Scientists at Porton Down don't believe in biological sex!

[Kucinghitam]

Article in the Times. Sorry I don't have a share token, only an archive link.

https://archive.is/5bCAD

As a scientist at Porton Down developing technology to secure Britain’s defences, Peter Wilkins never imagined he would be considered a threat because of a belief in biology.
But when he stated his gender-critical views and support for the concept of immutable sex, Wilkins was reported for his “ideology” and labelled by colleagues as transphobic, “sad and pathetic” and “a rubbish employee”.
An employment tribunal has found there was a “clear hostile animus” towards gender-critical beliefs at the top-secret Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL). It found that an intimidating atmosphere resulted in the harassment and discrimination of Wilkins, 43, who was forced to leave as a result.

What with the Nature, Cell, so many biology learned societies, (not even including "playing-at-being-science" magazines like New Scientist and SciAm) being captured, and now this, I really am beginning to believe that this ideology is a brain-eating mind virus.

Wow, would have loved to see Tribunal Tweets at that one. Particularly the Paul Kealey evidence,

I wonder how much effort was put into keeping it out of the media until afterwards. For all their work, still cowards.

I honestly want to cry. How did we get here?

Of course the fact that he’s Christian will be seized upon to prove that he’s the irrational party.

How can we ever get back from here? This morning, despite the court’s findings, I feel despair.

When do you think employers will learn? Staff networks are the bane of my life

After years and years of so many high-profile court cases, I've come to the sad conclusion that these people will never learn. Because they are, or are totally captured by, True Believers in the Righteous pseudoreligion. Each loss is like the apocalypse that didn't happen, which was merely sent to test their Righteous Faith.

Gosh, I so wish we’d been privy to this one.

That's good news but so depressing that this happened in a scientific organisation.

Paul Kealey, head of counterterrorism at Porton Down, was singled out for criticism. He told Wilkins that while staff were permitted to hold gender-critical beliefs, it was “not OK to express such views in the workplace”.

Whereas expressing the opposite view in hostile terms is completely fine! 😔 These people really cannot hear themselves, can they.

This is quite horrendous but sadly so widespread.

The scary thing is that they (captured organisations) ignore ministers as well as as the law. It's as if a coup has taken place.
I don't know what the answer is, since there are no consequences - the taxpayer pays the legal bills and damages, and nobody is sacked or even disciplined.

I wonder why this hasn't been reported until now - has there been anything on Twitter or elsewhere that I've missed? Any crowdfunder?

It's a crazy story. You keep thinking that we're past this madness and then another one pops up.

A series of internal blogs, not about actual work practices or anything, but for employees to bring their whole self to work to express their opinions which had absolutely nothing to do with their employment. What could possibly go wrong? Or to misquote Ben Cooper, how's that working out?

This seems to be a very straight forward case.

It seems to have started:

“In August 2021, when the neuroscientist Sophie Scott was awarded the Royal Society’s Michael Faraday prize, a DSTL employee wrote on the internal blog that it was “pretty disheartening” given that Scott was “well known for her non-inclusive views on trans and non-binary people”. Another wrote that it emboldened transphobes.”

“Wilkins complained to moderators that this was “deeply unfair” to Scott, who had simply applied her scientific expertise to her views. It left the implication, he warned, that anyone with gender-critical beliefs should not receive public recognition for their work.”

”His concerns were not properly acted upon. In the following months a string of blog posts demeaned people with such views. One DSTL employee wrote that explicitly stating gender-critical beliefs was “abusive”. Another describ­ed gender criticism as bigotry and one said those who supported gender-critical views led “sad pathetic little lives”.”

”After Wilkins liked a post on LinkedIn by the gender-critical charity Sex Matters, a colleague suggested that “GC beliefs were an ideology” and that the matter should be referred to security and HR. They took no further action but Wilkins said it was astonishing that he was flagged “in the same way as if I was expressing support for the provisional IRA or al-Qaeda”.”

So, a written comment about the abusive comments on an intranet blog and liking a sex matters posts on LinkedIn.

All depends on what he was doing. I believe in biological sex but I also believe in treating people with dignity and respect, if people wish to be known by a different name and be called a different pronoun it doesn’t hurt me to respect their wishes. You cannot become the opposite sex to the one you were born but you can present as the opposite gender at work, colleagues should respect this and larger work places should have policies and facilities in place eg a gender neutral toilet for them to use so nobody else is uncomfortable, for small workplaces like mine just use the disabled loo!

It doesn't hurt me to respect their wishes

You don't think that submitting to coercive control is harmful?

The employer is having to pay the employee because of constructive dismisal and nothing in the report suggests the employee behaved in the way you suggest. I think we can take it as proven that Peter Wilkins was entirely reasonable, entitled to his gender critical beliefs and was targeted in an entirely unfair way. I'm not sure why you think it's necessary to say people shouldn't be doing what he didn't do.

That seems plausible. Like Mormons or JWs continually revising their core beliefs? Their previous positions are just quietly forgotten but they still occupy the moral high ground.

