“But why are you so interested in this?”

[lily444]

trying to explain to my very close and wonderful friend who knows nothing about gender ideology why I am concerned about Giggle V Tickle situation.
she is Australian, actually lives in Queensland. Very strong and outspoken woman. She doesn’t understand why I’m interested in this topic.
”is this something that is affecting people in Ireland ?”
she didn’t know anything about it.
and now I feel like she thinks I’ve gone a bit mad.
why am I so interested in this topic ?
any reasonable sounding answers ? That don’t make me sounds like a conspiracy theorist ?
she keeps coming back to me with “how is this relevant to your life?”

Because if the word woman is redefined to include women and man who say there are women there is literally nothing that can be only for women

rape support groups
prisons
intimate care for women who need it
sport
Etc

It does directly affect her life, she just doesn’t understand it yet

Also, since when are people only allowed to be interested in things that directly and immediately affect them? It's happening in the world we all live in, therefore it's reasonable for anyone to take an interest.

You’re interested in it because trans ideology which pushes the false idea that TWAW seeks to break down women’s rights and women’s spaces.

Your friend must have had her head in the sand for a while. Why isn’t she interested?

I ask myself this regularly! My position is: Saying men can be women is an existential threat to sex based rights. It creates all kinds of distortions and unfairness as well as outright danger to women. Previously, I very much took sex based rights for granted, indeed I probably thought they were a nice thing to have but excluding men probably wasn't necessary in a lot of situations. It was the Isla Bryson case in Scotland which made me realise what J K Rowling had been talking about. I think privileged women (and I absolutely count myself as one) really don't get it because they don't experience the effects of not being able to exclude men from places. If you've never experienced the need for intimate care, needed rape crisis support, been in a woman's prison or been in a changing room with a man then you might not appreciate what is happening. It is very easy to ignore what's going on in the world. I also think there is disbelief that anyone in authority could 'allow' things like men in women's prisons to happen.

It's such a daft question, isn't it? Why do you have to give a reason for being interested in something? But why are you interested in who the next leader of the Tory party is? Why are you interested in the Russian invasion of Ukraine? Why are interested in the refugee crisis? What answer is there other than: I am a human being, and I am interested in other human beings?

She's trying to put you down by making out there is something weird or abnormal about your interest. More fool her.

I'm a feminist, so I care about feminist issues, and feminism is for females.

Same reason I care if women in Afghanistan aren't allowed to speak. I'm a feminist.

You could try something Sall said herself in her The Mess We're In discussion a few days ago. It's basically my view:

I think gender ideology is so evil and so destructive. To just say it's women's rights is to miss so much bad of what it's actually doing.

Women's rights are the canary in the coal mine. Everyone's rights are affected by this.

It's freedom of belief, freedom of speech and freedom of association. That is what it's destroying, And that affects every single person in the world.

So if a man gets involved in this issue because he cares about free speech, freedom of belief and freedom of association, and we're having the same fight, great, welcome - let's fight together. As a byproduct women's rights will be saved.

But maybe if women's rights are too abstract a concept, maybe stuff like freedom is way out there.

It's also an issue where we can, indeed must, have an impact. I care about what's happening to women in Iran and Afghanistan but realistically I can't do much to influence the situation. However, I can write to my MP in the UK and support the ban on puberty blockers for example.

You’re interested as this is happening across the western world and is affecting women’s rights.

As with any political topic, it’s very hard to ascertain how important this situation is, when compared to others, but it appears that swathing legal changes are being brought in, which change the legal definition of the words “woman” and “female”.

It should be obvious that any human rights that are afforded to women, particularly when those are to protect women from inequality based on sex or from harm from men, will effectively be nullified if men can choose to be legally female, especially where that occurs with no checks and balances.

So it may appear unimportant on the surface but it has an enormous impact on the entirety of women’s rights.

And that’s before you consider the medical profession’s approach to treating children with the disputed diagnosis of “gender dysphoria”.

For me it's because the whole concept of gender is so very sexist.

