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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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EasternStandard · 19/12/2023 21:35

Again child v adult is relevant

Schools will not allow boys and girls in same facilities

The same is not true for adults

MsGoodenough · 19/12/2023 21:37

I think Noble giraffe is getting a hard time here. There is nothing in law that states that the PC of gender reassignment doesn't apply to under 18s. That example of harassment in the pub would put the fear of god into a headteacher trying to navigate this. Cass did also say that doing nothing in the case of a student iding as trans is also not a neutral act. We tend to quote this a lot less than her saying social transition was not a neutral act! I think some people here are as a guilty as Stonewall of presenting the Law as they want it to be rather than as it is (which is a total mess...)

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 21:37

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:34

What’s relevant is whether the pupil is an adult or a child.

Not when it comes to whether children can have the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.

Having the protected characteristic of gender reassignment does not mean that children with that PC should be subject to lower standards of safeguarding, and less protection of their future physical and mental health, than children without that PC.

Social transitioning of children is not a neutral act.

nothingcomestonothing · 19/12/2023 21:39

AuContraire · 19/12/2023 20:59

But it means that if a child does have the PC of GR, it's not clear that the school can say that the child who changes his name and pronouns and wears a 'girls uniform' has to be de/transitioned back.

Yes, the whole thing of transitioning children is a clusterfuck, but it's happened, to our society's eternal shame. So now what?

Show quote history

The child never had a right to be called a different name or pronouns or wear a different uniform. The activists who were invited to train professionals in their own preferred version of the law should be held accountable for the mess we're now in, though they won't be. Schools will have to sort out the mess they allowed to happen, and some likely vulnerable kids will be in a shit position be iase adults who should have stopped this didn't. It's shit but it's got to be righted, we can't carry on with the mess because cleaning it up will be unpleasant.

EasternStandard · 19/12/2023 21:40

MsGoodenough · 19/12/2023 21:37

I think Noble giraffe is getting a hard time here. There is nothing in law that states that the PC of gender reassignment doesn't apply to under 18s. That example of harassment in the pub would put the fear of god into a headteacher trying to navigate this. Cass did also say that doing nothing in the case of a student iding as trans is also not a neutral act. We tend to quote this a lot less than her saying social transition was not a neutral act! I think some people here are as a guilty as Stonewall of presenting the Law as they want it to be rather than as it is (which is a total mess...)

The guidance is clear on single sex. There’s no ‘guilty’ about that.

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:44

The child never had a right to be called a different name or pronouns or wear a different uniform.

Then how come the guidance cannot say that they definitely don't have the right? Why is it having to allow for exceptional circumstances?

All the guidance is doing is trying to narrow down the circumstances in which it can happen as much as possible, because it cannot ban it.

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:46

Another thing that the hypothetical headteacher could do is avoid conflating “less favourable treatment” and harassment.

It's the Equality and Human Rights Commission who detail deliberate misgendering as an example of harassment, not the hypothetical headteacher.

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 21:46

“That example of harassment in the pub would put the fear of god into a headteacher trying to navigate this.”

Oh, come off it. Schools have all sorts of stupid and petty rules that the children are required to comply with. It doesn’t mean that the children are being harassed by those rules.

Using correct sex pronouns for all pupils - regardless of protected characteristic - on the basis that using opposite sex pronouns is not a neutral act, would not be less favourable treatment of the pupils with the PC of GR.

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 21:50

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:46

Another thing that the hypothetical headteacher could do is avoid conflating “less favourable treatment” and harassment.

It's the Equality and Human Rights Commission who detail deliberate misgendering as an example of harassment, not the hypothetical headteacher.

It was your post at 21.17 that conflated “less favourable treatment” and harassment. As part of your energetic defence of the hypothetical headteacher.

Not the EHRC who conflated the two.

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 21:50

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:17

Having a PC just means you must not be treated less favourably than someone without the PC

If you go to the Equality and Human Rights Commission website then this is one of their examples of harassment against someone who holds the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.

Now ask any headteacher who visits that page what they should do about pronoun use in their school.

Here.

nothingcomestonothing · 19/12/2023 21:52

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:44

The child never had a right to be called a different name or pronouns or wear a different uniform.

Then how come the guidance cannot say that they definitely don't have the right? Why is it having to allow for exceptional circumstances?

All the guidance is doing is trying to narrow down the circumstances in which it can happen as much as possible, because it cannot ban it.

Well it also doesn't say they don't have the right to eat cake in science lessons or call their head of year Mavis, but that doesn't mean they do have that right.

I don't know where you're getting the idea that the guidance cannot ban transition - the purpose isn't to ban transition but to mitigate the potential harm of social transition encouraged by unqualified people and hidden from parents. This is not about banning trans people, it's about safeguarding children from something known to be potentially harmful.

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:55

I don't know where you're getting the idea that the guidance cannot ban transition

Because, if you had been following the story of the development of the guidance, you would be aware that one of the co-signatories of the guidance very much wanted to ban all social transition in schools, but came up against the law which wouldn't allow her to do that.

EasternStandard · 19/12/2023 22:01

The guidance may not ban it but it will change the situation for the better for children

And it will give children their own single sex facilities and mean no sanctions for pronouns and change sports

nothingcomestonothing · 19/12/2023 22:07

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 21:55

I don't know where you're getting the idea that the guidance cannot ban transition

Because, if you had been following the story of the development of the guidance, you would be aware that one of the co-signatories of the guidance very much wanted to ban all social transition in schools, but came up against the law which wouldn't allow her to do that.

The purpose of the guidance is to help schools manage the rise of social transitioning in a lawful way. Someone very much wanting to ban something, doesn't make that thing the purpose or scope of the guidance.

