Tag: Transgender

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Free Speech

Plea to Trans Lobby

Sir, As transsexual people we are dismayed by the escalation in harassment, threats and abuse directed at women and women’s groups in the name of “transgender rights activism” (“Trans lobby sent me death threats, claims professor”, Dec 6). In the past few years violent rhetoric on social media has spilt over into real life too often. After the harassment of Julie Bindel and the Working Class Movement Library, the physical assault on Maria Maclachlan and the recent use of “masked-up” tactics at a feminist meeting in Bristol, we are horrified by the intimidation and abuse directed at the human rights expert Rosa Freedman.

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Children

The rush to diagnose trans children serves no-one

On Wednesday night [21 November 2018], Channel 4 broadcast a much-debated documentary examining the staggering rise in children being referred for consultation on gender re-assignment. In the last nine years, referrals for children to the NHS’s Gender Identity Development Service have risen some 2500 per cent.

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Free Speech GRA Reform

A Woman’s Place is a Safe Port – a transsexual perspective

[Transcript of the Speech I gave at A Woman’s Place is a Safe Port, a meeting organised by Woman’s Place UK in Liverpool on 25th September 2018 to coincide with the Labour Party Conference]

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GRA Reform Personal Testimony

Trust and confidence must be restored

I am a transwoman but I am also a science teacher, and I do understand the reality of biological sex. It is the basis of the procreation of our species. There are seven and a half billion people on this planet and each has two biological parents – one female and one male – that’s real.

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GRA Reform Personal Testimony

Not all transsexuals think ‘trans women are women’

When equalities minister Penny Mordaunt launched the consultation on reforming the Gender Recognition Act she declared that “trans women are women”. Whether anyone really believes this remains to be seen. Yet our political leaders are willing to endorse this Orwellian thinking, and when it comes to the transgender debate, objective truth plays second fiddle to political expediency.

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GRA Reform Prisons

Gender Recognition must be grounded in objective evidence

As the Government Consultation on reforms to The Gender Recognition Act 2004 comes to a close, we should reflect on what is at stake. As a transsexual person I have a particular interest. While I understand the superficial attraction of self-declaration, a procedure based purely on an assertion of our own feelings, any process lacking objective evidence is vulnerable to abuse.

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GRA Reform

Transgender Debate

Sir,

The compilers of the Book of Proverbs probably had more pressing concerns than gender identity when they characterised the wicked, the foolish and the wise, but the transgender debate today (letters, Oct 3 & 4) involves the same three kinds of people.

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GRA Reform Prisons

Women are right to have concerns over trans reforms

As ministers consult the public over plans to simplify the legal process for changing gender, it’s important to recognise the valid concerns that many women have about their safety. Removing medical and legal barriers to people who want to identify their own gender is welcome, but it involves a lot more than wearing new clothes and changing names.

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GRA Reform

Society needs to dismantle sexism before revising legal definitions of sex

I am grateful to both The Economist and my fellow contributors for shedding light on such a controversial debate. The apparent clash between trans rights and women’s rights has created a storm but, in this feature, calm voices on both sides of the discussion are working towards solutions where everyone can feel secure, valued and respected for who we are.

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GRA Reform Trans Health Workers' Rights

Trade unionists can help bring light and understanding to transgender debate

WHEN the government announced a consultation on changes to the Gender Recognition Act in July last year, trans people expected that by now we might be discussing the outcome.

However, proposals to streamline and demedicalise the process to change our legal gender proved more controversial than the government perhaps anticipated. Repeated delays left a vacuum that spawned polarised and often heated discussions on social media and elsewhere.

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