Any recognition given to gender identity in law is just solidifying ideas that men and women are fundamentally different on some non-physical level.

Deffo more fool her.

My father (aged 80) who lives in Australia telephoned me to alert me to this latest travesty. We talk about this stuff alot and for my birthday he bought me Doc Stock's book 'Material Girls'.

He's awesome- and as a white elderly (vaguely left of centre) male this 'stuff' is as far removed from being relevant to him as probably possible. But he is interested. Because (to quote Penny from the big bang theory)- he goes outside and talks to people.

Our discussions around Laurel Hubbard (which peaked me) Lia Thomas and Imane Khelif have been fascinating.

of course women should be interested in the erosion of women's rights. We should be as involved with this as much as the entire world should be involved with the erasure of Afghan women's voices in public.

Something doesn't have to be relevant to my life for me to be interested or concerned.

Women not being allowed to speak in.public in Afghanistan affects me not one jot. Animals being mistreated in China? No effect at all on my life.

But, these things are wrong, whether they affect me or not and I am interested in the issues.

Charities exist because people are interested in wrongs that they want to right. I am interested in the Tickle v. GIggle case here in the UK and will help crowdfund an appeal.

Oh, and I feel this particular case does affect me because it is part of an erosion of women's spaces and freedom of expression that will spread if people don't notice and push back. Your friend is part of a priblem she's not even seeing.

SPAG typos

It's interesting that your friend said she didn't know much about it. There are so many different aspects of gender ideology. Is there one which might be a way in with your friend? For example men in women's prisons.

I'm surprised that a very close friend doesn't know you're gender critical or a feminist. I would explain that I've been a feminist for years and don't like how gender ideology is encroaching on women's rights. This is an example of it and it doesn't bode well for protecting women's safety or spaces.

You could point out to her the outcome of this case could have ramifications for an International Treaty that Ireland probably signed to. The crack pot decision of a tin pot Australian judge could end up redefining what it means to be a Woman all over the world. Why the hell isn't she concerned about this.

Try telling her something like: It is relevant to us both because we are both women. Women's rights are a very recent phenomenon.* They were hard won in the last century and there has been fierce opposition against them for centuries. Within a few decades of women getting the right to vote, the right to have domestic violence treated as a crime, the right to fight for (not yet gained) equal pay, a new misogyny is emerging in which women are being told that men are women if they say they are women. This allows men into protected women's spaces. I think this is a global issue, a feminist issue, a women's rights issue. It is not an anti trans issue or transphobic issue but an issue about respecting the need for women only spaces, respecting the opinions of women and being a bit circumspect about the impact that trans self ID will have on these most fragile, new and hard won rights. So yes, it's relevant in Ireland and Australia and everywhere else.

in the mid 1990s, I joined a feminist campaign trail urging women to use their votes in Europe. We stood in city centres and called out to women shopping, 'Use your vote.' They ignored us. Then I started shouting,' Women, we've only had the vote for 70 years in the whole history of Britain. Use it, don't lose it.' I got inundated with women wanting leaflets from our stall. they had no idea we'd only had the vote for 70 years. It made me realise then how very flimsy our rights are. So I have remained vigilant about the ways in which they can be eroded. What strikes me forcibly about the transrights campaign is the irony. Not once have they said: We see your need and respect it. What can we do to ensure both our needs are adequately met. Instead, it's a Harry Enfield-esque 'Women, know your place!' dictate that we should shut up, comply, accommodate. Like men have expected us to do since time began. The sheer old-school male entitlement of it all stinks.

If she has children or grandchildren, point her in the direction of the Queensland Education Dept Handbook for Gender Woo (not the exact title).

Any student (from primary to uni) can declare they are the opposite sex.

From that moment they can use the facilities and other designated for the opposite sex - toilets, change rooms, accommodation, even scholarships, sports, etc.

Parents and teachers MUST affirm. If they don’t, they are referred to the Anti-Discrimination Commissioner and can be charged.

