CPS change the proposed 'sex by deception re gender' legal guidance

[Chariothorses]

Following public objections, the CPS announced yesterday they have changed the proposed legal guidance on Rape and Serious Sexual Offences (RASSO), specifically the guidance on “Deception as to gender”, which can be found in Chapter 6 Consent, to 'Deception as to sex'. Rape and Sexual Offences - Chapter 6: Consent | The Crown Prosecution Service.

The outcome of the consultation is available here: Consultation on the Deception as to Gender section in the Rape and Serious Sexual Offences (RASSO) legal guidance | The Crown Prosecution Service.

summary of consultation responses here: Consultation on CPS guidance on Deception as to Gender - Summary of Responses | The Crown Prosecution Service.

There are ongoing problems re ideological capture by trans lobbyists and misogyny within the CPS so thanks to all who contributed to the changes they have reluctantly introduced.

All they have to do is be honest. If they are cis passing then they need to make sure any sexual partners realize their natal sex. If they don't they are being deliberately deceptive and stop their partner being able to give informed consent.

I've gotten very lost over this (what I believe to be contradictory posts).

In one post the poster claims that they would never pursue sexual relationships, yet in another they are so passable and everything works exceptionally well post-op that no one could ever tell.

I think for all the talk about hypothetical science fiction ideas, I think so much of these life-experiences are hypothetical, because just the way everything has been expressed doesn't seem particularly passable on a text-based platform, let alone a real-life situation.

I would be extremely careful about how I use single-sex spaces knowing that my impact on other people using them will be perceived quite differently and harm could be caused in ways that my previous body would not cause.

So this is really an argument that non-passing TW should stay out of female single-sex spaces because women will be uncomfortable sharing with perceived males but if women are none the wiser they can’t be uncomfortable because what they don’t know can’t harm them.

So is it BH’s position that non-passing TW should stay out of female spaces?

I think the intent of 'sex by deception' law is reasonable in its original context - cases where someone has actively gone out of their way to deceive a specific person into believing they are a man when they are in fact a woman (and the hypothetical vice-versa situation), and where the act itself involves extremely dubious and questionable bait-and-switch behaviour involving the substitution of physical parts of anatomy. There is clearly a completely unreasonable act of deception occurring here and the actual behaviour itself is being obfuscated.

I am pleased that the CPS bothered to consider the existence of gender reassignment at all within this context. I am pleased that it has specified that trans people are not actively intending to deceive when they engage in consensual intimate behaviour with their own bodies without obfuscation.

I think the guidelines it has issued are unfit for purpose because they, in practice, place trans people who have had gender reassignment into the same category as people who are actively attempting to trick others into consenting to sexual acts that they are not consenting to.

Our bodies are real. They are part of us. They are not bait-and-switch props. Portraying us in this way demonstrates a profoundly offensive and trans-hostile interpretation of our existence and sets an extremely concerning precedent.

Women's bodies are real. They are part of us. They are not bait-and-switch props for anyone's validation.

No. I'm not saying that. I'm saying that we should be humane and considerate to people who are trying their best with what they have even if their bodies don't look the same as ours, and I'm saying that can be done while also being conscious of and careful with the effect that doing so can have on other people who will find it difficult to accept them as they are.

Yes the posts are consistently contradictory. To back up whatever point butters is trying to make. As Helle says it's like watching whiplash.

Butters passes so well that no one would know they were trans, yet they are subjected to transphobia at the drop of a hat, live a life of isolation, whilst enjoying an active social life, seek validation wherever they go, yet everyone they know thinks the idea of them as a man is ridiculous.

And have said countless times that anyone objecting to being deceived as to butters sex is transphobic.

so if a man, in a sexual situation with butters is horrified when they find out butters is male, it's because they are a transphobic bigot and best avoided.

Not having a totally normal heterosexual reaction to being deceived as to sex.

And all this because the law has just been clarified that you cannot obtain sex by deceiving people as your own sex.

As objections go, it's a pretty revealing one.

Yes. This was confirmed on another thread recently.

They want a sub group of the sub group of male people excluded but them included.

However, they will attempt to splice it and parse the language to make it appear to not be this. But it is. Under all the sparple, this is what they want - a special sub group of male people to be included, others who are not so special should be excluded.

Oh for god's sake, can you please at the very least try and interpret what I say without this constant, systematic pattern of malicious interpretation?

I think the guidelines it has issued are unfit for purpose because they, in practice, place trans people who have had gender reassignment into the same category as people who are actively attempting to trick others into consenting to sexual acts that they are not consenting to.

Only if you lie about your sex!

Men who have had genital surgery do not have a vagina. They have an inverted penis. They don't have breasts.

A lesbian, for instance, has every right to expect the same anatomy in the woman she's going to have sex with ffs.

It's quite important!!!

Glad we are in agreement on this!

Maybe you should answer clearly without all the emotionally manipulative and inconsistent language and discussion points.

Should I show the evidence of what I refer to? I am absolutely happy to.

Nice one! I'm glad that you agree women's bodies are real, i.e born that way and not surgically created at a later stage.

God, can you imagine.

Who's going to be the arbiter of which men pass??

It's just so much simpler to say 'no males in female single-sex spaces'.

It would be lovely if we could trust all males, including transwomen, to accept that female single-sex spaces are not for them.

