[ED] Discussion: Trans Women Are not Women (Part 6)

[LondonJohn]

I provided every possible combination of the two, which makes it definitively NOT a false equivalence.

It's a false equivalence.

It seems like that would fall into the last category: a mix thereof depending on situation.

Which of those characteristics takes precedence for validity in the context of a locker room? Is sex class, as a valid protected characteristic, of higher precedence than gender identity, given that the law in the UK allows segregation on the basis of sex in appropriate situations? Or is gender identity as a valid claimed characteristic (Self-ID is still not the law in the UK) of higher precedence than sex?

They're both valid and applicable to all the above.

I'm not sure you've been reading much of what I've been writing. Because, in a nutshell, my overarching opinion is this:

If the granting of rights (notably access rights) to transwomen (I'm guessing you have no problem with things like transmen gaining access to men's facilities, since you never mention it...) results in increased risk of physical/mental harm to ciswomen, and it proves impossible to mitigate/offset that risk to a statistically-insignificant level....

.... then - and only then - should action be taken to partially or wholly revoke transwomen's rights in that situation.

When those two characteristics are in conflict, what is your personal position as a resident of the UK as well as a lawyer?

The problem is - you're starting with the near-unequivocal hypothesis that there will necessarily be a conflict between transwomen's rights and ciswomen's rights in certain areas. I reject your hypothesis, because 1) I believe it's possible in every area to take sufficient steps to mitigate the risk to ciswomen, and 2) I'll only change my mind if I see empirical evidence in any given area which tends to support your hypothesis. In other words, if real-world data shows either a zero or very small increase in risk to ciswomen, I think society should accept that. But anything worse than that, and it would be clear to me that transgender access policy should change significantly (in that particular area, of course).

Feel free. Please make them clear, direct, and without embedded presumptions.

Physician, cure thyself!

 

[LondonJohn]

Does it, though?

Your analysis seems to treat sexual assaults against female prisoners as being exclusively from other prisoners. That is very unlikely. Prisoners, particularly female prisoners, can also be sexually assaulted by guards.

The context of the judicial ruling makes it pretty clear (IMO) that the 97 sexual assaults in women's prisons over the specified period (only seven of which were carried out by non-grc transwomen prisoners) were prisoner-on-prisoner assaults.

And on this matter, I take significant issue with your opinion that it's "very unlikely" that all of these 97 sexual assaults were prisoner-on-prisoner, and correspondingly that some of them were very likely (the corollary to your "very unlikely") to have been carried out by prison guards. It's well documented that there is the occasional problem in E&W with prisoners - in both men's and women's prisons - being physically assaulted by prison guards (though to my knowledge, this problem has been dramatically reduced over the past 20 years on account of things like better reporting processes and wider use of closed-circuit TV).

But I believe that sexual assaults by guards on prisoners (whether male or female) in E&W is vanishingly rare these days. And if it were ever to happen - and given that the 97 incidents listed in the ruling must have been the ones which were reported and found to have merit - there would inevitably have been widespread media publicity if one or more of those incidents had involved a prison guard (there'd have been a criminal trial of the guard in open court).

Incidentally, if you might instead mean that you believe guards carry out sexual assaults upon women prisoners, but that (perhaps on account of coercion, threats or fear) the victims don't report these assaults (meaning they are not included in that 97 number), then ironically it would only serve to offset yet further the relative risk to a ciswoman from sexual assault by a transwoman (ie a ciswoman prisoner ought to be far more afraid of a sexual assault either by another ciswoman prisoner or by a prison guard, than by a transwoman prisoner).

In passing, it also occurs to me that we are not discounting the possibility that some of those 7 sexual assaults carried out by transwomen prisoners.... might have been against other transwomen prisoners - if that were the case, then it would further reduce the relative risk profile for ciswoman prisoners.

I have no confidence that prison vetting will improve, and fully expect it to degrade if current trends in accepting self-identification continue.

