Is anyone worried about pressure now to change the Equality legislation?

[Unbeleevable]

There's a lot of wisdom in this forum - I wondered in the happy afterglow of the very clear-cut SC and EHCR pronouncements on biological sex … is there a risk that behind this, someone is pulling strings to publish strong statements hoping this will to trigger a surge of pro-trans-rights sentiment leading to a widespread acceptance the EA must change to encompass rights based on declared gender identity? And eventually a political mandate for the same?

In other words - we can’t expect the TRAs will give up. Have we won the battle but not the war?

I have long felt I have landed on the wrong side of history in my GC convictions - I can’t shake the feeling that the recent developments are too good to be true.

I would be interested to watch the public debate if this did happen.
In so many jurisdicitons, the movement to replace "sex" with "gender identity" in law has progressed by eschewing scrutiny. Trans rights activists have acknowledged this as a deliberate tactic.
If it was a fully democratic process I think it would be no bad thing for this to be hashed out in the public arena. Maybe changes to UK legislation would result, but I doubt it.

I'd say, if this did happen then let's put it to a public vote. See what the general public actually want. Despite all the 'poor marginalized trans vs. evil ugly old bigots type comments on social media, I don't believe the majority of the general public would vote in favour of having trans identified men back in women's spaces.

Wouldn't you have to make gender identity worthy of respect in a democratic society, first?

Good luck with that

I know what you're saying, I think all along the end game of extreme trans activism was to change the EA2010 because the exemptions contained within were massively inconvenient to gender ideologists. They (the "they" being mainly Stonewall) have tried doing this by stealth and without public scrutiny so far.

So I'm not sure the goal of tra extremists will have changed. However, what has changed is now they are under public scrutiny and it's notoriously difficult to get statute based laws changed. Now we have a statute based laws - the EA2010 and a precedent based ruling that the EA2010 refers to women meaning biological females. This is going to be exceptionally difficult to overturn and is probably a tra's worst nightmare.

But, they brought it on themselves.

Do you understand what marginalised means?

The blokes who were pissing in the street last week don't need any kind of special accommodations. But I would appreciate a public conversation with stealth trans men and women because I don't know what would work best for them, I have no idea what sort of numbers of people we're talking about, and they have had no public voice until now. They only operate as a sort of TRA gotcha.
My suspicion is that we are talking about such a vanishingly small numer of people that no public works programs will be needed, but it would be good to know. And I'm sure from the perspective of long transitioned, never clocked trans people things look very different. Again, I'd be interested in a conversation that centred voices other than the types who were carrying on at last week's protest.

Marginalized describes individuals or groups treated as insignificant, often excluded from mainstream society and denied opportunities, resources, or power.

Yes I do. Do you?

I don’t think there is likely to be public support to remove sex as a protected characteristic so long as VAWG is alive and kicking. Sadly, I can’t see VAWG becoming obsolete in my or my children’s lifetime.

I don’t think Labour, Conservative (or Reform) will have any appetite to change the legislation relating to the SC ruling. I think the Greens and LibDems will add it to their manifestos, for what that’s worth!

I suppose it's possible, but they don't seem to have widespread public support now. Surveys are showing decreased support for trans rights in recent years, probably because of the transactivists' demands becoming more visible. Demonstrations like those last weekend, with photos of placards threatening violence splashed across the press, don't help their cause.

I'm more worried that public places will now stop providing single-sex toilets, changing rooms etc. If single-sex toilets must now exclude men (however they identify) then calling them mixed-sex or unisex means they can allow anyone to use them. A couple of museums in the county I grew up in describe their male and female toilets as "gendered toilets", which I assume is a way of not saying they are single-sex. So even though a toilet has a female symbol on the door, it's not intended to be single-sex and hence men are allowed in.

In order for something to be legislated it would have to have a firm definition.
Given that the trans lobby cannot/are not able do this in any coherent manner, we should be ok.

The most noise is being made about public and workplace toilets and changing rooms, so that seems to be the area where new legislation and/or regulations will be needed, as it was with disabilities some time ago, to accommodate everyone safely and with dignity and privacy. Refuges, wards, rape crisis services would still need to be available on a single sex basis but none of that prevents mixed sex facilities as well.

