Hampstead Heath Ladies Pond - considering the SC judgement

[QuetzalTerfLus]

Apparently the CoLC is considering its position

https://www.hamhigh.co.uk/news/25109343.equality-ruling-affect-hampstead-heath-swimming-pond/

@StuckUpPrincess

The women's pond is only 37% of the size of the men's pond.

The men's pond is 18,290 square metres. The ladies pond is 6,845 square metres. The mixed pond is the smallest at 4,270sqm.

Source: https://wildopenwater.com/swimspot/hampstead-heath-mixed-pond-greater-london-england-united-kingdom

You can see them on the map here: mixed is 8, ladies is 14 and mens is 17. https://www.hampsteadheath.net/getting-here-around

What is a genuine transwoman please?

Presumably not the chap mentioned up thread with his cock and one ball carelessly draped outside of his bikini bottoms...

In the Telegraph this morning: https://x.com/LilyLilyMaynard/status/1919518160073453638?t=31ynj8fR6wN74za2GgS4Pw&s=08

As pointed out earlier the staff seemed to have no trouble distinguishing between men and women yesterday but struggle at the other pool. It’s blatant sexism and misogyny.

You are using the services provided by the City of London. I think that should be enough reason to complain.

Disappointing opinion piece today in the Observer by novelist Esther Freud. Includes an emotional appeal at the end about the suicide of a trans-identifying male teen - terribly sad but has no obvious relation to women wanting a single sex space to swim.

I'm fed up of the implication that women must affirm TIMs or else we are responsible for suicides. What about holding extremist trans activists to account instead, for convincing young people that the world is out to get them, and the only solution to their unhappiness is to transition?

https://observer.co.uk/news/opinion-and-ideas/article/opinion-im-thrilled-our-pond-will-remain-open-to-all

No. If single sex facilities are provided they must be single sex, otherwise they are mixed sex. The SC said there was no need to justify excluding men from women's single sex spaces, and TWs are men - i.e. they are not biological females, and biology is what the EA2010 is built on here.

Quite right, Grammarnut. The Supreme Court ruling was very clear (as indeed is the Equality Act itself). I'd recommend TeiTetua and others who think there is room for dispute to read the judgement.

As for Esther Freud, she seems to be yet another posh white woman who thinks she has the right to lecture other, less privileged, women to "be kind". I really think that kind of woman is simply used to having her way, and hasn't understood that the law is categorical. Does she understand that she is encouraging people to break the law? Or does she think perhaps the law doesn't apply to people she likes?

Not all women are/want to be ladies but only women can be ladies.

It's not open to all though, is it? It used to be open to local Orthodox Jewish women, who used it up until 2019 and no longer can. The Jewish Chronicle reported a planned lawsuit at the time, but I can't find any updates.

(I met up with tra friend on Saturday and we discussed this. They believe that trans inclusion should be mandatory everywhere, with only rare exceptions: they grudgingly conceded the religious exception on the grounds that they are bigoted people who don't know better and are yet to be educated out of it. Sickening.)

I think they will find they are breaking the law. They can be challenged by men who are excluded a) because they are not TW, b) by transwomen without a GRC (possibly) and c) by women who can claim indirect discrimination i.e. it's not a sex-segregated space when it purports to be so.

The Man Friday experiment suggests men would not tolerate transmen.

Yes, every woman deserves respect so setting up groups which include men in what are supposed to be women's spaces excludes some women. That is not just. And I don't know where you get better moral standards from - the point being made is that some religious groups do not accept mixed sex groups where members may be in a state of undress - nothing to do with moral standards but is about modesty and dignity.

I was brought up to refer to every woman as a lady (and still do, to everyone's amusement) whilst men had to be sorted into men and gentlemen according to appearance (male, female and woman were all impolite when applied to humans). No idea why. There must be a sociology thesis in it.

The protest is in the Daily Mail today too: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14679981/women-rights-campaigners-storm-male-pond-Hampstead.html?ito=native_share_article-top

TBF I think what people generally mean when they bring in faith is that, while for some women they simply don't want to share with men (which is my own position, and a position I completely support in any other woman), for women of some faiths they just cannot share with men, regardless of whether, all other things being equal, they would be okay with it. They're doubly disadvantaged, is perhaps what I'm trying to say.

Maybe. Maybe not on this occasion.
Turning up in costume after announcements on social media might have prepped them 🤣

The real test would be for a group of women to go weekly and “covertly” to see what complaints arose.

Superb effort yesterday to all involved! Thank you xx

I'm loving that the American TRAs don't realise the irony in slating these women for wanting segregation when it's them being kept out of the male pool.

(They seem to think these women are protesting to keep men out rather than the other way round)

That might be legal - but 'female' means biological so they might have to say it was a society of trans identified men. That then might be indirect discrimination against men who are not trans-identified. So I think 'migh't tranlates to a doubtful 'may'.

I saw they had a recruitment advert for a legal specialist in “enforcement” the other day so maybe they are planning to show more teeth in future? Hope so.

Religionists have arbitrary self-imposed rules, and to deal with that we a) let them get on with it, provided they don't hurt anyone or break the law, and b) refrain from engineering situations in which their rules will put them at egregious disadvantage (=reasonable accommodation - eg don't force the Muslim employee to work on the bacon counter). We don't adopt their arbitrary rules for the whole of society.

Transgenderism should be treated likewise.

I can't quite work out if you're arguing with me or not! But yes, I agree.

Regarding Jewish and Muslim women: I was swimming in Kenwood Ladies Pond some years back and struck up a conversation with an older lady, who said her rabbi had told her she could not swim in the pond if men were present.

I am not religious, but as a theoretical religious Christian I could swim in the pool even with men in it. Religious Jewish and Muslim women could not. There are many Jewish and Muslim women in this area of London (Hampstead, Camden, Haringey).

TW can swim in the mixed or the men’s. Women should not be excluded.

Expanding on, not disagreeing. Still enraged that tra friend thinks that Jewish women who don't want transwomen in their space are uneducated bigots. It's so ... illogical.