I don't share your ex-ante absence of confidence. I have a sense (but no more than a sense) that further experience and further training in this new area of operations for prison authorities may result in better outcomes, but in any event I'll wait and see what happens in real life.

 

[gnome]

Most of us are, in fact, giving tons of consideration to transsexuals. A lot of this discussion has been around the very few but important areas where it seems necessary to give due consideration to the needs and wants and concerns of both transwomen and women.

Most of us agree that transwomen are humans with human rights and valid concerns. Most of us agree that their identity should be recognized and respected, and their needs should be accommodated wherever reasonable.

Most of us agree that in cases where sex segregation is important, the conventional wisdom of self-ID and unquestioning tolerance is insufficient to come up with a good solution to what is a complex problem.

Some of us - me, for example - have come to the provisional conclusion that there are some situations where sex segregation is necessary, and that therefore biological realities must take priority over self-identification. I recognize this sucks for (some) transsexuals. Unfortunately I can't see how to reconcile this with the general principles of trans acceptance and accommodation that I believe in.

I guess what I'm looking for is a "grand unified theory" that can reconcile these two things. I've been hoping that the more vocal and engaged trans-activists participating here can help us figure out such a theory. Or at least agree on some sort of public policy position that makes the best of the problem.

I honestly believe this is where people of good conscience can meet on the issues. To honestly talk about when separation by sex instead of gender, or any separation at all, is and is not necessary, and consider whose interests prevail or what creative solutions might accommodate all. I think it would do some good to be slow to decide that the other person is arguing in bad faith.

 

[Meadmaker]

They're both valid and applicable to all the above.

I'm not sure you've been reading much of what I've been writing. Because, in a nutshell, my overarching opinion is this:

If the granting of rights (notably access rights) to transwomen (I'm guessing you have no problem with things like transmen gaining access to men's facilities, since you never mention it...) results in increased risk of physical/mental harm to ciswomen, and it proves impossible to mitigate/offset that risk to a statistically-insignificant level....

.... then - and only then - should action be taken to partially or wholly revoke transwomen's rights in that situation.

I think everyone agrees with this, or would if they thought about it.


Where I think we disagree is what constitutes harm, especially mental harm. I think a lot of the six continuations of this thread has been arguments over whether or not the harm claimed by women is legitimate.

 

[lionking]

I think everyone agrees with this, or would if they thought about it.


Where I think we disagree is what constitutes harm, especially mental harm. I think a lot of the six continuations of this thread has been arguments over whether or not the harm claimed by women is legitimate.

Yes, my view as well. In my view physical harm should not be the only measure. Psychological harm caused by seeing a penis in a woman’s locker room is a legitimate complaint.

As I might have said earlier, I don’t think reasonable people object to anyone’s choice in how to dress, who to partner with and how to live their lives. It’s when exemptions are demanded, like the “rights” of transwomen to compete against biological women in sports, and the right to use places previously reserved for biological women where I and many others draw the line.

And for those who are about to post “but the law allows it”, save your time. Sometimes laws are wrong and don’t reflect the will of the people, but rather lobby and pressure groups.

And ST can call me a TERF as much as he wants.

 

[Aber]

You're not properly/correctly assessing risk wrt this matter. Please read my explanatory post on this.

As someone who is occasionally paid for risk management, I disagree. The evidence that you provided makes it clear that including transwomen in women's prisons has increased the risk of sexual assault.

ETA: And as I also mentioned earlier, I don't think it's illogical to suppose that prison authorities will get much better over time at things like the risk-profile analysis of transwomen prisoners, and the management of those transwomen prisoners who are allowed to be housed within women's prisons. This is an extremely new circumstance for the prison authorities to be dealing with, and it wouldn't be surprising to me if, at the beginning, things might have been unfortunately slightly suboptimal.

On the basis of no evidence at all you handwave increased risk to female prisoners, and dismiss increased sexual assaults as "slightly suboptimal".

