Also in the News - Part 2

[Guest Sideshow Faes]

22 hours ago, Happy Fox said:

I think the whole idea of party politics is useless and backwards to be honest.

 

If the politicians across parties decided to consult together and work together for the good of the country it wouldn’t be in this state right now, it wouldn’t be perfect either but it would be a damn site better.

 

 

Let's hope we see proportional representation sooner rather than later then 

[Footballwipe]

1 hour ago, RoboFox said:

Senior Tory in nepotism corruption shocker. 

 

Speaks volumes about their arrogance and contempt for the electorate that they continue to do this despite being caught out time and again. They don't care.

 

Reprehensible scum.

And the dyed-in-the-wool Tories will defend it.

 

As mentioned, party politics is gutter stuff to most of us. All we want is for the best for ourselves and, as a result, for the country. Corruption, whichever party commits it, should be called out, especially when it's in your own organisation. We know if this Keegan story develops legs then the usual faces will defend, deflect and wave off.

 

Similar was happening yesterday with the 114 notice for Birmingham - lots of Tories out showing this is what it'd be like under a Labour government.

 

I suspect the majority of people are sick of this partisan crap that comes out of all orifices and corners of all political wings, angles etc. People are busy working, being parents, trying to live a life. Career politicians whose job it is to whip up storms and do everything they can to cling onto their privilege and pension just don't care or give a damn - in fact they don't even live in the same universe as us, tbh.

[Daggers]

Just running with the whole broken politics thing, I've just pre-ordered Rory Stewart's Politics on the Edge [£16.69 from Amazon or £22ish from your independent book store]

 

The Torygraph: "Rory Stewart was never going to be prime minister. He had far too many glaring flaws. For one, he’d held a variety of difficult jobs in the real world (soldier, diplomat, professor at Harvard), rather than becoming a Spad straight out of Oxford, like modern MPs are meant to. For another, his speeches made it sound as if he’d given actual thought to the subject at hand, rather than just reciting a list of crowd-pleasing soundbites scripted by a strategist. Most damaging of all, however, was the inescapable impression that he said things because he genuinely meant them, rather than because a pollster had told him they would be popular. As a result, he was entirely unsuited to modern politics, and his campaign to become PM in 2019 ended in swift and crushing failure."

 

Everyone I know who's read it says it is a top drawer book about politics today.

[FoxesDeb]

17 hours ago, The Doctor said:

So on 1) their fears of trans women are irrational. trans people have been using single sex spaces in line with their identity for decades, have been legally protected in doing so for 13 years, and self ID laws exist in dozens of countries, without any increase in violence.

2) ignoring that that hasn't played out in reality, the same would apply in birth sex segregated spaces, the only difference is whether said predatory man tries to abuse trans women being allowed in women's spaces (which is already the case and hasn't been abused to any significant degree) or pretends to be a trans man. 

 

As for safe spaces for both, there's so many issues with the idea of "trans only" bathrooms and changing rooms (phrased that way might bring back memories of racial segregation?), but primary among them is logistics. There's been talk in recent pages of the financial waste in councils, who is funding and finding room to put these bathrooms in public spaces? Unless you want to go on a multimillion pound spending spree to accommodate less than 0.5% of the population, the end result of this "people should use the spaces associated with their birth sex" is giving trans people the option between exclusion from public life or a constant threat of violent crime against them. 

I'm not sure that invalidating women's fear as irrational is the best argument tbh. I'm also not sure we can say with any degree of certainty that violence and sexual assault has not increased, given that the vast majority of sexual assaults and rape go unreported, of course we can't say it has, either.

 

Apparently, half of trans prisoners in the UK have been convicted of at least one sexual offence,  and almost all of them are trans women. The nature of said offences would need to be looked at, but certainly on the face of it, that's a pretty good reason to segregate trans women from cis women in prisons imo:

 

https://fairplayforwomen.com/transgender-male-criminality-sex-offences/

 

You liken separate spaces to racial segregation, but isn't it more comparable to the facilities we have everywhere now for disabled people? I expect before they were introduced cost was a concern, but now we pretty much take them for granted. If we're going to accept that society is changing we need to make the changes needed to include everyone as far as possible.

