Following on from last weeks’ post I wonder whether now that everything is coming to a head, it is the catalyst for change. I have no sound basis or evidence that this is the case, just a feeling, which I hope isn’t wishful thinking, that enough is enough and some sanity will prevail in the coming months, or year.
I have seen that the Good Law Project is to bring proceedings against the NHS for its failure to deliver timely healthcare to Trans people. The basis of such a claim is that Trans people are properly entitled to healthcare and that a wait of some four years even to be referred for treatment is unacceptable. In addition, a recent report of 700 people showed that 29% of trans people are refused healthcare by their GPs simply because they are trans and out of those that do receive healthcare 70% experience transphobia while receiving treatment. The Welsh Government are actively training GPs in Trans healthcare which is a positive step. Maybe England could follow suit?
At the same time the Medical Council Tribunal hearing into the work of Dr Helen Webberley and Gender Care has been taking place and is now in its eleventh week. It has been patently obvious from the experts that trans people are being failed by the NHS causing suffering to many trans people. Even if Dr Webberley is found to have transgressed in respect of some technical point, which I fear may be the case as the Medical Council will be pushing for something to exonerate bringing the charges in the first place, the evidence has overwhelmingly and clearly shown the failings in the way that Trans people are treated by the NHS. The Defence experts have supported Dr Webberley’s approach wholeheartedly, including the head of WPATH. One would hope that such heavyweight support would carry some clout.
As far as the Government is concerned it was disappointing to read that the Conservative Whips had invited the Labour MP Rose Duffield to defect to the Conservatives. So far as I am aware this has not happened, yet. It does however show where their heart is along with their hosting a stand for the LGB Alliance at their conference.
Then there is the fun down at Sussex University, where the students are protesting about Dr Stock. Dr Stock wrote a book called “Material Girls and what really matters for Feminism”. Dr Stock takes the position that trans women are not women and supports the Gender Critical view of sex being immutable. A position she should be allowed to speak freely on without fear of harassment or threats of violence. Equally, so should trans activists be able to speak freely without fear of harassment or threats of violence. Dr Stock, however, complains that she is being labelled as transphobic and says that journalists “now see a familiar and ‘marketable woman’ aggressed angle” which distracts from “the main story: how for six years, our national institutions- including media- have colluded”. A Mere solicitor comments on Twitter that “the lie has been those who seek to excuse a campaign against trans people’s existing human rights and legal protections (can) be (seen as) anything other than transphobic.
To put Dr Stock’s book into some kind of perspective it has been reviewed with that other Gender Critical best seller by Helen Joyce “Trans When Ideology Meets Reality”. The review is by Alex Sharpe, a Professor of Law at the University of Warwick and can be found on:-
It is a devastating and convincing deconstruction of the arguments put forward by Dr Stock as well as by Helen Joyce. It is a substantial and detailed review and concludes that “both books fall considerable short of claims made on their behalf. Rather they contribute to the toxicity surrounding trans people and they make it more difficult for us to live our lives. Moreover they provide comfort to right wing political forces who both solicit and deploy their rhetoric in ways antithetical to the interest of women and LGBQ, and especially T people.”
I may well be being naïve that matters will improve, yet I do feel that there is now more resistance to the Gender Critical transphobic views than there has been before with reasoned argument, pointing out that trans people already have legal protections which the gender critics are consistently ignoring and are currently trying to erode. Therefore I live in hope
It's never too late.... 