I wonder what the WI are going to announce on Woman's Hour in the next few minutes?

[nauticant]

Apparently it will be a matter of the greatest seriousness and sorrow.

A substantial proportion of the population rejects your narrow and dogmatic opinions about what "a woman" is.
Furthermore, the law as
established by parliament recognises trans women with a GRC as women.

That missed the intended quote for some reason.

Hopefully there will be lots of applications from males who don't identify as women. This will help the WI to understand if their new group is legal or not.

Even though IANAL, I can give them some help here:

1. Does your WI Sisterhood group allow males who identify as women?

If yes, go to question 2. If no, go to question 2.

2. Does your WI Sisterhood group also allow males who don't identify as women?

If yes, congratulations 🎉 You have created a legally compliant mixed-sex group with a bizarre name and an unclear purpose (unless its purpose is to promote and enjoy stereotypes that women apparently should follow to "live as a woman", yet the male and female** members of your group are not expected to identify as women to do so).

If no, sad times 😞 You have broken the law ⚖️

**I am female, yet do not identify as a woman. I don't identify as nearly 50. Yet, curiously, I would still be both of these things, even if I identified as a 10 year old male. Luckily for my sanity, and for the sake of everyone's around me, I don't actually identify as anything.

But far more disagree with you. Which surely can't be any kind of surprise to you?

You seem to be suggesting that a democratic civil society is best protected by letting organizations discriminate against people for whatever reason they wish. But our history has shown us that actually we need to regulate the ways in which discrimination is permissible when it involves characteristics that are associated with oppression.

I think the issue is that people think a women's organization can be an inclusive organization. It can't. It's very premise is about excluding a group of people (who, as a class, have and do oppress women).

The proportion of the population that thinks men can be women is wrong. So what? A legal fiction doesn't change that fact (no woman needs to claim she's "legally" female), and the GRC was only ever a contract with the government, not the population. Good for marriage and pensions. Doesn't grant a TW entry to female spaces.

Besides, I'd rather be narrow minded and dogmatic than a liar or a blithering idiot.

Furthermore, the law as established by parliament recognises trans women with a GRC as women.

No it doesn't.

That is literally what the case before the Supreme Court was about.

Maybe so but the law also recognises the right for people to organise based on the protected characteristic of biological sex as well and, as I'm sure you're aware, the vast majority of TIM dont have GRC and indeed, keep their male penises. So these TIM would still be legally excluded, even from anywhere that was organising based on the protected characteristic of gender reassignment. It would also exclude the professional transvestite like olf Pips Bunce and Eddie Izzard who reserve the right to identify as men when it suits.

Has anyone proved black is white yet ?

Watch out for zebra crossings.

No it literally was not

No it literally was not

Hmm.

What do you understand the SC ruling to have been about?

Yes, it was.

From the Press Summary

https://supremecourt.uk/uploads/uksc_2024_0042_press_summary_8a42145662.pdf

"Following FWS1, the Scottish Ministers issued new statutory guidance which is under challenge in this appeal. The new statutory guidance states that, under the ASP 2018, the definition of a “woman” is the same as that in the EA 2010. Section 212 of the EA 2010 defines “woman” as “a female of any age.” The new statutory guidance also states that a person with a Gender Recognition Certificate (“GRC”) recognising their gender as female is considered a woman for the purposes of the ASP 2018.

A GRC is a document that allows trans people to change their gender legally. The Gender
Recognition Act 2004 (“GRA 2004”) established that an adult can receive a GRC if they
provide evidence that they have or have had gender dysphoria, have lived as their acquired
gender for two years and intend to continue to do so until death.

In 2022, the Appellant challenged the lawfulness of the new statutory guidance. The Appellant
submits that the definition of a “woman” under the EA 2010 refers to biological sex, meaning
that a trans woman with a GRC (a biological male with a GRC in the female gender) is not
considered a woman under the EA 2010, and consequently the ASP 2018. The Respondent
submits that the definition of a “woman” under the EA 2010 refers to “certificated sex”,
meaning that it includes trans women with a GRC. On 13 December 2022, the Outer House
dismissed the Appellant’s petition. The Appellant appealed to the Inner House. On 1 November
2023, the Inner House dismissed the Appellant’s appeal. The Appellant now appeals to the
Supreme Court.

Judgment
The Supreme Court unanimously allows the appeal. It holds that the terms “man”, “woman”
and “sex” in the EA 2010 refer to biological sex. Lord Hodge, Lady Rose and Lady Simler give
a joint judgment, with which the other Justices agree."

