Open letter to Baroness Lane-Fox of Soho:

Chancellor of the Open University.

Dear Martha Lane-Fox,

I am a student of the Open University reading Art History. I am grateful for the opportunity to study without entry requirements and the course materials are, in most part, excellent.

However, I have an issue with the OU’s definition of sex and gender. Apparently sex is no longer a definitive biological classification based on possession of particular gamete producing organs (the recognition of who-has-what being essential for the survival of our species). Sex is now a ‘biological identity’ that can be congruent or rejected by individuals. My question is; congruent or incongruent with what? Genders are social and psychological constructs imposed on us depending on our sex : we are not born with gender roles and stereotypes within us. Our gender is not revealed by what we do: it’s decided by what is done to us. Unlike testes and ovaries; masculine and feminine are imaginary traits not innate ones. This is what over 50 years of feminism and gay rights have taught us. Or so we thought. Do we have to establish this all over again? We do not need to reject our bodies, be butchered by surgery nor take life-long drugs to be who we already are, to be with who we love nor to dress, work or behave however we want to. We just need to reject our gender conditioning.

I see that you are a Diversity Champion of the political activist group Stonewall. The culture that has been created is one of intimidation towards anyone questioning the fiction that a man can become a woman by merely dressing like one (in my case; jeans, trainers and no make-up) or ‘identifying’ as one. Tutors do not couch their responses to the issue of sex and gender, as they would with everything else, in terms of their considered opinion, with the option of being wrong, or from their research into the matter. Out of fear for their jobs they repeat the quasi-religious, unscientific dogma of gender ideology, as though it was unquestionable immutable fact. Just discussing the basic references of reality is seen as inappropriate or a very risky ‘sensitive issue’. This represents the opposite of the academic freedom and rigour that I’m sure you are aiming for.

The much targeted and threatened J.K. Rowling has been back on X for some time. The tide is turning away from the dangerous, contradictory and aggressively pushed nonsensical fantasy that puts girls, vulnerable women, sports women, women prisoners and those at rape crisis centres in considerable danger. There is also emerging evidence of the harm that puberty blockers and sex hormones inflict on bodies with the opposite sex organs. Not to mention psychological issues that are made worse, not better, with such drastic surgery that masks underlying causes of depression and anxiety.

Kathleen Stock, despite considerable intimidation, has spoken eloquently at both the Oxford and the Cambridge Unions on these issues.

Everyone is allowed to ‘identify’ in any way that they wish, though identities are restrictive and unhelpful. However, if these identities require the removal of safe-guarding protections or the right to the safety of same-sex facilities and sports, then the feelings and fetishes of men or women do not trump women’s and girl’s protected rights.

I look forward to your response,

Yours,

Jo

J. M. Waller

And from JK Rowling.

'Gender ideology has undermined freedom of speech, scientific truth, gay rights, and women's and girls' safety, privacy and dignity. It's also caused irreparable physical damage to vulnerable kids.

Nobody voted for it, the vast majority of people disagree with it, yet it has been imposed, top down, by politicians, healthcare bodies, academia, sections of the media, celebrities and even the police. Its activists have threatened and enacted violence on those who've dared oppose it. People have been defamed and discriminated against for questioning it. Jobs have been lost and lives have been ruined, all for the crime of knowing that sex is real and matters.

When the smoke clears, it will be only too evident that this was never about a so-called vulnerable minority, notwithstanding the fact that some very vulnerable people have been harmed. The power dynamics underpinning our society have been reinforced, not dismantled. The loudest voices throughout this entire fiasco have been people insulated from consequences by their wealth and/or status. They aren't likely to find themselves locked in a prison cell with a 6'4" rapist who's decided his name's now Dolores. They don't need state-funded rape crisis centres, nor do they ever frequent high street changing rooms. They simper from talk show sofas about those nasty far-right bigots who don't want penises swinging around the girls' showers, secure in the knowledge that their private pool remains the safe place it always was.

Those who've benefited most from gender identity ideology are men, both trans-identified and not. Some have been rewarded for having a cross-dressing kink by access to all spaces previously reserved for women. Others have parlayed their delicious new victim status into an excuse to threaten, assault and harass women. Non-trans-identified leftybros have found a magnificent platform from which to display their own impeccably progressive credentials, by jeering and sneering at the needs of women and girls, all while patting themselves on the back for giving away rights that aren't theirs.

The actual victims in this mess have been women and children, especially the most vulnerable, gay people who've resisted the movement and paid a horrible price, and regular people working in environments where one misplaced pronoun could see you vilified or constructively dismissed. Do not tell me this is about a tiny minority. This movement has impacted society in disastrous ways, and if you had any sense, you'd be quietly deleting every trace of activist mantras, ad hominem attacks, false equivalence and circular arguments from your X feeds, because the day is fast approaching when you'll want to pretend you always saw through the craziness and never believed it for a second.'

🐒