Annaliese Dodds: "sex and gender are different"

[CheshireSplat]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/jul/24/labour-vows-to-modernise-simplify-and-reform-gender-recognition-act

I try my best never to think of Crispin Blunt.

The new politics isn't right or left, tbh. Trans is as much a Left intersectional analysis/post modern thing as it is a Right libertarian personal choice/transhumanist capitalist idea.

There is as much cross party unanimity on TRA as there is on GC.

Brexit itself can also be argued from both a Right and Left standpoint.

The new politics is identity and group interests, and the interaction with woke capitalism and academia.

It is a pain, but I'm more than happy to take screenshots, if I am around.

Thank you.

It’s the one entitled “no trans”.

That thread has been deleted

It's just been zapped by MNHQ for investigation.

I'm glad. I didn't report it but presumably someone did. It was unlikely to lead anywhere: some people believe in gender identity, some people don't so debating whether it's "real" or "possible" to be trans is at best pointless, at worst offensive. A bit like an argument over whether God is real or not. You can't force someone else to accept your belief (GC or gender identity) through debate.

This conversation is far more productive. There does indeed seem to be some interesting movement within Labour. Small steps and no guarantee where it's going. But interesting and positive sounding (based on what I read in the specific thread about the spousal "veto", Dodds just sounded ignorant - presumably the more Labour digs in to the feedback and details on this, the more they will shift their position towards
an increasing understanding about the importance of clarity).

They will highlight that their rights are being eroded (eg for 10 years they have done x and now it's being proposed that they can't

Yeah that only works if they equally care that women could once do x, then it was proposed that they couldn't (by TRAs) and for 10 years women have had their rights rolled back. By men with TQ+ identities and their political supporters.

Either this matters for all, and rolling rights back is always a bad thing - in which case, the TRAs started it and owe reparation to those women AND solutions that work equally for all - or it's just yet more 'women are lesser humans who should accept having less rights and importance and lesser treatment in law than men, and accept they exist to be used by men and good women don't argue about this.'

Which, let's face it, is what this really all boils down to. And let's link that to all the girls desperately trying to identify out of this fate into the sex they perceive as having the rights and power and autonomy that service humans are increasingly legally and acceptably denied.

As to WH doing an hour on Transwidows... I can describe the programme now, it doesn't even need to happen. I could bloody perform it for you. There'll be 58 minutes of male people telling sob stories about how they were just innocently living their best lives and their wife only wants to leave because transphobia and a whole lot of head tilting and no actual interviewing or difficult questions from a soft voiced interviewer, and a woman might be allowed two minutes to say something very mild about 'perhaps I ought to be allowed a say in my own marriage please, if I'm very good and ask very nicely and say all the mantras like a good girl'.

Tinsel et al will be allowed nowhere near it on the grounds that the male people involved will all cry and refuse to come on the show . No one at the BBC or any of these male transitioners however will be remotely bothered about how the female women feel at any point in all this. They will not really exist as people in this narrative, merely as failed service units refusing to soldier. The male voices will of course end the programme on touching anecdotes, and absolutely NONE of the issues faced by actual women or these men's children will be mentioned at all. Spin city. Nasty facts vanished. Through tax and through funding the BBC women have had to fund their own oppression and gaslighting.

I disagree with you on that.

I think we do need to dissect and analyse the whole concept of 'being trans' - because so far it has been wilfully equated with 'being gay' - as if someone has no choice about 'being trans'. That some people just are.

Whether of not somneone utilises 'being traans' as a framing device for their sense of self, or 'believes' in gender identity doesn't mean that the concept itself should not be challenged or discussed. In fact, it has to be challenged - and indeed that is what is required if we are to roll back/push back against the impact of gender theory on young people.

Of course, you can avoid the discussion if you don't like it; but it is not for you to decide whether other people can have that discussion or not.

BBC coverage is revealing:
Labour drops pledge to introduce self-ID for trans people
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66299705

The LGBT+ Labour group said the party's new position would be a "huge step forward" for trans people over the current government stance.
But it added the party was "signalling a retreat on their policy of de-medicalised self-ID for the trans community at the next general election".
Labour MP Lloyd Russell-Moyle, a patron of the group, told the BBC it would push for further changes, including giving non-medical professionals such as social workers the power to "externally verify" someone's acquired gender.
Rosie Duffield, who had threatened to quit as a Labour MP over the party's previous stance, said she welcomed the retention of medical reports, calling it the "core thing" demanded by women's groups.
Ms Duffield, the MP for Canterbury, has opposed self-ID as a way for trans people to gain access to single sex spaces such as domestic violence refuges and prisons.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, she called for more clarity on the party's position ahead of the general election, expected next year, adding it still included a "bit of confusion and a bit of fence-sitting".

