From Girl Guides to the Women’s Institute, trans people are being told they don’t belong

I am not surprised by Tuesday’s announcement that Girl Guiding is now to exclude trans girls. Yesterday’s follow-on by the Women’s Institute does not shock, either.

No. Mostly, I am numb. Beyond shock. Beyond surprise. Beyond grief, even – although, for the trans girls and young women directly affected by this, who are now sundered from friends and social ties, I feel a deep and lasting sorrow.

I can only imagine what this means to a young trans woman, aged 14, 15 who finds herself singled out. Rejected. Informed, by implication, that she is bad, unwanted, un-normal.

There is a world of research telling us just how calamitous this can be. The beginnings of a spiral into a lifetime of depression, low self-esteem and even, self-abuse.

For older trans women – especially those who have watched over the last few years as the UK has become progressively less friendly – it is ‘just one more thing.’  An unpleasant reality. But also, one to which they have become inured. At least, if they have decided to stay. Because for many, this is just one more reason to leave.

Alongside this, I can’t help but notice the slow, steady expulsion of trans people from UK society – an expulsion which seems to have gained pace since the Supreme Court ruling back in April.

This, you may recall, was the assertion that trans folk remained, for certain narrow legal purposes, the sex they were assigned at birth. This is contrary to what we had come to understand for over a decade.

It’s been deeply concerning to witness the way trans people are frequently positioned as threat – to free speech, to public spaces, to wider society.

It’s a threat that is entirely manufactured. Often under cover of a claim that this is all about some nebulous ‘trans ideology’.

Whereas if you knew trans people at all, you’d know this is not a thing. What I want – what most trans folks want – is to transition and live quiet post-transition lives unbothered by the public gaze.

We just want to be left to exist in peace.

We do not wish to spend our lives in court defending ourselves from attacks – both verbal and physical – or advocating for our right not to be excluded from public spaces. 

Yet, as those attacks have ramped up in recent years, we are taken to task for defending ourselves. Not even childhood is safe. Because if a trans girl dare object to her exclusion and take legal action to fight it, we just know she will get the blame.

Meanwhile, we have a leader of the UK opposition who boasted openly, when in office, about appointing people to stem the pro-trans tide. That’s exactly what Kemi Badenoch did when she chose Baroness Falkner to lead the EHRC, then stood back as the Baroness delivered. 

First, intervening in multiple court cases to argue for a reinterpretation of Equality Law in line with that demanded by anti-trans groups. Then, in her proposed guidance that is all about exclusion, in my opinion, with nothing that properly promotes inclusion. 

That is being challenged now in the courts as excessive. Challenged, too, by politicians and lawyers. But, judging by this week’s announcements, too little, too late.

We’re dealing with the utter cowardice of Keir Starmer. A lawyer who, faced with a new interpretation of the law, pronounced himself happy that ‘clarity’ had been introduced, then washed his hands of the whole affair.

At the same time, a growing number of women’s organisations that have no issue with trans inclusion are being pressured to comply with anti-trans policies. Some of that pressure comes from the EHRC.

Even more comes from ‘lawfare’ – targeted legal interventions designed specifically to make trans inclusion both legally and financially risky – backed by groups such as JK Rowling’s Women’s Fund.

Announcing their decision, the Women’s Institute speak of acting with ‘the utmost regret and sadness.’ GirlGuiding talk of doing so “with a heavy heart.” They do not align to any kind of anti-trans agenda.

But in the absence of any lead from the government – anything to point them back to the path of empathy and tolerance – they have little choice.

Because if you are a charity or a public body under funding pressure, you really do not want to spend hundreds of thousands defending yourself against a legal onslaught.

In the process, real harms take a back seat. The very real threat of violence against women is diluted by policing of ‘women’s spaces’ against an imaginary threat from trans women. Cis women who do not present conventionally are equally subject to policing and exclusion.

And the sad result is that trans women – and trans girls – are pushed even further to the margins of society.

So much is being claimed about defending women, standing up for their rights. To my mind, this is just smoke and mirrors; about as credible as the suggestion that the BBC has been infiltrated by and dances to the tune of some radical trans activists.

I feel like we live in a world where 99 out of 100 cis women might declare themselves undisturbed by the presence of trans women, and yet it only takes one to object – one tiny minority – and it is that view that will prevail.

Is this, then, our new reality? A world that flies in the face of all of the decency and fair play and good intentions with which I grew up.

It no longer surprises me. Or shocks me. It just makes me very sad. For other trans folk. And for what follows after when the bigots declare victory and turn their fire on other minorities.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing M.Navarrogriffiths@metro.co.uk. 

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