If the granting of rights (notably access rights) to transwomen results in increased risk of physical/mental harm to ciswomen, and it proves impossible to mitigate/offset that risk to a statistically-insignificant level....

.... then - and only then - should action be taken to partially or wholly revoke transwomen's rights in that situation.

This throws the precautionary principle overboard; and ignores the evidence that you provided of the increased risk in prisons.

 

[shuttlt]

If the granting of rights (notably access rights) to transwomen results in increased risk of physical/mental harm to ciswomen, and it proves impossible to mitigate/offset that risk to a statistically-insignificant level....

.... then - and only then - should action be taken to partially or wholly revoke transwomen's rights in that situation.
This throws the precautionary principle overboard; and ignores the evidence that you provided of the increased risk in prisons.

More to the point, do we actually go back when the upside of a policy fails to materialise and the downside is worse than claimed? By that point political capital is invested in it. At what point do people admit that issues with a policy are "impossible" to mitigate? It's not obvious to me that there is a clearly defined line in the sand. Supposing we think that the war on drugs has been a policy failure, how long did it take for that to be walked back?

What often happens is that when a policy is proposed, it is presented as easily walked back, so objections to it can be waved aside. After the policy is implemented, it is presented as far too difficult to walk back and in any case the policy just needs reform, so objections to it can be waved aside. An otherwise politically desirable policy has to fail very hard indeed for it to be abandoned.

 

[Elaedith]

Unless the trust's physician population numbers in the tens of thousands, 35 resignations who are also willing to testify seems like a lot for a healthy, well-managed organization.

They didn't all testify.

Two former directors (David Bell who retired, and Marcus Evans who resigned) are both highly critical of the service, the underlying ideology and lack of evidence base, and the role of political lobbying by activists. Bell testified along with a few others.

Full judgment here in case anyone is interested.

 

[TomB]

It's a false equivalence.
...
If the granting of rights (notably access rights) to transwomen (I'm guessing you have no problem with things like transmen gaining access to men's facilities, since you never mention it...) results in increased risk of physical/mental harm to ciswomen, and it proves impossible to mitigate/offset that risk to a statistically-insignificant level....

The highlighted part is...well, I'm not sure if it quite constitutes a strawman, but it's closely related.

First, EC is female and is not presuming to speak for males as to their concerns. Second, the concerns of males regarding private spaces are not the same as the concerns of females, so its not an equivalent situation. Third, given the premise behind the perception of increased risk of biological males gaining access to women's spaces, the increase risk of biological females gaining access to male spaces is not to the males, but to the females who choose to access those spaces. And as far as I know, it would be a choice. I haven't seen anyone suggesting that a trans-person would forfeit the privilege of accessing the space associated with their sex (as opposed to gender).

.... then - and only then - should action be taken to partially or wholly revoke transwomen's rights in that situation.

Bot overall, I agree with the exception of the highlighted above. It is my position that good practice in making laws is to attempt to identify and close loopholes that can be exploited and identify and mitigate potential problems before you put the law into effect. This should be done before enacting the law.

The problem is - you're starting with the near-unequivocal hypothesis that there will necessarily be a conflict between transwomen's rights and ciswomen's rights in certain areas.

A significant number of women assert that there will be a conflict. I am not female, and therefore don't think I can state with any authority that they are wrong. Even if I might think they likely are incorrect in some areas, I think it's important to take those concerns seriously until they can be convincingly demonstrated to be unfounded. And I'm not the jury as to what constitutes "convincingly."

I reject your hypothesis, because 1) I believe it's possible in every area to take sufficient steps to mitigate the risk to ciswomen,

I agree, for the most part, but as above, I think that mitigation should be attempted proactively, rather than as a response after the fact.

and 2) I'll only change my mind if I see empirical evidence in any given area which tends to support your hypothesis. In other words, if real-world data shows either a zero or very small increase in risk to ciswomen, I think society should accept that. But anything worse than that, and it would be clear to me that transgender access policy should change significantly (in that particular area, of course).

