gender-critical-feminists

"For several months, Rugby Australia has been in possession of a transgender participation guideline developed by World Rugby in consultation with developmental biologists, medical experts and sport scientists. The World Rugby Guideline runs to 38 pages. It has a reference list of 45 scientific reports. It finds that it is neither safe nor fair for transgender players who are biologically male to play in women's rugby, demonstrating with significant rigour that a situation where a male player tackles a female creates "a minimum of 20 to 30 per cent greater risk for those female players". Rugby Australia is yet to respond to this document or release it publicly. On Thursday, Rugby Australia released its own trans inclusion guidelines. It contains no references to scientific reports and doesn't mention the World Rugby findings of significantly increased head and neck injury risk to female players. It lays out a procedure to allow biological males identifying as women to play women's rugby."

"Nothing exists in isolation, we are talking about a systemic societal issue which is male violence against women, and within that, abuses of power, and hierarchies in the arts. As I have said about the 'not all men [are like that]' theme – I have yet to hear of a women boss forcing a male artist to masturbate: that just doesn’t happen. That just doesn't happen."

"What has been revealed since, many times over, is that no one but Yaniv is, in these particular circumstances, guilty of harassment. Indeed, it is the women he attempted to extort money from, by abusing the tribunal system and human rights law, who have felt afraid, bullied, and preyed upon by a man claiming to be a woman."

"The truth is that, in all likelihood, most men – if not all men – have engaged in behaviour that was inappropriate, made a woman feel uncomfortable, or was even abusive. This is the lesson we should have learned from #MeToo: that the problem of male entitlement and misogynist attitudes towards women is a social one, not a personal one, and certainly not one that will be resolved by more men insisting they are feminists."

"The Canadian Human Rights Act protects women because as a society, we understand that women face discrimination based on their biological sex. But our ability to organize on behalf of women's liberation and to maintain women-only space is threatened by legislation that protects people based on "gender identity" and "gender expression." How can we argue for women's rights, based on the understanding that women are oppressed specifically due to their biological sex, if we simultaneously say that sex doesn't matter, but that "gender identity" and "gender expression" do?"

"Over a year after a man then-named Jonathan Yaniv filed multiple complaints against British Columbia estheticians who declined to wax his balls, the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal has ruled against the now-named 'Jessica.'"

"[On Lindsay's experience of being cancelled] My publisher was harassed. People who worked with me were harassed. Now, bear in mind, I'm not a public figure and all of this was kind of bubbling under the surface for about seven months. People trying to get me fired from things, my income tanking and me not really 100 per cent knowing why. And then it burst onto Twitter in February 2020, quite a febrile time just before a lockdown when a young poet I've never met called me a terf and tried to harass a small publisher to drop me from their programme. I retaliated of course, and then the Scottish Poetry Library got involved issuing a statement. opposing calls for no platforming, they fought against other poets, which led to almighty hell and the SPL accused of institutional transphobia and all of the time this has been reported in the papers with my name sort of attached to it, but people weren't 100% sure what I'd done, just that you got to avoid me now."

"[Introducing her "Save Women's Sport Bill"] Women’s sport exists to provide separate competition for females, in acknowledgement that males have numerous physical advantages over females in the sporting arena. When the bill comes to a vote, Parliamentarians will have a simple question to answer: Do you agree that women and girls have the right to play single-sex sport?"

"Under current trans activist doctrine we're not allowed to exclude a man from a woman's space if he says that he's female and I find that quite dangerous and troubling."

"What women experience as intimidating, many men read as harmless, not least in part because women are socialised to avoid conflict and respond politely, even when offended or uncomfortable."

"There is, in fact, no place in the world that has managed to make prostitution safe for women, despite efforts to regulate the industry and even to form unions of sorts. Under legalised regimes, trafficking and an illegal industry thrive."

"Some of these [beauticians] were women working out of their homes and their names were published in the papers, but [Yaniv's] anonymity was protected."

"Women's rights exist because women are born female, not because they identify with femininity, because they wear dresses, because they wear make-up. There is an understanding in law that women face oppression and discrimination because they are born female. I think we do need to protect everyone from being discriminated against, but we don't need to say that trans-identifying males are literally female to protect them from discrimination."

"I have received countless violent threats on Twitter and I don’t think they’ve banned any of them. My tweets were not violent. I think someone at Twitter wanted to get rid of me — I was one of the most well-known women talking about this, and I wasn’t apologetic. It is scary a corporation [can] start determining what we’re allowed to talk about."

