Ask your general election candidates what a woman is: results

[generalelectionfish]

I have decided to ask all major parties in my constituency how they define a woman, particularly with regard to women in sport and prisons.

My constituency (currently, subject to borders changing) is Aylesbury Vale.

Conservative: Rob Butler - no reply. This doesn't surprise me because he's a useless tosser who only ever turns up to stuff being opened and has never answered a single email I have sent.

Labour: Laura Kyrke-Smith - replied! She says, "I define a woman as someone who has female sex at birth or defines herself as a woman.
This piece by Annelise Dodds is a good summary of where Labour stands on trans rights more broadly."

Weasel words in my opinion, but useful to know where she stands. We are a (ugh) Tory safe seat here, but if anyone can challenge it, it would only be Labour.

Anyone else have any assurances or otherwise from their local candidates - and where are you (if you are happy saying)?

I had a response from the Lib Dem candidate in my constituency today. It’s a marginal seat where either Lib Dem or conservatives will win.

He said this:

‘I do recognise a difference between sex and gender, and understand the importance of sex remaining a protected characteristic. That doesn't mean that I don't recognise the persecution and suffering of trans people, and want to do all I can to ease it.

Regarding the concerns you raised, I believe in solutions that respect everyone's privacy and safety. The issues of women's safety aren't resolved cleanly through 'sex' based segregation either: I'm sure many women would be alarmed and could feel unsafe if someone born a female, but who has undergone transition and passes as male, were to be forced to use a women's changing room.’

And some bits about he will use his judgment and not just blindly follow the party line. I’m not convinced. The issue of women who have transitioned feels like a red herring to me - in my view we should start with single sex spaces which address the actual (not just perceived) risks to women and girls from men. I take the point that there may be some women who are alarmed at what appears at first glance to be a man in the women’s facilities but is in fact a trans man. I guess the answer to that is third spaces. I don’t think we can get into the realm of who passes or doesn’t, or who fits in with the sex stereotypes or doesn’t - it all gets hazy and risky again if we do that.

Like some PPs above, not sure what to do. I feel like spoiling my ballot, but as the seat is supposedly so close here, that could effectively be a vote for Lib Dem. So I might have to vote Tory.

My Labour candidate needed a follow up but then emailed back the same day.

It wasn't exactly a bad reply - no sign of any copy n' paste, nothing about being kind and it was a specific answer to some specific questions about single sex spaces and the Equality Act. But at the end of the day they just re-iterated Labour statements and swerved my question about what the GRC actually did.

It might have been enough a year ago.

I feel sad about it but, unless Starmer agrees tomorrow to clarify the EA, I'll vote for the independent - and I know I'm lucky to have an independent.

9 candidates. 3 independent - 1 hasn’t bothered publishing anything about why they are standing, 1 hasn’t replied, 1 is anti-abortion and that’s it.

Labour - TWAW
Tory - lives 150 miles away. Won’t get in.
Plaid - TWAW
Greens - TWAW
Lib Dem - TWAW

i have literally nobody to vote for.

Our local Labour candidate (hoping for re-election in a v marginal Inner London seat) was at the railway station as I walked past tonight so I stopped to ask her - not for a definition of what a woman is, but about what her stance was on women’s rights and the protection of single sex spaces. She said she absolutely understood the importance of protecting single sex spaces and, while she didn’t want any group to feel vulnerable or marginalised, she was clear that there was a need for single sex spaces in certain circumstances.

I asked whether she was convinced her party colleagues and, in particular, the leadership felt the same. She said she thought they did, and said she thought there had been a sea-change of thinking and that things were at last moving in the right direction. She thought, while it was important to respect people’s pronoun preferences, there needed to be a review of the Equality Act, and some legal clarity about what key words mean. I said we also needed clarity in general conversation too, so we all knew what the word “woman” meant. We talked briefly about the importance of clarity in that regard especially for Muslim women and those who are rape/abuse survivors so that they know “women only” means “single sex female” - she agreed: “otherwise people will self-exclude and that is not right”.

I pressed her on whether she was sure this was what the leadership was intending. She said obviously she cannot predict or guarantee absolutely, but she was confident. I then asked whether she could guarantee what she would press for, and she assured me she could, and would continue to be a supporter of women’s rights.

I asked her whether she thought Rosie D would be treated better in future, because her treatment by the party was shameful. She said she met Rosie and Tonia A frequently and simply could not understand the way they had been treated. I appreciate that is not quite answering my question, but I thought it was encouraging.

She has been an excellent constituency MP, and I think this gives me enough reassurance to vote for her as an individual. I’ve always been (quite far) left of centre and would have described myself as a natural Labour voter up until women’s rights started to be so fundamentally undermined by unthinking implementation of transmania.

Am deliberately not naming her, given that I don’t want to risk others reading this and going to attack her.

Thanks @AlexandraLeaving that sounds very encouraging. I'm so jealous 😫

I doubt she'd get attacked by any GC person reading this thread. But I suspect that's not who you had in mind.

I believe the readership of this board is fairly wide…

@AlexandraLeaving that sounds positive. If I was in a constituency with a Rosie Duffield type labour candidate I would vote for them despite the party view.

I e-mailed all my local candidates except for the Conservative & Reform UK guys. I've had responses from the Labour and Lib Dem candidates.

