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As LGBTQ lobbies get ever stronger, normal life will continue to recede further and further into #PCMadness
It's time for sane people to stand up against this lunacy
‘It will DESTROY women’s sports’: Tennessee governor Bill Lee wades into transgender athletes row
11 Feb, 2021 12:46
Governor of Tennessee Bill Lee. © AFP
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee announced this week that allowing transgender female athletes to compete against women in schools sports would "destroy women's sports" as controversial legislation deeming the practice "unfair" advances.
Lee made the statement after a bill gained steam which would mean that middle and high school athletes must only compete against athletes under the gender which had been assigned to them at birth, arguing that the boys are often physically more advanced than girls and that allowing the athletic mixing of people of different biological sexes could lead to avoidable injuries.
The legislation would in effect ban middle and high schoolers in the state under assumed genders from taking part in sports.
The debate is the latest in a string controversial legislative moves, some of which met a dead end last year in both of Tennessee's chambers amid criticism that it discriminates against transgender children.
Proponents of the bill say, however, say that it is ultimately designed to promote fairness and gender equality in sports.
"The bill is discriminatory in and of itself, but it's also misleading," said Chris Sanders, Tennessee Equality Project Executive Director. "They are not providing a path for everyone to play, they are picking a group of people and trying to find a way to sit them out."
Debate amped up early in the Joe Biden administration after the United States president issued an executive order which bars gender discrimination on the basis of gender identity, essentially mandating that children be allowed to compete athletically under any chosen gender.
"Children should be able to learn without worrying about whether they will be denied access to the restroom, the locker room, or school sports," the Biden administration said in part.
However, Governor Lee is among those who have pushed back against the executive order, describing it as another example of federal overreach.
"Transgenders participating in women's sports will destroy women's sports," Lee said. "It will ruin the opportunity for girls to earn scholarships. It will put a glass ceiling back over women that hasn't been there."
Sanders, though, isn't buying it and described the legislation as being "demeaning" to Tennessee's transgender community.
"How a small group of transgender students are going to destroy women's sports is baffling," he said. "The governor needs to learn more about transgender people and engage directly with the community."
The debate places both sides of the discussion, according to them at least, on similar ground of wanting to safeguard sports - with Gov. Lee backing the bill on the grounds of fairness and equality of opportunity for female athletes while, on the other side of the coin, its detractors bemoan the lack of opportunity for children who identify as being transgender.
"It's a scientific fact males are much stronger (in their) upper body and in the big muscles of the body than the females are," Tennessee Rep. Glen Casada said, adding that the bill is "based in science."
"What we are doing here is attempting to protect the females who would compete as males in field hockey and wrestling and these other sports."
Precedent shows, though, that the legislation might face federal opposition. In August, a similar debate was struck down when a federal judge in Idaho ruled that the state cannot disallow transgender girls from playing on female sports teams.
Academics bash draft plan to SWAP biological sex for gender identity in upcoming Scottish census
11 Feb, 2021 12:32
Pedestrians walk in Princes Street in Edinburgh, Scotland, Britain March 4, 2020.
© REUTERS/Russell Cheyne
A group of academics has protested against a draft proposal by the Scottish authorities to replace biological sex with gender identity when collecting census data, arguing the change would spell disaster for researchers.
In a letter published by the Times, several professors from across the UK said they had deep concerns about how data will be collected for the nation’s upcoming census.
When the UK census kicks off in March, the Office for National Statistics will ask if a person’s gender identity is the same as their legal sex, and, if not, will invite them to clarify what it is. Scotland, however, has postponed its own census until 2022, due to the Covid-19 crisis.
Although hailed as a victory for the trans community, the group of academics, from the universities of Edinburgh, Essex and Manchester, sees things rather differently. The voluntary questionnaire is “conflating two distinct variables, of biological sex and gender identity”, they wrote, adding that information about gender identities is welcome, but can only be “properly understood” in combination with data on sex.
Even more troubling, according to the professors, is that Scotland plans to do away with collecting data on biological sex altogether.
The academics pointed to a draft proposal by Roger Halliday, the Scottish government’s chief statistician, who has called for the practice of all data collection on biological sex to be ended except in certain “exceptional circumstances”. The government should focus instead on “gender identity”, Halliday suggested in his recommendation.
Condemning the policy, the letter argued that “no robust evidence or argument has been provided to support such a fundamental change”.
The Scottish government pushed back against the criticism, arguing that the allegations are “not true”, because no formal guidance on the matter has been published yet.
