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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Naomi Cunningham’s response to Prof Norrie’s post on University of Strathclyde’s blog on the SC decision

95 replies

Lolapusht · 15/05/2025 09:53

Yikes!

Gender Doesn’t Matter

This is a brilliantly written piece. Still reading it, but my goodness Naomi is incredible.

Gender doesn't matter | University of Strathclyde

https://www.strath.ac.uk/humanities/lawschool/blog/genderdoesntmatter/

OP posts:
MrsOvertonsWindow · 15/05/2025 13:41

KnottyAuty · 15/05/2025 12:28

Who encouraged this chap to write a blog post on a subject for which he was entirely unqualified and ill equipped? Getting the PCs wrong for starters undermines his whole argument... It's one thing to be out of your depth but to go into print and reveal it to everyone... ouch... Emeritus Professor possibly for reasons obvious to see. I'm embarrassed for him.

That'll be the over confidence of the mediocre man - never short of an opinion and ready to express it - no matter how often he beclowns himself.

An intelligent and incisive response from NC.

Brefugee · 15/05/2025 13:44

and just to indulge the schadenfreude a little more, i loved how she politely pointed out that his title is Professer (emeritus) 😁

TheOtherRaven · 15/05/2025 13:48

And another gem of succinct fact :

I will make this concrete, and no doubt Professor Norrie will think it unkind of me to do so. But there is a range of possible reasons why a man dressed in women’s clothes may be in the ladies’. He may be a man who genuinely believes himself to be a woman in his inner essence, and wants to pee, and feels uncomfortable using the gents’, and means no harm to anyone. That’s the least bad possibility, but even so he is betraying a disquieting contempt for women’s boundaries, and a willingness to prioritise his own comfort over the comfort and privacy of the female users of the space. But there are other possibilities. He may be a fetishist. He may be a rapist in search of a victim. He may be there to place hidden cameras to spy on women in a state of undress. He may be there to enjoy a sense of power that violating women’s boundaries gives him. The point is that we can’t tell at a glance which of these things he is: what we see is a man.

And when it's just a case of 'but you shouldn't say/notice that because 'unkind' to the man' -

I wholly agree, the only way this can be argued at all is from a standpoint of utter contempt for women and anything they may say. It is misogyny. It cares about nothing but enforcing the men's right to use women and silence them to ensure it.

Going rather well with the picture of the men in a woman's space, enjoying the fantasy of enacting violently battering a woman. For- well. The sin of being a woman. Nuff said.

RoyalCorgi · 15/05/2025 13:51

How can Professor Norrie be so stupid? It really beggars belief. I suppose his professorship is testament to the fact that even very dim men rise to senior positions while vastly more intelligent women struggle to be recognised.

CheeseNPickle3 · 15/05/2025 13:52

The one thing I agree with Professor Norrie on (if his stats are correct) is that it'd be rare to meet a transwoman with a GRC. Unfortunately, he seems to have conveniently forgotten that the number of transwoman without a GRC vastly outstrips the number that have one and that the protected characteristic of gender reassignment doesn't require one.

In his headlong rush to be kind and inclusive to trans people's feelings, he doesn't seem to have considered that transwomen and women don't actually have anything in common that isn't also shared between any human beings.

If he really can't understand why women need single sex spaces then it just means that he hasn't listened to anything women have been saying or, more likely, doesn't consider it important.

Naomi's counter arguments, on the other hand, are perfectly clear. Excellent writing.

wantmorenow · 15/05/2025 13:52

Fantastic and surgical destruction of his emotional, hysterical and hyperbolic nonsense.

Brefugee · 15/05/2025 13:59

am also smiling at the use of photographs. Because the one thing all the wailing and gnashing of teeth on the radio doesn't convey is just how big and imposing some of these people are. The idea that a tiny old lady might approach one of them to say they're in the wrong space totally falls down when you see the photos.

DiaAssolellat · 15/05/2025 14:14

I got to paragraph three and already Kenneth has misnamed two of the nine protected characteristics. This isn’t a good look for a Professor whose job must involve a degree of checking, quoting and double checking his sources for accuracy.

Brefugee · 15/05/2025 14:17

Naomi also included a reply to the "oh but people stare and make comments" without actually saying "mate THIS HAPPENS TO WOMEN ALL THE FUCKING TIME YOU KNOB". Which i would never have managed.