So as expected there will be attempts to water down the safeguarding in the proposals. The GRC panel will be a random guy from reddit if they have their way. We can expect the internal fight to intensify. Hopefully LWD will be gaining more open support as it becomes safer to admit they were always right.

Still no official word on what Scottish/Welsh Labour position will be now.

Jo Bartosch in spiked has an interesting but sceptical take.
Labour’s betrayal of women
https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/07/25/labours-betrayal-of-women/

Quite.

There is nothing wrong with debating whether or not God exists. If people of faith find that too uncomfortable to participate in, that is their choice but they cannot expect this never to be discussed or considered, or to be protected from awareness that people exist who do not share their faith. And if your faith is so fragile that meeting a doubter is likely to throw you into crisis, that really is an issue for you rather than the blame of the doubter.

If you are living in a country where laws and policy are under attack to force you to enact believing in God and banning you from ever saying otherwise, or to refuse to participate in prayers and communion? Then non believers have absolutely no option but to discuss, in depth, why this is not going to happen, and that to them God does not exist.

If you didn't want to force people to be discourteous to you in blunt truths? Perhaps you shouldn't have pushed them to that point.

Yes, i'm totally sceptical.

Behind the scenes what i likelys being communicated to the TRA movement/Stonewall is that this is purely a strategic move - a ploy, designed to make it far easier to Self Id. They're being told not to get upset about the change in wording or terminology - that it will still give them what they are after.

I think we do need to dissect and analyse the whole concept of 'being trans' - because so far it has been wilfully equated with 'being gay' - as if someone has no choice about 'being trans'. That some people just are.

I agree. I think it's important to differentiate the ideology from both reality, and the people saying they follow it. And this is all ideology. I agree with Helen Joyce that "trans" is an empty concept.

Judging by the deletion message it was zapped because presumably it was started by a PBP or similar. Not because it's not a legitimate topic to discuss.

If you are living in a country where laws and policy are under attack to force you to enact believing in God and banning you from ever saying otherwise, or to refuse to participate in prayers and communion? Then non believers have absolutely no option but to discuss, in depth, why this is not going to happen, and that to them God does not exist.

Perfectly put. I am never going to believe a male is a woman, because I don't believe "transitioning", however it is defined, is in any way meaningful as to whether one man or another should be able to use women's spaces or participate in things meant for women.

If it was anything else, ie a clear proud worked out policy, Dodds and Starmer would be all over the MSM. Not leaving it to one of our new female friends from the LDs.

I'm afraid gender policy is like Brexit, it's totally apolitical in terms of party allegiance while being totally and absolutely political in terms of, quite literally, the "body" politic.

There's nothing more political than being a female rape survivor, female swimmer, female prisoner, lesbian, and having men in your designated space.

Starmer, Davey et al better learn this, and fast.

Re the deleted thread: the premise was (and it was stated in the OP): there is no such thing as a trans person.
That's very different from the conversations elsewhere on this board about the impacts when people believe that they have a gender identity and say that they are trans. If people want to openly declare that they don't think trans people exist, they can do so but I won't be joining them.

Anyway, back to this thread:
The BBC article is interesting. It's a very small nudge towards more balance in their reporting, although they still have a long way to go e.g. it explains clearly that Labour wants to avoid mistakes made in Scotland in relation to women's spaces, including prisons. For anyone with a passing interest in the whole subject, this will remind them of the Isla Bryson case. From there it's not a massive step to thinking about women's sports... and from there it's pretty easy for someone to think that perhaps self-ID is a very flawed concept. So the more activists fight for it, the more they will find themselves ostracised from the public being on their side.
That in itself isn't enough, so clarifying sex in the EA (and how it differs from gender - which is a belief, not a fact) becomes key.

"For anyone with a passing interest in the whole subject, this will remind them of the Isla Bryson case. From there it's not a massive step to thinking about women's sports... and from there it's pretty easy for someone to think that perhaps self-ID is a very flawed concept".

Agreed. Scottish politicians attempting to explain why Bryson was not a "woman" but a rapist despite their avowed TWAW beliefs, did more to demonstrate to a horrified public just how dangerous this ideology is in enabling predators. The subsequent revelations about young women college students at being forced to undress in front of Bryson because of their protected status just sealed the issue.

