Jess Philips on VAWG and single sex spaces.

[ArabellaScott]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/02/24/jess-phillips-lindsay-hoyle-jo-cox-murder-gaza-vote/

Interviewed in the Telegraph, including on VAWG, and trans issues. Archived in the usual places.

'Would she still like to be prime minister? “I’d still give it a crack, sure!” she says, firmly. “I used to want to be the home secretary. But I’ve learnt I don’t have that special skill of plotting, organising for your own progression that you need to get on. Women are less interested in that than men. My only ambition in politics is to halve the levels of violence experienced by women and girls in a decade. Despite two women dying every week there is still <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.is/o/X8IhI/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/10/09/jess-philips-womens-lives-risk-failure-reform-child-payouts/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">no strategy or target around femicide. We live in a patriarchy still. It is 2024 but all our institutions are based on a 1950s, or 1850s or even 1750s ideal that doesn’t work for women.”

Prior to becoming an MP she worked for Women’s Aid and ran rape crisis refuges. I believe her when she says it is her life’s purpose. Phillips is a rare bird in today’s politics – a confident, clever working-class woman.

So where is she on trans issues, how has her work on protecting women been affected by this debate? “The actual work hasn’t been affected at all. The political space has undoubtedly been affected, not all negatively.” Can she still speak about women? “Of course! I feel totally comfortable speaking out about women – sometimes when I talk about women that means different things. I am capable of holding two ideas in my head at once… I believe in single sex spaces for biological women, prisons, refuges etc. – 100 per cent. I’ve got the T-shirt on that. But also, if someone asks me to refer to them as a woman, I personally will do that. I’ll call you whatever you ask me to. <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.is/o/X8IhI/www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/04/09/jess-phillips-no-trans-person-met-has-said-cant-say-woman/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">I am happy to refer to transwomen as women. But also the idea that I am meant to parrot ‘transwomen are women’ as a slogan is f-g meaningless.” Classic Phillips. Having her cake and eating it.

“When I worked in women’s refuges, we always asked questions on the referral forms about people’s sex at birth, whether people had transitioned, basically. The language we used would probably get you sent to the gallows now.” She smiles and goes into a long explanation about how “there are all sorts of reasons why women who are referred might not be allowed in a refuge, not just trans. For instance, if a woman had a 14-year-old son with her, she wouldn’t be allowed in the main women’s refuge centre, she would be cared for in dispersed houses within the community with supervision so she could stay with her son. Or women with child protection issues or those with substance abuse issues.

This is Parliament’s responsibility, it’s up to the legislature to make it clear. She stresses that it is disabled women, older women and those with complex needs who have “the hardest time accessing the right kind of safe spaces… We need to have women’s biological spaces, but also when I was on Birmingham City Council, I commissioned domestic refuges for LGBTQ+ folk, particularly men beaten up by their partners. It should not be beyond the wit of man to protect women’s biological sex spaces and provide different spaces for trans people.”'

@PP82 Being polite is one thing.
Being NOT rude is another.
I do not want to be put in the position of having to join in with anyone's fantasy.

This is positive. I know that Phillips knows what a woman is.

If this was the Labour Party position AND they committed to clarifying the legislation (which is what she gleans to here) This is Parliament’s responsibility, it’s up to the legislature to make it clear.

Then I could vote for them.

As it is , it is not and this is not enough for me.

"sometimes when I talk about women that means different things" 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

Agreed.

I'm picking up that some of the more upbeat posts might come from people who've not read the OP, far less any further.

@PP82
Do you feel the same about using people’s pronouns if it is giving them sexual gratification for you to do so?
That’s a genuine question.

I think she’s getting there, good for her. It’s a shame it has taken so long but I welcome what she has said here about single sex spaces.

sometimes when I talk about women that means different things.

Does she mean that sometimes women are cats? Or men? What are these different things that aren't listed in the dictionary?

I wonder when she talks about men if she means different things too...

It's good news that Jess Phillips has come round to openly supporting single sex spaces for biological women. However, although she may be able to hold two ideas in her head at once, are her listeners always going to be able to tell whether, when she mentions 'women', she is referring to adult human females only or to adult human females plus some adult human males?

I think I agree with her. I'm still processing and churning through where my mind lies on each new aspect of the trans debate and I'm happy that she seems to be thinking and changing too. I don't want politicians to be black and white and intractable. I want them to think and engage critically with issues and change. I like that people want to explore who they are and different ways of living their lives. I think politicians have to respond to that and not laugh at it. Sunak et al making crass remarks about trans people doesn't feel like they're on the same page as me at all. I don't want to ridicule trans people or make them uncomfortable but I do want put safe guarding women and fairness to women at the forefront. I think JP agrees.

If she is getting there, it's only because it's politically expedient for her to do so. Don't forget she was on WESC when they carried out a consultation into reform of the GRA without consulting a single women's group.