What none of the media blowhards seem to understand is that things appeared more 'progressive' before this judgment precisely because Stonewall et al had misled so many institutions that to some, the judgment feels like a backward step. (That they are blind to the fact that removing women's rights was always regressive is a separate but related point.)

Slightly worried that some of the die-hards in the Labour Party (Stella Creasy etc) might try to go down this route, but overall, it runs so contrary to public opinion that I don’t think it will be a real issue.

What I really don’t understand is why transpeople want to pretend they are actually the opposite sex. Transwomen aren’t women, they are transwomen, and that’s an identity they should be able to be proud of. Trying to force non-consenting women into vulnerable situations with them is wrong on so many levels, and doesn’t help their standing in society. They (and their allies - and I’d be happy to be one if this is how they behaved) should be out there fighting to get the changes to society/infrastructure that they need rather than trying to steal stuff from women.

btw OP, why do you think GC is the wrong side of history?

I think there will be campaigning to change the law.

I also think it will not be changed as it would be a gift to Reform and the Tories to campaign to keep the present law.

I doubt there will be new legislation. Labour managers know this debate damages them more than it does Con / Reform and won’t want the headlines.

I am hating the current push by transactivists to immediately undermine the clarity of the current judgment. That has been their tactic throughout and it is incredibly tiresome.

But the reason they have done, and continue to do this, is that their demands are entirely unreasonable. They might manage some legal changes, if they switch to asking for something more reasonable, but it’s difficult to know what that might be.

There’s no doubt that in their overreach, they have shot themselves in the foot. Even the ECHR created problems in saying that it was bad policy to require medical or surgical intervention for access to opposite sex spaces. “Medical need” would have been a much easier argument for them to justify, even when that meant infringement of other (healthy) people’s rights.

I do wonder whether some legal challenge will be attempted through the ECHR and we might discover that the EHCR is another captured organization. Even then, I think there would be broad calls for the UK to leave as I think there are so many people who are heartily sick of all this.

It is odd though. Most people I know are sick of it, but I do still know some rational, decent people who are still pushing the “Trans rights are human rights” agenda. I think the pushback is still going to take far longer than it ought to.

Following the clarification of the law it has been made clear that this is not allowed. Any euphemism, the male/female symbol, damsel, dame, pictures of an aubergine Vs a peach etc. any indication that the toilets are separated by sex means they need to be single sex and sex in this case refers to biological sex.

They would have to make both spaces overtly mixed sex and even then they could be accused of discrimination if one toilet retains urinals and doesn't contain sanitary disposal for example as it would still be clear that one sos e is set up for men and not for women.

Absolutely. There's been a huge misrepresentation of the powerful trans lobby as "some of the most marginalised / vulnerable people in the world". While in fact they were an immensely powerful, male led lobby that managed to overturn the social contract and bully almost the whole population into agreeing with their anti social, anti safeguarding demands that have harmed so many.

The main vulnerable people in that community are now all the children and young adults who have been sucked into this age inappropriate ideology and gaslit that their developing bodies were wrong. They were and remain vulnerable and now have to face the consequences including their mangled bodies and futures.

Marginalised indeed 😡

I agree that ought to be the case but if MPs are hellbent on passing a law, they don't care about pesky details like definitions.

Don't tempt MPs into creating bad law with vague definitions.
They've done it once already with the GRA and that one's most likely due an update complete with unknown/undefined terms.

Somewhere TRAs will have to recognise that their demands conflict with sex based rights. And provide a solution that doesn't conflict to come to peace.