This is precisely what I mean. Trans people don't lie about their sex. It is an ill-fitting and over-simplified brute-force metaphysical label you are forcing onto us. We change our bodies to align - as best as possible - with what we know ourselves to be. We are well aware of the complex natures of our anatomy and the inappropriateness of trying to jam us into oversimplified categories based upon a single factor that demonstrably does not accurately reflect who or what we are. This language - 'do not have a vagina' 'don't have breasts' - is bizarre reality denial and is actively offensive and exclusionary to other women who have undergone identical treatments to us in order to help their own bodies align with their own self-image.

A lesbian, for instance, has every right to expect the same anatomy in the woman she's going to have sex with ffs.

Heaven forbid that a woman with any kind of developmental disorder - that she might not even herself be aware of - ever has an intimate encounter with someone who holds your mindset.

The notion you are presenting here is that trans people are inherently corrupt and spiritually suspect. That everything they do is inherently predatory and harmful; that every crime must have been committed by a secret trans person; that there is no authenticity to their lives; that they are mired in soul-deep pathological perversion; that their bodies are inherently grotesque and shameful.

This is what you do, Datun. This is what you are doing here. You are once again displaying negative attitudes toward trans people or transness in general. There is a name for that.

a law which actively encourages discrimination against trans people

Absolute tosh. Why does people being given the facts and a chance to say 'no' offend you so much?

Am I a poor victim of discrimination because gay men don't want to have sex with me, as you seem to be saying trans people are if someone doesn't want to have sex with them on the basis of their sex?

and criminalises sexually active cis-passing trans women unless they take steps to no longer be cis-passing

No, it criminalises them if they deceive someone to obtain consent for sex, and rightfully so because that is sexual assault. This isn't hard to understand.

'Trans people don't lie about their sex'.

Well that's great. If all Transwomen are open about being biologically male, and all Transmen are open about being biologically female to any prospective partner, then they won't commit sex by deception and that's good news for everyone.

Haha! you can go ahead and rewrite my post and then complain about it, but you'll need an industrial bottle of calamine lotion for all that straw itch

A vagina is an organ that men don't possess. It leads to the uterus, it's self cleaning and elastic, it enables menstruation, conception and birth. A man can't have one.

And it's a very important piece of kit in a sexual relationship.

Something that has now been recognised in law.

it's not difficult. Transwomen can just stay within the law. Job done.

And a fake vagina is a fake cavity inserted into a pelvis.

It doesn’t react like a vagina and it is not a vagina. This is the same for surgically attached phallus.

That any person thinks that it is acceptable to not inform a sex partner of the origins of these body parts about to be used for sexual acts, ie. their surgically attached vagina/phallus, is a sure sign that the person has no care at all for the partner. That partner has essentially been reduced to a sex toy for the occasion.

Well… quite. If that was the case, why would the law be needed?

Everyone's body is real and a part of them. The existence of people with trans identities is no different to anybody's else's existence in the sense that we are all human beings with complex inner worlds and self definitions. We all exist. But the fact remains that we are all either male or female.

“I'm not saying that. I'm saying that we should be humane and considerate to people who are trying their best with what they have even if their bodies don't look the same as ours, and I'm saying that can be done while also being conscious of and careful with the effect that doing so can have on other people who will find it difficult to accept them as they are.”

In other words signalbox, be kind and allow some male people in based on their efforts to present themselves as female and the rest we can exclude.

And as for this:

“Oh for god's sake, can you please at the very least try and interpret what I say without this constant, systematic pattern of malicious interpretation?”

I think the evidence is pretty clear that I have not misrepresented the poster’s view point, I have just clearly stated it so there is no doubt.

This is what I said:

“They want a sub group of the sub group of male people excluded but them included.”

If the poster is not happy with the blunt truth, they should feel free to keep correcting any misrepresentation of the facts. I don’t see any facts misrepresented here.

Do you, butterflyhatched, want some male people excluded that are currently included?

Have you changed your mind on that over the past week?

Have you or have you not previously stated you wish to be free to continue to use the female single sex spaces as a male person? Yes or no?

Happy to be told you have changed your mind over the past week or that I misunderstood you the first time.

The term tends to be 'gender critical'......not just one word. It conveys the understanding that one cannot change sex, and that people with trans identities remain the sex they were born. That sex is in the body, in its deep chromosomal structure and in its genetic/chemical programming. Imagining one is the other sex does not make it so.

One can have empathy or identification with the other sex; but identifying as the other sex is simply a performance of 'gender'.

Datun A lesbian, for instance, has every right to expect the same anatomy in the woman she's going to have sex with ffs.

ButterflyHatched Heaven forbid that a woman with any kind of developmental disorder - that she might not even herself be aware of - ever has an intimate encounter with someone who holds your mindset.

What on earth are on you on about ButterflyHatched ?
A lesbian is a biological woman who is attracted to other biological women. It's a sexual identity, not a 'mindset'.
What have women 'with any kind of developmental disorder' got to do with it?

Don't you ever read back what you've written and realise just how illogical and unconnected a lot of it is? Like this leap from 'lesbians' to 'women with developmental disorders'... it makes no sense, and reads like an obvious swerve away from a valid point that you can't find an answer to.