Womanhood is lived; it is not biologically given or legally bestowed. - Centre for Women's Studies response to Court ruling.

[IwantToRetire]

The Centre for Women's Studies joins other UK university centres, research groups and networks in gender/sexuality/feminist/women’s studies to issue a statement about the Supreme Court judgment on the meaning of ’sex’ in the Equality Act 2010.

The statement reaffirms our commitment to trans-inclusion, and expresses deep concern about the judgment and its effects on trans, non-binary, intersex, and all gender nonconforming people.

https://www.york.ac.uk/womens-studies/news-and-events/news/trans-inclusion/

We reject the framing in the media and in public discourse that puts women, and/or feminists, at odds with trans people. This is especially the case in relation to the inclusion of trans women in women’s spaces. Womanhood is lived; it is not biologically given or legally bestowed. The rights of trans people and the rights of cisgender women are inherently connected. As academic experts on sex and gender, we do not agree that biological sex is ‘self-explanatory.’ As feminists, we see the weaponisation of ‘women’s safety’ to vilify and exclude trans people as shameful.

From the full statement available at
https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTlPrVc6AjQSFRYgnpfggRZii7ee0LWmZUxH32cNojIExJzYUdqQLVLGbkIZwMi17UZDAijyiKB1Q9t/pub

(Can we blame Judith Butler for this word salad or is it inherently part of being an "academic expert on sex and gender")

Womanhood is lived; it is not biologically given or legally bestowed.

Please tell me how womanhood is lived???

And vice versa Please tell me how manhood is lived ???

What's the difference?
It's certainly not clothes my jeans and my timberland boots definitely don't make me a man.
And a man is certainly entitled to wear a dress or a frilly top but it doesn't make him a woman

‘Biologically given’ implies an entity which bestows this prize. The ‘given’ is redundant. Sex is randomly chosen at the point of conception. So you’re left with ‘womanhood is not biological’ which is nonsense.

Still waiting to be told what living as a woman means.

It’s all so circular and illogical. Hilarious that the centre for woman’s studies doesn’t know what it’s studying except a sort of cloudy concept of a gender role which can be opted in or out of.

Please tell me how womanhood is lived???

Well you will have to take out a student loan to join a women's studies course so that the incredibly knowledgeable academics will tell you!

It's kind of embarrassing that supposedly clever people come out with this nonsense.

But it has to be a thing of privilege that only 'posh' people could get away with.

Can you imagine boys in some of the rougher estates or less wealthy schools in this country deciding to come out and say they are trans - Yah big Jessie - would be a fairly mild starting point!

As academic experts on sex and gender, we do not agree that biological sex is ‘self-explanatory.’’

Well as an expert on being a woman with 50 years of lived experience, I concur that sex is and always will be self explanatory and unchangeable.

As feminists, we see the weaponisation of ‘women’s safety’ to vilify and exclude trans people as shameful.

As a feminist I see the prioritising of women’s safety to sometimes exclude men as necessary.

Are you suggesting that there are no working class trans people? Pretty sure there was a high profile case of one being murdered not too long ago.

As feminists, we see the weaponisation of ‘women’s safety’ to vilify and exclude trans people as shameful

I missed that bit.
Define Feminist?? What is a Feminist ¿?

Weaponisation of 'woman's safety'
Why are men so keen to get into women's spaces?
What's wrong with using the men's, much quicker, whip your skirt up, pull it out and job done.
If transwomen are frightened of other men in the men's why wouldn't women be frightened of male transwomen in the ladies.

Well yes, I’d agree that womanhood is lived. You’re born a woman, because biology, and then you live, hopefully for a long time.

Womanhood is lived; it is not biologically given or legally bestowed.

Tell that to the women of Afghanistan. Actually tell that to the men of Afghanistan.

and by god do I wish I could weaponise "women's safety". I'd do some damage.

This is hilarious!
I'm beginning to think the reason tradwives get such an outsized portion of the chattering classes' attention is stright up envy.
Maybe they could print this tretise out on pretty coloured pamphlets and hand it out with button mending kits and gold lamé purses.
This has well cheered me up, thanks experts on womanhood!

The rights of trans people and the rights of cisgender women are inherently connected.

How? And in what ways are we inherently connected? And in those ways, how are they different than how women are inherently connected to men?

Every single trans person has been birthed by a woman. Is that how we're inherently connected?

Womanhood is not bestowed. It cannot be given or taken away. It just is. As like whether you are old or young it is something unchanged by your own thoughts on the matter, how you dress, talk or act. Sure you can behave and present as more feminine (just as a teenage girl can attempt to make herself appear older) but it doesn't change biological facts.

