I’m a big supporter of free speech. I even direct a initiative called FREER, set up in order to promote social and economic freedom. But there’s a topic I’ve been avoiding writing about lately. I see the sexually violent threats on Twitter. I hear about the hate mail. I notice how few politicians dare to intervene. Gender recognition has just been the subject of a public consultation, but it’s become a no-go area for full-on discussion.
It’s an understandably emotional topic: identity is literally central to us all. To some people, however, it’s a topic of special concern—not least to those who identify with a gender different from that commonly understood to correlate with their biological sex. If you’re already starting to type online hatred at me for my choice of words in that last sentence, please bear with me.
I don’t want to address the most difficult things in this piece. I’m not going to write here about distress at children undergoing experimental medications and surgery, to which they are in no sense mature enough to consent. Or the way in which these “solutions”, often based on gender stereotypes, send certain messages to other young people who are struggling with their sexuality. I’m also not going to write about my deep concerns about the move towards a preference for subjective claims over objective fact in matters of law, as best exemplified by hate crimes legislation. Or unintended consequences regarding self-declaration and other protected characteristics, as emphasised by Trevor Phillips.
Rather, I’d like to try to be pragmatic. It’s clear that it’s increasingly dangerous to speak freely about the deepest questions related to all of this, so perhaps we can begin instead by searching for a small point of agreement about something of practical use.
There are three big issues at the heart of this debate: equality, fairness, and safety. The first issue is the most important, and should be easy to address: it is, of course, the case that trans people should, all other things being equal, be treated the same as anyone else. The second issue, which involves, for instance, concerns about who should be eligible to compete on women’s sports teams, is too complex to address now. But the third issue, I hope, is where we can introduce some pragmatism.
I used to think it was only the immensely privileged who could consider access to their lavatory of choice as a matter of great importance. There seemed to be so many more pressing concerns in the world, like FGM and labour camps. I now realise I was wrong. I see now that there can sometimes be legitimate safety concerns regarding the use of public lavatories. And I see that one of the real sticking points in the gender recognition debate comes in relation to this, regarding the competing needs of two sets of people.
The first set of people consists of transwomen who are scared to use men’s lavatories, for fear of discriminatory abuse. (I realise that some people will hate me for distinguishing between “transwomen” and “women”: I am not doing this out of unkindness or a lack of respect, but owing to a need for clarity within a limited word count.) The second set consists of women who are scared of using the same lavatories as transwomen, also for fear of discriminatory abuse. Recognising that both of these sets of people have some legitimate concerns, here, could be an important step forward in the gender recognition debate. In order to do so, however, it also seems necessary to realise that these concerns do not persist in every instance.
Safety concerns about using lavatories depend on two things: the people using them, and the lavatories in question. Some lavatories — in the bathroom of a trusted friend’s house, or within a single cubicle in a busy restaurant, where the single entrance/exit is in plain sight of many customers and staff — clearly do not generally pose a threat to anyone. On the other hand, most people would legitimately be scared of using an underground public lavatory at the end of a dark alleyway, alone, at midnight.
As responsible autonomous creatures living together in ordered society, we get nowhere without realising that our needs and preferences compete with those of other people. Ideally, as decent members of that society, we attempt to find ways to alleviate our conflicts of interest, considerately. I read the other day about a tall, heavy, man, who often delays his journey home down a lonely street by waiting for a few minutes, rather than immediately following behind any lone woman fellow traveller. Why? Because he recognises that she might understandably be scared of him. His actions do not make him guilty. They do not make him obsessed by gender stereotypes. They make him a kind and reasonable person.
It is human nature, in moments of vulnerability, to be afraid of people who are clearly physically stronger than us. This is not a point about gender, but about physicality. And about recognising that we share a world with other people. However, it is true, of course, that on average, those people born biologically male will be bigger and stronger than those born biologically female.
Again, this is nothing to do with identification, or gender as any kind of societal construct. It is a simple matter of scientifically provable fact. And anyone disputing that fact clearly does not want to find a good societal solution here; they seek to revel in, and gain from the serious distress many people feel over these complex and difficult issues. It is not the case that the only truths are scientifically provable, but it’s nonetheless important that we recognise scientifically provable truths as truth. Postmodernism is not the true progressive’s friend.
If we can accept the truth, however, and realise our obligations to each other as members of a shared society, then maybe we can start to address some of the seemingly intractable problems ahead of us. A starting point will be to recognise that, in most instances, there should be no need to be scared of using whichever lavatory you wish to use. We all need to make that true; the more we claim it cannot be so, the more division and hatred we fuel. Further points, however, will include the need for certain transwomen to recognise that, in some particular instances, it would be kinder to try to avoid using women’s lavatories.
When we try to make something like lavatory use a vital issue of formal rights and recognitions, we dilute the most important societal rules. And the more rules we make about these things, the less we are each able to choose to do the right thing. If we can start by discussing practical details, perhaps one day we will debate the fundamentals together again. If, as I increasingly fear, we cannot, then the future is bleak.