There are two problems with this section: first, testing your hypothesis requires putting people at risk in order to test the extent of that risk before deciding whether that risk should be mitigated.

Second, you deem a "very small increase in risk to women" as acceptable. What is very small? Who decides what "very small" means? And is that "very small" increase in risk acceptable to the people it applies to?

 

[theprestige]

I'm guessing you have no problem with things like transmen gaining access to men's facilities, since you never mention it...

By now it should be obvious that it's the same exact problem: Forcing females to be vulnerable around males when they don't feel safe doing so.

If you were to require transmen to use male facilities, I'd have the exact same objection, for the exact same reason, that I have to the requirement that female facilities admit transwomen.

 

[xjx388]

The discussion is not about whether your fellow posters are TERFs, transphobic, etc and it’s not about what their motivations are. Please discuss the topic and not those things. I’ve edited a few posts. I’m sure we would all hate to have this thread put on moderated status again.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: xjx388

 

[AcesHigh]

Transgender prostitutes in Brazil face higher levels of sexual violence.

I'd also like to take a moment and point out that the risk to those transwomen comes from... hold your breath... MALES.

And your proposed solution to the risk to transwomen from males is to subject females to additional increased risk from males.

Why do transwomen need to use the female restroom? Because if they don't, they're at risk from males. Allowing transwomen to use the female restrooms, however, also grants access to females for even more males. Same logic goes for prisons, locker rooms, shelters, etc.

Why should females have to face materially increased risk from males in order to protect some males from other males? Why do you not care at all about the risk to those females?

while I don´t exactly doubt about the data, what is the source?

 

[Lithrael]

Full judgment here in case anyone is interested.

Seems like a pretty fair finding. Sounds like she went ‘we should really be writing some more things down, like some standardized best practices guidelines for a start,’ and ‘if enough people aren’t on point you can end up with a whole jimmy saville type of a situation’ and everyone went ‘ugh, we’re already overworked, shut up’ and ‘oh so you’re calling us paedo enablers?’ Plus a bunch of standard hostile office grapevine and end-run-perception issues.

Given the stupid appointment wait times described towards the beginning of the document it does sound like these guys are chronically understaffed so I’m not shocked everyone is so combative about everything.

 

[LondonJohn]

Speaking as someone who assesses risk on a daily basis as part of my profession, Elaedith has assessed risk properly. Each male person in a female prison represents a significantly higher risk of sexual assault than any given female in that prison does.

Then I question your competence in this area as well.

A great white shark hunting for food in the vicinity of a healthy 50-year-old man swimming off the Pacific coast of the US poses a far, far greater threat of death to that man.... than the threat posed to that same man of drowning after getting into difficulties in the water.

And yet

This man has far, far more to fear from drowning of his own accord than from being fatally injured by a great white shark.

Why?

Because despite the fact that there are a good many great white sharks off the US Pacific coast, the actual chances of the man happening to find himself in close proximity to a great white hunting for food are gigantically lower than the chances of the man getting into serious difficulties all by himself in the water.


If your argument made sense, then it would also make sense to hunt every great white shark off the US Pacific coast to extinction.

But fortunately (especially fortunate for the great white shark) your argument doesn't make sense. And likewise, re the "transwomen in women's prisons" issue, the fact remains: a proper risk analysis, based upon empirical evidence, shows that ciswomen prisoners in women's prisons are far, far more at risk of sexual assault from other ciswomen prisoners than from transwomen prisoners. And that's the only metric which matters.


(My mind is also drawn towards that oft-quoted statistic that, in US households which have swimming pools and handgun ownership, waaaaay more under-6 children in those households die in pool-related accidents than from accidental handgun usage. So if state or federal government truly were looking for the single best way to protect those children from the risk of death, they ought to look at banning swimming pools before banning handguns)

((NB: just for the avoidance of doubt, I'm totally opposed to the concept of private gun ownership. But that's of no relevance when it comes to the correct understanding of relative risk in that last example))

 

[LondonJohn]

The highlighted part is...well, I'm not sure if it quite constitutes a strawman, but it's closely related.