Supporterofwomensrights · 15/05/2025 15:28

That was extraordinary (both pieces).

Norrie, norrie, norrie [shaking my head]. That was shameful. You dared to say that For Women Scotland should be ashamed for standing up for women's rights? That's truly shocking. It was obvious that you don't have a clue.

Naomi - candidate for best human on the planet?

KnottyAuty · 15/05/2025 15:37

CheeseNPickle3 · 15/05/2025 13:52

The one thing I agree with Professor Norrie on (if his stats are correct) is that it'd be rare to meet a transwoman with a GRC. Unfortunately, he seems to have conveniently forgotten that the number of transwoman without a GRC vastly outstrips the number that have one and that the protected characteristic of gender reassignment doesn't require one.

In his headlong rush to be kind and inclusive to trans people's feelings, he doesn't seem to have considered that transwomen and women don't actually have anything in common that isn't also shared between any human beings.

If he really can't understand why women need single sex spaces then it just means that he hasn't listened to anything women have been saying or, more likely, doesn't consider it important.

Naomi's counter arguments, on the other hand, are perfectly clear. Excellent writing.

Based on the (albeit flawed) self-ID ONS figures of 262,000 trans people in England & Wales and a total population of 68.35million gives a figure of 1 in 261. So Prof Whatnot needs to sort out his maths. So that is easily one potential encounter per day (whether or not you register this) if you live in a city.

AlexandraLeaving · 15/05/2025 16:19

TrainGame · 15/05/2025 11:00

Wow. What a missive. I’m so glad people like Naomi exist!!!

THANK YOU!

The thing I found worrying was at the start:

and do not represent the position of the University of Strathclyde or Strathclyde Law School”.

When ARE businesses, universities and other establishments going to get behind women and THE LAW??

It’s like they’re too scared to say, yes, she’s right, we’ll enforce women’s rights to single use spaces. It’s like they’re still pandering to the trans community, hedging their bets, dithering, hovering on the fence.

And why would that be? Because they know the virulence of the backlash they will get. We’ve all seen what JKR has had to put up with. Nobody wants that on their doorstep so they keep appeasing…

Just when is this horror going to go away? Forever?

The thing I found worrying was at the start:
”and do not represent the position of the University of Strathclyde or Strathclyde Law School”.

It is quite common for organisations that publish blogs from a wide range of people to have that sort of disclaimer. It doesn’t mean necessarily that they DISAGREE just means that they don’t have to vet every blog piece to check that they agree with every word within it and can therefore facilitate a freer debate on things. So, in itself, I didn’t find that worrying.

However, when I clicked through from the NC piece to the Prof Norrie one, there is no disclaimer on his piece, only a comment that “further information about these two posts can be found in the introduction to Cunningham’s piece”. And it does not appear above any of the other blogs I could see. So they did not apply the disclaimer equally.

So you’re right - WHEN ARE PEOPLE GOING TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT WOMEN HAVE RIGHTS AND THAT THESE MATTER, AND ARE RECOGNISED IN LAW.

Bloody brilliant NC blog though. Would have loved to be a fly on the wall as Norrie read it…

MarieDeGournay · 15/05/2025 16:23

Supporterofwomensrights · 15/05/2025 15:28

That was extraordinary (both pieces).

Norrie, norrie, norrie [shaking my head]. That was shameful. You dared to say that For Women Scotland should be ashamed for standing up for women's rights? That's truly shocking. It was obvious that you don't have a clue.

Naomi - candidate for best human on the planet?

Naomi - candidate for best human on the planet?

Ooooh, controversial!
I'm going to channel St Patrick here: one stem, three leaves☘
Naomi, JKR and Maya, a trinity of best humansSmile

TheOtherRaven · 15/05/2025 16:31

Supporterofwomensrights · 15/05/2025 15:28

That was extraordinary (both pieces).

Norrie, norrie, norrie [shaking my head]. That was shameful. You dared to say that For Women Scotland should be ashamed for standing up for women's rights? That's truly shocking. It was obvious that you don't have a clue.

Naomi - candidate for best human on the planet?

That blew my mind too.

Shame

Women, wanting their protections in law, should feel SHAME.

Women have been raped, harassed, excluded - but resistance is SHAMEFUL.

Dear God these men are absolute bastards.

