Starmer: Almost no-one is talking about trans issues

[SidewaysOtter]

To quote from the rolling news section of this morning's Times:

"Almost no Britons are “talking about trans issues,” Sir Keir Starmer has said as he questioned why such issues are a focus of political debate.

The Labour leader sought to win over gender critical campaigners and MPs at the weekend, telling The Sunday Times there would be “no rolling back” of women’s rights if the party formed a government.

Speaking to LBC this morning he repeated his position that “for the vast majority — let’s say 99.9 per cent — biology matters” in defining a woman. He said that Labour was trying to agree a “common sense, respectable and tolerant position”, but that it was “not prepared to ignore” the small number of people who identify as a different gender to the one they were born in.

He insisted it was a marginal issue for many voters, however. “As we go around the country campaigning, I talk to thousands and thousands and thousands of people. They want to talk to me about the cost of living crisis, about the fact they can’t pay their bills, they want to know what they’re going to do about their council tax,” he said.

“Almost nobody is talking about trans issues. I do sometimes just wonder why on earth we spend so much of our time discussing something which isn’t a feature of the dinner table or the kitchen table or the café table or the bar.”

Funny, because I think there's quite a lot of people talking about "trans issues". Whether it's the treatment of Posie Parker and the 72-year-old woman who were violently assaulted last weekend, male-bodied people in women's sports/changing rooms/hospital wards/prisons, the medicalisation/mutilation of young adults, or the vilification of those who speak The Terrible Heresy that you cannot change your biological sex. And yes, we're talking about it at the dinner table, the café bar or wherever.

"No rolling back of women's rights" doesn't mean shit if you count men as women, Mr Starmer. And you can wang on about "respect and tolerance" all you like but we know what you really mean by that is wanting us to be quiet and stop being awkward. That isn't going to happen.

I know a lot of transgender and GNC people and there has definitely been an increase in hatred, contempt and bigotry directed at them, by religious extremists, the usual right-wing anti
immigrant anti-gay crowd and now, purportedly left-wing gender critical people.

The Express, Mail, Times and Telegraph have chosen trans women as their scapegoats and people echo their talking-points. It’s quite chilling and it is cutting through. It’s got the usual “vast conspiracy” and nut-picking tropes we’ve seen with anti-gay and anti-refugee sentiment. The reframing of a movement which exists to undermine minority rights as one to protect the women and safeguard the children is old school, but very effective, as is “other bigotries bad, this one is different.”

So, yes, it is an issue and Starmer doesn’t want to fight on it.

I find the increase in violence, threats of violence, and extreme language aimed at women who say no and talk about single sex spaces so incredibly out of proportion and typically male in behaviour

I worry for women and girls who are not given safety, privacy and dignity and then this violence on top because males are angry at a simple no.

What an interesting way to frame the massive overreach by TRA's being exposed by the fall of no debate.

other bigotries bad, this one is different

The interesting thing is, this really is different. The only necessary difference between a man and a transwoman is the words used to describe them. Just words.

We are allowed to distinguish between male and female in some circumstances. Why do you think the words used should affect that?

I'd have thought you were all in favour of "nut-picking tropes" DadJoke

'hatred, contempt and bigotry' has poured, with death threats, appalling violence, appalling derision and dehumanisation, from this 'community' towards women.

You don't seem to be equally worried about that. Refusing to unconditionally obey, and stating truths, does not in any way equate to the behaviours that have seeped absolutely everywhere in the name of TQ+. One was in court only yesterday for several explicit threats to kill.

Perhaps you've missed the causative link, that when this kind of behaviour pours everywhere in the public consciousness, people lose patience, get fed up and start to think that the people doing it aren't worthy of the extreme respect they would like.

Concisely, elegantly and accurately put.

Women must not respond to threats or to concerns based on actual cases and situations even if they've had direct personal experience of them. Even if these concerns are voiced in a neutral, factual and non- emotive way. Women were not allowed to speak because there was 'no debate'.

Think about this for an example: women not getting into sports teams in the US matters to many because they are often linked to scholarship funds. Women are forced to share changing facilities with males which they find horrific in terms of their privacy and dignity. They then may be competing with males who physical size and strength puts them at a significant increased risk of injury.

This however is apparently 'hatred, contempt and bigotry' and has resulted in women being blacklisted, losing jobs or being threatened, harassed and intimidated for saying these concerns out loud.

Yeah go figure why newspapers have been covering these stories.

The thing about The Mail is how people fail to appreciate the symbiotic relationship between the audience and the paper. The paper can't just publish a bunch of stories on one subject if the public aren't interested. Why are they interested?

Is it because they are full of hate or because there is an underlying sense of injustice and the whiff of scandal coming from so many of these stories?