 

I'd use a trans public toilet, I use the gents now if it's empty and there's a queue for the ladies! My family also use the mixed changing facilities at swimming pools, but many women aren't comfortable doing this, and I'm not convinced any spaces which exist primarily to keep women safe should be compromised for what you call an irrational fear, but one for which many, many women, is very real.

 

 

 

[Dunge]

11 minutes ago, Daggers said:

Just running with the whole broken politics thing, I've just pre-ordered Rory Stewart's Politics on the Edge [£16.69 from Amazon or £22ish from your independent book store]

 

The Torygraph: "Rory Stewart was never going to be prime minister. He had far too many glaring flaws. For one, he’d held a variety of difficult jobs in the real world (soldier, diplomat, professor at Harvard), rather than becoming a Spad straight out of Oxford, like modern MPs are meant to. For another, his speeches made it sound as if he’d given actual thought to the subject at hand, rather than just reciting a list of crowd-pleasing soundbites scripted by a strategist. Most damaging of all, however, was the inescapable impression that he said things because he genuinely meant them, rather than because a pollster had told him they would be popular. As a result, he was entirely unsuited to modern politics, and his campaign to become PM in 2019 ended in swift and crushing failure."

 

Everyone I know who's read it says it is a top drawer book about politics today.

I can’t help but wonder what would have happened with Rory Stewart in a different time. Like now, even. I always found him likeable and sincere. I remember in polling he was the only leadership candidate that had any appeal to people who were more educated and centre left. But he had a massive problem at that time: Brexit. It’s also likely he would have struggled for support from within the party, but polling at the time suggested that if the Conservatives didn’t “get Brexit done” then a considerable (I mean really considerable) percentage of the electorate were going to go to Farage to force it through anyway.

 

In less Brexity times he could have made a for really interesting leader of the Conservative Party and even PM. I don’t know how possible that might be in the future but I don’t see anyone in there right now who could win an election.

[Guest Sideshow Faes]

3 minutes ago, Dunge said:

I can’t help but wonder what would have happened with Rory Stewart in a different time. Like now, even. I always found him likeable and sincere. I remember in polling he was the only leadership candidate that had any appeal to people who were more educated and centre left. But he had a massive problem at that time: Brexit. It’s also likely he would have struggled for support from within the party, but polling at the time suggested that if the Conservatives didn’t “get Brexit done” then a considerable (I mean really considerable) percentage of the electorate were going to go to Farage to force it through anyway.

 

In less Brexity times he could have made a for really interesting leader of the Conservative Party and even PM. I don’t know how possible that might be in the future but I don’t see anyone in there right now who could win an election.

As far as I can tell he would've fit quite fine in what the Tories used to be, before the poison of Thatcherism got consumed as gospel by their party, lurching them rightwards on economic issues, followed by anti-immigrant headbangers like the BNP and UKIP eating into their vote, lurching them rightwards on social issues.

[The Doctor]

1 hour ago, FoxesDeb said:

I'm not sure that invalidating women's fear as irrational is the best argument tbh. I'm also not sure we can say with any degree of certainty that violence and sexual assault has not increased, given that the vast majority of sexual assaults and rape go unreported, of course we can't say it has, either.

 

Apparently, half of trans prisoners in the UK have been convicted of at least one sexual offence,  and almost all of them are trans women. The nature of said offences would need to be looked at, but certainly on the face of it, that's a pretty good reason to segregate trans women from cis women in prisons imo:

 

https://fairplayforwomen.com/transgender-male-criminality-sex-offences/

 

You liken separate spaces to racial segregation, but isn't it more comparable to the facilities we have everywhere now for disabled people? I expect before they were introduced cost was a concern, but now we pretty much take them for granted. If we're going to accept that society is changing we need to make the changes needed to include everyone as far as possible.

 

I'd use a trans public toilet, I use the gents now if it's empty and there's a queue for the ladies! My family also use the mixed changing facilities at swimming pools, but many women aren't comfortable doing this, and I'm not convinced any spaces which exist primarily to keep women safe should be compromised for what you call an irrational fear, but one for which many, many women, is very real.

