Tuesday, March 22, 2022
This day in Herstory: Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton, Lady Stirling-Maxwell (née Sheridan); born March 22, 1808 (died June 15, 1877), was an active English social reformer and author.[1] She left her husband in 1836, who sued her close friend Lord Melbourne, then the Whig Prime Minister, for criminal conversation (adultery). The jury threw out the claim, but she failed to gain a divorce and was denied access to her three sons. Norton's campaigning led to the passage of the Custody of Infants Act 1839, the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857 and the Married Women's Property Act 1870. She modelled for the fresco of Justice in the House of Lords by Daniel Maclise, who chose her as a famous victim of injustice. (more)
Gender Dogma Threatens to Pulverize Women's Rights | Opinion
From Newsweek (USA)
By Raquel Rosario Sánchez
March 21, 2022
Earlier this month, on International Women's Day, President Joe Biden announced he will request $2.6 billion for foreign assistance programs to promote "gender equality" abroad. A week before that, during his State of the Union address, he pleaded with Congress to pass the Equality Act—a piece of legislation he vowed to enshrine as law within his first 100 days in office. The bill would, among other things, create federal protections against discrimination based on the concept of gender identity. It passed the House of Representatives last year, but is currently pending approval of the Senate.
Biden had already established the White House Gender Policy Council, tasked with "leading a government-wide effort to advance gender equity and equality both at home and abroad," and launched a National Strategy on Gender Equity and Equality to address "gender discrimination" and "work to advance gender equity and equality in the law and ensure that rights on paper are fully implemented in practice."
It appears that women's rights have now become gender rights.
You would be forgiven for forgetting that the United States was a pioneer in outlawing sex discrimination through the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Today, public policies are modifying the meaning of sex to include gender identity—when they don't erase sex altogether. The Equality Act seeks to make this the national law. … read full article
UN warned that equalities watchdog being targeted by trans activists
Women’s groups, LGB rights organisations, Lords and MPs have expressed ‘concern about recent attempts to undermine its credibility’
From The Telegraph (UK)
By Hayley Dixon
March 21, 2022
The UN has been warned that the equalities watchdog is being targeted by trans activists trying to “undermine their credibility” in a letter from more than 50 women’s groups and campaigners.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is facing a complaint about its stance on trans rights and alleged politicisation.
Writing in support of the watchdog, a range of women’s groups, LGB rights organisations, Lords and MPs have now expressed their “concern about recent attempts to undermine its credibility”.
“The British public deserves well-considered, sound legislation on human rights issues and an independent human rights institution to promote them. We believe it has such an institution in the EHRC,” the letter said.
Call for watchdog to be stripped of status
The Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (Ganhri) is currently looking at a complaint from a coalition of trans rights groups led by Stonewall which calls for the EHRC to be stripped of its “A status” which gives it access to UN committees. … read full article (web page archive)
Humiliation for Nicola Sturgeon as women's rights campaigners win gender court case and get awarded costs
After a court win including costs against the Scottish Government, For Women Scotland are congratulated for successfully defending the definition of women in official diversity policy.
From Scottish Daily Express (Scotland)
By Jessica North
March 22, 2022
Women's rights campaigners have won a court case that will protect gender representation on the boards of Scottish public authorities.
Dealing a further blow to the Scottish Government, For Women Scotland (FWS) were awarded the costs meaning the SNP administration will have to pick up their legal bill.
The SNP sought to allow men who identify as women to fill key public roles that have been earmarked for females, despite this characteristic being defined in the Equality Act 2010.
The Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018 demands authorities like parliament and the civil service strive for women to make up 50 per cent of those on the non-executive boards.
However, the inclusion of self-ID and the expansion of the legal definition of women was refuted by feminists for undermining an initiative that seeks to guarantee women's rights and representation in Scotland. … read full article
The fictional world of trans activism
There's nothing harmless about denying the truth
From UnHerd (UK)
By Kathleen Stock
March 22, 2022
When people say things like “transwomen are women”, “transmen are men”, and “nonbinary people are neither women nor men”, what do they mean? In my book Material Girls, I suggested that many of them are immersed in a fiction.
Getting immersed in fiction is a familiar state for most of us. Nearly all of us do it, and some of us do it several times a day. When you dip into a novel, binge on a box set, or even just daydream furiously about succeeding romantically or seeing your enemies fail, you’re doing it.
