Good for David Lewis!
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I'm a woman on Wednesdays
(342 Posts)blogs.spectator.co.uk/2018/05/meet-the-man-standing-to-be-a-labour-party-womens-officer/
Sometimes it’s hard to be a woman. Except in the Labour Party, when it’s surprisingly easy. Just ask David Lewis. David, 45, is a member of the Labour Party. After several years of supporting the party, he became a full member last year having been “inspired” by Jeremy Corbyn. Tomorrow, David will be a candidate for election as an office-holder in his Constituency Labour Party in Basingstoke. He is standing for election as women’s officer, a post that Labour rules say can only be held by a woman. David is standing for that post because he is a woman. On Wednesdays, at least. When we spoke yesterday, he put it like this:
“I self-identify as a woman on Wednesdays, between 6.50am when my alarm goes off and around midnight when I go to bed.”
What does self-identifying as a woman mean? In what way is David a woman on Wednesdays?
“My womanness is expressed by my saying ‘I self identify as a woman’ now and again on Wednesdays. I make no changes in my behaviour or my appearance. I keep my name, David and my male pronouns. I wear the same sort of clothes I wear the rest of the week. I keep my beard. I enjoy the full womanness of my beard.”
The Basingstoke Labour Party last week accepted the womanness of David and his beard. He is listed as a candidate for election as CLP Women’s Officer, a post that involves encouraging women to join the party and generally speaking for women, their concerns and their experiences. But who is a woman? In the Labour Party, among other places, the answer to that question is not always as simple as some people might expect.
Labour operates a policy of self-definition: if someone defines themselves as a woman, the party recognises that person as a woman, with no question, verification or scrutiny of that definition. This approach is intended to make the party inclusive and supportive of transwomen, people who were born male and later say they wish to change their gender and be recognised as female. Many advocates of greater legal rights for trans people say that accepting such self-identification is right and fair because “gatekeeping” checks, where trans people are required to “prove” their gender identity to another person or authority, are discriminatory and intrusive. “Transwomen are women,” they say, as if those three words are all that’s needs to settle this matter. More on this later.
The Labour approach on self-defining women also extends to the all-women shortlists used to select the party’s candidate in some parliamentary seats. Some Labour members have doubts about the policy of self-definition. Some are feminists who worry that a policy that allows male-born people (who might have enjoyed the social and economic advantages that are often associated with being male) to compete for and hold women-only posts is unfair to people who were born female (and thus prone to social and economic disadvantage.)
Some raise legal questions. Generally, equalities law doesn’t allow organisations such as Labour to reserve jobs or services for any particular group, but the Equality Act 2010 includes some exemptions for single-sex services, because Parliament wanted to ensure that women could be guaranteed that there are some roles and places where men cannot enter.
Some Labour members have sought to bring a legal challenge against the party for opening up women’s roles to “self-defined” women. They argue that where transwomen are not legally recognised as women (i.e. they do not hold a gender recognition certificate) they cannot be entitled to posts that the law reserves for women. Some women have resigned from Labour over this issue.
Labour’s NEC, meanwhile, has insisted that the policy of treating self-defined women as women will stand. Which brings us back to David Lewis, candidate to be Basingstoke Labour’s women’s officer:
“After I looked at the NEC position and what it really meant, I thought, I’ll put my name forward for women’s officer. After all, what’s the worst that could happen? I expected them to say, ‘don’t be silly’ and politely decline my application. But they didn’t. They accepted my candidacy as valid.”
So he’s standing for a woman’s post. Why?
“My priority here is to inform the CLP, and maybe some other people, about what this policy means, about what happens when you say that someone’s gender depends only on what they say and nothing else.”
How would David respond to those who might say he is being offensive or bigoted, that he is trivialising the issues that transgender women face?
“I’d say those people don’t have any right to criticise my gender-identity. If I say I am a woman on Wednesdays, then all they can do is accept that. After all, there are other people who only identify as women on some days of the week and not others, and they are accepted, not criticised.”