The question of the law has been chucked around quite a lot but as far as I can see, has never been tested in terms of children and the PC of gender reassignment. We have legal opinion (not case law, I don't think) that children and adults don't have the same rights as regards the PC, but it's not been tested in court. So commentators on either side of the question can say 'the law does/doesn't allow x or y' but it's not come to court as yet, so is still to an extent unknown. I'm pretty confident that when the PC was included in the Equality Act, no one was thinking about whether children would be allowed/encouraged to socially transition on the scale we are now seeing. It will probably have to be tested in court, or the law clarified, before long but this guidance is a lot clearer than what we've had up to now.

SabbatWheel · 19/12/2023 22:08

Not sure why teachers are getting such a bashing on this thread.
In my experience it is not the school leading the social transitioning but the parents - in our school no child can change their preferred name without parental permission and, believe me, it will be FUCKING BRILLIANT when we can say ‘No, Mrs Smith, we will not be requiring our staff to call little Simon Stephanie from now on.’

What I want to know is why, in my experience again, are the children who choose to socially transition autistic - almost without exception?

ChatBFP · 19/12/2023 22:09

@noblegiraffe

I agree, doing nothing is not a neutral act.

It is, upon current evidence as to the rates of desistance (which is causing a u turn for many Scandi countries in treating young people with gender dysphoria), most likely the least harmful. Which is why it should be prioritised in those who have not already been transitioned. In 10 years time, the medicalisation approach will not look so benign as the be kind brigade think.

As regards those who have been socially transitioned, there should be guidance for this, I would agree. Compassionate guidance for people who are suffering a great deal of turmoil.

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 22:10

The purpose of the guidance is to help schools manage the rise of social transitioning in a lawful way. Someone very much wanting to ban something, doesn't make that thing the purpose or scope of the guidance.

You misunderstand. The guidance, if the law allowed it, would very much ban social transitioning in schools. That the guidance doesn't ban it outright means that the law doesn't allow it.

That the law doesn't allow it means that the protected characteristic of gender reassignment as relates to children is meaningful.

EasternStandard · 19/12/2023 22:15

We could not get men out of adult female spaces but we can for children

It’s not the same

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 22:16

“You misunderstand. The guidance, if the law allowed it, would very much ban social transitioning in schools. That the guidance doesn't ban it outright means that the law doesn't allow it.”

I think it might be more accurate to say “if, on a topic which is hotly contested within political parties, and in a pre-election period, there was absolutely no uncertainty or debate whatsoever as to whether the law allowed it…”

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 22:20

They're already overstepping the law with the guidance as it is.

This government is not averse to going up against the courts where they think they have a case. They've been told there isn't a case and that the only way forward would be to change the law.

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 22:34

EasternStandard · 19/12/2023 22:15

We could not get men out of adult female spaces but we can for children

It’s not the same

Strictly speaking, it’s not men (ie it’s not the fact they’re an adult not a child which supposedly gives them that “entitlement”). It’s adult males with a GRC. (GRCs aren’t available to children.)

Adult males without a GRC, which awards the status of “legal fiction female”, do not have an entitlement to access opposite sex spaces. (Other than under Stonewall law.)

The problem, as has been said on here, is that once an entitlement to access opposite sex spaces has been awarded to adult males with a GRC, there’s no practical mechanism for stopping adult males with the PC of GR but without a GRC from accessing that entitlement, nor of stopping adult males without the PC of GR from doing so either.

I’m sure you know all that already. I just wanted to point out the distinction between the PC of GR, and having a GRC. As having the protected characteristic of gender reassignment (applicable to under 18s) does not automatically confer the rights conferred by a GRC (restricted to over 18s), and the PC of GR is being deployed a lot in this thread to justify eg social transition.

ChatBFP · 19/12/2023 22:36

@noblegiraffe

I think that the guidance serves its purpose if it shows that the current law prevents schools from taking a cautious approach in line with recommendations in the Cass review and supports those who take a cavalier approach to transitioning children - if those who complain about the guidance loudest make this point for the government it becomes much easier for those in government who are not in favour of social transitioning to say the law should change.

Binglebong · 19/12/2023 22:37

Hmmm, mixed coverage on the BBC news at 10. Anchor was vague "urges schools to preserve single sex toilets and changing rooms" but education correspondent very clear that toilets and changing rooms must have single sex options.

nothingcomestonothing · 19/12/2023 22:37

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 22:10

The purpose of the guidance is to help schools manage the rise of social transitioning in a lawful way. Someone very much wanting to ban something, doesn't make that thing the purpose or scope of the guidance.

You misunderstand. The guidance, if the law allowed it, would very much ban social transitioning in schools. That the guidance doesn't ban it outright means that the law doesn't allow it.

That the law doesn't allow it means that the protected characteristic of gender reassignment as relates to children is meaningful.

I'd be keen to see evidence that 'the law doesn't allow it'. I don't believe there is any, there's opinion in both directions but it's not been tested in court. Maybe it will be.

I don't think anyone is arguing that the PC of gender reassignment isn't meaningful. Just that what that means, both in practical terms and in legal terms, is not clear. There is no law which says that children ought to be socially transitioned, and evidence is starting to pile up that social transition isn't helpful and may be harmful, so its a good thing that this guidance has finally arrived so that schools have clear directions from government on what to do if a child is gender questioning.

LoobiJee · 19/12/2023 22:37

noblegiraffe · 19/12/2023 22:20

They're already overstepping the law with the guidance as it is.

This government is not averse to going up against the courts where they think they have a case. They've been told there isn't a case and that the only way forward would be to change the law.

Depends which law you are most interested in.

Posters on here have repeatedly pointed out that child safeguarding is covered by a statutory framework and that mindlessly putting children on a pathway to body modification and sterilisation, at the behest of external lobby groups, or of activist headteachers, is in breach of that.