When immersed in a fiction, your direct aim isn’t to recognise and respond to the world as it actually is. To borrow a phrase from philosophy, your thoughts and behaviour aren’t directly “truth-tracking”. That’s usually ok, because fictions are supposed to be harmless bits of fun, or interesting encounters with possible-but-not-actual scenarios. But what they are not supposed to be are accurate reports of reality as you personally find it now. When immersed, it’s as if many of your thoughts are flying parallel to earth without touching it. … read full article
Opinion: The health establishment is failing young adults who question their gender
Why hormone prescriptions for people age 18-25 should not be written after one doctor’s visit
From The San Francisco Examiner (USA)
By Erica Anderson
March 21, 2022
In a recent consultation, divorced parents recounted that their 18-year-old son questioned his gender during senior year in high school, moved on to a university and, during the fall term as a freshman, presented as female at the student health center and was started on gender affirming hormones.
The student lacked health insurance through the university or from his parents, and so his care was transferred to the local Planned Parenthood clinic. At neither place did this 18 year old receive an evaluation by a mental health provider. In both places and during the first visits, the prescription for hormones was based upon the “informed consent” model.
The advance in acceptance for sexual and gender minorities is something for which I have advocated and applauded for years. But I have been witnessing worrisome developments in gender care. Issues with young adults are among my concerns. And I am not alone; a March 2022 journal article by Case Western Reserve University Professor Stephen B. Levine questions the limits and dangers of the informed consent model for trans-identified young adults. … read full article
Why the Left Should Welcome a Debate Over Trans Women in Sports | Opinion
From Newsweek (USA)
By Skylar Baker-Jordan
March 22, 2022
Over the weekend, a photo of transgender swimmer Lia Thomas went viral. In it, a smiling Thomas stands on a podium, having won the 500-yard freestyle at the NCAA Division I Championship. Her opponents—all biologically female—stand together on the other end in what many interpret as a show of solidarity.
The photo was like a Rorschach test: To some, it symbolized a grave injustice to girls' and women's sports. For others, it represented a triumph for transgender acceptance and rights.
Unfortunately, no robust conversation is taking place between the two sides, because one of the sides is refusing to even debate this important issue. Too many activists on the Left have adopted a "no debate" mentality. This is not only undemocratic, but it is unhealthy for the movement for trans rights. The Left must allow a robust debate over this issue, one that is brand new to many Americans and which presents real questions and conundrums. And LGBTQ activists should welcome it as a chance to once more change hearts and minds. … read full article
Superintendent Catherine Truitt contends transgender swimmer had unfair advantage
From The Pulse (USA)
By Greg Childress
March 22, 2022
State Superintendent Catherine Truitt has joined the roiling debate over whether female transgender athletes should be allowed to compete against cisgender women.
For Truitt, it’s a hard no.
At issue for the superintendent is transgender swimmer Lia Thomas’ recent domination of the NCAA women’s championship swimming competition. Thomas swims for the University of Pennsylvania.
Truitt said Olympian Emma Weyant, who swims for the University of Virginia, and Virginia Tech University swimmer Reka Gyorgy, who represented her home country of Hungary in the 2016 Olympics, were “unfairly overshadowed” by Thomas after working hard to compete at the highest level of collegiate athletics.
Weyant finished second to Thomas in the 500 meters swimming championship. Gyorgy missed the cut for the event.
“They should be the ones who are celebrated and honored,” Truitt wrote on her campaign Facebook page.
Gyorgy charges that she would have secured a spot in the finals if Thomas had not been allowed to compete. … read full article
Gov. Ron DeSantis proclamation: Florida swimmer who lost to trans athlete is 'rightful winner'
From USA Today (USA)
By Zac Anderson (Sarasota Herald-Tribune)
March 22, 2022
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a proclamation Tuesday declaring Sarasota native Emma Weyant the "rightful winner" after she lost to a transgender opponent in the NCAA 500-yard women's freestyle swimming championship event.
The governor's proclamation adds to the controversy surrounding the women's collegiate swimming championship.
Weyant is an Olympic silver medalist who graduated of Riverview High School and now swims for the University of Virginia. She lost last week to Penn swimmer Lia Thomas, who became the first transgender athlete in any sport to win a NCAA Division I championship.
