Hampstead Ponds update today

[WallaceinAnderland]

I'm not sure that this is in line with the law.

They need to label all 3 ponds as mixed sex.

https://news.cityoflondon.gov.uk/hampstead-heaths-bathing-ponds-to-remain-trans-inclusive-spaces-as-city-corporation-agrees-future-access-policy/

It continues to surprise me just how many people believe that if a man calls himself a woman then, somehow, he is a woman.

I feel like we'll be blighted with this idiocy for generations.

IANAL but I think the argument is that you have to show detriment to prove discrimination. It's the idea that separate but equal is not discriminatory.

So you could have supermarket for men + women over 6 foot and a supermarket for women and men under 6 foot as long as they were identical?

In practice I think you would stumble over the problem that services are rarely identical and women and men have different needs.

I'm starting to feel that if it is genuinely true that a majority of users prefer the trans-inclusive arrangements, these arrangements should be allowed to stand,

Well all the users who didn't want and couldn't use mixed sex facilities were pushed out, so of course those who are left are fine with it.

This is rather like harrassing all the actual lesbians out of 'LGBT' groups, and then proudly claiming that the remaining group show how all homosexual people adore and want straight sex. Because everyone left said so! Look!

Or hounding and harassing all the vegans out of a vegan club and then claiming that look, all vegans love eating meat, everyone (left) here says so!

This is a political group of people with the behaviours of a young child struggling with social skills, who unless they've won everything, are always first, get all the attention going and have all the toys, are going to scream and cry.

'Trans inclusive' always requires excluding some women from anything at all, so that some men can have everything. It tramples women and gay rights. It is not nearly as lovely a thing in practice as it is intended to sound.

To the posters who think that people voting for men to be included in the women's pond tells them something, doesn't the fact that the Corporation of London got a whopping 38,000 people to respond give you a hint that no, the actual users don't want it?

I believe, at the time, the estimate was something like the ponds actually have 6000 users. That may even be visits, which would be even fewer users.

Why did they need to get every transactivist in the country to respond to their consultation, if the actual users were all fine with it?

Not to mention that the previous CoL consultation included great swathes of answers that were binned, because they didn't like them.

It seems they've learnt from that consultation, in order to doctor this one.

Surely the best way to consult the users, is to actually consult the bloody users. Give them a form as they leave. It's my understanding that season ticket holders have to give their names and addresses.

Just bloody write to them.

They haven't done that. It tells you everything you need to know.

Or crocheting doilies, embroidering cloths for tea-trays, making papier-mache bowls for pot-pourri and a host of other typically female activities.

The 2 characteristics thing is an absolute red herring.

There is no way on earth that the guidance says "You can have a group that is ONLY EITHER female OR trans identifying male"

It's TRA's poor reading of the guidance.

you COULD have TWO characteristics, say female and trans identified (so trans men only) but of course not if they contravened each other.

It's not at all literate, legally or otherwise, to say the code says you can have a group thats ONLY female or trans identified males.

two words, confirmation bias.

Any data coming from anything involving transactivism is worthless; it is always fiddled from the start to get the desired outcome.

It's rather like the thread about 'oh only one complaint was ever made to councils about single sex spaces'.

Bollocks is that true. We all know it. This is a political movement based in standing looking you right in the eyes and telling you reality is whatever they tell you to think it is, controlling the narrative and everyone involved, and discarding all evidence or facts (or people) that interrupts it. It's the two year old smeared in chocolate with a half eaten biscuit still in their hand, telling you earnestly that they never took it.

Could the detriment be that a man saying he's a woman gets to swim/socialise with his female friends and man who doesn't say he's a woman doesn't?

It was an aside. The issue was is it discriminatory towards women and men.

And the judge pondered that it may not be discriminatory towards men, if they had equal provision provided for them.

It was nothing to do with it being discriminatory towards women. It was just is there an extra discrimination towards men.

And, of course, those men can come up with all sorts of reasons why they felt it was discriminatory (see the WI) but it's all academic, because the initial discrimination is towards the women who are forced into sharing their facilities with a subset of men.