 

 

 

They very much are irrational though (self ID policies have never correlated with increased sexual violence in the dozens of countries that have them), and I'm not sure a group which tweet about how they hope trans women die of cancer is a particularly reliable source tbh.

 

 

Particularly given they're drastically misrepresenting the stats to suggest trans women are disproportionately rapists when actually trans women are disproportionately rape victims and the sexual offences are actually solicitation and other crimes under anti sex-work laws (which disproportionately hit trans people because of the rate in which trans people are forced into survival sex work).

 

As for the comparison with accessible toilets, they have different features to accommodate different needs between disabled people and able bodied people. Trans people don't need special accommodations in a bathroom, just a place to piss and a sink to wash their hands. Forcing them out to satisfy the paranoia of a small bunch of genital obsessed weirdos (and it wouldn't satisfy them, as absolute numbers, butch women face the most transphobia in public spaces because you in fact can't "always tell") is expensive, unnecessary and only wanted by a tiny minority of women.

[Captain...]

4 hours ago, FoxesDeb said:

The point being made is clearly not about genitals being on show. It's about the very real fear many women have of men and the threat they feel from them. The whole point of safe havens for women is not so they don't have to see men's genitalia, it's so the fear is removed as far as possible by men not being present, at least that's how I understand it.

Yes, and I'm deliberately highlighting the stupidness of making it about genitals. The previous comments are about whether a trans woman has a penis and if they've been "castrated" then it's a different matter. Even if you did judge a trans woman's threat level by the presence or not of a penis how on earth do you enforce it. 

 

Safety is a very real concern but how on earth do approve someone, trans or otherwise, of being allowed in a safe space based on potential threat. You just can't.

[StanSP]

Keegan doesn't help herself

 

 

 

[FoxesDeb]

41 minutes ago, The Doctor said:

They very much are irrational though (self ID policies have never correlated with increased sexual violence in the dozens of countries that have them), and I'm not sure a group which tweet about how they hope trans women die of cancer is a particularly reliable source tbh.

 

 

Particularly given they're drastically misrepresenting the stats to suggest trans women are disproportionately rapists when actually trans women are disproportionately rape victims and the sexual offences are actually solicitation and other crimes under anti sex-work laws (which disproportionately hit trans people because of the rate in which trans people are forced into survival sex work).

 

As for the comparison with accessible toilets, they have different features to accommodate different needs between disabled people and able bodied people. Trans people don't need special accommodations in a bathroom, just a place to piss and a sink to wash their hands. Forcing them out to satisfy the paranoia of a small bunch of genital obsessed weirdos (and it wouldn't satisfy them, as absolute numbers, butch women face the most transphobia in public spaces because you in fact can't "always tell") is expensive, unnecessary and only wanted by a tiny minority of women.

Like I intimated to earlier, emotionally invalidating anyone's fears is pretty poor imo, whether you or I believe the fear to be irrational or not doesn't matter. And again, given that the vast majority of sexual assaults and rape go unreported,  how do we know that sexual violence hasn't increased?

 

The stats the source quoted said they were taken from the Ministry of Justice, and I did caveat that they would need to be looked in to further, I'd be interested to read them from a better source.

 

Thankfully it doesn't affect me, but I'm not sure that calling women who have faced sexual violence and abuse as paranoid genitally obsessed weirdos is a particularly good argument for promoting inclusively either, unless I've misunderstood who you are referring to? 

 

Disabled toilets aren't just needed by people who need special adaptations, many of them also just need a loo and a sink, they also exist for the sake of inclusion, privacy and comfort for everyone.

 

I'm interested in a source for the tiny minority of women who want to see separate safe spaces, too, I couldn't really find anything when I looked.

[RobHawk]

Reading this thread it's almost like a discussion about who's rights matter more. 

 

Surely we should be looking for a compromise that suits all genders. Alot of people seem to see it as very black and white but it's an issue that isn't that simple and sometimes common sense needs to prevail on both sides

[dsr-burnley]

1 hour ago, Captain... said:

Yes, and I'm deliberately highlighting the stupidness of making it about genitals. The previous comments are about whether a trans woman has a penis and if they've been "castrated" then it's a different matter. Even if you did judge a trans woman's threat level by the presence or not of a penis how on earth do you enforce it. 