The Lib Dem response was sent within hours of my message, not the standard cut and paste response, a bit wishy-washy - lots of irrelevant stuff about trans people in history, Hjra in India etc etc. Other than that, it could have been worse. Seemed to go along the lines of third spaces, but didn't give the sense that he's actually really grasped the full extent of the problems, and he spent far too much of it talking about trans people and not addressing my specific questions.

The Labour Party candidate (who was our MP, and is highly likely to be so again) gave a much better response than I was expecting, and gave me some hope. The main focus of her response was healthcare (that is her area of particular interest), and she managed not to use any of the usual cliches, and confined her reply to talking about women and girls, rather than trans people.

What a terrible position to be in @FunZebra
and why does your Conservative candidate live so far away? As they are the only Party prepared to revise the Equalities Act and protect women they aren’t giving women much choice in your area. Is there any reason why there isn’t someone more local….ie are you very rural or something?

Saw this on Twitter. It really puts into perspective just how much the general population (i.e. outside of communities where people with gender critical views gather) actually consider the trans debate top priority.

We've got leaders bending over backwards to meet with billionaire Rowling (on her terms, of course), to reassure her about all the trans people in her head. But what does that do for normal working class people worried about the cost of living, crime, Britain's involvement in foreign conflicts and affordable housing or social care for the elderly or disabled?

It's almost as if billionaires such as JK Rowling aren't living in the same world we are.

Source: https://x.com/IndiaWilloughby/status/1808068665524334820/photo/1

Sadly I still havent seen any sign of the local labour candidate, perhaps because I had raised this as an issue with the local party and this candidate. As long as you dont visit too many doorsteps other than party members you can still claim it doesnt come up on the doorstep. Cant claim it's not in your email box though.

That's because it isn't a 'debate about trans people'. It's a women's rights issue. The right to have sex based spaces and sports. And you are STILL obsessed with JKR, as is IW. If you want to be taken seriously quoting from that unhinged deranged individual probably isn't the way to do it.

Lastly I'm not sure JKR is indeed a billionaire, due to her charitable donations. Someone could correct me if I'm wrong.

Nobody expects the 'general public' to have this issue as their top priority. But for those of us that do it is, of course, fundamental......and they/we will be thanked, or certainly remembered, for it at some point - when the 'average person' is themself directly impacted.......in the way the nurses in Darlington have been recently, and now the hospital staff member in Scotland - both of whom are taking action against the NHS for being forced to change with men, and then reprimanded when they complain.

Votes for women was never the top priority for most in decades gone by, either.......but if the few don't do the work on the behalf of the majority....then many issues would not be adressed at all.

The chart I posted speaks for itself, all the "sex based" stuff is basically just all a debate about trans people regardless what words you want to use for it. Most people in the real world are more concerned about how to pay bills or afford a house or issues regarding NHS/crime/social care as the chart mentioned.

Also where is my meeting with the party leaders? Do I get to set my terms for them to meet with me and will they promise to assure me and keep me happy like with Rowling? Or am I a nobody because I'm a non-billionaire without 14M followers on twitter?

IW aside, the source for the figures on the chart is at the bottom of the image (not from IW herself, obvs).

"If you want to be taken seriously quoting from that unhinged deranged individual probably isn't"

If you want to be taken seriously it's generally best not to call people "unhinged deranged". I know many here dislike trans people but I would prefer if we could chat without them being called names.

It's remarkably transphobic to assume we think IW is deranged because IW is trans-identified, rather than because of how IW acts.

That’s because the voting intention part states Conservative. Try filling it in with either Labour, Lib Dem’s or Green Party, then see what the results are.

Reword it with 'men in women's spaces and sports' and see what answers you get in your little chart.

IW is unhinged and deranged, as evidenced by their misogynistic behaviour on Twitter/X, mainly towards JKR. I'll stand by that any day of the week.

JK Rowling didn’t ask to meet them as far as I’m aware, Starmer said he’d meet with her didn’t he? As a sort of eye rolling ‘if it keeps her happy’ type concession if I recall correctly. And she responded that there were other interested groups who he should meet with first.

But yes, JKR is so awful… heaven forbid a woman might be successful because of her own merit and hard work, and that she might then use her money for the good of other women, and that she might have opinions and get involved in expressing them. Despicable behaviour

Just a guess here but I would imagine voters of other parties would consider the trans-debate to be even less of importance than Conservative (or Reform). There is other stuff happening.

Anyway just came across this, a WB Harry Potter store in NY displaying the progress pride flag. It must mean Rowling does care about LGBT people after all, how nice.

https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/07/02/harry-potter-store-flies-trans-inclusive-progress-pride-flag/

@Christinapple have you bothered to read any of her essays? I'll hazard a guess and say no.

Personally, I think IW is unhinged and deranged because of IW's unhinged and deranged social media spoutings.

Also misogynist.

Hth.

Well indeed.

Reword it with 'men in women's spaces and sports' and see what answers you get in your little chart

Yep.

Also I’m wondering if a bigger question to politicians could have been where do men with a GRC have access?

Many of us here are actually ex/Labour party members and activists of long standing......People who truly understand 'Women's rights' and the female perspective treat this issue as absolutely fundamental. For those whose feminism is predicated solely on 'equality' as sameness, maybe less so.

Some trans activists simply cannot live their 'true selves' or 'best lives' without Harry Potter, it seems.