LGBTQ

On the Andrew Marr show on Sunday 28 January, Jeremy Corbyn affirmed that “the position of the party is that where you have self-identified as a woman, then you are treated as a woman.” Although the NEC is yet to make a formal announcement, it is expected that it will affirm that transwomen can self-define in order to stand on all-women shortlists and in women’s sections of the Labour Party, and will not be asked to have a Gender Recognition Certificate. Corbyn′s position is correct, and his statement is a welcome affirmation of what had been the norm for transwomen in the Labour Party before...

The setting up of a socialist feminist network/ website should have been worth investigating. But a look at its contents indicates that the network/website has been set up purely to voice concerns over forthcoming possible amendments to the Gender Recognition Act (GRA), specifically that transgender people will be able to register a change of gender by self-declaration. The site includes a Q&A on the GRA and promotion of a new campaign Women's Place UK. That campaign's statement says that while it supports transgender rights it believes self-declaration may undermine the integrity of women...

Australia’s “postal survey” on same-sex marriage saw a resounding victory for LGBT+ equality. 61.6% said yes to marriage equality, and over 12 million people (79.5%) participated in this voluntary, non-binding poll — a higher rate than the Brexit vote. All states had a yes majority, and 133/150 electorates voted yes, including almost all regional and rural ones. However, 12 electorates in Western Sydney voted no. These were mostly Labor-held, with working-class, largely immigrant populations. These areas were systematically targeted by right-wing religious organisations, and not so thoroughly...

"Through immigration raids, detention and deportations, the government is trying to tear our communities apart. We must fight back together". "As a society we desperately need to change the narrative on migration and, as LGBTQ people, we can start by challenging the notion that we should fear migrant communities and by resisting these attempts by right-wing nationalists to pinkwash their politics." Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants On 11 November activists from LGSMigrants and others held a ″remembrance day″ for migrants. For the remembrance ceremony we gathered on the steps of the...

This article appears as an opinion piece in Solidarity 454 When we “no platform” and un-invite radical feminists from our universities — in the guise of safer spaces — who are we protecting, and who are we serving? The more time and energy we spend attacking these women, the less we spend fighting the Tories and the straight identified men currently posing a life-threatening threat to trans people on these campuses. We should be focussing our energy on the material conditions and accompanying attitudes that pose a threat to the lives of trans people, and on convincing other people to recognise...

In January 2016, the House of Commons Women’s and Equalities Committee produced a report on Transgender Equality which highlighted the outdatedness of the 2004 Gender Recognition Act (GRA). In July 2017, the government announced a consultation on specific proposals on the GRA; this will be launched this autumn. The GRA made it possible for people over 18 to be legally recognised as members of the sex appropriate to their gender identity as long as they could show that they suffered from gender dysphoria (distress caused by the mismatching of gender identity to sex and gender assigned at birth)...

This article by Louise O’Shea from the Australian fortnightly paper Red Flag outlines the important but unstable role of experience in revolutionary politics. Abridged and reprinted here to promote discussion. The label “identity politics” is applied to a range of positions and practices, the key unifying features of which are sectional approaches to challenging oppression and the prioritisation of subjective experience. These can be highly theorised or simply reflect a common sense based on what seem like readily observable truths: that the world is divided between people who suffer...

The Egyptian government has conducted an intense campaign of arrests, torture and intimidation against LGBT people over the past month. Dozens of LGBT people have been arrested, and many subjected to torture in custody in the form of so-called “anal examinations”, since 22 September, when the wave of repression was launched following a gig by left-wing Lebanese band Mashrou’ Leila in a suburb of Cairo. The band’s lead singer, Hamed Sinno, is openly gay and a vocal advocate of LGBT freedoms. Conservative and pro-government media outlets orchestrated a campaign of moral panic and homophobic...

New Zealand’s secondary school teachers’ union has called on all schools to offer gender-neutral uniform, toilet and changing-room options. All students should be able to “choose from a range of shorts, trousers, skirts of different lengths and styles, with both tailored and non-tailored interchangeable shirts... access to specific uniform items [should not be] not limited on the basis of biological sex or perceived gender identity”. The union also calls on schools to provide “individual toilet and shower units with lockable doors and floor-to-ceiling divisions” and “options for students to...

Solidarity 448 (20 September) carried an article called “Changing gender without defending boundaries”. In general we agree with this article’s stance on the Gender Recognition Act, opposition to scaremongering arguments and support for transgender rights. However, we have serious concerns about some of the content, particularly that which deals with sexual preference. This paragraph in particular causes concern: “Pat cites the idea of lesbians who refuse to have sex with transwomen who have penises being labelled transphobic. But it is legitimate to ask what the issue might be here. Assume...