"[On the emergence of the #MeToo movement since October 2017] Any institution worth its salt should have HR policies to deal with incidents like this. The problem with the arts is that you have a hell of a lot of freelancers, people working for themselves, you don't have a lot of people who you can go to and say "this has happened to me". The idea that this is all some kind of massive revelation is actually quite offensive. Because women have been talking about this for ages. And just because it was all en-masse and at once, everyone thought "Oh God"."

"I knew I had to use spoken word to talk about various things I’d been speaking about in pubs, with women online who were all saying: "Oh my God. What the hell is happening to the world?""

"So many women have contacted me with concerns about this issue (of trans activist claims on female sport) but they are worried that if they speak publicly, or even internally, they might face consequences at their club or at their work. How do Australians know that they are able to speak freely about women's rights. The idea that someone could lose their job or be banned from the sport they love for acknowledging that [biological] sex exists should be alarming to every fair-minded Australian."

"This decision, however, only further highlights the dangerous absurdity of Rugby Australia, Sport Australia, the AFL and other major sports in adopting the opposite position that 'inclusiveness' is more important than women’s safety. [...] If it is not safe or fair for a professional female rugby player to have to play against biological males, then it isn’t safe or fair for Australian women playing at their local club either."

"A woman is a female. That's it. And if you are born male there is no way to become female. It's simply not biologically possible. [...] And beyond that, why would a male ever NEED to 'become female'? I mean, by all means, be yourself, dress how you like, express yourself as you wish, in ways that make you feel good and authentic. Push back against gender stereotypes. But why that would demand one is literally the opposite sex, I do not know. 'Woman' is not simply a set of stereotypes, an outfit, a feeling. There is nothing wrong with being male or being a male who rejects masculinity. But it is ridiculous to say that if you reject gender stereotypes you are literally no longer male."

"Canada has managed to cultivate a culture that is simultaneously self-hating and self-righteous. We have no pride in being Canadian. Yet we are confident we are better than everyone else."

"[M]ales who wish to identify as women will be offered additional protections under the law; but those born female will not benefit in the same way. Of course, trans-identified people should be protected from abuse and discrimination. But why not women too? Does the SNP think the minority of individuals who choose to identify as transgender are much more at risk than women and girls? Women suffer disproportionally as victims of rape, domestic abuse, FGM, child marriage, and femicide around the world, yet in Scotland this seems to count for little."

"Dangerous women are those who challenge the status quo, defy gender norms and stereotypes, often at personal risk, and who refuse to be charming just for an easy life. Now, as in the past, and across cultures, who is deemed a "dangerous" woman is generally decided by those who oppose them."

"Being summoned by a quasi-judicial body to appear and explain why I say that males shouldn't be in female change rooms or in female sporting competitions is an indictment on the state of free speech in this country. [...] It is yet another example of the assault on truth and the assault on the very meaning of the word 'woman' by activists who are determined to remove every sex-based right that women around the world have, and allow anyone who identifies as a woman into women's sports and women's spaces. I will not be silenced."

"Eleven years old my small world lost its roof When I was told the truth of who I was, Where I should remain. Don't let her play with us, a classmate said. Her father comes home filthy."

"I was also frustrated with what #MeToo and spoken word in general often demands from women, where you’re judged on your trauma, not your craft, your ideas."

"[W]hat's the point of even having a category of woman in law if it's not defined as 'biological adult human female' if it's just a category any man can become. [...] It's meaningless."

"I don’t think it's kind to expect a woman to see a man as a woman."

"[N]ever in my wildest nightmare did I think there was anyone saying men are actually women if they just say it."

"[Asked why transwomen should be admitted to women's sports] Because the feelings of addled and entitled men are far more important than the inescapable, lived reality of little girls, teenage girls, young women and older women."

"It's always been you can't discriminate against anyone except when you can … (because it is) for a positive reason for that group. Female only spaces have existed for such a long time and there has been no controversy in it."

"We wanted to do equity crowd funding, which would allow women to have ownership in a start-up and have investment in the financial world. No equity crowd funding company would work with us, saying the trans issue was like an open wound."

"My goal is not to strip anyone of their rights. My goal is to make everybody's rights clear. If we can get clarity on this hopefully it will stop the fighting between women and trans activists. Let's try and find positives to move forward."

"It's terrifying and I've had to navigate it all through nine months of ­pregnancy. I created a social network for women, myself included, where we can relax on the ­internet away from death threats and toxic male behaviour."

"[From a series of posts on X/Twitter] I'm being taken to federal court by a man who claims to be a woman because he wants to use a woman-only space I created. [...] There isn't a woman in the world who'd have to take me to court to use this woman only space. It takes a man for this case to exist."