And that is the tip of the iceberg.

Actually, this is literally all that ever needs to be said. But it does need to be said. Again and again and again.

Its the collective insanity as much as the insult to women's rights that fascinates me.
Imo it would be odd not to be fascinated by such a spectacular example of collective folly.
Its human instinct to gawp at people making a spectacle of themselves and now we have a societal wide example and its mind blowing to watch, like a massive car crash, you cant take your eyes off it.

”is this something that is affecting people in Ireland ?”
It absolutely IS something that affects us in Ireland, even more than the UK.

Equality legislation in Ireland has been overwritten so that everywhere it used to say 'sex' it now says 'gender', including, crucially, the list of Protected Characterics. Gender is protected. Sex is not.
We have a Gender Recognition Act which allows anyone over 18 to declare their own 'gender identity', which legally means a man can self-declare himself as a women.

There are no legal exceptions, as there are in UK legislation, which allows for single-sex provision in certain circumstances - how 'sex' is defined is a moot point, but at least the provision is there.
So effectively biological women in Ireland have lost the protection of Equality legislation, and any biological male can claim to be a woman with impunity.

The trans campaign has been incredibly powerful in Ireland, they were organised and active when gender issues started to be discussed in the Irish legislature, and TENI, the Trans Equality Network Ireland, were deferred to as The Experts by parliamentary committees etc involved in drawing up equality legislation. They are still deferred to disproportionately, e.g. the media will go to TENI for comments on, for instance the Cass report, and publish their comments without any balancing comments.

We are, in short, one judgment away from exactly the same decision made in the Tickle v Giggle case. Irish woman have no protection from the law, and it's only a thin thread of public opinion and the 'careful now' principle which is keeping our heads above water, so to speak.

So yes it matters hugely to us in Ireland, even moreso than in the UK - the fact that so many women have been able to have their rights as biological women, and as GC women, validated by tribunals and courts is a tribute to the UK legal system.
And that's not something that I've often said, given how it has failed Irish people so spectacularly in the past! But fair dues, there is a roll-call of brave women like Maya Forstater and Allison Bailey and many more, who have successfully called on the UK legal system [perhaps more accurately the English legal system??] to protect their rights, and it did.
That could not happen in Ireland, as it cannot happen, apparently, in Australia.

“how is this relevant to your life?”

I'm interested in loads of things that don't affect me directly

I'm strongly motivated by unfair and unjust discrimination in a wide variety of circles, even though I am a classic middle aged, white guy, educated and straight(ish)

Homophobia is wrong, racism is wrong, poverty is wrong and misogyny is wrong

Even if they don;t affect me

Exactly this

i dont live in Gaza, Afghanistan or Ukraine either but am still interested and concerned/worried about what’s going on and how it impacts other people. Since when do normal functioning humans with empathy only care about things that affect themselves?

She's trying to put you down by making out there is something weird or abnormal about your interest.

RoyalCorgi has it right here.

I’m not sure meaningful engagement is possible when she is starting from this position.

Whatever reasons you come up with, she will be dismissive of them, because she just doesn’t want to acknowledge that this could be an issue that needs exploring.

Too invested in the groupthink line, for whatever reasons.

She’s got you on the back foot, defending yourself. Turn it back on her, if you can - ask her, as AtrociousCircumstance says, why she isn’t interested.

Why doesn’t she care about vulnerable women in prison, rape support groups, needing intimate care etc? Why doesn’t she care about safeguarding the rights women fought so long and hard for; about safeguarding children?

And why doesn’t she care about freedom of speech and democracy for us all?

She’s behaving like just another smug, sanctimonious, ignorant bigot. It might help you to remember that when you’re talking to her, rather than respecting and/or deferring to her wilfully uninformed position.

According to Oz press this person is female because of their GI. If Tickle is discriminated against for not being able to go on a female app, then what’s stopping this person bringing a claim for not being placed in the female prison estate (or any other female space)? It may not be a problem to her but for many others it is.