TrainGame · 15/05/2025 16:32

AlexandraLeaving · 15/05/2025 16:19

The thing I found worrying was at the start:
”and do not represent the position of the University of Strathclyde or Strathclyde Law School”.

It is quite common for organisations that publish blogs from a wide range of people to have that sort of disclaimer. It doesn’t mean necessarily that they DISAGREE just means that they don’t have to vet every blog piece to check that they agree with every word within it and can therefore facilitate a freer debate on things. So, in itself, I didn’t find that worrying.

However, when I clicked through from the NC piece to the Prof Norrie one, there is no disclaimer on his piece, only a comment that “further information about these two posts can be found in the introduction to Cunningham’s piece”. And it does not appear above any of the other blogs I could see. So they did not apply the disclaimer equally.

So you’re right - WHEN ARE PEOPLE GOING TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT WOMEN HAVE RIGHTS AND THAT THESE MATTER, AND ARE RECOGNISED IN LAW.

Bloody brilliant NC blog though. Would have loved to be a fly on the wall as Norrie read it…

Thank you for the clarification and for checking up on each post. Well I hope Naomi takes it up with them. They should put equal disclaimers on each one otherwise it does seem unfair.

Once again women are on the back foot, men pretending to be women, front and centre. 🙄

BellissimoGecko · 15/05/2025 16:40

That is a bloody brilliant article. And well done to Strathclyde University for allowing NC to reply to the astoundingly tone deaf response by Strathclyde’s own law professor!!

i wonder if he will be looking for another job any time soon? Naomi has taken his article apart. Must make very uncomfortable reading for him. He deserves it, though. 🤷🏻

Supporterofwomensrights · 15/05/2025 16:58

I would think more of Norrie if he published a reply acknowledging that he got this one wrong. I truly believe that's the only way he can even slightly redeem his repuation.

EDIT: what I mean by that last bit - at present he appears to be both stupid and immoral. If he recanted, it would act as damage limitation.

Peregrina · 15/05/2025 17:19

i wonder if he will be looking for another job any time soon? Naomi has taken his article apart

No, he's an emeritus professor, so he's already retired.

EuclidianGeometryFan · 15/05/2025 17:50

the Court has rejected the gender-identity creed: it has refused to intone “Trans women are women, trans men are men, and non binary people are valid”, preferring instead to proceed on the basis of material reality. Norrie continues: “This is a complete rejection of how most trans people conceive transgenderism: that the true definition of sex lies beyond the merely physical…”
The obvious retort to this is: “Where exactly does the true definition of sex lie, then? And what is it?” [...] if you are going to ask the law to attach consequences to something, you have to be able to define it. Airily asserting that it is “beyond the merely physical” won’t cut it. Is it about your inner essence? Or how you dress? How much you smile and giggle and tilt your head? Whether you wear make-up?

Apostasy. Heretics. Infidels.
How dare the SC reject "how most trans people conceive transgenderism: that the true definition of sex lies beyond the merely physical…”

😂😂

Thank you Naomi!

WifeOfTiresias · 15/05/2025 18:00

Wow, what a brilliant and devastating take down of Norrie’s nonsense.

Admittedly, it was like shooting fish in a barrel, but Naomi took an AK47 to him.

RayonSunrise · 15/05/2025 18:16

BOOM.

Well done, Naomi!

hholiday · 15/05/2025 20:44

VeraWangTea · 15/05/2025 13:26

Fantastic writing, wish I could be this articulate when trying to put my views across.

I am puzzled why people don’t ’get it’.

And angered at those that do and either don’t care or want to use it to their advantage.

We are so lucky in the UK there are so many bright and brilliant women who can state their case (and our rights) so eloquently and effectively. I dread to think where we’d be without them.

JanesLittleGirl · 15/05/2025 22:32

Now here is a word that I don't use every day but is perfect for NC's response: Excoriating

SinnerBoy · 15/05/2025 22:39

I agree, JanesLittleGirl!

Naomi made so many good points; where to begin? Most of them reproduced here already...

One thing which struck me was her explanation of the Supreme Court's role in clarifying this (and other legislation previously).

That they do not attempt to explain the reasoning and thought processes of individual Parliamentarians, who drafted the Bill.

No, rather, it is what is meant by the words contained within any particular Bill, which they have been tasked to examine. In other words, how your classic fare payer on the Clapham Omnibus would understand them.