Going by that poll it clearly takes all types
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A lot of the main players in the defending women's rights camp are left wing and also lesbian.
The discussion and debate around this has become a political football from those it suits to present it as such but the reality is there's cross party alignments involved regardless of viewpoint especially on the women's rights side.
This Tory MP has been reported as being involved in a lot of dodgy business related stuff including having the Ministry of Justice banning his company from taking clients. He was reported as being owner of a business called Sugar Daddy that pimped out young students to older men in business transactions to pay their student fees. He has also recently been charged with leaving the scene of an accident after his car was found wrapped round an inanimate object.
Acceptance without exception is a trans ally principle that up until this point seems to have been very much the case but its interesting to note some more notable campaigners are questioning Wallis' position and integrity including the likes of the very vocal LGBTQIA+ campaigner Peter Tatchell.
It's sad Wallis' family are forgotten in all of this - 2 daughters and a wife who must have had their world turned upside down.
I think broadly most people will agree with more rights for trans people, but with caveats. It's clear people don't want trans women playing female sports. And most women or certainly a big percentage don't want them in changing rooms. Surely that's a good push forward compared to where we were 20 years ago.
We could push businesses to have a few unisex changing cubicles, like we did for needing disabled toilets in premises
1 - I agree with this, but I think that, as usual, it's prominent right wingers, both inside and outside the political system who are trying to politicise it, as part of their perpetual 'culture wars' tactic of sowing division. They are trying to exploit it to win votes, just as they have in the past in relation to other minority groups.
2 - I have no idea but these things, but it's separate from his transgenderism. He might well be a terrible person (he's a Tory MP after all :wink:) but it isn't relevant to his recent announcement.
3 - That's exactly what I said above. His family must be in turmoil just now, trying to come to terms with it all.
There's been a few items (from commentators on the left) suggesting that the announcement might well be linked to him potentially being in enough bother to get the jail. It wouldn't be the first time a Tory MP made one headline gaining announcement or leak to take the heat off something else. I'm not saying this is absolutely the case here but it's not completely unthinkable.
He's not changing his presentation, he's not starting any treatment and he's keeping his pronouns as he/him. Which was why I mentioned the trans rights allies usual belief of acceptance without exceptions is being tested at present. Some very vocal trans allies on the left aren't buying it.
Is it?
I'm saying that a number of the key people on the "women's rights" end of the debate are not Conservative and some are LGBT. Like Joanna Cherry and Allison Bailey. And others.
Allison Bailey is suing Stonewall just now. She's (from her own biography) worked in the Mission District, in San Francisco, California; the epicentre of gay and radical left political activism, respectively, at the height of the AIDS epidemic.
She did voluntary work as a left wing Black British woman working with African-American women on a local level to provide advocacy, community support and friendship to other black women, straight and LGB, facing social, health and income inequality in the San Francisco Bay Area. She's no right winger.
My comment wasn't intended as a generalisation and simply a counter to the right wing v left wing assertions. I'm saying that there is cross party, cross politics at play in this single issue. Its not Trans Rights Left, Women's rights, erm, right.
In effect challenging the generalisations...
That's why JK Rowling is such a straight bat in all this. Somebody of no fixed political persuasion, prepared to take politicians of all colours to task - as well as being so successful as to be untouchable by the cancel culture heidbangers.
She's pretty much the only one who cuts to the chase on this issue (unlike the tongue-tied efforts if Starmer & co last week) ie just because you happen to believe that biology can't be ignored doesn't make you a bigot.
A good friend of Gordon Brown sure and (I think) a donator to the Labour Party in the past, but scathing lately about Starmer and as anti-Corbyn as she is the Tories. Anti-independence, but then so are (at least) half the Scottish population. What I mean is you can't really pin her down as wedded unflinchingly to one particular political brand.
Equality and human rights commission issues update on single sex spaces:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/...able-says-ehrc
Johnson getting another kicking.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-60988210
The overturning over the conversion therapy ban is exactly the kind of thing I was referring to about the Tories. What purpose does that serve, other than exploiting the issue to win favour with social conservatives and reactionaries? It isn't based upon science, it's a political stunt for right wing populism.
One of their own kicking them now. Their own LGBT "Business Champion" resigns over the CT stuff.
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/ent...b0e44de9c717f6
And fair play to him. He clearly sees the U-turn for the political stunt it is, throwing another vulnerable group under the bus, in order to appease the core Tory vote when the government is experiencing one crisis after another. It's a gimmick, designed to appeal to the Daily Mail and Express readers in middle England. After the lockdown party scandal, they even named the tactic "Operation Save Big Dog" i.e. throwing red meat to the Tory base. This is one example; other victims will include refugees and welfare recipients, as new Bills designed to make their lives even more unpleasant are going through parliament.
'The EHRC has had the bottle to point out that women and transwomen are not the same':
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/...3b1727b793e590
https://www.personneltoday.com/hr/eh...-unlawfulness/
Amazing how different interpretation is possible.
Sky News
@SkyNews
PM says 'biological males' should not compete in female sport and venues should have women only spaces
The majority of britians in that poll agreed, so probably not that controversial
I'd probably be inclined to agree about female sports being for females(as born) only. I'm not too fussed for a rule the other way around, hypocrite or pragmatic?
Woman only spaces is fine, but that doesn't sound like it answers the question that is presumably at the heart of the issue i.e. when can a man start to count as, or declare themselves as, a woman.
From context being next to the sports answer I assume it's the same answer and I'm not as ready to agree with that outright (although I understand the reasons), where does a trans-woman go to change/bathroom if there's only 2 options and that's the rule? :dunno:
I think unisex changing cubicles should be a legal thing like needing disabled toilets. I know trans people aren't happy with that as they feel they shouldn't be singled out and should go into the changing area of their choice. But if some biological women are unhappy with people with penises are in there women only areas, then their rights should be respected. Same for women's only crisis homes ect
Quite a few places and have them in my work. Some have just the toilet in the cubicle and shared sinks ect which is weird. The better ones have toilets sinks and dryer in each one, do what you need in and out. The only downside is urinals are even faster I suppose
Nobody seems to be able to look at the issue of female to male transgender people, it's always about how do women feel about their space being infiltrated by 'people with a *****'.
It's because with sports it's the clear physical advantage. No one would mind if there wasn't an advantage so wouldn't mind if female to male competed. The same with changing rooms as I doubt many men would feel physically threatened by a female to male being in the changing room.