David adds:
“In any case, anyone else’s criticism or questions about my gender identity are just not relevant to the Labour Party at the moment, given the current policy. If I say I’m a woman, I’m a woman.”
Now, if you’re new to this topic, you may by this point have come to appreciate that yes, in today’s Labour Party, anyone can be a woman if they say they are a woman, even David with his beard and his complete lack of any outward effort to live or pass as a woman. And maybe you might think “Yes, well, that’s the loony lefty SJW Labour Party, and nothing to do with the rest of us who aren’t part of it.”
If so, you’d be wrong, because that policy of “self-identification” could become the law for everyone. The Government will shortly bring forward a consultation on amending the law on gender recognition, where some groups will argue that people should be able to define themselves as a woman or a man (and thus obtain the associated legal rights and entitlements) without external check or verification.
Some people think that’s a good idea, because they say the current system institutionalises unfairness to trans people. Some people have doubts, because they worry that such rules could be (ab)used to erode the legal status of women, opening up their roles, jobs and places (for instance, domestic violence shelters, all-women colleges, hospital wards) to people with male socialisation and anatomy.
Many (but not all) of the people who raise questions about self-identified gender rules are women, women who are struggling to make their voices heard in what passes for the public debate about gender, because those who speak out are at risk of abuse and accusations of transphobic bigotry. Or even being assaulted.
Which is why what David Lewis is doing strikes me as important and worthy of attention beyond the lovely town of Basingstoke. David Lewis is a man standing for a post that the rules say should be open only to women. He can do so purely because he has said the words “I am a woman” and rigid adherence to the orthodoxy of “transwomen are women” means no one can question his claim. And if anyone who says “I am a woman” must be treated as a woman and granted the status and rights of a woman, does the word “woman” still have any meaning? You do not, I submit, need to a radical feminist to see that the logic of complete self-identification raises some quite profound questions.
Although I worry he’ll get his share of abuse for it, I think David Lewis deserves praise for what he is doing. He is standing for a woman’s job to make a point about what can happen to women when rules that affect them and their rights are made and enforced on the basis of blind dogma, not balanced debate. “We need to be able to debate this, we need to be able to talk about this without being told we are transphobic and to shut up,” David says, before adding:
“I completely understand the problems that trans people face and I can see the case for reforming a system that some people find difficult and undignified. But I think we have to have a proper debate where both sides are heard and there are people who raising valid questions who are not being heard. In the end, we need to have a compromise. And a good compromise is one where both sides are equally unhappy.”
Does he think there is any chance he might actually win his election and end up being elected as women’s officer? “I am hoping that my local party will be sensible.”
Hollycat, for saying those things, you would be considered, by many transgender people and their supporters, to be committing literal violence against them as well as the hate crime of transphobia.
(I agree with you, btw)
Elegran wrote 'there doesn't seem to be anything to stop anyone claiming to have made the declaration when they are in fact fully and rampantly unchanged'
There is also nothing to stop anyone actually making the declaration when they are fully and rampantly unchanged, simply because they feel they want to do that - for whatever reasons of their own.
There are already transwomen who say that they are lesbians and that any lesbian who doesn't want to have sex with an owner of 'lady-dick' is transphobic.
The public, in general, has felt that these issues only concern a tiny minority and are nothing to worry about.
I hope that view is now changing.
Clearly I have lived too long. The world has gone mad!
You are totally missing the point Jinty44. Signing a false Statutory Declaration is perjury, with a penalty of up to two years. This attention seeker hasn't done that, so he hasn't "self declared" as female.
Nobody is proposing to change the existing laws about voyeurism or assault, or anything else like that. You would have exactly the same rights to complain about a woman who "doesn't look female enough" as you do now. That has been done several times, and I think it has always turned out to be a slightly masculine looking ciswoman.
Oh, and there are no changes to the use of toilets either. Women will be just as free to use the Gents when there's a long queue for the Ladies as they are now. Do you scream for the police every time there's a male toilet cleaner? Probably not.
