"Supporting trans colleagues through this difficult time."

[StopTheHyperbole]

So I've NC for this, I'm a fairly regular poster on this board, but I've been pushed to start this thread as I am just in despair at the hyperbolic statements certain people at my place of work are spouting. Ugh!!!!

Anyway, so, I work in the public sector, there was a big gathering of opinions on the workplace, all invited to chat, round tables, discussions etc. Key questions being: what can we do to improve? How do we do things well? What do you think about our organisation? Etc. It's a yearly thing that's gone on for at least 20 years.

One of the colleagues on another table (everyone asked to write down then summarise discussions) said the company could "do more to help support trans colleagues during this extremely difficult time." Silence round the room and then when asked to clarify, they said "due to the supreme court decision."

I had to physically stop myself from sighing out loud as I was right in the eye line of the person who said this. A young, fairly grumpy they/them (actual female though) from a different team. It's just such utter UTTER bullshit. No one challenged this view, a few people NODDED!!! ARGH, it's just so frustrating.

What difficult time? Nothing is difficult??? The court decision just clarified equality law, why the need for this hyperbole? Nobody is banned from anything, this over-dramatic language about a law being clarified to ensure that single sex spaces are respected in certain circumstances is just...nuts.

Anyway I'm venting, but it worries me it's so prevalent at my work, when we should be neutral to activist causes (as a public sector organisation) and it clearly isn't the case. I wish I'd been braver in challenging this arrogant, grumpy young person but I didn't. And I slightly hate myself for it, but I have kids, mortgage and bills to pay. I just can't rock the boat. HR and the internal equality team are very much on board with it all unfortunately.

This is making my piss boil - some one on here needs to understand one basic fact women say no! Simple?

same here, I work for a big organization and we are in the process of moving to a brand new office. Some lgbt+ colleagues are loudly talking how even though the ruling said one thing this is not how our organization will do things and they will do "the right thing" and loudly insisting on mixed toilets for the whole building. no-one is challenging them but equally, I am too scared to say anything either as it sounds that my opinion wont be very popular.

They'll be opening themselves up to a legal situation if they don't provide single sex toilets. By all means have a gender neutral option too if that activist group feel that strongly about it, but as per workplace regulations all buildings have to provide single sex facilities. Hence all the tribunals going on at the minute against organisations that ignored these rules.

Well it goes without saying that nobody is forced to respond if not comfortable.

What a cloth-eared post! Women's uncomfortable, distressing or frightening experiences aren't there to educate you. Why not use your own intelligence and power of imagination to try to put yourself in the place of any woman faced with a man where no man should be and see how you might feel?

Are you seriously saying we should be happy to share intimate spaces with men?

Why don’t you think women and girls should be allowed access to single sex spaces?

Toilets are the thin end of the wedge - the thick end is the female prison estate, in between lie changing rooms (especially those in sports settings with open showers), hospital wards, female sports (especially contact sports which are not just unfair but also unsafe if some men are allowed to compete) DV shelters, rape services etc. If the last few years have shown us anything it's that there is no supposedly female only spaces where trans identifying men fear to tread. There is nowhere we can draw the line that is seen as palatable to the TRAs.

One more time for those not keeping up the back women don't just pee in public toilets. They deal with uniquely female things like menstruation and breast milk leaks and miscarriage and waters breaking. If you can't imagine why some women don't want to do those things in the presence of men I'm not going to spell it out for you.

I bet you would.

It's very simple. Trans women are men. Women don't want to share public toilets with men.

Are you arguing that toilets should all be mixed-sex? Because that's what it sounds like.

i love this analogy ! 🤣

oh usually the bull thing through the nose !

I think this could all have been much less divisive and difficult had it not needed a supreme court judgment, but perhaps as many as ten years ago, government had amended the law for clarification. However, in the latter part of the last decade Parliament only seemed concerned about Brexit, then you had Liz Truss who allegedly believed in self-ID, and then Boris Johnson who cared little about the issue because of his misogyny.

I work for a corporate firm that has well and truly drunk the cool aid. I take the position of just smiling and waving and letting it all go over my head. This too shall pass 🙏

I have many years ago but reliving it for the people who don’t believe any normal women have had problems with trans people in women’s toilets keeps it current 😢 I typed out what happened but then deleted it this time because at this point I’m not altogether convinced some posters aren’t getting off on me reliving that fear.

That is an insane comparison.

The place where women are partially undressed and vulnerable is not the same as the general workplace, and you know it.

I have shared my lovely mum's experience several times under several user names but never in response to a 'request' like this. We say no, we don't have to justify why we say no, we certainly don't have to lay it all out for someone to assess whether it's a 'good enough' reason or not.

Please do be wary of screenshots and worse.

I'm not telling you what to do, you're your own person, of course. But I've had things I've said on here taken and put on other social media.

We say no, we don't have to justify why we say no, we certainly don't have to lay it all out for someone to assess whether it's a 'good enough' reason or not.

💜

That last paragraph nails it. Many people find it ‘difficult’ when they’re told no they aren’t able to continue exploiting these kinds of situations. This isn’t any different.

It should be easy enough to misdirect. Eg. What about our [corporate failure] failure to support trans-whoever. You: so pleased you raised that. The recent staff/customer/ee survey stated that this area [eg accessibility, colonialism, language etc] was of concern. I suggest that we spend the rest of this precious time together to look at how we can achieve [organisation aim a, b, c] to address this clearly articulated need. Our funders [x,y,z] need us to do [a,b,c]. In other words:they say x, you ignore and move on. Keep a few reasonable organisational AND RESOURCE focused examples in your pocket.

There are many cases online if you search for them. Asking women directly very much feels like you're wanting an audience to invalidate and tell that they're being very silly for being scared

I've been excluded from using what I consider necessary facilities of my choice. Every time I try to enter my local over-60's social group, they tell me I'm too young and refuse to let me in!
But but I don't feel comfortable or safe around people of my own age and I feel like I'm 70 years old, so why shouldn't I be allowed in? These old bigots need to get over it and stay at home if my presence makes them feel unsafe or uncomfortable

Do you really need specific personal stories to understand that men in women's spaces are a threat to many women?. And what with trans identified males being men, they are included in the 'men in women's spaces are a threat to many women'? And it's not 'threatened by a trans person'
It's trans'women'. Trans identified males.
Absolutely no chance of me sharing details of traumatic experiences online with randoms

I & many others are fresh out of sympathy for a group of people who accorded themselves unwarranted privileges by lying that those privileges were their "rights".

They ignored & trampled the rights of others, all the while knowing that even their Famous Victory in Goodwin at the ECtHR never afforded them any such "rights", the Court's decision being based on Article 8, a qualified, not absolute right. As a qualified right, Art 8 can be set aside & one of the circumstances in which it can be set aside is when it conflicts with the rights of others. Then there's S9.3 of the GRA itself.

That they are miffed to be found out in their lies is at best the banal experience of liars. As to public sector managers being unaware of the responsibilities they always had under the Equality Act, that speaks very ill of the managerial competence & reading comprehension of those managers. The Supreme Court judgment in FWS is a scant 88 pages & a model of clarity. It is not a novel reinterpretation of the law, it states what the law always was.

Looks like you may have an ET shaping up there. Keep notes of relevant conversations, meetings etc, also keep copies of emails, Slack posts, & so forth. You don't have to want to go to law right now but it's always worth having insurance of a sort when there are workplace bullies about & esp if HR enables them.