UK — England and Wales. Members are leaving the Green Party of England and Wales over its failure to stand up for legal sex-based rights for women and girls, according to an unofficial support group for women in the party.
Over the last month Green Feminists UK has received emails from dozens of people – mainly women – who say the election of a trans-identified male as co-chair of Green Party Women is a final straw, symbolizing the loss of a distinct political space for women in the party.
Many more are thought to be ‘slipping away quietly’ from the party, or withdrawing their efforts from local election campaigns taking place in 2021. Currently, the Green Party has 372 local councillors, with one MP and two peers.
Under the rules of its women’s section, Green Party Women, anyone who identifies as a woman or ‘gender variant’ can vote for its leadership team. In its election last month trans-identified male Kathryn Bristow was named co-chair, alongside gender-critical Emma Bateman.
Despite a campaign by gender identity enthusiasts to take control of Green Party Women, other positions on the committee were split 50-50 between supporters of sex-based rights and advocates of an agenda to replace ‘sex’ with ‘gender identity’ in law and policy.
The result reflects a rift in the party on this issue, but it was too much for some members, who say the party has been failing women since it was ridiculed for referring to women as ‘non-males’ in 2016.
The Green Party does not support women so I can not support the Green Party. Having a man or other ‘non women’ representing the concerns of women and girls is a backwards step. It is men silencing women by taking up our spaces. We got fed up with men speaking on behalf of women over 100 years ago.Former grassroots activist
I have left the party over its stance on women’s rights. You can’t even discuss it without being accused of transphobia. It’s a terrible situation which I believe is driven by a powerful lobby intent on driving an agenda which is anti-gay and anti-women. Ex-Green woman
I have been passionate about saving planet Earth since I was 13 years old (I am now 63 years old) so it breaks my heart to see what has happened to the Green Party. Would I consider rejoining at a future date? Not unless this folly of pursuing the destruction of women’s sex-based rights was dropped, that biological men were banned from taking positions that are meant to be for women and that the Green Party recognises the irreparable damage that is being done to our children and adolescents and campaigns to stop it. Former parliamentary candidate
The Green Party is not alone among UK political parties grappling with the conflict between supporting trans-identified individuals and addressing women’s continuing under-representation in political life. Currently only 35% of local councillors are female, 32% of MPs, and 26% of peers.
The 2010 Equality Act recognises the ‘protected characteristic’ of sex, and allows positions in political parties to be reserved for women on that basis. However, political parties, including Labour, Liberal Democrats, Scottish National Party and the Women’s Equality Party, have expanded their definitions of ‘woman’ to include anyone who identifies as female, transgender or non-binary.
I am considering resigning – on the basis that a male identifying as female, e.g. as co-chair of Green Party Women does NOT represent me, my risk of rape on a dark night, my fear of my home being stalked or attacked as a public figure living as a single woman, my experience of being bullied in the street by anti-female male neighbours who want to put me in my place etc.An elected Green
I have resigned. I just cannot work for a party which demands I believe men are women. It’s Stalinist.Former candidate in local and European elections
It is my intention not to renew my membership unless I see some sensible changes to quite insane policies and women being valued as adult human females. The Green Party cannot demand that the country and the public follow the science on the environment and climate change but that we completely ignore it when it comes to biology. It makes the party look ridiculous. Science-supporting Green woman
The Green Party has lost its focus on the Climate and Ecological Emergency. I myself have had hurtful comments from several male green party members who are online bullies on this issue, silencing women about their genuine concerns for women’s and children’s rights and safeguarding. When we have a true environmentalist leadership team and policies I will gladly return to the Green Party.Former Green woman
Read more on this story
Anger over trans woman on SNP all-women shortlist
The Times
Mridul Wadhwa, a trans rights activist who has no gender recognition certificate, appeared at a Stirling hustings, prompting allegations that SNP headquarters was ruling “by diktat” and had broken the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act, 2002, designed to promote all-women shortlists.
Labour confirms self-identifying women eligible for all women shortlists and women’s officer roles
Huffington Post UK
‘Self-identifying’ trans women are eligible for Labour’s all-women shortlists and other roles, the party’s ruling body has confirmed.
I would be a natural Green Party supporter and have voted for them in the past. In the last election I specifically didn’t vote for them because of their stance towards women, and voted independent instead.
I am a Green Party member only just sticking with it because I am aware of the good people within the Party fighting this toxic & essentially unGreen ideology. Bristow makes me sick – his audacity is beyond comprehension.
