Will Gender Ideology influence how you vote?

[Heylo]

Hi, new to Mumsnet. Full disclaimer I have no kids yet but will start trying March 24 (lesbian with some embryos in the freezer!). I decided to join after the hilarious responses to the Dawn Butler debacle over the weekend.

I’ve historically been a Labour voter but I’m voting Tory next year because I’m concerned about women’s and children’s rights in relation to Gender Ideology. The lesbian scene especially has been culturally bulldozed by the new additions to womanhood & a lot of us (in our 30s) now self - exclude based on some of the militant trans rights activists (TRAs) pressuring women into taking on trans women as partners and socialise more closely with them. (Only media reporting on this is Telegraph & The Daily Mail. There has been a media blackout on this at the BBC and The Guardian). Actually a couple of women have tried to run same - sex speed dating nights but TRAs have sent them threats, doxxed them to their employers and called the venues to get the nights / events shut down. You can read more about that here: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12401009/amp/Lesbian-speed-dating-event-sparks-transphobia-row-organisers-insist-adult-human-females-attend-popular-weekly-event.html

Anyway sorry for the segue, my question is to anyone who is interested in answering- if you are historically a Labour voter would the Gender issue sway you to voting conservative?

its a big topic at the moment in Gender Critical lesbian and bi circles. Everyone is usually a Labour voter but we’re all worried about what craziness Keir Starmer is going to introduce re erasing women’s spaces. I was curious what Mumsnet users think as outside of lesbians you are the next group (parents) who are most affected by this.

Always been an "anyone but the tories" voter but I cant vote Labour while they are failing to safeguard children and the Lib dems and greens are a bigger disaster. So it's either vote for the tories or spoilt ballot paper.

The schools guidance was a start but the tories still have to convince me they will really sort out this issue. There needs to be more real progress before the next election or I'll be spoiling my ballot paper. Anyone seen Starmer comment on the schools guidance yet, surely journalists should be asking the labour party stance on that?

In 91 constituencies the choice is really libdem or conservative and as labour may need to govern with lib dem help in those constituencies I'd have to support voting conservative.

I think it’s going to have to be a Tory vote. I’ve been emailing our Lib Dem MO for years and she hasn’t even bothered replying. Useless.

Anyone seen Starmer comment on the schools guidance yet, surely journalists should be asking the labour party stance on that?
I've not seen anything from Starmer but Bridget Phillipson (Shadow Education Minister) was asked about it and she answered that Labour welcomed it. The clip's on YouTubs. Posters have pointed out that she was referring to the consultation and not the guidance itself.

Journalists should not permit the other parties - important to ask Lib Dems too - to weasel out of a straight answer. Do they believe children need to be safeguarded from this ideology or not?

Welcome to the nest of vipers @Heylo! I've been a single issue voter on this for some years now. Traditional Labour voter with a tradition of Labour activism in the family. I have spoiled my ballot for this (wrote a suffragette slogan on it) then was relieved to have an SDP (Social Democratic Party - not in Scotland honest!) candidate standing who I could vote for. Really not sure I could ever vote Tory and I felt so guilty spoiling my ballot. The problem is there aren't enough of us. So many people swallow this down for the other policies. I see why, have done this myself for other issues, but on this I just can't

I would make a plea for people not to spoil their ballot papers.

It doesn’t make any difference, and it just means your choice isn’t counted. I know that the choices are awful, but one of them will be in power, and your vote, whether you choose to use it or not, will influence the outcome - it’s very rare that any candidate gets so many votes that they couldn’t have been beaten if the turnout was higher.

Alternatively of course, consider trying to find and support a local independent to stand - if my choices were all as dire as some of the Green Party candidates, this would start to look like the only sane response!

I’ll be voting labour - really can’t understand how any GC person could vote Conservative who support the likes of Jamie Wallace! And that’s just for starters! But hey you stay on your high Tory horses!

Marjorie, yet you’re happy to support the likes of Lloyd Russel-Moyle? Don’t pretend any of this is an easy/obvious choice!

No - unfortunately there are TRAs in all of the UK’s political parties - but I will not vote for a bunch of incompetent and morally bankrupt fraudsters who have ground this country to its knees solely for their own advantage with not a care for the average woman.

And that makes complete sense 💐

It will absolutely inform how I vote in any GE. Labour remain useless on this issue, while the LibDems & Greens are dangerous on it. The Conservative party I can't forgive because they brought about the bulk of this mess, even if they are now reverse-ferretting.

If the SDP stand locally, they will get my vote.

No.

This is as much the tories' fault as it is Labour. In fact from an educational pov, in terms of the chaos of outside providers, charities and private companies delivering resources to schools, it is mostly their fault.

What we see now in terms of the rates of gender questioning children would have absolutely happened with either government. And just as many women would have been fighting for their children. The evidence of harm started from the whistle blowers inside the nhs. and parents, some academics etc.

But you could argue the toss that a stronger NHS and centralised better funded teaching would have been easier to rein back in. I don't think SEND and CAHMS would have been in the state it is. And lack of provision there has led to children finding solace in the cult.