 

Safety is a very real concern but how on earth do approve someone, trans or otherwise, of being allowed in a safe space based on potential threat. You just can't.

The entire point of women-only safe spaces is that the people seen as potential threats in the minds of the people taking refuge are kept out.  It is more important in women's refuges that the women concerned feel safe than that they feel inclusive.

 

Are you saying that all men (judged by sex, not gender) should be allowed into women's refuges, or only some of them?  Because the very reason men are excluded from these refuges is because of the threat perceived by the women.  Not because that particular man, or trans woman, is a threat.

[dsr-burnley]

3 minutes ago, RobHawk said:

Reading this thread it's almost like a discussion about who's rights matter more. 

 

Surely we should be looking for a compromise that suits all genders. Alot of people seem to see it as very black and white but it's an issue that isn't that simple and sometimes common sense needs to prevail on both sides

In a sense it can't be compromised.  You can have a safe space for women (traditional definition) who are frightened of people with penises.  You can have a safe space for women with penises who are frightened of men.  But you can't have one safe space that suits both lots of frightened people; you have to have two,

[FoxesDeb]

25 minutes ago, RobHawk said:

Reading this thread it's almost like a discussion about who's rights matter more. 

 

Surely we should be looking for a compromise that suits all genders. Alot of people seem to see it as very black and white but it's an issue that isn't that simple and sometimes common sense needs to prevail on both sides

Compromise is exactly what needs to happen, but regrettably it seems that's not enough to satisfy some. 

[urban.spaceman]

Florida Man September 6th

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-66733230

[Leeds Fox]

Unfortunately I don’t believe there’s a practical solution that caters for all (ensuring women feel safe and making trans women feel included).

 

Adding segregated toilet, similar to a disabled toilet, only smaller as it wouldn’t require additional room for access. This wouldn’t be cheap and isn’t practical to install in older buildings. FWIW, I’d use that toilet purely for the peace and quiet for a number 2 .

 

I understand this is a touchy subject whichever side of the fence you’re on and offence is easily made without intent. 

 

 

[kingkisnorbo]

Reading that escaped prisoner story. Feel bad admitting this but I the first thing I thought was fair play. Must be so hard in this day and age.

[Super_horns]

I mean yes he could pretty much anywhere now .

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66733660

Mind you how can he escape tied to a lorry !

[Captain...]

5 hours ago, dsr-burnley said:

The entire point of women-only safe spaces is that the people seen as potential threats in the minds of the people taking refuge are kept out.  It is more important in women's refuges that the women concerned feel safe than that they feel inclusive.

 

Are you saying that all men (judged by sex, not gender) should be allowed into women's refuges, or only some of them?  Because the very reason men are excluded from these refuges is because of the threat perceived by the women.  Not because that particular man, or trans woman, is a threat.

It's this fixation on genitals I don't understand. There can be a 5' nothing trans woman who has been on puberty blockers and hormones for 10 years, but has not been able to get surgery.

 

Or you could have Tyson Fury identifying as a female and using his money to get all the surgery required to fit your previous stated definition of "castrated" but only been on hormones for 6 months.

 

You also have women that were born women but have high testosterone levels and look kinda manly, and there will be some women that look more like a man than some trans women. 

 

So how are you going to enforce it? Ask for proof of sex at birth before you are allowed in or a quick peek in their pants.

 

There is no logical application of any rule that could be used that wouldn't risk causing offence and more distress. This is the problem with all of this we have spent centuries creating a binary world, now people are breaking out of these binary definitions and we're just not set up to cope with it.

 

You can't deny a safe space to vulnerable trans woman.

You can't create and maintain specific trans safe spaces nationwide when it is such a small minority.

You can't deny the feelings of vulnerable cis women.

You can't demand proof of sex at birth or presence of genitals in any ethical way.

You can't force trans women into male spaces where they might be put at risk.

 

It's an impossible situation which is why it is perfect to stoke up feelings on all sides with a manufactured culture war.

 

It doesn't matter that the number of these theoretical situations that we are talking about is minimal. Trans woman have been using female spaces for decades without issue, but the difference now is there are certain agents on both sides pushing agendas and creating division and distrust.