First, EC is female and is not presuming to speak for males as to their concerns. Second, the concerns of males regarding private spaces are not the same as the concerns of females, so its not an equivalent situation. Third, given the premise behind the perception of increased risk of biological males gaining access to women's spaces, the increase risk of biological females gaining access to male spaces is not to the males, but to the females who choose to access those spaces. And as far as I know, it would be a choice. I haven't seen anyone suggesting that a trans-person would forfeit the privilege of accessing the space associated with their sex (as opposed to gender).

Bot overall, I agree with the exception of the highlighted above. It is my position that good practice in making laws is to attempt to identify and close loopholes that can be exploited and identify and mitigate potential problems before you put the law into effect. This should be done before enacting the law.

A significant number of women assert that there will be a conflict. I am not female, and therefore don't think I can state with any authority that they are wrong. Even if I might think they likely are incorrect in some areas, I think it's important to take those concerns seriously until they can be convincingly demonstrated to be unfounded. And I'm not the jury as to what constitutes "convincingly."

I agree, for the most part, but as above, I think that mitigation should be attempted proactively, rather than as a response after the fact.

There are two problems with this section: first, testing your hypothesis requires putting people at risk in order to test the extent of that risk before deciding whether that risk should be mitigated.

Second, you deem a "very small increase in risk to women" as acceptable. What is very small? Who decides what "very small" means? And is that "very small" increase in risk acceptable to the people it applies to?

I don't have time to do a line-by-line response.

But to address your final two paras (and it's something which has wider application across the, erm, *passionate* views of some):

We know - and we have vast databases of evidence to prove it beyond all doubt - that recently-qualified 17-25-yr-old male drivers cause hugely disproportionate numbers of deaths or serious injuries to themselves, their passengers, and other road users & pedestrians. So we know that all sorts of people on (or near) the roads are at very significantly increased risk of death or serious injury courtesy of these young male drivers.

And yet...... (I'd hope the reader might be able to follow this one through to its logical conclusion, and be able to apply it to matters arising in this thread)

 

[Ziggurat]

And likewise, re the "transwomen in women's prisons" issue, the fact remains: a proper risk analysis, based upon empirical evidence, shows that ciswomen prisoners in women's prisons are far, far more at risk of sexual assault from other ciswomen prisoners than from transwomen prisoners. And that's the only metric which matters.

No, it's not the only metric which matters. You keep referring to proper risk analysis, but you aren't actually analyzing risk at all. You're looking at overall statistics. But overall statistics are not a measure of risk.

I'll give you a trivial example of the distinction. Many women in prison will never encounter a transwoman. Such women are obviously at zero risk of being assaulted by a transwoman. Conversely, women who are in regular contact with transwomen are at higher risk of assault than the overall statistics would suggest. You cannot derive risk to an individual from a single macro statistics. The risk to an individual still matters, especially to that individual.

Furthermore, you're also ignoring the concept of marginal risk. That is, given a change in policy, what's the change in risk? If a given risk is unaffected by any possible change in policy, then that risk is irrelevant to policy considerations, no matter how large it is. Conversely, if a risk is small but it would change dramatically with a change in policy, it is worth consideration.

You're acting like you've got some better understanding of statistics than the other posters in this thread, but you really don't.

 

[Ziggurat]

So we know that all sorts of people on (or near) the roads are at very significantly increased risk of death or serious injury courtesy of these young male drivers.

And yet...... (I'd hope the reader might be able to follow this one through to its logical conclusion, and be able to apply it to matters arising in this thread)

And yet... what?

We don't prevent them from driving? That's true. One of the reasons we don't is cost/benefit analysis. There's huge benefit to letting them drive, a benefit which outweighs the cost.

You have made no real argument about the cost-benefit of allowing transwomen in women's prisons.

