So I took the conversation private, with many friends agreeing: there is a difference between trans women and women, and between trans men and men. It doesn’t always matter but sometimes it does. It never means anyone should be treated as lesser, rather that anyone vulnerable should be protected. Oh, and that we should be able to discuss this without beardy men shouting at us.
The 2010 act established that differences in our identity can affect the way we’re treated and that a tolerant society should accept these differences. It gave women the protected right to organise independently of men and offered pioneering protections to those undergoing “gender reassignment” i.e. trans people.
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Judges have ripped up trans rights - I'm terrified
Read MoreJudge Lord Hodge said the ruling should not be considered a triumph of one group over another, though the campaigners who brought the case, For Women Scotland, toasted the ruling with champagne. Meanwhile, trans people – who are more likely to be younger and struggle with mental health issues – were left confused and upset.
This void was filled with a slew of hate. Supposed trans rights activists threw around misogynistic slurs; at last weekend’s trans rights protests, several placards called for the hanging of JK Rowling, for all “terfs” to die and/or “suck my dick”. A statue of Suffragette Millicent Fawcett was defaced with “fag rights”, which seems both ineffectual and irrelevant to what’s happening right now.
Starmer eventually spoke up to call for “care and compassion” in the debate. But before that, he said: “A woman is an adult female, and the court has made that absolutely clear. I actually welcome the judgment because I think it gives real clarity.” Clarity? While the Equality and Human Rights Commission prepares updated guidance on the law, how is the public meant to make social sense of the ruling’s turgid legalese?
Is sex segregation just for publicly funded spaces (hospitals, prisons, schools)? Or will toilets at cafés, museums, restaurants and clubs have to follow suit? Must trans men go to female-only spaces now or would they be chucked out by “reasonable objections” to their presence? And how are the objections’ reasonability measured?
What of those who have undergone surgeries to “pass” as the opposite sex? If a trans woman no longer has a penis, is she still a biological man? Surely there’s a tipping point? Surely a person who fits every feminine ideal under the sun, indeed looks more like a cookie-cutter vision of a woman than I do, shouldn’t have to go into the toilet with men who, we all know, have been culturally led to either sexualise or stigmatise trans women? How could biological sex even be checked?
Under better leadership, the debate didn’t need to become a febrile clash between two at-risk groups. It could have been a diligent commission set up to analyse why spaces or opportunities are segregated – on the basis of sex, or gender? And then a careful update to the guidance around these.
With this, the prospective Prime Minister effectively dismissed anyone who felt protective over their hard-won sex-based rights (including one of his own MPs) as well as the minority living in a trans body (and their many allies).
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Defining a woman solely by biological sex is a step backwardsRead More
He had the hubris to think he could fly above a petty squabble, as only men can. But ultimately, back down on earth, whatever’s putting trans women off men only spaces (it’s really not just about toilets) is the same thing putting all women off: the threat of male violence. If Starmer wanted to truly soar over the bunfight, that’s what he’d address. Yes, Labour have promised to halve violence against women and girls, but until we all actually feel safer on our streets, in our relationships, at work, the promises are just that.
Ultimately, if this fraught argument has taught us anything, it’s that we desperately need a more tolerant society, where every demographic can peacefully coexist. Where we feel a lot less like we’re fighting over scraps. Where people are safe to be themselves, where no one’s identity is dependent on another person’s beliefs.
Try to calm the debate all you like, Sir Keir, but if this ruling has proven clarity then, well, I identify as a llama with 12 udders and a rainbow tail.
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