The obvious objection to what you suggest is - why on earth should a workplace accept something as highly unprofessional as an employee 'presenting' as something they are not, and, as you agree, never can be, AND forcing everybody to go along with this, including the many employees who are offended by a colleague 'presenting' in this way?

But I keep my strongest objection for your last line:
for small workplaces like mine just use the disabled loo!

Disabled people campaigned for decades for accessible toilets which are reserved for their use. Disabled people trust that able-bodied people will respect their spaces, and able-bodied trans people have absolutely no right to appropriate disabled spaces just because it suits them.

Trans people using disabled loos, as you suggest they should, are showing zero respect for disabled people's hard-won rights.

Has the article missed something do you think?

While I think there are things that can be done at work, using preferred name is an easy one. I don’t believe that preferred pronouns will be something in the future that will be enforceable. Because those pronouns are based on one person’s philosophical belief about themselves and to enforce usage of them requires another person to actively comply to that belief. Ie. It is a coerced act.

It is fine that you choose to use those but I would hope you can see that others may not and that they should be completely free to not do it. It should never have been taught through policy or messaging that this group of people should have their belief prioritised above others. Yet it has.

“Trans people using disabled loos, as you suggest they should, are showing zero respect for disabled people's hard-won rights”

This is true Marie.

But it also shows how people do prioritise one group these days over others. Is it ‘kind’? I wonder.

To be fair, if I were new to this and I'd heard of cases like this, people being abused, sacked, ostracised, reported, NCHIed, etc for just liking a post that expressed as scientific and mainstream view. Or for supporting a colleague who has earned the wrath of the rainbow warriors for something completely anodyne. I'd think there must be something more to it, there has to be a background where they'd been rude or abusive. There never is though. The shit that anyone labelled GC (scarlet letters) is never warranted unless you're one of the righteous looking at them through a queered lens.

Well done Mr Wilkins. I'm so sorry you've been through this. It must have been extremely stressful and surreal. I can only hope that this time the fuckwits who persecuted you will learn and the rest of the fuckwits, who are slavering to emulate them, just...just don't.

“In August 2021, when the neuroscientist Sophie Scott was awarded the Royal Society’s Michael Faraday prize, a DSTL employee wrote on the internal blog that it was “pretty disheartening” given that Scott was “well known for her non-inclusive views on trans and non-binary people”. Another wrote that it emboldened transphobes.”

This part is both striking and sickening. If she had won an award specifically based on research on the topic of views they disagreed with, then I would expect comment and criticism. To suggest that someone should be denied an award for excellence, based on their views on an unrelated topic, really is in the realms of “she’s a witch!” or “blasphemer!”

The idea that it should be publically acceptable to say such a thing and expect no criticism is horrible. And that was only the start. For pointing out how unacceptable it was, someone ended up being hounded out of their job.

I’ve felt too often recently, that we are in an upside down universe. I hadn’t felt it for a while, but it’s almost unbelievable that this situation is still getting worse, despite all the court cases.

That said, there does appear to be a reflection of the transactivist’s new position since the Forstater judgment. “You can believe it if you like, but you can’t say anything about it.” Given that Forstater had unequivocally said something about her views (otherwise nobody would have known) it’s a bizarre and ridiculous take, but then these are people who claim men are women, so expecting any degree of logic is probably foolish on my part.

Really, Porton Down either had poor legal advice, or they thought that they could grind him down. How can any employment specialist lawyer NOT be aware of the Forstater ruling?

OK, they may have believed that the law was on their side prior to it, but certain not afterwards. Add on the other bullying and harassment cases, which have only reinforced the knowledge of the right to express sex realist views, what on EARTH were they thinking?

It's time that the bullies and management who encourage and support them get sacked, with a bad report. Wasting taxpayers' and charitable donors' money obviously doesn't faze them at all.

Paul Kealey, head of counterterrorism at Porton Down, was singled out for criticism. He told Wilkins that while staff were permitted to hold gender-critical beliefs, it was “not OK to express such views in the workplace”. The tribunal detailed how he created a “hostile and intimidatory environment” for Wilkins and encouraged staff to pick a side, including lobbying on the blog over the conversion therapy ban and to support reform of the Gender Recognition Act.

Kealey, a finalist for advocate of the year at the LGBTQ+ Defence Awards in November, “lost sight of his obligation to be impartial in line with the civil service code”.

I suppose it's too much to ask that Kealey should be disciplined by Porton Down management given his severe criticism by the judge at the Employment Tribunal.

A different neo-pronoun? Sure, that doesn't hurt anyone. But cross-sex pronouns or presenting "as" the opposite sex? No, those are harmful.

They are harmful because if you accept that female language can be appropriate for a man, or that a man can think, live or act "as" a woman, what you are really accepting is that the fundamental difference between men and women is not our bodies but in how we think.

That type of sexist and reductive belief hurts everyone, but hurts women especially.

I'm glad he won his case, from what's been said the way he was treated by his employer was manifestly unfair, I'm glad he stood up to them.

As far as his fellow employees are concerned he's right you're wrong and I'm pretty certain Michael Faraday would agree.

What worries me is the defence of this country now lies in the hands of people I would once have been willing to die defending this country from. Not any more, you're on your own now kids.