"Where there is a contradiction or a conflict we have to give consideration to the rights of women based on sex in these specific circumstances. In the letter I named a few — for example women in prisons, shelters from victims of violence."

"[Representing the pressure group Save Women’s Sport Australasia] Women have fought for decades to have access to similar resources (as male sport), similar media coverage, pay parity in professional sports — and now that we are actually starting to gain some ground, that's all being put at risk [by the admission of transwomen to women's sports]."

"The [[Julia Gillard|[Julia] Gillard]] amendments imposed the biggest game of wilful pretend imaginable on women and girls, now forced to suspend their reality and believe that a 'penis-owner' is a woman, because he says so. This would be laughable if it was not so serious. On ABC radio recently, Gillard asked "why aren’t we further along?" with respect to gender equality. She blames the vile sewer of social media and women's difficult balancing act of work and family life. No mention at all of the alarming and increasing impact of her government’s amendments to the SDA [Sex Discrimination Act 1984]."

"I think it’s welcome, I’m disappointed that unfortunately the Scottish Government has got itself into this mess to begin with, it didn’t have to do that."

"But what I will say, whilst this legislation, which is deeply unpopular with the Scottish public, is blocked for now, what I would like to see is that this legislation is withdrawn and I would like to see the Scottish Government say they will never implement this bill."

"Violent sex offenders have no place in the women's estate. Women's single-sex spaces for privacy, safety or therapeutic purposes are enshrined in the Equality Act 2010. These important protections will be impossible to uphold when anyone can decide they are a woman and have a GRC to prove their legal status."

"We have seen numerous instances in which the presence of just one male on a female team is enough to knock women and girls off the podium. Moreover, allowing athletes born male to compete in women’s and girls’ sports also dramatically heightens the vulnerability of female athletes to injury. Regrettably, the fear of experiencing such harm can and does result in women and girls choosing to self-exclude themselves from participation."

"[N]ot only disappointed but also very concerned about this dystopian ruling ... which distorts key concepts like sex and discrimination while dodging Australia's international human rights obligations vis-à-vis women."

"The Minister for Equalities must now report to parliament on what steps will be taken to ensure those at the government-funded Rape Crisis Scotland, who presided over the unlawful introduction of males within their single-sex service, are accountable for their part in this damaging dereliction of duty to service users."

"Amendments that could have prevented those on the sex offenders register from obtaining a gender recognition certificate (GRC) and strengthened the law on single sex prison allocation were voted down or withdrawn."

"[A] small group of people have taken it upon themselves to declare that I am not who I know I am, and they have set about making my life miserable. This case, and the unlawful and discriminatory exclusion from the Giggle app, has stolen the last three years of my life."

"There’s an idea that I wanted to put to you. It’s not my idea but the group that came up with it have said that we should be using it in the campaign. And it’s the idea of a ‘readiness thermometer’. I don’t know if anyone’s seen that idea yet. So, the idea is you can have an actual installation which is a readiness thermometer. We could put it up in Glasgow or in Edinburgh, and it can be outside and it has a dial on it that moves. So when we’ve made all the plans for the currency for instance, or we’ve set up how we’re going to do something to do with defence, or whatever it is, that dial will move and it will inch forward. And the media can look at it, everyone can look at it, and it builds that confidence with the public so that when we get up to the 100 per cent, everybody in Scotland knows we’ve solved all these problems."

"While there are a number of trans-only apps and straight women don't demand access to, say, the gay dating app Grindr, activists want Giggle removed from the Apple platform. They claim its software reads black women's faces as male. Grover says her users are women of all races from 88 countries and this is a vicious slur. Their true motivation is her female-only policy. It enrages a movement whose idea of activism is getting domestic violence refuges defunded for remaining single-sex; which can’t abide women having one damn thing."

"[Giggle was intended to be] a little corner of the Internet where women from all over the world could have a refuge away from men. It could be for serious reasons, very superficial reasons, or very practical reasons. It would be a place without harassment, 'mansplaining', 'dick pics', stalking, and aggression, and other male patterned online behaviour. A place to vent and get advice from other women and find out what was happening in the real world in a female-only environment."

"Not everyone’s gender identity matches the reproductive organs they were born with therefore you have been reclassified as a birthing person rather than a mother. Now are you ready to try chest feeding?"

"We didn't want this culture war either. Neither does anyone else, but when women were erased as a legal class, dissenters were punished, and the gender botherers came for our children, we would not be silent."