Although some details about data collection have yet to be finalised, the upcoming census will mark the first time that people in Scotland can identify themselves as transgender in their responses to the questionnaire.
The professors ended their letter by warning that researchers would be deprived of the valuable data used to study the “full spectrum of public policy areas”, should biological sex be replaced by self-identified gender.
We are on the brink of losing robust, high-quality data on sex in the UK. Once gone, we may never get it back.
The letter received accolades from the Campaign for Common Sense, which advocates for civil discourse on a range of hot-button issues facing the UK.
The group warned that “self-ID will be introduced [through] the back door,” should the proposed changes to the census be made.
Others suggested that opponents to the changes were dabbling in transphobia. The Equality Network, an organisation that campaigns for trans rights, claimed that “insisting” the question related to sex refers only to biological sex at birth would “deny” trans people their lived identity.
I'm sure it will be extremely traumatic for them to check that box.
The controversy comes amid efforts to make public services more inclusive for trans people in the UK, sparking debate about whether some initiatives go too far. Earlier this week, the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust told its maternity-unit staff it was launching language guidelines to show support for “trans and non-binary birthing people”. The new policy means that doctors, nurses and midwives will heretofore refer to a “birthing parent” rather than “mother”. In addition, references to “breast milk” will be replaced with “human milk”.
Backstep:
‘I regret the apology’: Australian bookstore backtracks after apologizing for hosting ‘transphobic’ writer in 2018
11 Feb, 2021 18:22
Melbourne bookshop Readings has backtracked after being pressured into making an apology (4th story on link) over a 2018 appearance by feminist author Julie Bindel. The apology was demanded by a non-binary author before a Zoom reading.
Readings managing director Mark Rubbo acknowledged he’d made a mistake in hurrying to apologize for Bindel’s event three years ago, telling the UK Times that “bookshops should be homes to all ideas.”
While he admitted that “Julie Bindel has done amazing work for the women’s movement particularly in the area of violence against women,” he nevertheless insisted that “her views on transgender people are particularly controversial and have caused distress in that community.”
He blamed the store’s rush to apologize on “the fact that we programmed an event with [trans author] Juno Dawson” and called the apology “an ill-considered attempt to acknowledge the distress that our event with Julie Bindel may have caused even though it occurred some time ago.”
However, it wasn’t Dawson who had impatiently (and publicly) demanded the apology. Alison Evans, a self-identified non-binary writer of “queer sci-fi for young adults,” was the one who’d threatened to back out of a February 25 Zoom event with Dawson if Readings did not “publicly apologize for hosting Julie Bindel.”
“Where is this apology?” Evans tweeted on Monday. Readings apologized for taking too long to put up the apology before posting it later that day.
Evans eventually made their tweets private, while Dawson did not appear to weigh in on the discussion at all, other than retweeting a post from Readings about the event.
Bindel herself was dumbfounded that a bookstore that had no problem stocking Hitler’s Mein Kampf and other more traditionally disturbing works would cave to such a “ludicrous” demand.
While she was used to being “no-platformed,” and “this [was] not the nastiest example,” it nevertheless “made [her] jaw drop” – especially because she’d been so warmly welcomed at the shop in 2018, before it became politically incorrect to hold her views.
“I’ve been attacked twice now by trans activists but apparently it is the feminists who are dangerous and make everyone feel unsafe,” she explained, declaring the dustup was “about extreme misogyny and bullying.”
If we don’t all stand up against this – as businesses, individuals, political activists or just as decent people – then we’ve had it.
Those following the controversy on social media noted Readings was not broadcasting their “apology for the apology” with nearly as much volume as they had the original post.
Bindel herself weighed in on the controversy with a sarcastic tweet, noting that Rubbo owed her a more personal apology in a way that suggested she didn’t expect to get one.
While Rubbo did not explain why he had opted to apologize for the initial apology – and not contact Bindel – the reaction to it on social media had been harsh, with many followers vowing to avoid the bookshop in the future and questioning why Dawson and Evans’ “misogynist and homophobic” views should be privileged while Bindel’s should be exiled. Dawson herself had once commented that many gay men are gay “as a consolation prize, because they couldn't be women.”
Juno Dawson's views on women & their rights are particularly controversial & have caused distress across the globe. The fact that you programmed an event with Juno Dawson, then intentionally trashing Julie Bindel AND retroactively, brought that back to the surface.
— Michael_A (@Michael_AW77) February 11, 2021
“I hope destroying your reputation was worth it,” one commenter snarked.
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