Oh how I love it when men say let’s do a compromise on women’s rights.
How the trans row will end in compromise
By comparison, debates about Brexit and Scottish independence are akin to a chorus of Kumbaya at Brownie camp. There is something about the trans issue that brings out the irrational, the visceral, the absolutist.
Ooh I bet I know what that “something” is. I bet it’s the crazy irrational brainless stubborn wacky stupid mindless unthinking daft witless nature of women. Stupid bitches need a big patronizing man to show them how to do a compromise.
We are close to a compromise on the trans issue that will satisfy neither side of a deep divide. In fact each will greet a deal with dismay. And yet a middle way is necessary on this issue that has scarred public discourse like no other in recent years.
Except who is that “we”?
It’s a different “we” depending on who is talking. When Kenny Farquharson is talking it’s reasonable decent good people like him, who all happen to be men and thus who have nothing to lose if other men do help themselves to women’s rights. When the “we” who are talking are women things look rather different…but he’s too manly and important to pause for a think about that.
What does compromise look like on the issue of trans rights? Its exact contours are still indistinct but its general shape is now discernible. A useful guide is the judgment offered by Lady Dorrian earlier this month in a case brought by For Women, a feminist campaign group.
Dorrian upheld an earlier judgment that trans women should be treated the same way as biological women under legislation to improve gender balance on the boards of public agencies. She rejected the argument that this was incompatible with the Equality Act in which, she accepted, “sex” meant biological sex.
In short, she sought to protect trans rights while upholding a biological definition of woman.
Oh that kind of “compromise.” The one where men who call themselves women still get to steal jobs reserved for women, but in return the women get…uh…nothing.
I sometimes get the feeling diehards on each side of this argument would rather lose than compromise. Defeat would require no giving of ground.
Where’s the compromise? Spell out for us exactly what the compromise part is. Telling us that putting men who call themselves women on the boards of public agencies as a way to increase the representation of women on those boards is not repeat NOT a compromise. Saying “sure, they’re not literally women, but we’re giving them the women’s places on the boards of public agencies anyway” is NOT a compromise.
A key belief of gender critical feminism is that a man can never become a woman. And yet existing laws in place for decades allow a man to gain a gender recognition certificate to help them live the life of a woman.
And yet a “certificate” does not and cannot change the physical reality that a man is a man and not a woman. Imagine if a “certificate” could allow people to live the life of Kenny Farquharson; do we suppose he would cheerfully allow this someone to live in his house, drive his car, spend his paycheck?
A strand of thought is emerging that not only should extending trans rights be blocked but existing trans rights should be rolled back. At this point the distinction between gender critical feminism and social conservatism becomes hard to discern.
Define “trans rights.” Spell out exactly what they are and say what makes them rights as opposed to demands.
The compromise required of this particular side of the debate is to accept that for most intents and purposes a man can indeed become a woman in the eyes of society and in the eyes of the law.
Oh that compromise. The one that other people spell as “total submission.”
As a man, my view on the definition of woman is necessarily as an outsider. Having accepted this, I am still entitled to a circumscribed view, which I pose as a question: surely womanhood in all its glory is capacious enough, generous enough, diverse enough, to accommodate and perhaps even to welcome a small number of people who did not start life’s journey as women?
No, you’re not. You’re not entitled to jack shit when the issue is women’s rights.
There’s even more of this clueless entitled smug lecturing; read it at your peril.
