The Scottish government has given new instructions to its schools that say that transgender students must be banned from the correct toilet facilities, either forcing them into the incorrect toilets that could put them at risk of harm, or to provide them with separate facilities that segregate them from cisgender students.
Holyrood ministers has issued new guidance that say that pupils can only access toilets that correspond with their 'biological sex', a reversal on their previous stance that trans students can use the facilities that match their gender identity, or that they feel most comfortable in.
As with other guidance given across the UK following the UK Supreme Court Ruling on sex as outlined in the Equality Act 2010, this new guidance tries to reduce trans students (and everyone) to 'biological sex', yet does not lay out what it means by that.
There are probably some people reading this who are going to jump in with their very simple 'but it's easy, male and female!' response, but sex is neither binary, nor simple, no matter how much anti-trans bigots want it to be. As they like to say, facts don't care about their feelings.
Without clear definitions on what sex is from the government issuing these guidance's there is very little to enforce this. Are they referring to genotypic sex, the type of chromosomes someone has? If so, they need to address the fact that there are more than two groupings of chromosomes, and that there are masculine presenting people who are physically male with XX chromosomes, as well as women with XY chromosomes; so what are they and the variety of people who fall outside the supposed XX/XY binary?
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Are they referring to only genitals, and if so how will this be enforced in schools? Are they suggesting that someone needs to be present at the toilets to check what students have in their underwear before they're allowed to go inside? This hardly seems practical, nor decent, and I don't think sexually abusing every student who wants to take a piss is a good policy. Or are they talking about phenotypic sex attributes, which in itself is a whole slew of physical characteristics that can vary, can be modified, and mean different things in different cultures?
The UK Supreme Court and government officials have said over and over again that these new segregationist, bigoted guidance and laws 'bring clarity', yet have not once been clear on what they mean. 'Biological sex' is a broad phrase with dozens of variables, none of which define someone's sex individually. This is why these rulings have been called unscientific and biologically illiterate by medical professionals and biologists. Yet here we are, yet again seeing parts of the UK government charging ahead with policies that are only designed to harm people, with no grounding in reality or science.
In making the declaration that trans students in Scotland must be singled out like this, outed to their peers, forced into unsafe environments, or removed completely, it is only furthering harm towards children. Literal fucking children. What happens when a child is outed as trans and is bullied? What happens when bigoted kids wait outside the special trans only toilets to jump any kid who comes out? What happens when cisgender kids are accused of being trans and attacked? What happens with children are so bullied and abused in large part to these policies that they take their own lives? How many dead and hurt children will be enough before people see that these policies aren't just stupid, but cruel?
The Scottish government has turned its back on its children. It's given in to the loud, cruel screams of awful bigots who have made it clear that they want trans people gone, whether that be legalised out of public life or just dead. Everyone who has backed this should feel shame, they should feel guilt when children end up hurt, and they shouldn't be anywhere near decision making power like this, because they've demonstrated that they don't care about science, they don't care about children, and they aren't worthy of respect.
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