The Gender Debate

[TxRover]

5 hours ago, virginton said:

If an adult wishes to undergo treatment (including surgery) to transition gender, then that's not an issue. 

You're discussing children being given puberty blockers without the need for their legal guardian's consent or any serious psychological scrutiny into the case first to approve their suitability for use. That's not ethical - that is tantamount to child abuse for the inevitable set of cases where the patient recognises at a later date that they have made a terrible mistake and have had consequential damage done to their lives. 

Your 'two wrongs make a right - fight suppression!' approach to ethical medicine is utter nonsense. 

Never suggested children be treated without adult involvement, but I will draw a line at requiring it to always be the/a parent. There are a number of case where requiring parental consent is tantamount to automatic denial, there has to be a means to allow a bypass, with appropriate controls and monitoring.

[Boo Khaki]

13 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

They said their objections were not against the principle but conflict with the EA.

I personally think asking them to sort it out puts the ball firmly in their court - no excuses then.

 

What makes you think the Westminster government would do anything more than shrug and move on?

They are not about to go altering the EA to accommodate a Scottish Government Bill, when the likes of Badenoch are already agitating for the EA to be amended to effectively render transpeople legally non-existent.

As I said, Jack made it clear at the point of announcing the s35 in the HoC that as far as they were concerned, this was the end of the matter, and it's entirely up to Holyrood to resubmit the bill in a format that is agreeable to WM even though no such format exists. It's entirely unrealistic to expect the Westminster govt to amend a UK Act pertaining to reserved matters just to facilitate a bill pertaining to devolved ones. Isn't going to happen in a million years, even if the WM government of the day wasn't already utterly hostile to the aims of the SG Bill in the first place.

[Theroadlesstravelled]

What about the families that can’t afford the thousands of dollars required for puberty blocker treatment? Or the ongoing cost of medical treatment into adulthood?

A large percentage of trans people are white, middle class and it’s apparent why.

[Trogdor]

1 hour ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

So legal challenge is going to go ahead.

I've been a consistent supporter of trans rights on these threads but politically think this is not the right move.

They should have kicked it back to the UK Government to sort out.

Aye, another expensive defeat beckons.

[welshbairn]

The UK Government made no comment as the bill took 6 years to progress through Holyrood, and now have made no suggestions of how it could be amended to avoid the so called conflicts with the ERA. Their complaints about the bill have to be reasonable to merit a section 35 order, their statement of reasons is no such thing. They've got two motives for intervening imo, first to play culture wars which they think will do them good in the polls, and second and more serious, to set a precedent for using Section 35 whenever they want. At least a legal challenge will force them to specify exactly where the conflict arises, if it's the same as before I think the case has a good chance of winning as that was laughable.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/statement-of-reasons-related-to-the-use-of-section-35-of-the-scotland-act-1998/html-version

This bit in particular was just bizarre.

Quote

A full GRC has the effect of changing the sex that a person has as a protected characteristic for the purposes of the 2010 Act, meaning that transgender women with a GRC are legally considered as female claimants and comparators, and transgender men as male claimants and comparators.

Where an equal pay claim is brought by a claimant with a GRC, or a comparator with a GRC is used in the claim, an individual may have been treated as the opposite to their current legal sex for a significant proportion of their career with better or worse terms during this time than the comparator or claimant respectively. This may lead to the comparator test identifying an equal pay issue where one does not properly exist, or indeed failing to identify such an issue due to an individual’s status as the holder of a GRC.

Where a claimant may deem a colleague to be the most appropriate comparator of the opposite sex, but that colleague then receives a GRC, the 2010 Act would not enable them to be cited as the comparator in the claim. This could prevent the comparator test from accurately identifying what might otherwise have been deemed unlawful.

 

[welshbairn]

Humza.. 

Quote

Westminster gave no advance notice of this attack, asked for no amendments to the Bill in its nine-month passage through Parliament and refused outright to work with the Scottish Government on any potential changes. A legal challenge is now our only means of defending our Parliament’s democracy from the Westminster veto.  

 

[AyrExile]

29 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Humza.. 

 

Will Humza be sharing more around the legal advice he has recieved suggesting this is a viable battle to contest? Considering the majority of the scottish public have more important issues currently then it might help to see this was more than a phone call with his pal Anwar. Most people would likely rather the fees were spent on another motorhome than keeping their wee green pals happy

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by AyrExile

[andyg83]

4 hours ago, carpetmonster said:

It’s good for Matt Walsh. He makes lots of money by screaming about it. 

Matt Walsh is a roaster but even he manages to land the odd decent point in the "debate",  such is the polarisation on both sides. 

The legislation from Scottish Parliament has no widespread public support so as much as I don't like UK government running roughshod over devolved matters they are right to intervene on this issue. 

Edited April 12, 2023 by andyg83

[carpetmonster]

8 minutes ago, andyg83 said:

Matt Walsh is a roaster but even he manages to land the odd decent point in the "debate",  such is the polarisation on both sides. 

The legislation from Scottish Parliament has no widespread public support so as much as I don't like UK government running roughshod over devolved matters they are leveling right to on this issue. 