"Behind the scenes what i likelys being communicated to the TRA movement/Stonewall is that this is purely a strategic move - a ploy, designed to make it far easier to Self Id. They're being told not to get upset about the change in wording or terminology - that it will still give them what they are after"

Doesn't it boil down to the entitlements that come with a GRC. If sex and gender are recognised as being separate phenomenon, and both the GRA and EA are understood through this lens, then a GRC is only meaningful to those for whom gender identity is meaningful.

I would quite happily support self id if gender identity was recognised as a completely separate phenomenon to sex.

Doesn't it boil down to the entitlements that come with a GRC. If sex and gender are recognised as being separate phenomenon, and both the GRA and EA are understood through this lens, then a GRC is only meaningful to those for whom gender identity is meaningful.

I would quite happily support self id if gender identity was recognised as a completely separate phenomenon to sex.

[My italics above] As far as I can tell, yes and no. Yes, as long as the meaning of "legal sex" is also clear. For example transwidows would need to be allowed to have marriages annuled based on (biological) sex, not legal sex. There may be other boundary crossings that need consideration too, where legal sex has impacted someone else.

Additionally, self-ID could still do harm psychologically. When I watched the Swedish documentary The Trans Train it was really sad to hear a transwoman reflecting on whether in hindsight, being recognised with the legal sex of "female" was the right thing. Also the whole transition (wondering if perhaps she/he was in the right body all along). But knowing that an application would need to be made to overturn it and that this was a difficult process was clearly an uphill battle mentally. Adding some (real, not affirming) psychological gatekeeping in for GRCs would still be sensible to help make sure people understand the implications of what they are doing.

Still no official word on what Scottish/Welsh Labour position will be now.

According to the Times Labour Scotland has distanced itself from UK Labour's stance:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/82ddaaa0-2ad5-11ee-aede-28bc53acbdb8?shareToken=958fc330ee6784664996449d5b62dcb8

The only reason Scottish Labour oppose these changes is they want to be seen as being sufficiently distant from London to still be the "champion" of independent minded Scots.

They have zero principle here, want to be all things to all men. Being an alternative to SNP for independent Scots to vote for.

They're happy to not only drive the bus over girls and women but then reverse it as well.

In the next few years as the West recoils from these positions, the likes of Scottish Labour will claim they never wanted THAT. No, they deffo never wanted to blitz female rights. Not at all.

Nobody is suggesting that people who believe in gender identity don't exist; or that no-one who frames their personal struggle for expression in such a way. exists - that would be daft.

But it is entirely valid, and necessary even, to challenge the concept that. 'being trans' is just something that people are - by nature. They aren't! There is no such thing as being born in the wrong body, and 'Gender' is a social construction. Yes, some people suffer from dysphoria- but this is by definition a mental health issue.

You only have to speak, or listen to, to detransitioners to know that 'being trans' is simply a way of trying to make sense of an internal emotional or psychological struggle. A framing device.

What is so offensive about that? Nobody is denying that some people subscribe to such a belief; but that belief is something personal and private to them. It bears no realtion to what we can discuss here.

I believe in all sorts of things; and view my life and self in all sorts of ways that might make no sense to other people - but that's fine. They don't have to.

Isn’t the comparison more like:
The belief

• some people believe in God and also believe in the concept of God’s anointed people;
• some people don’t believe in God and also don’t believe in God’s anointed people;

What You’re Allowed To Say

• some people believe in God, in God’s anointed people, and believe they are God’s anointed people, but recognise that others don’t believe that and are entitled to both hold and express those views;
• some (of the loudest and most influential) people who believe in God and in the concept of God’s anointed people (not all of whom believe themselves to be God’s anointed people) shout that people who don’t believe in God, or in the concept of God’s anointed people are God-phobic bigots whose belief and free speech is a hate crime towards God’s anointed people and deserve to be punched in the face;
• some people who don’t believe in God or the concept of God’s anointed people think that describing their non-belief as hate speech is, amongst other things, an in-bad-faith silencing technique
• some people don’t believe in God but don’t want to get into a discussion about what the concept of God’s anointed people actually means and argue that “there’s no such thing as God’s anointed people” is something that should not be said.

That analogy is possibly a bit tortuous/ over-extended, it’s been a long day!

This is spot on:

“If people of faith find that too uncomfortable to participate in, that is their choice but they cannot expect this never to be discussed or considered, or to be protected from awareness that people exist who do not share their faith. And if your faith is so fragile that meeting a doubter is likely to throw you into crisis, that really is an issue for you rather than the blame of the doubter”

I’m not surprised it was deleted. I didn’t contribute and clicked away from that thread as it struck me as a potential “for the screenshots” enterprise, right from the off.

Nice one. I look forward to them going further.

Delighted to see the Labour Party beginning to listen to women in its official policies. This is such an important first step.