Edited to add, and yes of course it's not just about the changing rooms. Women are stripping down into swimsuits, bikinis, etc. Not to mention the domination aspect of men in your bloody pool. Any woman who swims in a public pool knows this.

There is a significant number of women who would far rather swim in a single sex environment.

No, because there is also an everyone pool.

EDIT: Also, the discrimination men would have to allege is discrimination on the basis of sex. And women face exactly the same set of exclusions as men -- ie, if they don't claim a trans identity there are only two out of three ponds they can use. So no discrimination on the basis of sex

I don't know, because as far as I can see the practical impact of the policy is that anyone can swim in any pond. As long as you aren't rocking up with a banner and a photographer, I don't think there are grounds for excluding anyone.

Which sort of brings up the question of, if there's an everyone pool, why do certain men require entry to a women's pool?

Well what if it's his wife, and she wants a single sex only pool. So she goes in the ladies, and he's upset that he can't swim with her, but some other bloke can.

Oh wait, then you get into the complete down the rabbit hole fuckwittery of the fact that even though she wants a single sex pool, guess what, there isn't one.

It's not just about the changing facilities. A lot of women go to the pond to swim and sunbathe, often topless, away from the male gaze.

There is no legal requirement to provide single-sex swimming but it is lawful because it's a proportionate way of meeting this legitimate aim (it doesn't have to be a 'need' as such). As soon as you let some men in it fails to meet the aim and therefore cannot rely on the single sex exception.

It's like arguing that it's OK to let some men into a female only swim session at the local leisure centre because there are separate changing rooms. It removes the justification for the single sex sessions in the first place.

Also, regarding the names of the ponds, the Equality Act doesn't directly state rules about the naming of facilities as such. It just holds that calling a service single-sex when it isn't in fact single sex (bcs there are transwomen using it) is legally null in the sense that it doesn't do anything to establish that the provider is making needful provisions for women.

There is a sign up at the entrance which says 'women only beyond this point'. It very clearly presents itself as a single sex service.

It's not just excluded men who could make a claim. Women could claim indirect discrimination and harassment on the basis of sex.

The bigger question might be whether they still require entry to the women's pond it anyone can use it and it is no longer the women's pond.

The mixed pool is not enough.
If you swim in the Ladies' pond, it means you're a lady (is the thinking)
Total validation

Surely the most basic discrimination comes in that many women do need a single sex pool.

The end.

What is to stop him from accompanying his wife in the women's pond or inviting his wife to join him in the men's pond?

I agree. Let's rewind:

Once upon a time there were three ponds; one was reserved for women, of the biologically female kind; one was reserved for men, of the biologically male kind; one was mixed, and could be used by anybody at all.
Everybody had a place that was for them, whether they were male, female, or 'preferred not to say', or indeed 'preferred to say they were not'.
Nobody was excluded, or deprived of a place to swim, and lots of fun was had by all, with lashings of ginger beer.
And they all lived happily ever after...

...until somebody decided that it was all too simple and satisfactory and reasonable, and must not be allowed to continue undisturbed, and they set about changing everything, with no obvious justification and no advantage to anybody, as everybody already had a place to swim in.

Why did they do that? What was wrong with the original configuration, in which everybody had equal provision, everybody had a place to swim?

Yes, and, like others on here, I do wonder if the shine would be taken off it for certain elements of the trans community if it just became a mixed-sex pond.

I know; that was my point.
So if they take down the 'women only' sign (which they have to, surely, to remain on the right side of the law while allowing men into the Ladies' Pond?), it will cease to appeal to some men.

Michael Foran suggests that the segregation by sex is the detriment, unless you are relying on EA separate-sex carve outs. In which case sex means bio sex.
You can't have a pool for white people and a pool for black people and say 'it's fine because they are 'equal' facilities'.

Yes, exactly, he presumably just has to say he identifies as a woman.

If the goal is to protect a single sex service that is the real argument.

The logical end point of arguments about discrimination is mixed sex provision, which is fine by me, but not what some people want.