She is only interested in one thing, and that's Jess Phillips. I also dispute the claim that she's a "confident, clever working-class woman." To quote Wikipedia, her parents were "Stewart Trainor, a teacher, and Jean Trainor (née Mackay), an NHS administrator who rose to become deputy chief executive of the NHS Confederation and chair of South Birmingham Mental Health Trust."

A rather different idea from most people of what constitutes working-class.

Yeah, there seem to be a lot of people in politics who say they have WC roots, who seem to have very MC roots to me.

Now granted, there are certainly jobs which have over the years migrated from being WC to MC, and there was a period for many of them where it might be difficult to decide where to put them. The military is like that, when my grandparents joined the navy it was very WC if you weren't an officer, by the time they retired it was decidedly MC. Similarly with a lot of journalism, and some trades.

But given her age, and her parent's specific careers, that doesn't seem like what is going on.

I couldn't care less which "class" anyone is or thinks they are. It's mostly meaningless anyway. Do they care about helping everyone to have safer, happier, healthier and more fulfilling lives? That's what politicians are for. Any politician who doesn't have that at the heart of their agenda isn't worth their salt.

I think I agree. Also, JP as an elected representative need to make sure that whatever she does she aims to be there for ALL her constituents. That means her constituents who are also trans. Taking a route which is respectful to them but allows for single sex spaces is exactly where I want politics to be heading.

what that looks like in practice and legislation is important. If the conversation is opening up enough to have these discussions that can only be a good thing. Just as the hard line TRA demands won’t win, the hardest line women’s rights demands won’t win.

we all need to be open to these discussions, and I have never been comfortable about the insistence by some here that all preferred pronoun use is bad. Doing so by choice isn’t. A PP was asked about what the cut off for pronoun use would be, for me it’s when i personally feel uncomfortable. If a person is trans and is respectful, kind and decent, I’ll respect them in return. If they are obnoxious, take up more space than they should, and/or behave badly they lose my respect. That boundary can’t be written into the rules anymore than pronoun use should be, it has to be personal comfort level. Which means the notion of it being compulsory needs to go.

I take it you've read the extensive trans widows threads in full then?

I wonder whether labour have finally registered the fury that the public feel about their unthinking pandering to the trans lobby and are worried that it may impact the vote in certain constituencies?
Just as the tories are never going to apologise for funding trans lobby groups to the tune of millions, labour won't admit they've backed the wrong horse. So stealthily they're sending out Streeting (no transwomen in women's hospital wards), Jess P - (single sex spaces for women) etc?

I take it you've read the extensive trans widows threads in full then?

Agreed.

I also wonder if some posters have taken onboard the enforced necessity in courtrooms and court proceedings that women should refer to the Accused who assaulted or raped them by the Accused's preferred pronouns and status, irrespective of the emotional or cognitive labour this confers on the victims.

Even pre-proceedings, I still cannot accept that the NHS denied a woman was raped on their wards because, "There were no men there".

Courtesy pronouns may have their place for some people and that's their choice and aligns with their principles. Plausible outcomes from the use of courtesy pronouns are

• harm to people in the room and not in the room
• the upending of scientific evidence for ideological purposes rather than through radical discovery
• workplace policies that disadvantage some protected beliefs that are WORIAD
• impenetrable sports policies that undermine women's sports
• health and social care policies that harm women and children.

If someone at work tells you they're a Christian, but you know they don't go to church regularly and live with a partner to whom they are not married, do you insist on telling them repeatedly that they aren't a real Christian?

That's just something 'GC' people have made up. And even if it were true, why would I care? But it's not true, it's hate speech.

I think Labour's longterm plan is to differentiate between men and 'legal women'.

They will argue that of course it's not right for men to be in women's spaces - men being all male people without a GRC.

Simultaneously they will reform the GRA as they've told us they will and make it very easy for any man to get a GRC on a self iD basis.

The upshot being that any man can stake a claim in being a 'legal woman'.

Women will be punished for referring to 'legal women' as men.

Wims, remind me what that form of words is called, please.

It didn't happen.
And if it did, it's not that bad.
And DARVO…

I can't recall.

Being trans is not a sexual fetish.

It is for some @PP82 . They freely admit it themselves.

Of course! I feel totally comfortable speaking out about women – sometimes when I talk about women that means different things. I am capable of holding two ideas in my head at once… I believe in single sex spaces for biological women, prisons, refuges etc. – 100 per cent. I’ve got the T-shirt on that. But also, if someone asks me to refer to them as a woman, I personally will do that. I’ll call you whatever you ask me to.

In the EqA currently, women are allowed SSE when they fulfil a legitimate need. Phillips seems to want to reduce this to only mean when our saftey is compromised - prisons and refuges.

Im please that she has ring-fence those two areas, but ffs, shes telling us shes limiting the araas in life where woman are allowed single sex spaces and women are thanking her?

Except those ones who say it is. Themselves.

HTH

You clearly are behind the curve on this...

If it isnt a sexual fetish for men, how come so many of their origin stories start with hiding women underwear they buy (or steal), from their family?