Blair’s removal of Clause 28 was also unpopular, and was whipped against by the Tories in the Commons and rejected by the Lords at the first attempt. Do these arguments sound eerily familiar?

The main argument in support of Section 28 was to protect children from "predatory homosexuals" and advocates seeking to "indoctrinate" vulnerable young people into homosexuality.^{[note 10]}

Whether you like a policy or don’t, an independent Scotland can’t go running to Westminster for bills that pass by supermajority if folks don’t like them. If Holyrood doesn’t challenge it they’re essentially saying ‘aye you’re right, we are just a wee pretendy parliament, we’ll sit back down now’ 

 

 

[andyg83]

11 minutes ago, carpetmonster said:

Blair’s removal of Clause 28 was also unpopular, and was whipped against by the Tories in the Commons and rejected by the Lords at the first attempt. Do these arguments sound eerily familiar?

The main argument in support of Section 28 was to protect children from "predatory homosexuals" and advocates seeking to "indoctrinate" vulnerable young people into homosexuality.^{[note 10]}

Whether you like a policy or don’t, an independent Scotland can’t go running to Westminster for bills that pass by supermajority if folks don’t like them. If Holyrood doesn’t challenge it they’re essentially saying ‘aye you’re right, we are just a wee pretendy parliament, we’ll sit back down now’ 

 

 

This is different from Clause 28. It's at best a lazy narrative to suggest otherwise.

Self ID is a total mess due to the different factions within the trans umbrella.

[carpetmonster]

2 minutes ago, andyg83 said:

This is different from Clause 28. It's at best a lazy narrative to suggest otherwise.

Self ID is a total mess due to the different factions within the trans umbrella.

Please explain. 

[andyg83]

I can't actually be arsed to be honest mate. 

Read the previous 120 pages and pay attention to what dundee_f_c has posted?

Edited April 12, 2023 by andyg83

[Trogdor]

Anyone thinking the UK Government just winged this and didn't seek the opinion of legal counsel before blocking the bill hasn't been paying attention. 

[carpetmonster]

3 minutes ago, andyg83 said:

I can't actually be arsed to be honest mate. 

Read the previous 120 pages and pay attention to what dundee_f_c has posted?

I’m still waiting on a response to me asking to cite at least 2 things they’ve claimed as well. 

[andyg83]

I can't keep up. Got better things to do.

[carpetmonster]

Just now, andyg83 said:

I can't keep up. Got better things to do.

Of course you have. 

[welshbairn]

1 hour ago, AyrExile said:

Will Humza be sharing more around the legal advice he has recieved suggesting this is a viable battle to contest? Considering the majority of the scottish public have more important issues currently then it might help to see this was more than a phone call with his pal Anwar. Most people would likely rather the fees were spent on another motorhome than keeping their wee green pals happy

 

From my perspective it's the casual and possibly unfounded use of section 35 for the first time that's the major issue. It should be tested. 

[welshbairn]

11 minutes ago, Trogdor said:

Anyone thinking the UK Government just winged this and didn't seek the opinion of legal counsel before blocking the bill hasn't been paying attention. 

Did you read their statement of reasons? 

[f_c_dundee]

19 minutes ago, carpetmonster said:

Blair’s removal of Clause 28 was also unpopular, and was whipped against by the Tories in the Commons and rejected by the Lords at the first attempt. Do these arguments sound eerily familiar?

The main argument in support of Section 28 was to protect children from "predatory homosexuals" and advocates seeking to "indoctrinate" vulnerable young people into homosexuality.^{[note 10]}

Whether you like a policy or don’t, an independent Scotland can’t go running to Westminster for bills that pass by supermajority if folks don’t like them. If Holyrood doesn’t challenge it they’re essentially saying ‘aye you’re right, we are just a wee pretendy parliament, we’ll sit back down now’ 

 

 

Section 28 is a genuine example of politicians trying to legislate based on their beliefs. 

 

There is clearly nothing wrong with kids learning in an age appropriate way about different types of relationships and families. 

 

That's not what we're seeing here. It's not the same thing as protecting the rights of gay people. 

 

There is no medical element for that.

 

It doesn't require anyone else to actively suspend disbelief and agree that gender identity exists if they don't believe it.

 

All it requires is for folk to be a bit more accepting and not be dicks to people in same sex relationships.  Because it affects them precisely 0%. 

 

It involves simple changes to law and doesn't affect existing laws in an adverse way.

 

Nothing like what the recent bill was attempting to do. 

 

I've never been a supporter of either the Tories or the SNP  (in the politically homeless camp currently tbh) but it was the correct thing for Westminster to intervene on this matter. It may have got majority support from *politicians* from all parties, but a lot of them ignored and dismissed concerned constituents asking questions. So I agree that it's not representative of public opinion in Scotland.

 

Why do you think gender recognition legislation was quietly tacked onto other proposals in Ireland? Because it was known that it would get even less support than changes to law about marriage.

 

The whole thing got so far deliberately on the QT in the UK and in Scotland and now that sunlight has eventually hit the issue, many people have questions about the proposals. 

[f_c_dundee]

30 minutes ago, carpetmonster said:

Please explain. 

See above, I've tried to explain the difference.

Edited April 12, 2023 by f_c_dundee