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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Sex & gender in 2023

151 replies

ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 11:23

This thread is an attempt at a broad overview of where we are now, especially for those new to to the issues involved.

Main issues:

  • Impacts of sex and gender in legislation on women's rights
  • Safeguarding
  • Children, young people, and 'gender incongruence'
  • Freedom of speech, thought, and belief

Input and questions welcome! Please keep it factual and concise.

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Thread gallery
54
Fukuraptor · 19/08/2023 14:57

Podcast series

BBC Nolan Investigates Stonewall Influence in UK institutions
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p09yjmph?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

The Witch Trials of J K Rowling - Meghan Phelps-Roper interview of JK Rowling interspersed with other interviews trying to understand the internet culture wars around JKR's views. It's an in-depth look at what she actually thinks about the clash of women's rights and the demands of transactivists
https://spotify.link/pmrj5sWnoCb

And here's JKR's original essay on the topic for completeness. If you've heard she's transphobic then taking a look at what she said might make you think.
https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/

BBC Sounds - Nolan Investigates - Available Episodes

Listen to the latest episodes of Nolan Investigates on BBC Sounds

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p09yjmph?origin=share-mobile&partner=uk.co.bbc

MavisMcMinty · 19/08/2023 15:21

Fukuraptor · 19/08/2023 14:57

Podcast series

BBC Nolan Investigates Stonewall Influence in UK institutions
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p09yjmph?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

The Witch Trials of J K Rowling - Meghan Phelps-Roper interview of JK Rowling interspersed with other interviews trying to understand the internet culture wars around JKR's views. It's an in-depth look at what she actually thinks about the clash of women's rights and the demands of transactivists
https://spotify.link/pmrj5sWnoCb

And here's JKR's original essay on the topic for completeness. If you've heard she's transphobic then taking a look at what she said might make you think.
https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/

As an incentive to carefully and thoroughly read JKR’s sensitive and neutral essay, some group or other has organised a £1,000,000 prize for the first person to find anything transphobic in what she has written.

AgnestaVipers · 19/08/2023 15:37

Those interested in a psychological perspective:
British mental healthcare responses to adult homosexuality and gender non-conforming children at the turn of the twenty-first century
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0957154X231181461

RebelliousCow · 19/08/2023 16:01

Can I add Sheila Jeffreys to the reading list:

  1. Unpacking Queer Politics
  2. Gender Hurts

And also ( quite expensive and academic, but excellent)

   3. Transgender Children and Young People ( <span class="italic">Heather Brunskill -Evans and Michelle Moore)</span>
Farmageddon · 19/08/2023 16:19

FFS this is grim reading - lesbians need not apply to a lesbian dating app unless they are willing to do dick.

https://reduxx.info/from-her-to-him-the-downfall-of-a-lesbian-dating-app/

Somanyquestionstoaskaboutthis · 19/08/2023 16:31

This is amazing thank you.

Would you see this as the place to ask questions if you are on a thread and don’t understand something but don’t want to derail the thread? Such as background on a person or a court case which you just need the brief details not an in depth search? Or even just acronyms

WarriorN · 19/08/2023 16:37

Personally I'd ask qs on a thread as others may also appreciate the context, but if it gets lost, ask here too?

ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 16:48

Questions are welcome! MN has an extraordinary range and breadth of women with knowledge and experience.

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mauvish · 19/08/2023 17:12

For those wondering about "being kind" to confused children, as well as the links above I think that this is also important:

https://www.transgendertrend.com/the-suicide-myth/

I should add that I worked as an NHS doctor for 35 years and (thankfully) I can't remember a single child suicide amongst my patients. If there were so many "hidden" transgender children in that past, and they were undergoing terrible psychological suffering from not being recognised, then there should have been quite a few.

Conversely, now that being transgender as a child is recognised and society is sympathetic towards it, suicidality due to this cause should have plummeted.