Yes, there are lots of extremely sexist people. We have said this repeatedly- if you think you are somehow in disagreement with us here you've utterly failed to understand anything.

The only way my definition of a woman as "any female" could be narrower than yours is if yours is "any adult". Yet you're pretending you don't think that. Unsurprisingly when you're not honest you tie yourself in knots.

(Edit - this post is in response to the first para. The second is so embarassingly untrue I won't bother pointing that out)

WTAF

Sorry but the non apologetic WI hierarchy should be ashamed to keep repeating this nonsense dogma. Really hope that someone surveys their membership soon, to show that this is an isolated view.

Men are men. Nothing is wrong with that. Don’t care what you want to wear or call yourself as a man but regardless you are very unwelcome for many good reasons, to join women’s organisations. And only very suspect and deeply entitled men ever try to push that.

Hopefully this CEO and whatever trustees that back her in believing TWAW (and thus morally believe that men should be in women’s organisations), will move on swiftly to be replaced by actual women. Who ‘strongly believe’ in actual women and their freedom of association in single sex spaces and organisations.

You seem to be suggesting that a democratic civil society is best protected by letting organizations discriminate against people for whatever reason they wish.

Nope . I am suggesting that mandating that a civil society organisation must exclude a group of individuals based on a protected characteristic and restrict their membership, against their own stated values and mission, is profoundly undemocratic and dangerous/ disturbing .

And furthermore, I do not believe it is what the SC intended/ contemplated for a second. They meant to allow the exclusion of trans women from female services where this could be justified as being a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim, not mandate it across the board.

Currently the fundamentalist logic is winning the day, and people are disturbingly struggling to perceive the difference.

May I correct - the whole point, surely, is that to maximize how inclusive of women a women's group is, it needs to exclude men. The exclusion of men is in order to promote inclusivity, not because excluding men is a jolly fun game to play.

Obviously a group for absolutely everybody cannot be exclusionary... actually that's not even true, a group for men, women, boys and girls would do well be be exclusionary towards bears and lions and cobras in order to maximize participant numbers (and ensure the same number of members at the start and end of meetings).

"This is about male people in female-only spaces regardless of whether they are transgender or not."

I feel so much more positive about women taking back safe spaces, sports, activities etc that they want to do with REAL WOMEN not men in various guises of what they THINK being a woman is (usually ridiculously odd) .

Men dressed as women should not be allowed or encouraged to shove women aside for their own gratification. Women are not support things for men who don't like their own bodies. Sick of the enablers and handmaidens and it's BRILLIANT to see so many more women and men stand up to the trans nonsense and show it for what it is.

Of course they do. If yor argument is that only biological women can join, you have to accept biological women who have a penis. You know, trans men. You have to make your mind up. If you’re basing your argument on XX vs XY you have to accept XX who have transitioned to male.

@puppymaddness (and @SolidMam if you join this thread) are you able to explain what your ideal "inclusive" policy would actually look like? I genuinely don't understand.

I presume you would agree that a space/organisation/opportunity that is for "all female people plus any male people who want to be part of it" is by definition a mixed sex space/organisation/opportunity. Please confirm whether or not you agree with this as we will be talking at cross-purposes if we can't agree on that.

If I am right that you would agree that, what possible half-way compromise exists that is somewhere between "all female people plus any male people who want to be part of it" and "actual female people only"? What additional criteria would you use to draw a line between these extremes?

The Women's Institute is to stop accepting transgender women from April next year in response to the landmark gender ruling from the Supreme Court earlier this year.

Brilliant. A WOMEN'S GROUP should only be for WOMEN! Not that hard to understand is it. Men are not and will never be women.

So that makes 1000 ex-members who might now rejoin now they don't have to suffer Petra & his ilk.

I presume you would agree that a space/organisation/opportunity that is for "all female people plus any male people who want to be part of it" is by definition a mixed sex

I would not agree with this no.

Biological women don't have penises and no human has ever changed sex.

No woman ever transitions to male; it's biologically impossible. No trans man has a penis; a neo-penis is not a penis, not even close. And even if it were, it would be a female penis, not a male one, because it would be on a female body. You can argue otherwise until you're blue in the face, but those are the hard facts trans men actually have to live with - whether we want to or not, and whether we accept it or not.

Or rather what I meant to say is I do not agree that an organisation that comprises women and trans women (only) is definitionally "mixed sex" and therefore must be prohibited by the state: That is very much part of the fundamentalist and dangerous/ antidemocratic logic I find very disturbing .