And again, I'd like to point out that we don't even need to treat transwomen as a single group. A fully medically transitioned transwoman (ie, sex reassignment surgery, hormone therapy) is a very different case than a transwoman with no medical treatment at all. Putting the former in a female prison isn't the same as putting the latter in a female prison, either in terms of cost OR benefit.

 

[LondonJohn]

No, it's not the only metric which matters. You keep referring to proper risk analysis, but you aren't actually analyzing risk at all. You're looking at overall statistics. But overall statistics are not a measure of risk.

I'll give you a trivial example of the distinction. Many women in prison will never encounter a transwoman. Such women are obviously at zero risk of being assaulted by a transwoman. Conversely, women who are in regular contact with transwomen are at higher risk of assault than the overall statistics would suggest. You cannot derive risk to an individual from a single macro statistics. The risk to an individual still matters, especially to that individual.

Furthermore, you're also ignoring the concept of marginal risk. That is, given a change in policy, what's the change in risk? If a given risk is unaffected by any possible change in policy, then that risk is irrelevant to policy considerations, no matter how large it is. Conversely, if a risk is small but it would change dramatically with a change in policy, it is worth consideration.

You're acting like you've got some better understanding of statistics than the other posters in this thread, but you really don't.

How many women's prisons do you think there are in England & Wales?

(There are 12 women's prisons/prison units in E&W (in fact they're all in England), with the 6 largest housing around two thirds of all women prisoners in E&W. So most - if not all - are statistically likely have at least one transwoman, in rough proportion to the overall relative number of transwomen-in-womens-prisons to ciswomen-in-womens-prisons.)

((And I'm entirely correct about relative risk. You are free to think whatever you like though, of course))

 

[LondonJohn]

And yet... what?

We don't prevent them from driving? That's true. One of the reasons we don't is cost/benefit analysis. There's huge benefit to letting them drive, a benefit which outweighs the cost.

[Appeal to emotion] Yeah I'm sure that's of great comfort to someone whose child has been killed by a speeding out-of-control 19-year-old [/Appeal to emotion]

You have made no real argument about the cost-benefit of allowing transwomen in women's prisons.

That's an interesting thing for you to say. And, I suspect, a pointer as to how you choose to identify and measure benefits (and costs). Because I - together with the governments and judiciaries of almost all progressive nation states (plus the corresponding supranational entities) - very obviously view "benefits" in this context in a very different way from you.

And again, I'd like to point out that we don't even need to treat transwomen as a single group. A fully medically transitioned transwoman (ie, sex reassignment surgery, hormone therapy) is a very different case than a transwoman with no medical treatment at all. Putting the former in a female prison isn't the same as putting the latter in a female prison, either in terms of cost OR benefit.

I agree, in broad principle at least. And we don't necessarily treat transwomen as a single group when it comes to policy enactment - e.g. transwomen prisoners in E&W are risk-assessed before being allowed to transfer to women's prisons

 

[Ziggurat]

That's an interesting thing for you to say. And, I suspect, a pointer as to how you choose to identify and measure benefits (and costs). Because I - together with the governments and judiciaries of almost all progressive nation states (plus the corresponding supranational entities) - very obviously view "benefits" in this context in a very different way from you.

You can view benefits however you like. It doesn't have to be about money, for example. If you think that making transpeople feel good about themselves is a benefit, then you can count that as a benefit. View benefits however you want.

But you still aren't making any argument that the benefits, whatever you think they are, are more than the costs.

And if you think the benefits AREN'T more than the costs, well...

I agree, in broad principle at least. And we don't necessarily treat transwomen as a single group when it comes to policy enactment - e.g. transwomen prisoners in E&W are risk-assessed before being allowed to transfer to women's prisons

Then you might actually find a bit of common ground with Emily's Cat and others, if you're willing to explore that. But you've got to start with acknowledging that they have valid concerns, or you're not going to make any progress. And so far, you've basically just denigrated their concerns. That's a mistake, both conceptually and just tactically.