So I call BS ----

Suicide Facts and Myths - Transgender Trend

The threat that children may commit suicide if parents do not support their social and medical transition is not born out by the facts.

https://www.transgendertrend.com/the-suicide-myth

DrBlackbird · 19/08/2023 17:29

Thanks for starting this thread. I often thought about how such informed and supported material was spread across too many disparate threads.

Posting these four q’s in case anyone on this thread can answer any one of them:

One, is it the Denton report that talks about how the gender ideology movement specifically targeted children because doing so would help avoid or remove the problematic issue of sexual orientation (vs gender identity) and because the young are more malleable and suggestible?

Two, can someone repost the news report on how some of the key men who opened up access to female spaces had highly questionable motives? I remember a report of several photos of men including someone high up in the Scottish prison service turning out to also be found to possess CSA images.

Three, can someone post some good resources on pronouns? I would like to ask colleagues not to refrain from asking our students to include them, but am looking for a way to do so as neutrally and impartially as possible.

Four, does someone have the link to one of the family sex show threads where a poster was closely involved in counselling and spoke eloquently on how many of those abused as children were groomed by the abuser focusing on ‘pleasure’? Those were eye opening and succinctly explained why the show talking about ‘pleasure’ to children was so so wrong.

DrBlackbird · 19/08/2023 17:46

ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 16:50

And an undercover report from a conference way back in 2018 that is also worth looking at:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3398737-We-re-Still-Here-Conference-8th-September-A-report-from-the-inside

Apparently small acts like helping to campaign about period poverty or retweeting the local branch of Women’s Aid will make a difference and result in some reciprocation. They want to make it look like they care about Women's issues so they don’t appear threatening

This quote from that 2018 conference made me think about a certain recent Period Dignity officer and wondered whether that was part of that campaign tactic or just blind stupidity on the part of the panel who hired him?

terryleather · 19/08/2023 18:15

DrBlackbird · 19/08/2023 17:29

Thanks for starting this thread. I often thought about how such informed and supported material was spread across too many disparate threads.

Posting these four q’s in case anyone on this thread can answer any one of them:

One, is it the Denton report that talks about how the gender ideology movement specifically targeted children because doing so would help avoid or remove the problematic issue of sexual orientation (vs gender identity) and because the young are more malleable and suggestible?

Two, can someone repost the news report on how some of the key men who opened up access to female spaces had highly questionable motives? I remember a report of several photos of men including someone high up in the Scottish prison service turning out to also be found to possess CSA images.

Three, can someone post some good resources on pronouns? I would like to ask colleagues not to refrain from asking our students to include them, but am looking for a way to do so as neutrally and impartially as possible.

Four, does someone have the link to one of the family sex show threads where a poster was closely involved in counselling and spoke eloquently on how many of those abused as children were groomed by the abuser focusing on ‘pleasure’? Those were eye opening and succinctly explained why the show talking about ‘pleasure’ to children was so so wrong.

Regarding point two, the man you're referring to is Gordon Pike.

A quote from Reduxx:

"The policy allowing the transfer of male inmates to female correctional facilities was backed by a senior official at the Scottish Prison Service who was convicted in 2016 on charges related to the possession of child sexual abuse materials. Gordon Pike, responsible for the Prison Service’s “gender identity and gender reassignment policy,” pleaded guilty at Paisley sheriff court to hoarding 22,000 indecent pictures of children. "

Sex offender Gordon Pike helped set prison trans rules

An official who agreed a policy allowing male-bodied sex offenders into women’s prisons was a sex offender who hoarded 22,000 indecent pictures of children.Gordon Pike, a senior official of the Scottish Prison Service, was one of those responsible for...

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sex-offender-gordon-pike-helped-set-prison-trans-rules-q8n3lnksv

ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 18:22

Pronouns:

Three, can someone post some good resources on pronouns? I would like to ask colleagues not to refrain from asking our students to include them, but am looking for a way to do so as neutrally and impartially as possible.