How about falsely replying to a challenge of lurking where they have no right to be with "I should be here. I am female!" ? The person who challenged them would be guilty of a hate crime for doubting their femininity - and would not have had the option of asking to see documentary proof that there was a legal declaration in existence. There is no point in being able to charge someone with making a false declaration if there is no right to ask to see that declaration in circumstances where it is relevant - a law that cannot be implemented is like a stick of limp celery.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/214118
Keep going with this petition. It needs another 89,000 signatures.
I wonder why transwomen think it's acceptable to redefine women by adding the prefix "cis". Do they seriously think women are now going to refer to themselves as "cis women" ? most will have never heard the expression anyway thank God. Yes lets all alter the terminology, used since the beginning of time to describe adults of the female sex, to accommodate a very, very tiny minority 
Surely the word "transwoman" makes the distinction between women per se and those who have transitioned.
TerriBull I couldn’t agree more about the use of ‘cis’. It’s an absolute red line as far as I’m concerned. It also is based on a faulty understanding of gender. Some transwoman yesterday on Twitter posted about a trans woman being born with the body of a male and the mind of a woman and really couldnt understand that this is sheer rubbish.
I lost the will to read a quarter of the way through that....
OK TerriBull - I object to being called "White". I'm Human (not Coloured). Is that any more or less acceptable?
Elegran: If someone is in a cubicle in the toilets having a pee and you are poking your camera under the door to look at their genitals, you are the one committing an offence. If someone else is committing an offence then complain, whether they are male or female.
“In any case, anyone else’s criticism or questions about my gender identity are just not relevant to the Labour Party at the moment, given the current policy. If I say I’m a woman, I’m a woman.”
I like this man/woman 
and am cheering him on. He has highlighted the lunacy AND frightening disregard to all the alarming issues self identity has raised. Not only that, Labour has lost many, many female members because it is favouring a small minority of (confused?) men (who may need psychiatric help) over hard won women's rights.
MaryXYX, I don't understand how your last post related to the two people you mentioned.
Could you explain further?
A clicky link for the petition again -
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/214118
In my experience, limited as it is, the people who regard cis people as the only "real people" as the same one who regard white people as the only "real people".
There are people on this forum who are deliberately confusing the right of trans people to exist with the quite different question of sexual predators, some of whom are lesbian. This whole argument of "We have to keep predators out of the public toilets" which I agree with, is being used to imply "Trans people have no right to stay alive", an entirely different question.
It's a tragic confusion between biological sex and 'gender' as a cultural norm that is imposed on them both. I mean, gender rules say how a biological sex is supposed to look, dress, feel, talk, etc. I am most worried about this ideology spreading to schools, even at primary level. Apparently, there is a transgender kit for teachers to use to explain to pupils how to respect boys who think they are girls and girls who think they are boys.
Beammeup, I find it disturbing and frightening that such issues are now on a school's agenda. It really is becoming ridiculous.
It's tantamount to child abuse to subject children to this ideology. It is an adult-inspired problem and we seek to confuse children who need to develop without even considering if they are boys are girls. It's foolish and irresponsible to ask a four year old or a 10 year old or even a hormonally-confused teenager to question their gender.
The very few (a tiny, tiny minority) who do have confusion need mental health expertise and guidance, not a teacher's.
Gender identity disorder in children (GIDC) is a formal diagnosis used by psychologists and physicians to describe children who experience significant discontent (gender dysphoria) with their biological sex, assigned gender, or both
Gender dysphoria has definitely become a trend. It's lunacy to imagine it affects us all. I have every sympathy with the very small minority of genuinely disturbed and confused and have no problem with full transition, if it is a way forward, but to subject children to this adult and politically mad issue is verging on criminal imo.
MaryXYX, now you're claiming people are saying things that they are not. Of course you exist. And as for this paragraph -
"There are people on this forum who are deliberately confusing the right of trans people to exist with the quite different question of sexual predators, some of whom are lesbian. This whole argument of "We have to keep predators out of the public toilets" which I agree with, is being used to imply "Trans people have no right to stay alive", an entirely different question."
well, where to start? Casting aspersions at lesbians? No, I think I'll start with 'no right to stay alive'. Really? Really? Could I roll my eyes any further and still see!