I say this a lot on MN, but I don't believe the vast majority of people are evil/bad/full of hate. They are well meaning and do the right thing. For these people to be getting upset, something has to be happening which they are unhappy about it. If they aren't 'haters', then why are so many interested?

This isn't purely about sensationalism and click bait. There has to be some thing else. And it's this injustice element - sometime justified and other times very much misguided or misplaced. But it's injustice as the driver.

Human Rights are supposed to be about balancing rights. Think about it, how this entire thing is framed is about 'anti-trans'. Never 'pro-woman centred'. Why?

Who is driving the narrative? Is it GC people or is it TRA?

Answers on a postcard.

Apparently, nuts that have been removed can be kept in the fridge. Next to the eggs. It seems that retaining one’s removed nuts in a bottle is common amongst certain subgroups. Almost like they simply cannot be without them after all.

'hatred, contempt and bigotry' has been long been the catch cry of male people who are uncomfortable with women who campaign for their own rights. When women assert their own boundaries to exclude those male who seek access, these are the words and the accusations that used against those women.

I have just come from a different thread where the same accusations have been made by yet another male poster.

To some male people 'hatred, contempt and bigotry' = a pro-women perspective.

Plus ca change. It really is the same old, same old.

The other trope I really enjoy is the conflation of “women” and “gender critical people” and reframing of an attack on a minority as “fighting for women’s rights” when women and LGB people disproportionately support transgender people. It’s very clever.

When your allies are MRAs, evangelical Christians, the Pope and the right wing of Tory party it takes some brass gonads to claim it’s a fight for women’s rights. The shear DARVO of it is audacious.

Please don't start getting into allies. I'm sure you must have seen the posts about the transwoman in court yesterday for the most horrendous credible threats of murder and torture against women. I won't list any more allies. You're not going to guilt and blackmail women out of expecting equal rights.

My fav part of this whole shitshow is how calling a man a man has been constantly framed as "transphobic hate attacks" - and then all the claims that "transphobic hate is increasing".

If your whole movement replies of lies, smoke & mirrors, when "no debate" crumbles there will be a lot more truth spoken.

More & more people now see what is really going on.

Gender Ideology is MRA on steroids so don't come with the bullshit that women on here are allied with MRAs.

Removal of the rights of women to have any space or service free of males as you @DadJoke want is pure, unadulterated MRA.

Almost nobody is talking about trans says nobody who can't shut up about trans now.

And no Joke Dad , gay people are not thronging to Limerick to support Barbie Kardashian and his right to be in a female prison. They must all be phobic.

"when women and LGB people disproportionately support transgender people"

I'd go further and say that the majority of the UK population support transgender people. The majority of people want trans people to live happy lives and be free from discrimination. They also want access to single sex provision to be determined by natal sex.

TRAs are the people insisting that the above two 'wants' are incompatible and insisting people are 'anti trans' even when they want both.

And kittens are small carrots who fish lawnmowers.

I'm not engaging with nonsense like this.

Do you really want to do a Lorna Slater here? She made herself look very silly.

I find it amusing that TRA's try to frame widely disparate groups being cognizant of simple facts like 'human beings can't change sex' as anything but a failure on the part of TRA's intellectual rigour. Gender ideologists are the equivalent of flat earthers - facts won't fit your demands, so you make them up and keep insisting that anyone who doesn't believe what they know is a lie is a bigot.

And 'shear Darvo' (sic)? Funny 😬

DadJoke, what would it take to convince you that someone wanting to have hospital wards, rape shelters and changing rooms exclusively for natal females does not hate or dislike trans people not want them to suffer?

And conflating those with GC views with MRA's? Another funny 😬

I'm not interested in convincing posters; I don't think they should be permitted to repeatedly misrepresent the Equality Act or harass women about it. The behaviour would not be tolerated if it was the other way round.

Well said.

You might be interested in this
I 100% recognise what Doyle is talking about on here - the GC equivalent to TRAs/MRAs is what JT was referring to as "GC Ultras"

https://unherd.com/2024/02/caught-up-in-the-gender-critical-civil-war/

When your allies are MRAs, evangelical Christians, the Pope and the right wing of Tory party it takes some brass gonads to claim it’s a fight for women’s rights. The shear DARVO of it is audacious.

There was a photo a little while ago that got shared on the internet, possibly on Mumsnet. I can't find it now, unfortunately, but someone may remember. It was from the 1970s and it showed a group of women protesting outside a meeting (or possibly offices) of the Paedophile Information Exchange. Along with the women were members of the National Front.

And I dare say, DadJoke, if you'd been around in the 1970s you'd have been berating those women for allying themselves with the far right. You'd have said how disgusting they were for protesting against men's perfectly reasonable desire to have sex with children, and that if the only people they could find to agree with them were fascists, that proved how wrong they were.

Yes, that's what you'd have said. And you know what? You'd look pretty fucking stupid now, wouldn't you?

Here's an article about the protest.