MPs on the other hand, I honestly have no idea what they need. They go with the wind.

it comes back to language again & again doesn’t it. I’m reading now “Starmer doesn’t even believe trans women are women” - stated with disbelief .
”Starmer doesn’t even believe seahorses are horses” 🐎 😱😳😂

I’d argue no one believes TWAW not even TW. But the mantra TWAW has been very powerful for TRAs & the compulsion to lie in support of the “most marginalised & vulnerable” has been extremely attractive to the middle classes. In complex issues with many diverse opinions people outsource their thinking. We all do this to one extent or another. TRA talking points can sound reasonable to many if you give them a glance. And then a huge % of politicians & media etc repeated the mantra over & over & so many people went with “be kind”.

look at how Alastair Campbell has done no research or investigation himself, instead fostering his own willfull ignorance & proudly displaying it publicly when he talks about this issue. It’s toe curling embarrassing but he’s so arrogant not to be bothered by this. And he has much support.

as for WHY I think about this a lot too. I keep coming back to power, misogyny & access to women & girls. This access can be as “simple” as affirmation, for AGPs it’s a turn on/feeds their fetish, or something even more nefarious.

access to women & girls is at the heart of most MVAWG.

without TWAW mantra/lie we would all be in a very different place today.

Yes we will need some definitions:
gender
trans
transgender
transition
fully transitioned
non binary

good luck with all of that.

and according to TRAs “biological sex” needs a definition too. 😂😂😂

Not until they need to rent a womb! Then wham! We know where all the biological women are at!

To change things they now need to change the entire basis of equality law.

That is a huge thing. It requires massive commitment and open discussion over years.

Notice that the SNP have now basically given up on this stuff. This is because while there were many gender fanatics in the party MOST just went along with it and had no deep commitment. As soon as they saw deep resistance from the public they either give up, or read more deeply and flip to the reality side usually while pretending they haven't changed. Instead of saying we respect women and stabbing them in the back, they now say we respect the trans people while ignoring what TAs say. Obviously we can see this for the hypocrisy it is, but lets be realistic - this is how human politics works. John Swinney is absurd - BUT as soon as the TAs lost him they were in serious serious trouble. Relying on people without principles is politically a very risky plan.

The problem on relying on consensus politics is that the type of people who go along with it ultimately go for the perceived strong side over the weak. For years the TAs were the side these type of people backed, now it is going the other way. Because in the long run it is pretty clear our side are going to win now.

This is the problem for the TAs open debate ALWAYS makes them weaker. Because they don't have much except don't listen to the bad women and the bad gays.

That is why we won 5-0.

So we are winning, but to keep winning we have to push HARDER.

We watch the politicians like a hawk as the TA side are still out there we look at the upcoming Conversion therapy bill is a potential danger area as is the Digital ID bill. TA power is still huge in the cultural/academic sector.

TA power is still huge in the cultural/academic sector.

but not in the real world where most of the population live.

I think this is a real risk... women speaking to defend the right of women to define the meaning of the word woman, to be described as women, to defend the spaces that were deemed necessary for our safety and dignity, are not heard, supported or defended by politicians, business leaders, journalists, policing authorities and in some cases, not even the courts - but it is the courts, where we have seen the battle lines defended, despite the fact that women have been compelled to lie in court and refer to their male assailants with female pronouns - so even the court system is not defending the position of women.

I think we will see more reliance on the GRC, less emphasis on the support and creation of sex segregated spaces, increased use of neutral language and further amplification of male voices in female spaces.

The behaviours we have seen in Education, Civil Service, NHS, the Police, the Judiciary and in Government have show a willingness to side step the concerns of women and centre those who speak of inclusion, progression and freedom of expression, ignoring the fact that this results in an over representation of male voices in all spaces. I do not believe that the ruling of the Supreme Court will stop this movement.

I believe we will continue to see the narrative that the Equality Act is only one part of the legal structure of our country and while single sex spaces can be justified in some cases - I think these will continue to be challenged by the voices that are amplified by journalists, MPs and people in power and that there will be insufficient support for the female perspective. Even where single sex provision is legally required (schools, hospitals) - the organisations in question proceeded to ignore or dismantle these provisions without impediment. In cases there single sex provision is not legally required, I believe that single sex provisions will fade away under the guise of giving equal opportunities for everyone, removing sex based stereotypes and inclusion.

For the most part, I am 100% supportive of giving equal opportunities for everyone, removing sex based stereotypes and inclusion but when the reality is that girls and women face continued structural and cultural barriers to equal share of power, wealth and share of voice, unless we continue to reflect, review and report on progress towards equality, it will slip backwards.