The UK’s largest women’s membership organization has announced that it has been forced to ban transgender women from participating after the UK Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that transgender women are not legally considered women.
Women’s Institute will no longer be offered The organization announced Wednesday that it will continue to officially include trans women in its membership. CEO Melissa Green said: statement “This is not something we would do unless we feel we have no other choice.”
“In order for the Women’s Institute to continue to operate as a legally recognized women’s organization and charity, we must act in accordance with the Supreme Court’s decision and limit formal membership to biological women only,” Green said. “However, this change is about our membership policy and does not change our firm belief that transgender women are women too.”
Scotland, which is part of the United Kingdom but has a semi-autonomous government, passed a law in 2018 that requires all Scottish public bodies’ boards to have an equal number of women and men. Trans women are included in the number of female directors if they have a gender recognition certificate.
Scotland for Women, a right-wing group specializing in so-called women’s “gender-based rights” (a dog whistle used by anti-trans activists to exclude trans people from public life and reduce women to genitals), has taken legal action against the government to challenge trans women’s participation. They initially lost their case in Scotland, but then appealed to the UK Supreme Court. Harry Potter author JK Rowling has funded a challenge to anti-trans legislation.
The court ruled in their favor, ruling that trans women cannot legally be considered women under the country’s equality laws. The ruling has already been applied by some bodies, including the Football Association, which in May banned trans women from playing women’s soccer without any reference to trans men.
In August, the UK’s main human rights body, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, published guidance banning transgender people from homosexual establishments, even those that in some cases match their sex assigned at birth. The guidance affects toilets and changing rooms in organizations providing public services, including schools, hospital wards, sports clubs, domestic violence shelters, prisons, charities and some shops.
Professor Green said the Women’s Institute will launch a national network of local “sisterhood groups” in April, which will “provide monthly opportunities for all people, including transgender women, to come together, socialize, learn from each other and share their experiences of living as women.”
“We know that many of our members will find this decision extremely distressing,” Green continued. “We have actively sought other ways outside of formal membership to continue our fellowship, sisterhood, and support for transgender women who are important members of our Wisconsin family.”
Source: Advocate.com – www.advocate.com
