour" types looking for a community to save and Nirvana to create. Study, become fully indoctrinated with the idea that other parts of the UK aren't safe for you, and then stay where you are for your career. I saw a comment from someone the other day that young campaigners for these causes are deliberately going into the professions of therapy and teaching so that they can carry on proselytising as a career and convert others at grass roots. So even if many of those flocking there are carrying co-morbidities, and are not going to be productive members of society, there will be plenty of other "believers" to pay their taxes and prop them up. Brighton on a country-wide scale.

Are they all 'desperate to be different from England' then?

"TBH I was thinking more of the support actors - e.g. student population who aren't trans themselves, but enjoy the whole NB, rainbow bullshit world view, and who are "saviour" types looking for a community to save and Nirvana to create."

The youth wings of the progressive parties are obviously all very pro-trans. They manage to hound out any gender critical politician.

No idea,you're the one who lives on the continent.

In the Government of Wales Act 2006, in SCHEDULE 7A "Gender recognition" is one of the reserved matters (Section L13).

www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/32/schedule/7A

Thanks nauticant

Live in Wales, have repeatedly written to my local MP about this.
No response or even an acknowledgment. They don't do grass root campaign here.
There is so much of gender ideology pushed in schools and universities here, really scary.

I am also Welsh and I agree with this.

I live in Wales, Plaid knocked my door last time they were coming around and I asked him what a woman was. He flapped around, couldn't answer snd eventually pointed to me and my partner and said we were both humans. I repeatedly asked him to tell me how me and my husband are different, but he couldn't. He is a man in his mid 50s, he doesn't appear to be woke, so i don't know if his inability to define a woman was due to higher orders. He left looking utterly embarassed.

I recently emailed our conservative MP and asked him to back section 35, and he replied with a fairly lengthly response saying that he was in agreement, as he was very clear Scotland's GRR was a danger to women.

In terms of MD wanting his own reform -

I am more cynical.

Watching Sturgeon talk about 'the individual' and 'the rapist' when questioned on Isla Bryant, I knew I was very much watching a woman who didn't believe what she was saying.

My musings are - are the Scottish, Irish & Welsh Givernmebts more penetrable than Westminster? If an organisation wanted to bribe a Government, would it be easier to do so with these states?

To me, something is very fishy with MD's announcement. He would have to be deaf and blind to think that copying Scotland is a good idea at this point.

He can quite easily see that, Westminster will not allow it, it is completely unpopular, evidently dangerous, and makes a mockery of the government.

But what if he has already agreed to someone he would do it, and is unable to back out?

He and his same sex husband have had a child via surrogacy

They've got 2 now. That's Adam Price and hubby.

I do know what Gwenhwyfar means about 'seeing things through English eyes'. People do it all the time on a local whatsapp group where I live. Stuff to do with land use, class and so on. I mean we all see things through our own prism and experience but you'd think that when you move to a place with a different culture there'd be some kind of awareness! Somebody more patient than me often intervenes and gently and diplomatically points it out at which point they say 'oh yes, of course'. I roll my eyes and stick the group back into archive.

I started the youth club thread yesterday, I'm in rural Wales. It's depressing.

A female friend of mine from the Labour party says that all the older women agree with us and not to worry, but I know a load of the young ones and they're all TWAW.

Wales is a different place to different people. To some it is the land of their mothers and it is the place of their cultural heritage, slipping away between their fingers.

To others it's a quaint place to retire to, nothing more.

There are definitely different perspectives

Indeed.

In fact, where I live, for some people, it's a quaint place to retire move to in your 20s as you can't afford to live anywhere else and one of your mates has some land so along you come and populate our whatsapps with your pronouns and our village halls with your queer ecology workshops, nothing more

FFS

Can you tell I've had enough of this nonsense? 😆

(you can probably pin me down almost to the square mile from that ^^, time for another name change?)

To me, something is very fishy with MD's announcement. He would have to be deaf and blind to think that copying Scotland is a good idea at this point.

He can quite easily see that, Westminster will not allow it, it is completely unpopular, evidently dangerous, and makes a mockery of the government.

But what if he has already agreed to someone he would do it, and is unable to back out?

I think you have a point here.

