Supreme court ruling

[mids2019]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/16/uk-supreme-court-rule-legal-definition-woman

How do we think this is going to pan out? My feeling reading the piece is that the court is going to side with GC women.....hope so but we will see.

David Tennant's a smug, wee luvvy arsehole.

Well I suppose that is true in a way. There were 4 intervenors in the case and none were trans organisations. I suppose that was possibly because the entire scottish government was on the trans side - which might not seem like much but was a fairly large obstacle to the 3 women who run FWS

It's honestly the biggest own-goal in history.

I'm sure if this ideology hadn't been pushed and pushed to the Nth degree, that trans people quietly going about their own lives would still be doing so.

It was the utter refusal to be seen as anything less than actual women, and the forced language/speech, and the invasion of sports, and many other things, that initiated a push back.
If they had been content to accept that they could not change reality, then they would not be in this position.
You can only scream so many times that the Emperor is not naked, before people wake up and see that he is very much naked indeed.

Biggest fail in history, and they did it to themselves.

I can’t believe some people are NOW calling for third spaces when if they’d just accepted them years ago, instead of calling us evil apartheid loving nazis, so much heartache could have been saved for so many women. The cheek of it.

I don't think that is going to meet the single sex exemptions though is it? The whole point is that mixed sex or ungendered is not acceptable for specific situations like toilets, changing rooms, sports, hospital wards etc as mentioned in the ruling. So there will have to be female changing rooms etc and then there might be unisex. It will be for the men or transwomen to then exert their rights to whatever spaces might meet their needs independent of the women

Oh, I must be mistaken that every time a Labour representative was asked specifically about SSS in the run up to the GE, they responded by talking about 'safe spaces' which were clearly not the same thing at all.

Jesus wept, they must think we're idiotic / amnesiacs to fall for that bullshit.

Good work by the SC. Future generations will look back on the last 15 years of trans rights and arguments as being a case of mass delusion. It is amazing that this nonsense captured major political parties and even a government.

I suppose there’s always the possibility of an appeal to the ECtHR. But I doubt that will happen.

Haven't seen anything Mrs O, but I should think they'll be taking a look at their policies because if woman means biological woman, they will have to ensure a distinction is made (my guess)

It will allow law suits against orgs which insist on allowing men into women's spaces. I wonder what the FA is going to do now for example.

Just a reminder of how important single sex spaces are: women and girls are at 9 times more risk of sexual assault in mixed sex spaces.

From the Independant:
"The vast majority of reported sexual assaults at public swimming pools in the UK take place in unisex changing rooms, new statistics reveal.
The data, obtained through a Freedom of Information request by the Sunday Times, suggests that unisex changing rooms are more dangerous for women and girls than single-sex facilities.
Just under 90 per cent of complaints regarding changing room sexual assaults, voyeurism and harassment are about incidents in unisex facilities."

Unisex changing rooms put women at danger of sexual assault, data reveals | The Independent | The Independent

That blithering numpty Robin Moira White is currently on PM. No great surprise there. Evan Davies is a TRA to the end of his fingertips. At least he had Michael Foran on first.

Yes he said that the ruling doesn’t stop trans women from going into women’s toilets. He is wrong.

I don't think you're right. The EA 2010 is about discrimination. Transpeople aren't being discriminated against by being told to use the facilities by sex, as they aren't being singled out for being trans. Everyone has to use the facilities of their sex. 'Acquired gender' is not relevant in relation to SSS.

And there is no 'new' interpretation of the EA2010, today's judgment is the law as it's always been. Stonewall law no longer applies.

I understand the point that you're making, but that's why the public debate about this needs to be honest about the fact that the impact of people using spaces for the opposite sex isn't equal both ways.

Men represent a threat to women and women do not really represent a threat to men.

So if a passing trans man is in a women's space, the women in that space will perceive the threat to be the same as if an actual man were in there. And the perceived threat they experience is harmful in itself because of the distress it causes, even if there is no actual threat.

If you flip it round, a passing trans woman in a men's space might make the men in that space feel uncomfortable, but they are not going to feel that their physical safety may be at risk. They represent much more of a risk to the trans woman than the trans woman represents to them.

Feeling discomfort is not the same as feeling unsafe. (And I mean actually unsafe in the usual sense of the word, not claiming to feel "unsafe" because someone does not share your views.)

Of course he said it would put transwomen at greater risk of violence. As stated time without number here, let's not worry at all about the greater risk of violence and voyeurism for women and children if any man who says 'I'm a woman' is allowed into female changing rooms, toilets, refuges, prisons, you name it.

So glad you said finger tips.

He (White) thinks this might go to the European Court of Human Rights. I wonder if that's true?

Some of the GC comments on social media regarding this seem to think this ruling is declaring that all transwomen, even with a GRC, are now to be considered male in law. I'm not sure whether that's true - the ruling today was specifically about the definition of sex in the Equality Act. Are the protections that still remain in the Equality Act for trans people enough to keep this from going to the ECHR?

Agree with you - but the answer can only be that society deals with that specific issue - otherwise you leave it wide open for transwomen to enter women's spaces - it is going to be difficult to work through...

I think that in the hierarchy of needs, the need not to feel uncomfortable ranks lower than the need to actually be safe.

Yes, but the protections for trans people are in Line with their sex. Basically, you can’t treat a transwomen any differently to any other man. You don’t have to treat them as women. As long as they’re no worse off than anyone else of their sex, then that is completely lawful.

Helen Webberley was just on the really. God she’s dangerous and frankly bonkers crazy.

I think we're agreeing, they want single sex loos. Albeit for different reasons. And sex as defined by the supreme court for us as well as them. Sure awkwardness comes second, but they are supportive.

I think that we should put to bed the argument that possible threats against transwomen means they need facilities other than male ones...

History shows us that large sections of society treat badly all sorts of sections:

• trans
• gay
• ginger hair
• freckles
• spectacle wearing
• weaker people
• disabled people
• deformed people
• different skin colours
• etc.

None of that means that the answer is to provide separate facilities / allow them to use the opposite sex's facilities - the answer is to deal with the underlying issue....

At 17.13 TW barrister Robin White commenting. Says it is not OK for those without GRCs to have to use the gents loos and it will be worse for butch lesbians being chased out of the ladies.

My (admittedly quite uneducated) take on this is that some people will always behave in a way that best suits them, rather than the way required by law, and yes, they will frequently "get away with it". So on a practical level, someone who convincingly passes as the opposite sex will be able to continue to use opposite sex facilities if they choose to do so. I can't think how that could be prevented, without resorting to the the infamous 'genital inspections' which is clearly unacceptable to everyone.

But this ruling means that the moment a trans identifying man makes a woman feel uncomfortable in a single sex space, the woman can now (in theory - we'll see what it means in practice) quite rightly call this out and seek to have that individual removed from that space without being gaslit, accused of bigotry, or finding themselves barred from their own space. I think that is a momentous change.