Thomas's dominance in collegiate women's swimming has amplified a fierce debate about transgender athletes, one that Weyant is now drawn into. Weyant did not respond to a voicemail or text message Tuesday. … read full article
Labour is failing women
How have we reached a point where a former shadow women and equalities minster doesn’t know what a woman is?
From The Critic (UK)
By Joan Smith
March 22, 2022
There was a time when shadow ministers were expected to know what they were talking about. The shadow women and equalities minister, for instance, would be expected to know basic things like the definition of the word “woman”. Not any more, however: the current office-holder, Anneliese Dodds, couldn’t give a straight answer to the question a couple of weeks ago. Now her predecessor in the post, Charlotte Nichols, has raised the stakes even higher. Wading into the debate about men’s participation in women’s sport, the MP for Warrington North has used Twitter to blast anyone who refuses to accept that a six-foot-one male swimmer is a woman.
Harry Kane? Should he really be captaining the England women?
“As a former competitive swimmer, indeed, I know full well how much training is required for a title like this and anyone nastily trying to diminish Lia Thomas’s incredible achievement because of lazy transphobia should frankly pipe down,” Nichols wrote. “Huge congratulations to her.’
In just two sentences, Nichols managed to encapsulate everything that’s wrong with extreme gender ideology: misrepresenting people who disagree with her, smearing them as “transphobes” and denying their right to free speech. The boast about Nichols’s own prowess in the pool is an unexpected addition to the canon although she didn’t mention the sex/gender identity of the people she competed against. The only thing she didn’t do was drag in trans activists’ number one hate figure, JK Rowling, who recently reminded us how evil she is by promising to match donations of up to £1m to a children’s charity working in Ukraine. … read full article (and SUBSCRIBE to The Critic!)
'We are just guinea pigs': Women describe trauma of transitioning as teenagers
From The Washington Examiner (USA)
By Tori Richards
March 21, 2022
The number of teenagers identifying as transgender has exploded. Advocates say it protects young people from marginalization. Some experts, however, many of whom consider themselves survivors, warn against treating adolescent confusion with drugs and surgeries that have irreversible physical and psychological effects. In the first part of this series, the Washington Examiner speaks to some of these women who are still struggling with their decision years later.
The mournful post on Reddit, “My consent was not informed,” details a grim future for a woman who pulled herself out of a transgender lifestyle: weekly injections, diabetes medication, pain, lack of energy, and “who knows what else” for the rest of her life.
“I was a child, allowed to destroy my body permanently, under the assurance that I can always change my mind, and that it’s a beautiful, harmless process,” wrote Lgbtcos in February . “The informed consent model is a lie, because we are just guinea pigs to a medical experiment, my life is permanently afflicted, and I was not informed.”
The missive was on the Detrans subreddit, which currently has 23,000 members. It caught the eye of Candace Sharpe, 22, who has undergone her own hellish surgeries. She answered the post. … read full article
Mother of trans teenager: Los Angeles County killed my daughter
From The Washington Examiner (USA)
By Tori Richards
March 22, 2022
The number of teenagers identifying as transgender has exploded. Advocates say it protects young people from marginalization. Some experts, however, many of whom consider themselves survivors, warn against treating adolescent confusion with drugs and surgeries that have irreversible physical and psychological effects. In the second part of this series, the Washington Examiner speaks to the mothers affected.
Abby Martinez tried to fight back when a Los Angeles school, county social workers, and an LGBT group sought to transition her confused 15-year-old daughter.
But once Yaeli Martinez was moved into foster care and later injected with testosterone, the heartbroken mother could only watch helplessly as the girl spiraled into depression that ended when she stepped in front of an oncoming train.
"They killed my daughter," a tearful Martinez told the Washington Examiner. "They had to pick pieces of her off of the track.”
At the funeral home, Martinez begged to see her daughter for the last time, even if it was just a hand or foot.
“The gentleman from the funeral home told me there’s nothing really that you can see or recognize,” Martinez said. … read full article
To the "helpers"
(those we teach our children to trust)
From Parents with Inconvenient Truths about Trans (PITT) (USA)
March 22, 2022
It must have been so exciting to the two of you when my son mentioned to you that he was exploring his gender! You'd gotten one of those special kids that everyone talks about!