“The Green Party cannot demand that the country and the public follow the science on the environment and climate change but that we completely ignore it when it comes to biology”
This loud and clear to liberals in the US too??
JFHC – putting a man who LARPs as a woman in charge anywhere in a place reserved for women really gets my hackles up.
How the left wing parties sent women over to the right.
Yeah. Basically. I’ve voted democratic for my whole life, and now I have a high chance of voting conservative (candidate, regardless of party) if this stuff keeps going on in the Left.
The right surely doesn’t have my back, but anything is better than Biden.
They better hope it peters out before 2022, let alone 2024.
What’s that got to do with the Green Party (UK)? And you think *anything* is better than Biden?! ROFLMAO…
S Stern appears to be replying to a comment that broadened the conversation to “left wing parties.” The website has global news and an international audience who coexist to provide much-needed global solidarity, unity and strategies. Some are regulars who read all or most content, regardless of country.
I can see that you disagree with S Stern’s statement that “anything is better than Biden.” We all learn through communication and discussion. Perhaps you can expound. Why do you disagree? In the context of women’s concerns, what alternative strategies would you suggest, instead?
Can S Stern not answer for him/herself? I would love to know how Trump would be ‘better than Biden’! Or perhaps Bolsonaro, Putin, Duterte or any other far right populist demagogues?
As reported, the UK Green party has all of *one* (1) MP (out of Parliament’s 650) – so if you’re looking to confirm your bias using the alleged ‘exodus’ of a few female members, then I’m afraid you’re grasping rather lamely at straws…
I prefer that this website host civil and constructive dialogue, as opposed to mocking retorts, hostility and other chaos.
S Stern stated her opinion and reasons for it, and I politely nudged you to do the same. Examples of dialogue are, “I am hesitant to vote for the right, because ____, but I understand your concerns, and believe women and girls may nevertheless retain their basic human rights by _____.”
Your latest comment confirms my suspicion that you are a gender identity idealogue merely trolling, which explains your inability to construct an intelligible argument. There are only so many tricks in your trick-bag when the gender cult bible has not provided you a rote answer for a particular conversation. I see that you have decided to employ the tactic of gaslighting.
As your commenting here is done, you and I will not be going back and forth; however, I will note for the benefit of others that women have been politically underrepresented for centuries, and that this continues worldwide, with some countries doing far worse than others. There has been a pattern of male people taking the few seats designated for women, rolling back the progress women have made.
Examples:
– In the UK, Lily Madigan, a teen boy, was appointed a woman’s officer in the UK Labor Party shortly after the boy had begun identifying as a woman.
– In the US, a young man named Emilia Decaudin who identified as ‘non-binary’ was elected to one of two Democratic leadership seats in New York 100 years after Eleanor Roosevelt and The League of Women Voters fought to ensure that one seat would be for a man and one for a woman. This sex-parity rule had been put in place shortly after women won the right to vote following a 1917 march on Washington, for which women were arrested, clubbed, beaten and tortured. The sex-parity rule was dismantled by the same young man who took the seat.
– In Bangladesh, men who identify as women may fill the 14.29% of Parliamentary seats formerly reserved for women.
– In Thailand, males who identify as women are already overrepresented in Parliament while women struggle to get in.
This is about male people retaking male power while portraying it as a social justice movement. This is a Trojan Horse, weaponizing social justice tactics against those they were once intended to help, tricking women into aiding our return to marginalization and calling us bigots if we ask questions or object. TRAs (trans rights activists) are MRAs (Men’s Rights Activists).
As if women/girls don’t already have enough oppression to fight … here we are dealing with the ‘sexually confused’
The Green Party once rightly held the place of being the political party with the highest understanding and regard for solutions provided by technology and science. Currently, the Green Party’s insistence on the biology-denying ideological capture that “Transwomen are women, transmen are men and all non-binary identities are valid” is turning the claim that we are a party driven by scientific evidence into a tragic and dangerous joke.
1 – your choice – identify as male and be subject to violence and working for your enemy – OR identify as female and be continuously raped and abused ‘rape used as oppression during war’
If you wouldn’t choose male then you are not a woman.
Gender identity is like religion.
I support everyone’s right to believe in it, and to live their lives according to however they interpret its demands of them, where doing so does not have a detrimental impact on others.
But I don’t believe in it. I refuse to act as if I do believe in it. I should be able to say that I don’t believe in it and point out scientific and practical arguments against it without risking my job or being hounded off social media.
I should not be expected to define myself in terms of “gender identity” any more than in terms of a “soul”. These are concepts belonging to a belief system to which I do not subscribe.