The last week has been a lesson in the difference between theory and practice. For several years now some feminists have tried to point out the risks… - Joan Smith

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The last week has been a lesson in the difference between theory and practice. For several years now some feminists have tried to point out the risks posed by unquestioningly accepting claims about gender identity. When we pointed out that self-identification is unverifiable, and open to exploitation by sexual predators, we were shouted down and accused of transphobia. When we argued that vulnerable women prisoners should not have to share intimate spaces with men convicted of sex offences, we were told to think of the feelings of trans prisoners.

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About Joan Smith

Joan Alison Smith (born 27 August 1953) is an English novelist, journalist and human rights activist, who is a former chair of the Writers in Prison committee in the English section of International PEN. She is an advocate of gender-critical feminism.

Also Known As

Pen Names: Jennie Gallant
Alternative Names: Joan Alison Smith
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Additional quotes by Joan Smith

Smith’s book [Different for Girls] is, nevertheless, an acute and enjoyable analysis of misreadings and misrepresentations of women in popular culture. Put simply, her argument is that women are far less different from men than the media, religion, politicians, pundits and the fashion world would have it. And indeed there is a kind of ‘new woman’ abroad: a more androgynous, much tougher creature than the postwar or even Sixties model. The new woman, according to Smith, enjoys her own power, her own money, her own sexuality. She can play with self-image without burning her fingers. She is unimpressed by the ever-after promises of marriage (or of men, as it happens) and the easy seductions of motherhood. Smith has often written on the growing numbers of women – one in five, the most reliable figure – who refuse motherhood, and is particularly scathing on the patriarchal implications of infertility treatment.

The slogan "trans women are women" admits no ifs or buts. If a man identifies as a woman, even if he has taken no steps towards transitioning, we are supposed to accept that his "gender identity" trumps biological sex. But if Bryson is genuinely trans, rather than a sexual predator gaming the system, this strikes down the claim that trans women never pose a threat to women and can be safely placed in the female prison estate.

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That's me done. I wrote to Keir Starmer and spoke to him in person. I warned him about misogyny. He never replied.
Labour has betrayed women with a raft of policies designed to appease trans-identified men. I don't suppose Starmer cares, but I've resigned my membership today.

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