For you, his pediatrician, it likely wasn't that much excitement, since you only see him once or twice a year, and your private conversation with him was only a few minutes. But he respects you and listens to you! And it meant a lot to him that you were so positive! Treating him like he was not just some kid, but instead a special kid! Dealing with major important serious things! I remember the smug look you gave me after you had your chat, but didn’t understand it at the time.
But for you, the therapist who was counseling him every week for anxiety and depression, it must have been a thrill, as you've told me since that you don't know much about gender dysphoria! You told us parents much later, though, that you kept trying to bring it up repeatedly when he was discussing his other issues! How daring! (He brought up suicide, too, at one point, in both cases possibly because the school had a program on it. I know you didn’t encourage more focusing on suicide. Why? With gender, did you realize you were nurturing a poisonous seed of misinformation that would explode like a time bomb when he developed severe mental distress about other things, later on? Do you know what the words “iatrogenic harm” mean?)
For you two professionals, it sounds like it was such an adventure!!! But I ask, given that you, the pediatrician, are not an expert on my kid, you barely see him, and you, the clinician, are not expert on gender dysphoria, according to you….why did neither of you see fit to mention this questioning was going on? … read full article (and SUBSCRIBE to PITT!)
I stand with JK Rowling — women need space in which to be women
From Evening Standard (UK)
By Nimco Ali
March 22, 2022
One of the UK’s largest women’s charities has today published its position on single-sex spaces. Women’s Aid, whose mission is to promote the protection of women and children who have suffered from or are exposed to domestic abuse has, after a year-long consultation, rejected the growing trend towards gender-neutral spaces. In a compassionate yet punchy statement, the organisation said: “The provision of single-sex domestic abuse services is a founding principle of Women’s Aid, and we will defend it.”
It shouldn’t be controversial to say that women need space in which to be women, but it is. It is wild to think that this statement will spark outrage online, but it will. That the chief executive of this incredible organisation will today be fearing for her safety and that of her child — just for doing her job. But that’s the world we are living in right now.
Last week after tweeting “thank you JK Rowling”, I was attacked on Twitter by former equalities minister Lynne Featherstone and countless others who called me transphobic for merely thanking someone who put her head above the parapet to stand up for women. … read full article
Don't mix with money.
From Writing Behavior (Canada)
By Eliza Mondegreen
March 22, 2022
If I may propose a warning label for pharmaceuticals: Don't mix with money. Here are just a few reasons why:
- Running Phase I drug trials on prisoners, homeless people (recruited from Eli Lilly-funded homeless shelters), undocumented immigrants, and people recently released from prison unable to find other employment, people in developing countries where there's little to no oversight (not that there's any real oversight in the above US cases either!).
- Relying on for-profit IRBs, so you can buy your way to "yeah, this checks out."
- Elevating 'thought leaders' who promote diagnoses and drug treatment regimens... Here are a few ways pharma companies can prop up a thought leader's career: funding their research and travel, ghostwriting articles to be published under their names, giving them public-speaking training, assigning them as investigators on sketchy clinical trials to pad their resumes, and just giving them tons and tons of cash and perks (not a complete list). Oh, and silencing their critics by attacking their critics' funding, research, and employment.
- Mimicking scientific research without doing scientific research, including burying results that don't sell drugs — whether signs of ineffectiveness, adverse events, or deaths. … read full article (and SUBSCRIBE to Writing Behavior!)
Women’s Aid: Single sex services statement
Position regarding member services and direct services to survivors
From Women’s Aid (UK)
March 22, 2022
Following a consultation with members and stakeholders, we are now able to publish our organisational position on single-sex services. We are proud to have a range of services, including single-sex services and services that meet the needs of trans and non binary people, in our federation.
Full statement here:
About Women’s Aid
Women’s Aid is a national charity. Our charitable objects are: “To promote the protection of women and children who have suffered from, or are exposed to, domestic abuse, including the preservation and protection of their mental and physical health, the relief of need and the promotion of research and education concerning gender-based violence.”
Women’s Aid is a membership organisation with over 160 members that provide support and accommodation to survivors of domestic abuse and their children across England. Each individual member organisation is autonomous providing a wide range of support services including women’s refuges, 1-2-1 support, dispersed accommodation, counselling, helpline, and groups. The membership includes many specialist services led by and for marginalised communities. Women’s Aid also runs national online support services, as well as providing expert training and consultancy to a range of external agencies and professionals. … read full statement