On April 16th the UK Supreme Court have unanimously ruled that Trans Women are no longer women in the eyes of British law.
The decision is the latest in a sustained attack against our vulnerable community and it has wider implications for both the Intersex community and all women.
The ease and speed at which the US and UK governments have been able to strip away rights from Trans people is hardly surprising when both are complicit in the Genocide of the Palestinian people.
As with the Cas report, the voices of Trans people have been both ignored and excluded.
All single sex services in the UK will now be based on Biological sex.
The Supreme Court Ruling comes only weeks after World Athletics introduced mandatory sex testing for female athletes.That ruling results in a complete ban on all intersex and Transgender women from competing in their women’s category in all athletics events.
The supreme Court ruling has attempted to define women biologically and will invariably lead to a physical inspection of all women’s bodies.
The narrow definition of women by their XX chromosomes is overly simplistic and completely ignores the natural and scientifically proved variations that all women possess in both gender and sex. They have stated that a person with XX chromosomes usually has female sex and reproductive organs, and is therefore usually assigned biologically female.
This completely ignores the fact that there are many other chromosome types including XXY,XO,XXX,XYY and even mosaic variants. Some intersex women born with XY chromosomes are genetically male but live their lives as girls and then women, and a few can even give birth.
We have quickly and quietly moved beyond biological facts. The UK has defined woman as XX and excluded all women that don’t fit their narrative.
The UK government said the ruling “brings clarity and confidence, for women and service providers such as hospitals, refuges, and sports clubs”. Some TDs in Ireland have already welcomed the decision.
Women’s prisons, refuges, hospitals and sport are chronically ignored and underfunded, and only ever seem to matter or need to be protected when a Trans woman is included.
Following the US lead, the UK supreme court has now put a nail in the coffin of trans peoples right to exist in Britain.
This is just the start. This is another uncontested victory by a very wealthy anti transgender movement aiming to chip away at all womens rights and return to christian traditional values.
Trans women are the greatest threat to patriarchal capitalism, they are also the most vulnerable to attack.
We are now seeing the results of almost a decade of work, where divisions have been sown between Cis Women, the LGBTQ+ community, the Intersex community & Trans women. We have seen daily attacks in the media to change public and political opinion preparing society for the full removal of Trans rights and protections.
Expressing love, support and solidarity with the Trans community is no longer enough when throughout the world we are being stripped of identity, healthcare, freedom of movement and freedom of expression.
Your time to speak up was five years ago, where do we go from here?
Sorcha Ní Fhaoláin
Rosa Socialist Feminist Movement
