A worrying thought about the SC judgment

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Is anyone else concerned that what may happen now, in reality, is a big increase in ‘gender neutral’ facilities as organisations realise they don’t actually have capacity for a third space, at least in the short term?

And we all know from what we’ve seen in theatres, etc, that that will end up with effectively one ‘Men’s/with urinals’ and one ‘Gender Neutral’.

It was this story in today’s Times that made me think about it. I’m especially worried about gym changing rooms etc. Would we have the right to challenge if this does happen?

story:

Equalities watchdog inundated with questions on trans women ruling

https://www.thetimes.com/article/557269e6-2902-4b30-b873-4fac87ba6253?shareToken=131768232050262c20823acf6fe87c92

I understand your concern and perhaps this is a real worry in dyed in the wool rainbow organisations?

But given that there is no legal requirement to provide third spaces I'd imagine that the vast majority of organisations will take the default cheapest option of not providing them?

Yes I think decisions will be based on customer base, and also any external pressure they get (in either direction). Keeping their toilets as is, with men’s and women’s, and just saying “sorry, Supreme Court decision about who uses what, not down to us” if queried would probably be the cheapest & easiest thing for most places to do.

If there's a men's but not a women's then that's sex discrimination.

The ruling has made it clear that women means biological women so they can't have something labelled women that also includes male people.

I guess gyms could make all their facilites gender neutral and see how popular that is.

I am worried about this too. On World at One BBC R4 yesterday Sarah Montague asked a chap commenting on the impact of the ruling on the NHS whether the answer was to do away with wards organised on sex altogether and just use gender as the determinant for everything.

I actually couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The fact that she was horrified that a TIM might be accommodated with other males, but seemed unconcerned about him being accommodated with females, was staggering.

I was thinking that might happen too as most places will not want to police who is and isn't trans, nor risk being sued if they get it wrong. Easier to just make facilities gender neutral.

I heard that too. It was a very telling reframing. All concern for the Trans woman that might have to share with men but no concerns at all about the women that have to do so and then a suggestion that the NHS could do away with single sex wards altogether. Strange that’s female journalist didn’t even try to look at the argument from a female perspective at all

Yes, I heard that, couldn't believe my ears. Changing language to circumvent the law. Shame on her and the BBC. She really pushed it.

What I find most troubling is that she’s clearly an intelligent woman with enough life experience to know how the world works and have experienced sexism, but absolutely no insight or capacity to think critically about what she’s saying / believing. It’s so depressing. I was yelling at the radio!

I also wonder about the consequences. What happens if men persistently refuse to acknowledge single sex spaces apply to them and continue to use them?

You are wishful thinking.

If organisations do this they will lose a lot of their customer base.
Most women don't want to share facilities with men, and decent men don't want to impose themselves on women.

in certain areas anway the law says that separate mens and womens should be provided (sex based now clarified), and if not then full height doors etc which in reality takes up more space.

By the way, by saying it has to be 'policed' are you saying that trans people would willingly and knowingly break the law? For hundreds of years sex separated spaces has worked, it really isn't that difficult.

Added: Oh and I saw a lawyer on another thread explaining why it is up to the person to prove they should be allowed, not the organisation, who have the right to refuse entry.

I'm also curious to know what the likes of M&S will do about their changing rooms, especially in the women's underwear/bra-fitting area. I fell out with them years ago over this when all this nonsense started. Am I right in thinking it just says Changing Rooms, not Men's and Women's Changing Rooms?

It’s worth reading the judgement:

https://supremecourt.uk/cases/judgments/uksc-2024-0042

It makes it clear (as did the Equality Act) that there are lots of situations in which people can reasonably expect single-sex facilities or insist on single-sex carers, for example.

I don't think we will see a rush to change everything gender neutral, in fact I think we will see the opposite. Given that the vast majority of public spaces have male, female, disabled and baby change, the cheapest, quickest, easiest and legal option is single sex toilets and if you can't cope with the toilet appropriate to your sex because you've got gender feelings, you can use the fully enclosed, private, mixed sex disabled toilet.

I appreciate that this isn't fair on disabled people who don't have decent provision as it is. But given that we're told that barely anyone is trans to begin with, surely it won't cause that much of a problem if they are using the disabled facilities. After all, they only want to pee, right?

I live v close to a flagship store and intend to find out in the next few days

They might do this but I am hoping most places will just say ‘ not my fault gov, it’s the law that says it men’s and women’s innit’

The whole gender bollocks thing has been shown to be far more problematic and far less popular than it was when organizations started changing provision. So I am hoping they will just revert back to how things used to be.

I note that many female gym users are now moving towards a preference for female only sessions.......and are sick of being perved on by men in mixed sex sessions.

Another thought, they’d really have to remove urinalysis to have men’s as gender neutral which would be expensive which venues won’t want to, or men will have to use cubicles which men won’t want to I should imagine. I think venues will be more bothered by upsetting men than they were women.

So time for men to ‘be kind and inclusive’ to TW in their spaces.

Legally they will have to make sure there is space for trans people as they aren’t allowed to discriminate so either they will need to have a third space or they will have to make existing spaces neutral.

Or trans ppl can use spaces for their biological sex

If companies and council/government buildings do not provide single sex facilities, whether that is a toilet or a changing room, then women in particular may have to bring cases claiming direct discrimination, as they can no longer take part in public life.

I can't see those cases failing now and it may only take one or two high profile ones to make everyone else fall into line.

(And of course in the case of employers the workplace regulations are crystal clear.)

This is indeed a risk and thus it is why we need to flesh out the argument that NOT invoking the SS exemption is in itself sex discrimination because it inevitably exposes women to more detriment - safety in particular - than men.

There are already spaces that people with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment can use.

They use the toilet appropriate to their sex, as based on that characteristic they have the same rights as everyone else.

Men who are now wailing that they can't go out in public if they can't use female toilets are saying the quiet part out loud.

The vast majority of the general public still see Trans as vulnerable. They imagine confused effeminate man in a dress who has had surgery. We urgently need to get the message out on this.

I was amazed at that. Apart from anything else, what she was suggesting would be illegal.

A thought - it would be possible to make current provision mixed sex, but if they do this simply by changing the notice on the door, and relabelling them "with" and "without urinals", would it be possible to make a case for indirect sex discrimination? Some would be making full provision for one sex while others wouldn't. You could argue that while nominally they were mixed sex, in reality the previous sexed based purposing of the faciltiies was continuing.