A Government That Puts Adult Affirmation Over Child Safety Is One That Has Lost Its Way
Humane is not synonymous with easy, simplification does not trump safeguarding
Processing Issues
My other half and I are at the point where we are beginning to discuss having children. Not only when but how. While both of us often talk of ‘our’ future baby, conceived naturally, we are both intrigued by adoption.
Him more so than me, I admit. But this has nothing to do with biological egotism. I admit I would like to experience pregnancy, and, while birth terrifies me, the hallowed moment of seeing the child I grew handed to me in a blanket is just enough incentive to endure it (with a boatload of pethidine and an epidural, I hasten to add). But while newborns and babies are enchanting, the awe factor (or ‘awww’ factor) doesn’t trump the unique wonder of giving a child who, through no fault of their own, does not have a mother/family willing or capable of providing them with nourishment and security. I am not put off by the prospect of a child with trauma or neglect-based behavioural difficulties and attachment issues. I like to think I would make it my life’s work to help my adopted child overcome them and thrive under our love.
No, what puts me off is the, frankly, brutal adoption process; the maze of red tape my partner and I would have to navigate and fend through to become parents. Having researched the process in as much depth as I can, the complexities and bureaucracy around adoption could easily fill three articles. A family friend who pursued adoption attested there is not a single aspect of your life that is not probed - down to you and your partner’s bedroom activity and sexual fantasies. And then there’s the added complications of the biological mother’s/family’s rights - particularly if the child has siblings. They would be entitled to retain contact, even if it wreaked havoc on the bond my husband and I were trying to forge. I would be heavily discouraged from renaming the child, even if their birth name was misspelt or guaranteed to get them bullied (it is not unheard of for children in the care system to be named after alcoholic beverages). Indeed, you can’t even be put on the adoption register until you have registered as foster parents. There is every likelihood we could foster a child, fall in love with them, and then just as we’re about to secure adoption rights, have them taken back by their birth mother, something that would irreparably break our hearts.
In short, if my partner and I pursued adoption, we would be pursuing one of the most invasive and potentially traumatising legal processes one can undertake.
Now where have we heard these words before?
Sturgeon does Chicago-style
On October 6th, while a women’s rights rally - oh, sorry, satanic bigot rally - was happening outside the Scottish Government, Nicola Sturgeon sat down with Gina Davidson from LBC, where she was quizzed on the rally and the sentiment she was a ‘destroyer of women’s rights’.
As anyone who has read my open letter to the First Minister will know, I’m not wild about her presently, in the same way I’m ‘not wild’ about rolling around in stinging nettles, but I will give the devil her due. She is an outstanding politician insofar as her image. Sturgeon - sorry, Nicola - is the cool, no-nonsense Auntie who lets you have a glass of Prosecco on your sixteenth birthday and listens when you’ve had a big falling out with your mum. Her interview with Gina Davidson was a masterclass in evasion and deception, so much so I found myself thinking of Richard Gere’s tap-dancing-around-the-witness sequence in Chicago while watching it.
She was entirely prepared for the question. She didn’t so much as bristle when it was asked. Her tone was a perfect balance of flippant yet respectful. Every mild-mannered dip and careful rise in inflection was rehearsed to the point of immaculacy.
“I think *cue trademark sped-up gloss voice* we should be respectful of all views”
“I’ve thought about this deeply…”
“Look, I’m 52...”
“What the gender recognition bill seeks to do is simplify an existing process..."
“Less traumatic...”
“Less invasive...”
“I don’t think that is a bad thing to do...” (I mean who would? Bad people, of course)
At one point, when Davidson apparently remembers what her occupation is, she makes to intervene about safeguarding.
“Let me get to that,” says Sturgeon with patient confidence before wheeling out the the creme-de-la-creme of virtue baiting for so-called progressives.
“A very, very small group in society who are already, possibly the most stigmatised...”
I’ll stop here with the transcript but there’s a hell of a lot more I could critique. I could, for instance, discuss her statement that ‘violent men are the threat to women, not transwomen’, cleverly removing any association of maleness/male biology from said ‘transwomen’. I could talk about how she emphasises “It’s a legal declaration...[you still have to] declare legally you intend to live in your gender for the rest of your life” as though this is a legitimate safeguarding measure instead of Meaning Absolutely Nothing Whatsoever. I could talk about how, while she claims any man caught lying in a bid to harm women are children will be prosecuted while giving zero explanation as to how this will be discerned (if he gives his gender as ‘she’ to the police, after all, that is how he will be recorded thanks to HER laws). I could talk about how she says ‘Most men don’t need to change their gender to abuse women’ while paying no heed to the SOME that will and, indeed, have already. Not to mention the sheer danger of mixed sex spaces (see: Primark). I could talk about the fact that ‘changing gender’ is a very superfluous phrase on the basis ‘gender’ has no concrete definition yet is being used synonymously with ‘sex’, (JK Rowling alludes in her must-read article in The Times)
Instead, I’m going to hone in on the emotional manipulation of the words ‘traumatic’ ‘simpler’ ‘invasive’ and ‘humane’. One of these is not like the other.
Think Before You Use Big Words
‘Humane’. Consider it’s antonym: inhumane. Personally, I most associate this word with animal rights; the important of humane slaughter, inhumane practices etc. Images of sows nuzzling their piglets from the confines of a tiny cage come to mind, of the necks of steer being cut as they low in agony, of chickens living in filth without sunlight, dogs and cats being boiled alive in the notorious Yulin Dog meat festival. Torture. Barbarity. Gore.
