Transwomen are not Women - Part 15

[Rolfe]

Glory hallelujah, I think we are in agreement.












Until you move the goalposts again.

 

[p0lka]

p0lka seems to think labels determine the rules, except when he wants to ignore the labels because of the rules. There's absolutely no internal consistency.

You understand that the rules I'm talking about are the parkrun rules yeah? Not like a thing I religiously worship or owt yeah?

You seem stuck with the concept of labels being independent of the rules, 'the rules' wasn't an abstract concept, it was the parkrun rules.

 

[angrysoba]

Speaking about the law as it stands in this country, what has to be understood is that "gender identity" is not a protected characteristic. You can't have a category which is restricted to people of one or the other "gender identity" - even if you assume that all women who do not claim a trans identity have a female gender identity, which is not a given. You cannot legally have a category of "women and transwomen".

The reason for this is that the two relevant protected characteristics are "sex" and "gender reassignment". Also that while you can have a category that restricts on more than one protected characteristic, you can't mix and match. You can have a category for male people if you exclude all female people, and one for female people if you exclude all male people. You can have a category for people with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, and you can have categories for male people who also have gender reassignment, and for female people who also have gender reassignment. But to do that, the first of these categories must exclude all people who do not have gender reassignment, the second must exclude all female people and all male people who do not have gender reassigment, and the third must exclude all male people and all people who do bot have gender reassignment.

You can add more and more protected characteristics, but you can't split them. You can't have a category that includes all females but only some males, which is what some people seem to think they can do. Parkrun and others like them are going to find this out when they get the lawyers' letters.

But I think the way parkrun can get around this is that they are not advertising gender as a protected characteristic.

How you identify is considered completely voluntary and nobody is excluded from any of the categories as far as I can tell.

If a legal challenge is to work it may have to punt he organizers down on how people think gender and age categories are assumed to work by the general public. It would probably be considered ludicrous for parkrun to say that age is merely a number you feel particularly as the age category someone falls into will change over the years.

 

[Rolfe]

But I think the way parkrun can get around this is that they are not advertising gender as a protected characteristic.

How you identify is considered completely voluntary and nobody is excluded from any of the categories as far as I can tell.

If a legal challenge is to work it may have to punt he organizers down on how people think gender and age categories are assumed to work by the general public. It would probably be considered ludicrous for parkrun to say that age is merely a number you feel particularly as the age category someone falls into will change over the years.

That won't fly. If anyone can enter any of the categories then they need to abolish the categories. Completely. You can't label a category "female" but then declare that anyone can enter it.

 

[theprestige]

But I think the way parkrun can get around this is that they are not advertising gender as a protected characteristic.

Gender is a meaningless characteristic.

And getting around sex-essentialist laws and rules is bad faith behavior anyway. If that's what parkrun wants to do, then parkrun has been captured and is part of the problem.

Which raises the question of why you're suggesting ways for parkrun to get around this.

 

[Ziggurat]

You understand that the rules I'm talking about are the parkrun rules yeah? Not like a thing I religiously worship or owt yeah?

You seem stuck with the concept of labels being independent of the rules, 'the rules' wasn't an abstract concept, it was the parkrun rules.

That applies to everything, not just parkrun. Everything has rules separate from the labels. Of course the rules aren't an abstract concept. That reinforces my point, not yours.

God, you're bad at this.

 

[angrysoba]

Gender is a meaningless characteristic.

And getting around sex-essentialist laws and rules is bad faith behavior anyway. If that's what parkrun wants to do, then parkrun has been captured and is part of the problem.

Which raises the question of why you're suggesting ways for parkrun to get around this.

I'm not arguing what they should do, but what they do do.

This is what they themselves specifically argue:

After careful consideration and extensive consultation–both in 2019 and in 2023,we decided to continue categorising people based on gender rather than sex. We feel this is aligned with us as a health and wellbeing charity that provides non-competitive socially-focussed physical activity, and allows people to identify in the way they feel most appropriate and comfortable.

 

[angrysoba]

That won't fly. If anyone can enter any of the categories then they need to abolish the categories. Completely. You can't label a category "female" but then declare that anyone can enter it.

Does the law say this?

 

[Rolfe]

Does the law say this?

Yes.

The way it works is that there are nine protected characteristics in the Equalities Act. These are the characteristics which may be discriminated in favour of, if this can be shown to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. You cannot discriminate in favour of a characteristic which is not one of the nine listed. Gender identity is not one of the listed protected characteristics.