 

[urban.spaceman]

2 hours ago, kingkisnorbo said:

Reading that escaped prisoner story. Feel bad admitting this but I the first thing I thought was fair play. Must be so hard in this day and age.

 

1 hour ago, Super_horns said:

I mean yes he could pretty much anywhere now .

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66733660

Mind you how can he escape tied to a lorry !

Love a good manhunt but sadly don't think this one will be as entertaining as Roal Moat. Unless Gazza's got a trick up his sleeve. 

[dsr-burnley]

56 minutes ago, Captain... said:

It's this fixation on genitals I don't understand. There can be a 5' nothing trans woman who has been on puberty blockers and hormones for 10 years, but has not been able to get surgery.

 

Or you could have Tyson Fury identifying as a female and using his money to get all the surgery required to fit your previous stated definition of "castrated" but only been on hormones for 6 months.

 

You also have women that were born women but have high testosterone levels and look kinda manly, and there will be some women that look more like a man than some trans women. 

 

So how are you going to enforce it? Ask for proof of sex at birth before you are allowed in or a quick peek in their pants.

 

There is no logical application of any rule that could be used that wouldn't risk causing offence and more distress. This is the problem with all of this we have spent centuries creating a binary world, now people are breaking out of these binary definitions and we're just not set up to cope with it.

 

You can't deny a safe space to vulnerable trans woman.

You can't create and maintain specific trans safe spaces nationwide when it is such a small minority.

You can't deny the feelings of vulnerable cis women.

You can't demand proof of sex at birth or presence of genitals in any ethical way.

You can't force trans women into male spaces where they might be put at risk.

 

It's an impossible situation which is why it is perfect to stoke up feelings on all sides with a manufactured culture war.

 

It doesn't matter that the number of these theoretical situations that we are talking about is minimal. Trans woman have been using female spaces for decades without issue, but the difference now is there are certain agents on both sides pushing agendas and creating division and distrust.

 

There are worse things than causing offence.  I would never support the abolition of women-only refuges for such a trivial reason as "it might cause offence".

 

And I don't agree that the number of theoretical situations where a woman wants a woman-only refuge, is minimal.  there is one on the street where I work, for heaven's sake.  I bet most towns have one or more.  

 

The difference is going right back to when I first commented on this - I think that women's safety and their need for protection from men is a matter of sex, the physical fear of people with testosterone and penises, and I think women's refuges ought to be run on that basis.  You think women's refuges ought to be run on gender, or else not run at all.  We'll agree to differ.

[Jon the Hat]

14 hours ago, Captain... said:

Again the problem there is males, boys being gross. 

 

Female's can and do use urinals at festivals with a bit of help from a She Pee, we could also go down the French hole in the ground squatters. I can think of many times the queue for the ladies is huge and the gents has no queue and free cubicles. Split it out as sitting and standing rather than male and female, more toilets for women to use and more options when it is busy.

If you listen to women, they don't want men in the next cubicle either.  I don't blame them.

[Jon the Hat]

14 hours ago, Captain... said:

So a trans woman without a penis is fine in these spaces?

A penis is threatening so yes it actually does make a difference. A lot of the noise around this has come from trans women with intact male genitalia getting it out in women's changing rooms, and the trans lobby defending that as absolutely fine and anyone criticizing is as transphobic.  Which is clearly nonsense.  

[Jon the Hat]

14 hours ago, dsr-burnley said:

My friend has a daughter at school and she (and the other girls) won't use the all-inclusive toilets not because of fear, but because the boys are so mucky.

 

Besides, female urinals will never be practical.

There was some discussion about this at my sons primary school, and I made this point.  My son won't use the boys toilets - I certainly wouldn't wish them on girls!

[Jon the Hat]

16 hours ago, leicsmac said:

I'm not the one conflating them or through conflating them considering that the former is an issue of higher priority than the latter. Others are.

 

But the two issues are related from the standpoint that they involve the same demographic of people.

You keep bringing it up as if that trumps everything else.  Women are killed for being women every hour of every day.  Reducing their protections to protect another vulnerable group is a stupid idea.  Especially if you consider the massively disproportionate scale of the problem.