I'm a member of the greens but would probably vote Labour in a GE. I feel there's enough evidence now that, should Labour get in, they'd be unable to ignore any of it.

Note that the shadow Labour Ed sec welcomes the trans guidance.

I also noted that hardly any Labour MPs were there to argue the toss with Kemi towards weeks ago. I personally believe that absence says something.

I agree with some of what you say WarriorN but, if we're going to point fingers and talk about where the blame lies, then it was a Labour government that brought in the legislation that caused this mess.

I am a socialist who has voted Labour at some critical times as obviously a socialist party vote is meaningless. I have no-one to vote for now, realistically. Highly GC, very left-wing and so anti-Brexit that I left the country so as to get my EU citizenship back. No-one represents me.

Yes that is true. But, moving forward, the background of a struggling nhs and education system, both of which are being essentially privatised and fragmented, is not decent one.

Labour will have to endorse the new nhs clinical guidelines which are already being implemented.

I am in an area where the Lib Dem's are really pushing hard to get rid of a very well known Tory MP.

I just couldn't vote Lib Dem for an MP though. They are so very fucking weird.

Labour expelled GC women, so i dont see how a labour government would have made schools and nhs less full of gender ideology?

To be fair, i dont think the leadership of either party understand the damage gender ideology has done. The first thing needed is to clarify and justify the GRA and PC of GR, and i dont see any politicians doing that, just faffy around at the edges. Its those two acts that have force the ideology into institutions not the political party governing.

The only advantage to conservatives over other parties is that they allow women to speak about the damages gender ideology. Without allowing GC views to be aired, labour cant sort out this problem.

I'd really like to get a firmer grip on where the shadow cabinet ministers stand on this, given there's a strong chance that many of them will be leading the next government.

From what I can recollect, these have been vocally TWAW:
Angela Rayner (deputy leader)
David Lammy
Lisa Nandy

And then there's
Anneliese Dodds (shadow minister for women) repeats the party lines but nothing I've seen from her suggests that she understands any of it.

Wes Streeting - hostile to us in the past but since backtracked.

I think I remember Rachel Reeves trying to dodge the question and looking ridiculous.

Anyone know about the others? I'm far more concerned about where the possible future cabinet stand than I am in comedy tweets from back benchers.

It would be interesting to know the same about the current government cabinet too, although I've less skin in that game myself as I don't intend voting for them.

Yvette cooper will probably move to the front benches. Shell probably continue to pretend nothing is happening.

Is Alex Sobel still on the front bench? Also TWAW.

Can someone enlighten me about Labours actual policies on other matters, they seem hard to find.

As things stand, gender ideology will absolutely influence my voting decision. I wish I didn't have to risk making a less than ideal decision in other areas to protect women's rights that were won in the past and are now under threat. But if legislation allowing males to be regarded as women whenever it suits them is introduced it may be impossible to roll it back.

I still haven't decided who I'll vote for. My parents in Scotland, who are in their eighties and aren't prepared to be gaslit about gender, plan to switch from SNP to Alba. My local MP is uncompromisingly GC but is a Conservative who has made questionable decisions on other issues. I'd like a Labour candidate I can trust enough to vote for, but need to wait and see who the party selects and then ask questions. Any other party would be a wasted vote at present.

Labour expelled GC women

From my perspective, because Momentum became a hard left rot in the Labour Party, in response to the tories being in power. As the T was embedding itself into LGB, it was absorbed into left leaning politics. And so Labour was completely captured.

When governments swing to more hard right positions, oppositions swing initially to hard left but only manage to return to power when they become more centralist. That has happened for both Labour and the tories in the last few decades.

What was missing was the scientific evidence. NHS whistleblowers, parents and litigation cases aren't going away anytime soon.

I don't think Alex Sobell is front bench but yeah, Yvette Cooper us shadow Home Secretary so I'd expect her to have a big job in a future cabinet. Thanks

No way Rachel Reeves is buying into all the gender nonsense, and she will be a key player in future government. I just don't understand how anyone can willingly put an X next to a Tory candidate, with all they stand for, after what they have done to the UK.
Totally agree with Warrior about the effects of cuts to CAHMS and other frontline services. In theory, including men as being women does make the category of women meaningless, yes, so I understand the passion to stop that happening. But, I would choose a functioning health/ school/ transport/welfare system over a system that actively attacks anyone who is not rich, even while admitting that women don't have penises.
Yes I would rather a single sex hospital ward. But the stark choice is, in reality, a hospital bed where the person in the next cubicle might be a man, or no hospital bed.
Reality sucks, but at this stage, voting on principle is fiddling while Rome burns. I do definitely get the sense from a lot of FWR that posters are living a nice comfy life and that the harsh realities of Tory trashed UK just haven't really seeped through to them. It's bad out there, really, really bad, and it could get so much worse. Ultimately whether lesbians can have social clubs isn't high on my list of priorities, sorry if that's harsh, it's just that people are actually dying as a direct result of the actions of this government.