Sex is. So you can discriminate on the basis of sex if it can be shown to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. In this case that is easy, running is a sex-affected activity, men run faster on average than women [snip all the physiological reasons for this], therefore it is legitimate and proportional to give women their own protected category so they get a fair chance at an award - whether that's "best female", or 92nd woman. What you cannot do is say this is a protected category for women, but we're going to let some men in. It then ceases to be a single-sex category. If you let some men in you have to let them all in.

Maybe Parkrun wants to say, that's fine, nobody is excluded, men and women can both enter the female category, no discrimination. But in that case they can't advertise it as a female category. I mean it's ridiculous. It's false advertising. Women will sue for sex discrimination in that they are being put in a disadvantageous position compared to men by men being allowed into the female category. And they will win.

What they seem to want to do, and what quite a lot of lost-to-the-woke organisations seem to want to do, is to create a category that is restricted to women and transwomen. But there is no way to do that under the Equalities Act. "Women plus some men" is not a legitimate category. "Men with the protected characteristic of gender reassigment plus all women" is not a legitimate category. They could run a trans-only category, because gender reassignment is a protected characteristic, but they would have to exclude anyone who was not trans. (They would probably also run foul of the "legitimate aim" part unless they presented it solely as a social event for trans people only, as having a trans identity doesn't affect how fast you run.)

It's not actually all that complicated or difficult, but organisations who don't understand it need to take legal advice, not just barge on regardless. The bottom line is that neither "women plus some men" nor "men plus some women" are legitimate categories under the Equalities Act.

 

[Rolfe]

I'm trying to imagine how it would even work. There are loads of women who hotly deny having a "gender identity". They think the whole thing is bullcrap. So if gender identity was actually a protected characteristic (which thank God it is not) you'd be excluding an awful lot of women from Parkrun. Probably a lot of men too. Also, we're constantly being told there are 72 genders, or is it 124, or maybe 236? Congratulations on being the fastest demiboy this week, Starshine.

 

[smartcooky]

It's not actually all that complicated or difficult, but organisations who don't understand it need to take legal advice, not just barge on regardless. The bottom line is that neither "women plus some men" nor "men plus some women" are legitimate categories under the Equalities Act.

I don't believe for a moment these organisations don't understand that what they are doing is illegal. It is clear and obvious to me they are feigning ignorance in the hope that no-one will notice and/or complain they are breaking the law.

Well, they need to realise that people such as Helen Joyce and Maya Forstater absolutely have noticed. All it will take is for someone to make a criminal complaint, and when it sees the inside of a court-room, its game-over - slam-dunk, because no court is going to go against the Supreme Court ruling.

 

[Orphia Nay]

Obviously, I am aware of the reaction Parkrun got when they removed the female rankings and records. I didn't think you were though, as you seemed so naive about the entire situation. It was a response to the complaints they were getting that men's times were being included in the female rankings. It's the only reasonable thing to do if you're not prepared to kick the men out of the female category, something they were apparently not prepared to do. However, predictably, this didn't satisfy the disgruntled women runners in the slightest.

A better solution is to make it explicit that the female category is for females only, and to purge all times and rankings of any men who have competed as "female".

What does it matter what the men who registered as women were, as regards "change of gender"? They're still men, still male, and will always be male. Sports are played with bodies, not delusional mental illnesses. But that raises another interesting point. Naturally, if challenged, all of these men would claim to be "transwomen". How would you police that, if that were the rule? (It's not a legal category in this country anyway.) Instead of keeping men out, you're trying to keep a subset of men out (those who are not "changing their gender") while allowing a different subset of men to remain. That's a great deal harder than simply keeping all men out. It's easy to discover who is male and who is female. It's not so easy - actually it's impossible - to tell which men really have some sort of lady feelz and which don't. Literally impossible where all you have to do to be a transwoman is to declare yourself one.

What Parkrun are doing is indefensible. It's also illegal here.

No, I'm talking about men keeping their pre-transition records as male. There's no need to amend those.

Do you know if Maya is talking about deleting those when she talks about 230 records needing deleting? She could be being vindictive.

And I'm also talking about parkrun getting rid of lots of other stats such as "most events". I was on that list, but I dgaf that the record is gone, but others were incensed and wore t-shirts saying "bring back the stats" and ran petitions.

parkrun is overwhelmingly NOT about being a trans rights battleground. It's not "completely" overrun with trans women winning female categories like you hilariously said.

The categories are labelled "male" and "female". That's where we came in - we were pointing out to you that labelling the categories as "male" and "female" does not prevent male people from entering the female category. How would you now suggest categories should be labelled to ensure sex segregation?

It may be different where you are, but where I am then if you label categories as male and female, then you are obliged to exclude females from the male category and males from the female category.

No, the categories are male, female, other, and prefer not to say. Get it right before going off the handle about it.

Your solution still doesn't stop cheats. Cheats will always find a way round rules.