As it stands, to obtain a GRC you need to live in your ‘acquired gender’ (i.e. as the opposite sex, in whatever sense that even means) for two years. You must be 18 years of age. You must have a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria.
Bureaucratic? Yes. Lengthy? Yes. Arduous? Yes. Inhumane? Hardly.
‘Traumatic’ is more subjective. While I have my own battle with PTSD (long story) and so am very much familiar with the symptoms of trauma, I have never suffered gender dysphoria and can’t imagine what it must be like. I sincerely applaud the courage of anyone brave enough to confess - whether to a doctor or themselves - that they may be struggling with what is clearly a hellish predicament. No one should be met with judgement or hostility for seeking help and exploring the options to help them contend with feeling estranged from the sex of their own body.
But surely there are ways of making the road to transition less ‘traumatic’ without shortening the required length of time to a farcical six months (same time it takes to get through a third of a fairy liquid bottle) and dispelling with any medical support and evaluation in lieu of simply declaring yourself as the opposite ‘gender’ and undergoing a ‘reflection period’. Perhaps better sensitivity training for GPs and psychologists? Improved access to support groups? A government campaign emphasising zero tolerance towards verbal abuse or physical intimidation for those who visually present as the opposite sex? What the GRA reform does is not simplify the transition process in the form of removing unnecessary red tape, it unlocks the door and puts up a neon sign flashing: COME IN AND MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME.
(I’m not even going to reiterate the lunacy of lowering the age to 16 as there should be no need. Even those halfway up the garden path with gender ideology have the sense to get squeamish about that).
‘Invasive’ also, is a word I would query. This clearly alludes to the medical diagnosis and to the relevance of patient’s psychiatric history. But is it invasive for a doctor or psychologist to probe this? If I decided emphatically I didn’t want natural-born children and went to the doctor to demand a hysterectomy, I don’t think it’s in any way invasive to (gently and kindly) have my experiences with depression or trauma inquired about in the event this is a rash action made in response to something else, or if my partner is pressuring me. Ann Furedi, one of the lead pro-choice campaigners in the UK, who formally ran an abortion clinic, never let a patient go ahead with the procedure (except perhaps in exceptionally harrowing circumstances) without sitting down with the woman to ensure she really wanted to go through it and consider avenues in which she could keep the baby. In taking this caution, she ensured that very few, if any, women, made an irreversible decision they regretted.
Why then, is it considered, hateful or oppressive to apply the same sense and rigour to changing one’s legal sex?
That’s a different article. That’s a different ten articles. Most of which have been already been written. Again and again to deaf ears.
No One Is Entitled
Let’s return to the adoption process; the traumatic, invasive adoption process my partner and I may one day undertake - that lots of people are currently going through. Many couples will be doing so because of infertility. Many single woman will be going through it because they have been unable to find an appropriate partner, same-sex couples have little choice but to elect this as their route to parenthood.
Having recently felt the desire for a child, I can tell you it is one of the most powerful and all-encompassing feelings you can experience. It’s not just a longing to nurture or care for a child, it’s as though some primal, tectonic force within me has shifted, an evolutionary drive I cannot attach language to. If I believed in such things, I’d say it’s a necessity felt in my soul.
I have listened to countless trans(sexual) testimonies and heard similar sentiments, and the crippling devastation and despair they claim they would have felt had they not transitioned. I imagine a similar crippling despair and devastation if I am unable to have a child, and a sense of dread at the red tape path to adoption, should I need or to traverse it.
But that does not mean I get to take the fast route. That red tape - however invasive, traumatic, ‘inhumane’ - exists for a reason. Because if it was taken away or lessened, predators would fall through the cracks. Things rarely go wrong with social services and child protection but when they do go wrong, they go wrong horribly. These blood-curdling stories of evil make the front page and for good reason.
And the same terrible consequences will happen here. Are happening. Teenage detransitioners. Women being raped by male inmates in prison. Young women being violated in shop changing rooms. Women being forced to call male rapists ‘she’ when they testify in court. Sportswomen having their skulls broken by ‘trans’ competitors. None of these are fabrications or exaggerations. And if your argument is that these rarities justify the end goal of simplifying transition, of convenience; that a ‘minority’ of women and children being sacrificed on an alter of adult affirmation is necessary collateral, do not dare ever use the phrase ‘right side of history’ in my presence.
However much motherhood feels like a need to me, it isn’t. It is an overwhelming want, as is changing one’s legal gender. But while I have a right to pursue parenthood through adoption, and gender dysphoric people have a right to pursue transition, that is not the same as entitlement to an easy process. Not at the expense of the vulnerable.
A want is not a need, regardless of how desperately it feels it is. Not for you. Not for me.
And it’s about time society and our leaders grew up and remembered that.
My husband and I started the adoption process over a decade ago. At the time, in our particular neck of the woods, there were only religious adoption agencies available.
We were denied because we were (and still are) atheists. This was within the rights of the agencies to refuse us a strong “relationship “ with god was considered an important aspect of parenting.
The utter gall of these people to call themselves oppressed is mind boggling to me.
Hello Nina
I don't know how far you have gone in investigating adoption and fostering, but it would be worthwhile you reading this post from Glinner's substack about a year ago, which recounts another woman's experience with how gender critical views can be an obstacle to proceeding.
https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/patricias-story