Fabulous essay from Barracker, originally published on MN, on pronouns. This may not be a very neutral resource, but it's a great read:

https://fairplayforwomen.com/pronouns/

This may be more 'neutral':

Yogyakarta Principles*

Principle 6

The Right to Privacy

Everyone, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, is entitled to the enjoyment of privacy without arbitrary or unlawful interference, including with regard to their family, home or correspondence as well as to protection from unlawful attacks on their honour and reputation. The right to privacy ordinarily includes the choice to disclose or not to disclose information relating to one’s sexual orientation or gender identity, as well as decisions and choices regarding both one’s own body and consensual sexual and other relations with others.
States shall:
a) Take all necessary legislative, administrative and other measures to ensure the right of each person, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, to enjoy the private sphere, intimate decisions, and human relations, including consensual sexual activity among persons who are over the age of consent, without arbitrary interference;
b) Repeal all laws that criminalise consensual sexual activity among persons of the same sex who are over the age of consent, and ensure that an equal age of consent applies to both same-sex and different-sex sexual activity;
c) Ensure that criminal and other legal provisions of general application are not applied de facto to criminalise consensual sexual activity among persons of the same sex who are over the age of consent;
d) Repeal any law that prohibits or criminalises the expression of gender identity, including through dress, speech or mannerisms, or that denies to individuals the opportunity to change their bodies as a means of expressing their gender identity;
e) Release all those held on remand or on the basis of a criminal conviction, if their detention is related to consensual sexual activity among persons who are over the age of consent, or is related to gender identity;
f) Ensure the right of all persons ordinarily to choose when, to whom and how to disclose information pertaining to their sexual orientation or gender identity, and protect all persons from arbitrary or unwanted disclosure, or threat of disclosure of such information by others.'

*these were referred to often by trans rights activists.

'The Yogyakarta Principles is a document about human rights in the areas of sexual orientation and gender identity that was published as the outcome of an international meeting of human rights groups in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in November 2006' - wiki

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yogyakarta_Principles

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3228002-Yogyakarta-principles

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4624160-yogyakarta-principles-and-self-id

One of the original architects of the YPs, Richard Wintemute, has since said that he realises that women's rights were never considered:

'Wintemute, Professor of Human Rights Law at Kings College London, is an expert on anti-discrimination law and sexual orientation law, and was one of the co-authors of the influential “Yogyakarta Principles”.
He now says the international human rights community got it wrong in merging lesbian and gay rights with the idea of a right to have “gender identity” replace sex.'
...
'Professor Wintemute says that women’s rights were not considered during the meeting where the principles were written and the authors “failed to consider” that fully intact males would seek to access female-only spaces.
Wintemute now wonders whether the GRA should have been passed at all. Instead of changing the person’s legal sex, the law could have simply sought to protect people from violence, harassment or discrimination based on gender non-conforming appearance or behaviour.'

https://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/yogyakarta-principles/

Pronouns are Rohypnol • Fair Play For Women

There’s a lot of chat around about pronouns right now. Specifically, ‘preferred’ pronouns. By which is usually meant, the pronouns a person would prefer.

https://fairplayforwomen.com/pronouns

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ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 18:27

DrBlackbird · 19/08/2023 17:46

Apparently small acts like helping to campaign about period poverty or retweeting the local branch of Women’s Aid will make a difference and result in some reciprocation. They want to make it look like they care about Women's issues so they don’t appear threatening

This quote from that 2018 conference made me think about a certain recent Period Dignity officer and wondered whether that was part of that campaign tactic or just blind stupidity on the part of the panel who hired him?

It's about to be a court case so I will be circumspect, but I'll say that there's no sign the people hiring the man involved were especially tactical.

However, it's worth considering that Lily Madigan, one time 'women's officer' for Labour, pushed for 'period' campaigns:

https://www.facebook.com/lewmomentum/photos/a.192884794673521/278005929494740/?type=3

Sex & gender in 2023
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ArabeIIaScott · 19/08/2023 18:31

There are several MN threads on the Family Sex Show. A useful tip is to google what you're searching plus 'Mumsnet' - google has a better search facility than Mumsnet's own, I find.

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