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.

It doesn't validate men as women, that's why.

Puppy still hasn't explained what traits the women and TW groups would discern on to define themselves. What traits are shared by all born women AND all trans women, but no men and no trans men?

What are your feelings on bus passes? Should the state be able to impose a singular definition of 'under 66'?

The point is, Pups, that if the "chinese ethnicity" (women) group included white people (men who identify as trans'women') then black people (men who don't identify as trans'women') have every right to shout "racist" (Misandrist).

In other words, women’s groups to be allowed to include men. But then they wouldn’t be women’s groups, they’d be adult humans groups. And I can guarantee that most men who claim to be women wouldn’t want to join that group.

Again, I really don't need you to explain your logic to me. I understand it completely. It's fundamentalist and anti-democratic because its consequence is an endorsement of State prohibition on women's organisations that include trans women.

No it isn't. Any organisation can set itself up to include women and transwomen. It can call itself a women's organisation if it wants to, and people will join or not according to their views.

The WI could change itself in quite a few ways to allow transwomen in on the same basis as adult human females (women) but it doesn't want to. It wants to keep the benefits of being a women's organisation (on the legal definition of women based on biology) but also admit transwomen. Cake and eat it.

"..sisterly souls" groups for people who identify with neo sexist ideas of womanhood and anyone who wants to join them..."

The sisterly souls groups still will have to accept men who don't claim to be women but who do enjoy doing whatever they do or discuss whatever they discuss.

*They can choose to, they just can't call it a women's organisation because it's not

right . You are obsessed with who's allowed to call things what. Who cares. You call it what you want. I'll call it what I want.

What matters is not what we call things, but that women are allowed to form an organisation / association for women, that also welcomes/ includes trans women, if they choose to do so.
You want to prohibit that in law. That is profoundly authoritarian and undemocratic.

But the great thing is that the 'sisterly souls' don't have to share the traits of all born women. They could just believe that they have a feminine aura.

YES, a state enforced prohibition on any SINGLE SEX organisation, association, facility or resource for women being used by men.

After women FOUGHT THROUGH THE COURTS FOR YEARS because men had relentlessly damaged those resources, damaged women, driven women's health and lesbian groups under ground or out of existence, made sure that women's resources etc actually excluded women who could not access a mixed space resource - because said men and activists behind them were insanely self centred and radical and absolutely unable to think about win-win and compromise and SOME resources left for women, everything had to be about these men with no interest or care whatsoever for the damage they left in their wake or how it affected women. Women were called bigots and evil for even mentioning the harms.

As with GG and WI we're seeing, these women's resources were intentionally targeted, captured, stuffed with activist driven leadership who got rid of anyone not male centric and fully signed up to an ideology that believes in the subordination and oppression of women and the evil of ever putting women above men with gender identities, or even giving them equal consideration.

ACTIVISTS AND THOSE MEN MADE THIS BED.

They can lie in it. It has become necessary to legally protect women's services and women from the abuse and vandalism of the trans political movement and no man in a women's space is innocent. His authentic expression is lovely for him but destroys the resource for every woman present - even if he doesn't actually hurt her or be the focus of anti women activists determined to destroy everything about women until it is all about men identifying as women.

This protection is needed for women. Not transwomen; women. It has finally been achieved by women having had to fight it to the highest court. There are mixed sex resources where these men can meet their needs AND now there are accessible and purposeful resources for women too. Equally. So the damage to women can stop. The End.

This wailing is solely about the horror of women having rights too.

They haven’t because they can’t

they can only assume that all women think they are women and transwomen think they are women

they can’t cope with the fact that women often only think they are women because of their sex and if you take that away then certainly I ( currently defined in laws as a woman) have no idea at all if I really am a woman

am I?

what evidence suggests I am a man or a woman ?

kind of like to know soon as I’ll be going out soon and would like to know which loos to use

… or in fact should I be using the ladies because of my xx composition? Hec I am losing the plot

Well you if you aren't willing, or able, to actually explain what it is you think you are defending them is it any surprise that people would, to use your own words, think you are an idiot, a fool or a penis panderer?

puppymaddness

One more thing please. I have long said that I cannot accept transgenderism and not transracialism. Race is much more of a spectrum so someone claiming to be black whilst having white skin and white parents actually makes more sense (because they might tan easily and or have black grandparents) than a man claiming to be a woman.

If you can convince me first that transracialism is valid then I will consider whether I can be persuaded to believe the much less rational idea of transgenderism.

If an organisation that says it's only for women decides to admit men who call themselves women then it isn't an organisation for women. Simple really.

It can call itself a women's organisation if it wants to, and people will join or not according to their views.

Can it?? Ok because a lot of people are saying not, so please do explain this to me..?

BECAUSE THEY ARE MEN

You are obsessed with who's allowed to call things what. Who cares.

The law, but as long as your organisation allows anyone to join it's perfectly legal. You obviously wouldn't want the kind of women who don't think they have a gender identity, but gender identity isn't a protected characteristic so no problem.

It's 2025 and people are still coming over here telling us that men are women. Amazing. When will this nonsense die out.

Genuinely interested in this and whether it's a view that's shared by others on this thread!

But it doesn't change their sex.

blimey.

I am so shocked and saddened by the number of women in my own group who are now wailing and gnashing teeth about this being a terrible step. As mentioned in my earlier post, we don't even have any TIM at the one I go to, so it doesn't affect us at all.
Except now, I'm realising how little many of the other women there care about women's rights, and their freedom to have things and situations that don't include male people.

I disagree.

With exclusive services they need to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim (e.g. increasing inclusion in a wider sphere). But when it comes to single sex associations like the WI, that isn't the case. Single sex associations don't need to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. Single sex associations can just be because people want them. I think that women's associations generally do increase women's access to the public sphere and so increase inclusion in society generally but it's not the justification for allowing the WI to be single sex. And associations that don't increase inclusion in wider society, or even further increase access to a wider sphere for those who are already in a privileged position, are still allowed (as we see with plenty of men's associations).

The key thing is that it would have to exclude men and women on an equal basis, so you couldn't include women of any gender identity or none and trans women. You would only be able to include people who believe they have a feminine gender identity.

You might have to put into words what you think that means, but as far as I know it isn't illegal to believe in feminine gender identity. It's true that people who don't believe in gender identity might call you sexist, but people are allowed to have opinions.

People are perfectly entitled to believe that men are women if they choose too. And people are perfectly entitled to believe that they are not. It's a free country.

The law means that those who wish to believe that men are women cannot commandeer and destroy resources that are clearly labelled and intended to meet the needs of women. Thereby also excluding some women and harming many of them. See the rafts of evidence and multiple years of court cases: women have had to prove this to the nth degree, merely being women.

Mixed sex facilities and resources etc are great. And when they exist alongside single sex options, this is actually inclusive, because women who cannot and do not wish to access mixed sex spaces/resources have an accessible option, and men who cannot and do not wish to access the male space/resources also have an accessible option.

My understanding is that honesty matters. If you call it a women's group then women have a right to expect to be able to turn up and not be surrounded by men.

But secondly it is about discrimination. If you call it a women's group but allow men then you can reasonably expect that men who claim to be women are more likely to turn up than other men, which itself is indirect discrimination against those other men. And if they do turn up and you refuse them access because they are wearing trousers then it is also discrimination.

I think.