My MP is conservative too, I don't like him on most issues but he has replied sensibly to me on this issue.

queer ecology

I want to know (morbid curiousity) and yet I also don’t want to know. Whatever it is, it sounds annoying!

queer ecology
Well, I've resisted copying and pasting the actual advert for the workshop local to me but the wiki enntry is pretty descriptive: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queer_ecology

It's absolute gobbeldygook, btw. There are people I have known for over half my life who I know to be sensible, intelligent adults, who are gushing over this shit. I don't understand.

Well , my AM is the previously mentioned Adam Price , even worse ( if that’s possible ) my MP is Jonathon Edwards

Oh my, what a lot of complete bollox!!

I think this is a large part of the reason why devolution has not worked as well as was originally hoped. When the devolution movement started, the big hope was that this was going to bring in an era of experiment, with different parts of the UK trying out different things and learning from each other about what works and doesn't work. But of course that's not going to work if you've got regions just being deliberately different from one another for points-scoring purposes.

Wales has a history of latching onto unsuccessful Scottish initiatives several years later (see also: education, where Wales seems to be about to start its own version of Scotland's woolly and academically unchallenging "Curriculum for Excellence").

Remember Drakeford is standing down by end of 2024. So being all in on this is pretty easy for him.

The problem is his most likely replacements look to be dedicated to this as well.

The next general election will be some time in 2024 it seems. So Drakeford will do that and head off. Right now we are looking at another Welsh Labour landslide. The problem is that the Tories have wrecked the UK economically and thus for ordinary Welsh people opposition to that is obvious.

The issue is that Welsh Labour have not been that successful in a lot of areas except in keeping power.

They control health and education TWO key areas and things are not going well. Now in some areas of the NHS Wales has done well, others badly. Education is all over the place. Real lack of innovative thinking.

This book is really interesting criticism of devolution so far from a lefty perspective.
www.parthianbooks.com/products/the-welsh-way-essays-on-neoliberalism-and-devolution

They regard Wales as a neoliberal state and genderism fits in nicely it is just another aspect of consumer capitalism.

However it is pretty clear gender is going to be a huge issue in the election. I have no idea how many will change votes over it, but talking about it is going to crop up all the time. The danger is we can't let this be a party political issue like in the USA.

I mean we all see things through our own prism and experience but you'd think that when you move to a place with a different culture there'd be some kind of awareness! Somebody more patient than me often intervenes and gently and diplomatically points it out at which point they say 'oh yes, of course'.

Could you give a concrete example? I can't think of anything I've ever seen on a local FB or WA group here in South Wales that fits that scenario. Please, give us the detail.

For what it's worth, I find the phrase 'English eyes' offensive but also very telling. You wouldn't say Irish eyes or Scottish eyes. It's a way of lumping everyone born the other side of the Welsh border together — working class people from council estates, London and country toffs, northern former mining communities, Cornish fishermen, Muslim and Afro-Caribbean communities, the poor, the homeless. As if we all see the world through the same lens and as if we all identify as English. My dad's family were from Ireland and Scotland, my mum's family came over from the Netherlands in the early 1900s. They happen to have been in England when I was born but I have always thought of myself as British. I didn't know I was English until I came to Wales, where people keep reminding me of it. This Welsh tribalism is one of the less attractive aspects of Wales.

I do actually think I know EXACTLY where you live!

I think (potentially) that exact same 'non-binary' couple which you refer to are the ones that peaked me....

After listen to her/they rant about JK Rowling dripping with hate, I went to have a look at what she actually said...and then I realised about all this MADNESS.

I must say though I also know some great young people who have moved here to live on the land, and they have created new community spaces and re-opened a village shop, learned Welsh and other positive things...

I think it's the second homes which is the absolute culture killer.....

And yes sometimes it does appear to be racist....! Its just weird when you walk down your highstreet all winter with smiling, relaxed, friendly people - and then come the summer there is a flood of English accents and all of a sudden people are shouting at you, muttering under their breath, pushing you out the way, totally impatient and aggressive, juat geberally on egde. Alrhough i know this is the city/country divide

But you can see how it could taint perspectives.....

Hahaha yes. Think I am not far from you.