Thousands of people on Saturday rallied in London and Edinburgh in support of trans rights, after a landmark UK court ruling on the definition of a “woman.”
The British Supreme Court on Wednesday last week ruled that the legal definition of a “woman” is based on a person’s sex at birth, with potentially far-reaching consequences for how single-sex spaces and services are run.
Outside the UK parliament in London, activists, protesters, trade unions and community groups waved flags and held up banners with slogans such as “trans women are women” and “trans rights are human rights.”
Photo: EPA-EFE
“My main fear — the extremists will feel empowered by this decision,” said Eevee Zayas, a 32-year-old researcher from Spain, describing themself as non-binary transgender.
“Hate crimes against [the] trans community [will] go up,” Zayas added.
The court ruling said single-sex spaces and services including changing rooms, toilets and women-only hospital wards “will function properly only if sex is interpreted as biological sex.”
Joe Brown, a trans woman in the process of transitioning, said that “everything in the transition is going to be harder.”
“Coming here in big numbers is very important to stand against the Supreme Court decision,” Brown said.
Other fears included not being able to access healthcare and children being scared to come out as trans, Brown said.
London’s Metropolitan Police said it was investigating after seven statues “in the vicinity of the protest” were vandalized.
At least two statues in Parliament Square were daubed with graffiti during the rally including one of suffragette Millicent Fawcett, who was part of the campaign to secure the vote for women in the early part of the 20th century.
Last week’s court ruling followed a legal battle between the Scottish government and a campaign group For Women Scotland involving clashing interpretations of the Equality Act.
While the Scottish government argued that the law gave trans women with a Gender Recognition Certificate the same protections as a biological female, the campaign group disagreed.
In the Scottish capital Edinburgh, thousands more protesters marched.
Lauren Yeoman, 38, said she was “disgusted” by a ruling she felt effectively removed the human rights of trans people.
“We’re pointing fingers at people who aren’t harming anybody, such as trans people, while ignoring the real problems,” she said.
Speakers addressed the crowd using megaphones, and led the demonstrators in chants that included: “When trans rights are under attack, what do we do? Fight back.”
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
The Chinese public maintains relatively warm sentiments toward Taiwan and strongly prefers non-military paths to improving cross-strait relations, a recent survey conducted by the Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center and Emory University showed. The “China Pulse” research project, which polled 2,506 adults between Oct. 27 last year and Jan. 1 this year, found that 86 percent of respondents support strengthening cultural ties, while 81 percent favor deepening economic interaction. The report, co-authored by political scientists at Emory University and advisors at the Carter Center, indicates that the Chinese public views Taiwan’s importance through a lens of shared history and culture rather than geopolitical
Cannabis-based medicines have shown little evidence of effectiveness for treating most mental health and substance-use disorders, according to a large review of past studies published in a major medical journal on Monday. Medical use of cannabinoids has been expanding, including in the US, Canada and Australia, where many patients report using cannabis products to manage conditions such as anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and sleep problems. Researchers reviewed data from 54 randomized clinical trials conducted between 1980 and May last year involving 2,477 participants for their analysis published in The Lancet. The studies assessed cannabinoids as a primary treatment for mental disorders or substance-use
RSS