Netherlands drops self ID

[ArabellaScott]

https://cne.news/article/4789-dutch-government-withdraws-transgender-bill-after-pressure

Bill withdrawn.

Don't get too excited. I'm not in favour of self id, but this is a desperate measure by a very right wing government about to fall. They've also just criminalised being undocumented and helping anyone undocumented. That means the next government is likely to undo everything.

I was just about to say something similar. Current caretaker government in the Netherlands is pretty far right, so it doesn't necessarily reflect broader changing sentiment on this topic in the Netherlands, much as it would be nice to think it did.

Oh that's OK then. This is merely an extreme illegitimate right wing caretaker government trying to fuck over the legitimate needs of gender-questioning people.

Or it could be the legislature reflecting the considered view of the body politic.

Oh dear, how complicated.

Whatever the reason for the role back, the result is the same. If a future government wants to reintroduce this bill it will have to go through the whole process of debate and scrutiny. People are so much more switched on to this issue than they were even a few months ago. I think there would be a much more effective opposition were they to reintroduce this bill at a later point.

Are you Dutch? Do you speak Dutch? Just like you get cross about American politics being applied wholesale to the UK, the same goes for applying your politics to nl. Different political situation. Don't ridicule posters that point that out, or go and join Orban if it's actually that you like that sort of politics. I can promise you they're not good for women

Likely the other way, because it would be virtue signaling against a widely reviled government, and honestly, most people don't care here. I'm fully GC, but you really can't apply UK politics and culture to NL, and trying to make you look a bit ignorant

I don't think the subject is yet on the radar in the Netherlands in any way, shape or form compared to the UK or US.

That said, I'm not convinced that it will stay off the radar if it has to go through due process again, despite that.

Why? Because it is such a political football elsewhere so it does have the potential to be a wedge subject. If there's ground to be made with it, then the subject could flair up.

I've had conversations with my Dutch friend on it, and it's been interesting how different the landscape is.

I did notice during my last trip to the Netherlands earlier this year that there were many more floor to ceiling cubicles, with no gaps in toilets than I'm used to in the UK. So that will have something of an impact on the debate too. I found them intimidating and oppressive tbh. You don't know how many people are there - it felt isolating. I nearly started a thread on MN about it but didn't find time.

We will see.

But surely buying time for people to become aware of the issue can only be a good thing?

Totally agree, and apt use of Gene Wilder!

Our own government, much as they're fucking up a lot of other stuff, are the only ones in the world I feel OK with about this stuff.

The penny is dropping, and it's driven by a realisation about fairness, not populism. They're not trying to make political capital out of it like the reform council in Kent who can't organise a meeting but have somehow rid the school libraries of trans promoting books (which weren't there).

I just hope they carry on as they are. Scrapping the GRC won't be necessary if it doesn't actually buy people the full range of opposite-sex access. People just won't bother with it.

Interesting that having a paedophile representing the country is all fine and dandy but self ID is a step too far

The questioning, and delaying for further discussion, of this self-id legislation had begun when the previous gov’t was in power. The initial legislation for changing your sex had gone through without much inspection. There wasn’t really discussion about the effects on women and children. It was just regarded as an extension of other rights, like sexuality. It was not recognised how it would adversely affect the rights of others. It may have been assumed that the desires of men would be equally prioritised, and trump everyone else with the self-id proposal this time too.

However, this time around there was much information sent to the members of their Commons (Second Chamber/Tweede Kamer) which illustrated the problems associated with this ideology. Much more sunlight as to what it really was all about and cause for pushback. The Cass Review had helpfully been done, and women’s groups such as ‘Voorzij’ who made sure that information was circulated to the Dutch MPs.

Some of the proponents of this ideology were there saying ‘This is only an issue of administration’. It was kind of like ‘we have it now, so why care if it is even easier for men, so inclined, to do what they want’. There was even a ‘Transwoman’ MP (a daddy of a son) who of course advocated for making it even easier for men to identify as women. They couldn’t believe anyone would give a shiny sh&t about women and children. It’s just like same sex attraction and freedom thereof, isn’t it? But attention was brought to how it wasn’t, and the harmful effects on impressionable and vulnerable youngsters, and the abuses on the rights of women. Women being locked up with men in prison, irreparable harm to youngsters, and such were brought up.

That was all before this gov’t came to power. Can people be unhappy they’ve done the decent thing and shelved this proposal?

I don't know any Dutch people who support self-ID.
DS' class mates definitely don't and find the whole idea 'onzin' - nonsense.
But I'll keep stickering anyway.

Of course, that doesn’t neutralise the effects of the initial legislation. Sex protection includes gender identity and gender expression. So the initial legislation did enough damage to undermine the rights of women and children in itself.

The below extract is from a tweet by ‘Mr Menno’: https://nitter.poast.org/MrMennoTweets .

“Plans to make it possible to change legal sex on a ‘Self-ID’ basis have finally been ditched by the Dutch government The first parliamentary debate was held September 2022. The follow-up debate was postponed multiple times, then kicked into the long grass after the then-coalition government collapsed Following a general election in Nov 2022 a new coalition government took the reigns in July 2023, but despite multiple votes to scrap the proposed amendment no action was taken It has now finally been ditched However… the current coalition government collapsed a few weeks ago so is now a caretaker government only and there’ll be another general election in the autumn so a new left-wing gov could easily introduce it again 🙄 Back in 1985 the Netherlands was one of the first European countries to make it possible to change your legal sex marker, following Sweden in 1972 and Germany in 1980. At the time you had to have a diagnosis and sterilising surgery. In 2014 the Dutch constitution was amended to remove the surgery requirement. The new proposed amendment would have removed the diagnosis requirement and made it all about ‘Self ID’ While its good news that it’s finally been scrapped, the Dutch law is still a mess - since 2019 our anti-discrimination law treats ‘gender identity’ / ‘gender expression’ / ‘sex characteristic’ as falling under the protected characteristic of sex, so you have no legal leg to stand on to keep men out of women-only spaces when they have changed their legal sex marker to ‘F’ - the Dutch law considers these men to be as much of a woman as actual women 🤡 Our anti-discrimination law urgently needs to be reformed so that sex once again means sex”

I hate to say it but if the paedophile in question was a Moroccan immigrant then van Wilders and large sections of the Dutch politics would be up in arms. Because the paedophile in question was blonde haired, blue eyed and not a Muslim old Gerrty made not a peep. In fact the only Dutch children's charity to raise any objection happened to be one founded by someone from a refugee background (and i emailed some of the others).
(It goes without saying that Moroccan paedophiles are also not ok. None of them should be protected)
But the dead silence from the Wilders of this world when the perpetrator is white Dutch should tell people they don't really care about women or girls.

Thank goodness. Feminists are getting the home runs everywhere! It will take time, but this dangerous, toxic, vicious misogynistic ideology is dying a thousand deaths.