Yes, results can be amended, though, and it's up to the volunteers involved to come to an agreement.

 

[Orphia Nay]

I am a parkrunner. I would report someone who cheated.

I saw a kid cheat and take a shortcut.

Would you report him?

At the end, someone else (I think his dad) mentioned it, and the kid said he felt bad about doing it.

I wonder if some new transwomen are so caught up in their new identity haven't thought yet of how their result affects others. I doubt all of them are doing it to hurt women.

 

[Aber]

II wonder if some new transwomen are so caught up in their new identity haven't thought yet of how their result affects others. I doubt all of them are doing it to hurt women.

Perhaps they see it as celebrating their womanhood?

 

[Aber]

The way it works is that there are nine protected characteristics in the Equalities Act.

Pedant mode on: Equality Act

 

[Pixel42]

I wonder if some new transwomen are so caught up in their new identity haven't thought yet of how their result affects others. I doubt all of them are doing it to hurt women.

Perhaps they see it as celebrating their womanhood?

It's weird because they are demanding the rights which women have, by virtue of being actual for real women themselves, whilst simultaneously removing those same rights from actual women.

So they insist that, as transwomen are actually for real women, they shouldn't need to compete against males in sports, just as women don't have to. But their solution is that they be allowed to compete in the women's sports leagues, which means that all actual women are now having to compete against males in sports - the very thing they say they themselves, as women, can't possibly be expected to do.

They insist that, as transwomen are actually for real women, they shouldn't have to pee/change/shower in the presence of males, just as women don't have to. But their solution is that they be allowed to pee/change/shower in the women's facilities, which means that all actual women are now having to pee/change/shower in the presence of males - the very thing they say they themselves, as women, can't possibly be expected to do.

It's the most simultaneously selfish and hypocritical rights grab since white men decided their rights should always take priority over everyone else's. Come to think of it, the majority of them are white men. Hmm.

 

[zooterkin]

I expect this can be resolved without the volunteers having to do anything on the day. The administrative level can instead be informed that there are runners misrepresenting their age or gender.

And who, in this volunteer organisation, would have the job of checking the allegations are true, and how would they go about it?

 

[smartcooky]

It's weird because they are demanding the rights which women have, by virtue of being actual for real women themselves, whilst simultaneously removing those same rights from actual women.
So they insist that, as transwomen are actually for real women, they shouldn't need to compete against males in sports, just as women don't have to. But their solution is that they be allowed to compete in the women's sports leagues, which means that all actual women are now having to compete against males in sports - the very thing they say they themselves, as women, can't possibly be expected to do.
They insist that, as transwomen are actually for real women, they shouldn't have to pee/change/shower in the presence of males, just as women don't have to. But their solution is that they be allowed to pee/change/shower in the women's facilities, which means that all actual women are now having to pee/change/shower in the presence of males - the very thing they say they themselves, as women, can't possibly be expected to do.

The very definition of cognitive dissonance!

 

[Rolfe]

No, I'm talking about men keeping their pre-transition records as male. There's no need to amend those.

Do you know if Maya is talking about deleting those when she talks about 230 records needing deleting? She could be being vindictive.

And I'm also talking about parkrun getting rid of lots of other stats such as "most events". I was on that list, but I dgaf that the record is gone, but others were incensed and wore t-shirts saying "bring back the stats" and ran petitions.

parkrun is overwhelmingly NOT about being a trans rights battleground. It's not "completely" overrun with trans women winning female categories like you hilariously said.


No, the categories are male, female, other, and prefer not to say. Get it right before going off the handle about it.

Your solution still doesn't stop cheats. Cheats will always find a way round rules.

Yes, results can be amended, though, and it's up to the volunteers involved to come to an agreement.

The "other" and "prefer not to say" categories are not relevant to this debate. I don't have to mention them every time.

Cheats will always try to find a way round the rules. Either try to prevent them, or abolish the rules. The current situation is ridiculous.

I don't recall saying that Parkrun was "completely overrun with transwomen winning female categories", but if I did, have you heard of hyperbole? Is there a particular number of cheating men that it's OK to allow to cheat? Do women just have to suck this up?

I have no idea whether anyone is campaigning to have stats recorded by men when running in the male category expunged. It seems a strange thing to propose. But hey, it's all just a bit of fun, right? Why would it matter?

 

[Rolfe]

I saw a kid cheat and take a shortcut.

Would you report him?

At the end, someone else (I think his dad) mentioned it, and the kid said he felt bad about doing it.

I wonder if some new transwomen are so caught up in their new identity haven't thought yet of how their result affects others. I doubt all of them are doing it to hurt women.

Always with the excuse to avoid criticising men.