I'll go back to my initial posting. I pointed out that a law allowing SelfID (I am what I say I am and you can't ask for proof) affects the behaviour of everyone else. Women will become reluctant to challenge an obvious male in a female-only space, lest they be accused of a hatecrime. Young women in particular, since they will be raised in such an environment, will be especially vulnerable. This will groom them to be compliant.
This is a sexual predator's wet dream, where they can swan into any women's space unchallenged. THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ACTUAL TRANSPEOPLE AND EVERYTHING TO DO WITH A BADLY THOUGHT OUT LAW WHICH IS MASSIVELY OPEN TO ABUSE.
Bleating that "You would have exactly the same rights to complain about a woman who "doesn't look female enough" as you do now" is a total red herring. The point I am making is that if such a law comes in, women will be afraid to complain because this ridiculous proposal would allow them to be charged with a hatecrime. Do you REALLY think most women would take that chance?
If I spotted a camera poked under the toilet partition, Mary, waiting until I had pulled up my knickers and rushed out of the cubicle I could be too late to get a good enough look at the fleeing perpetrator to identify him. I think I would bend down, grab the camera and "accidentally" drop it into the loo. (That is if I can bend that far quickly enough.)
It is less a matter of reporting an illegal act than of preventing one before it happens. At the moment a suspicious character who tries to infiltrate a space like a women's changing room can be told to "Hop it! this area is used by women who are taking their clothes off. You have no right to be in here." - before he points the camera up under the partition, or before he ogles the girls trying on clothes.
If he can threaten to claim to be the victim of hate crime if someone doesn't want him there, then women will hesitate to challenge the suspicious character. It is a variety of blackmail.
And if there is no onus on someone who has legitimately self-identified as a woman without undertaking any surgical or medical measures to be able to prove it by producing the documentation, then why bother changing the documentation at all?.
And if anyone who wants to walk into a women's changing room is free to do so, why have women's changing rooms at all?
Women are being blamed for "trans-hate" here, but a sizeable proportion of men are so obsessed by sex (rather than gender) that they will do anything to get a glimpse or a feel of female flesh. How can we tell which are genuine transpeople and which are bandwagon jumpers?
Beammeup: Within my lifetime children who dared to write with their left hand would have that sin beaten out of them. Today some people would classify them as mentally ill. You may have a personal hatred of people of colour, people who are gay, or people who are transgender, but the child abuse you are promoting is criminal - not verging on criminal. Child abusers do tend to suppress the truth - like some people write with their left hand, some are gay, some are transgender.
I'm trying to have sympathy with you on the assumption that you are genuinely disturbed and confused, but I must admit that malice seems more likely.
MaryXYX, your tactics here are quite interesting. Accuse people who don't agree with you of saying things that they haven't. Then accuse people who don't agree with you of being racist, homophobic,transphobic child abusers.
Tell, me; what forums do you normally frequent where this strategy wins the argument?
And I must say, I doubt left-handers being beaten was within your lifetime. You sound very young.
MaryXYX
What has being left handed got to do with this? Being left handed is also a biological fact just like sex. You don't choose to be right or left handed, you just are, just as you are male or female. Gender on the other hand is a social construct that differs according to region and time and refers to performing femininity or masculinity acceptably for the region or time you are in.
Why did you ask if anyone had seen a GRC? You detailed having to pay for things to get one so I am assuming that means you have one but no one can ask to see it, it's your birth certificate they are allowed to ask for.
Leelah Alcorn's parents had the choice of a happy daughter or a dead son. They chose a dead son and took steps to ensure that was the outcome.
40% of transgender people have attempted suicide. Among those who have proper support the rate is about 4%. How many of the parents and grandparents here would take steps to deny their own children their health and safety? If you wouldn't do that, then why would anyone want to deny other children the same?
And where are you getting your suicide stats from, MaryXYX?
I have read about Leelah Alcorn, who was treated very badly by her/his parents.
That doesn't mean that wholesale change to the law is a good idea.
It's unlikely that the change suggested would have helped Leelah.
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