"Our support for trans rights, and in particular for trans women’s inclusion in women’s spaces, and the rights of trans, intersex and gender-nonconforming people to access safe and inclusive healthcare and sanitary facilities, is steadfast."

You'd think that the incredibly clever academics would be able to define exactly what womanhood is, rather than saying what it isn't, and to give clear examples. Apparently, according to the word-salad statement, "cisgender-nonconforming women" are also marginalised and oppressed. So everyone is oppressed? Are they? I mean, as a cough "cisgender non-conforming woman" (I think) I have nonetheless received quite a lot of erm, reasonably safe healthcare, and stood in many queues for "sanitary facilities". But my life doesn't revolve around healthcare and sanitary facilities. They're very useful at times but I don't continually worry about getting them. Does that mean I am not properly living in womanhood?

Clearly I am too dim to understand what they're on about.

How are these idiots academics? And "experts"? They need to stop talking on behalf of WOMEN. They have no right to make stupid statements like this, and make it out as if majority of women are of their belief.

I find it pretty stupid. But -

'Can you imagine boys in some of the rougher estates or less wealthy schools in this country deciding to come out and say they are trans - Yah big Jessie - would be a fairly mild starting point!'

This is pretty ludicrous too, and sad. The homophobic bullying of boys who don't 'live boyhood' the way that a homophobic society thinks they should is something I as a feminist care about a lot. Brianna Ghey was stabbed in a park by two horrific teenagers who had decided to murder a boy, and ended up picking Brianna because she was a boy who'd transitioned and socially vulnerable. It sounds like you almost think that boys who don't conform should be in danger.

Why do these organisations feel the need to ‘issue.a statement’ as if the court of going to read it and say hang on a minute, we’d better reconsider, York university doesn’t like our interpretation of the law! The only people it makes sense to make a statement are the people involved in the case and the government.

As academic experts on sex and gender, we do not agree that biological sex is ‘self-explanatory.’ As feminists, we see the weaponisation of ‘women’s safety’ to vilify and exclude trans people as shameful.

As a non-academic non-expert in detecting bullshit, even I could smell it from a mile off on this nonsense. As a feminist, I see the belittling inverted commas around ‘women’s safety’ (because we really are talking about real threats to real women’s safety) as shameful.

Also, anyone who prioritises men’s wishes above women’s needs is, by definition, not a feminist.

The ex chair of my professional association (male) was all over LinkedIn demanding a statement of support for trans and nonbinary people from the new chair of the association (female, woman of colour). They produced one, just not in the timescale he thought they should. I hope she gave him a call and asked him to think twice about grandstanding in a professional setting.

I also wish of course that the statement had said what I wished it had, that my profession's involvement with trans healthcare was based on a sexist conception of being female and that she would be lobbying the government to remove this type of care from NHS provision, but no professional association is going to torpedo the jobs of some of its members in that way. But if he wants political engagement he should know the risk doesn't go all one way.

I think they still don’t actually believe this. But they’ve staked their careers on this belief, they’ve got trans people tapping them for sympathy, their ‘allies’ and at this point it would be too much to make the u turn,

Its cowardice rather than malevolence or stupidity imo

Cowardice is the thing I disrespect the most, I respect anyone who actually speaks truth, even when it’s unpalatable. They are total 💯 cowards.

How can they get away with this under the guise of being a renowned, intelligent, women focused group especially after the ruling. Be kind has been proven to have been a concoction of magical stupidity. Now that more and more are seeing the naked emperor and they are still deluded, what can we do?

They all should be sacked. We are paying for them and all that drivel.

Has anything more sexist and delusional ever been said.

I did a history degree with a side of women's studies in the 1990s. I was aware of Judith butler because I got into postmodernism and I went on to start work on a PhD which was around prostitution in the 19th century. Thankfully I was far more interested in Josephine Butler, who lived in the period I was studying and I didn't get captured. I was also less likely to because as a teenager I'd worked in a chemist near a psychiatric unit that specialised in transexual patients - as they were then known - and saw in person that this was far from straightforward. There was a lot to consider.

Blah, sorry, the tangent got a bit long. The fact is that feminism was different 30 years ago and the push toward everything these people see as canon for want of a better word, isn't. From the introduction of unnecessary language, cis, to unquestioning "inclusivity" is new and will change again. The rest of it is a bollocks. Stfu Judith, have a read of Josephine, far from perfect but a strong woman who cared about the dignity of the women around her.

Nobody is that stupid. So they must have been paid to say this or something?
This drive to eliminate women's rights in the west is funded by someone.

I knew something woke me up this morning; it was the sound of women everywhere banging their heads against the wall in response to this absolute bullshit.