Read on Twitter
Anyone confused about why women, & sensible men, are raging about rape & sex on Twitter today (& for some time to come)? Well, there is a new Bill going through the Scottish Parliament, the Forensic Medical Services Bill 1/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
Everyone seems to agree its actually a very good piece of legislation. The core element of discussion is that it would allow the victim, whether female or male, that had experienced a sexual violent assault, or rape, to get the forensic medical evidence 2/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
collected before you needed to make a decision about reporting the crime. Right now, if you wanted to report a rape, you'd go to the Police & get examined, probably within their facilities. As you can imagine the last thing you may want after an 3/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
incredibly traumatic experience is to deal with Police, right then. So, the Bill is providing a route so you can turn up to an independent space, be examined by a Forensic Medical Examiner (FME) & take time to decide about reporting the crime 4/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
The aim is to increase the reporting (& hopefully solving) of these violent crimes, and having forensic evidence can make or break a case. You can imagine that if you are a victim you really don't want to hang around a Police station, unable to wash or 5/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
answer invasive questions. The bill would enable this reversal in process to happen. Get the unpleasant examination over and then deal with the reporting of the crime later. The wording of the bill, though, states that a victim can exert some influence 6/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
over the FME used. It is entirely understandable that considering the trauma of the assault, the female or male victim may wish to choose the sex of an examiner, whichever would make them feel less vulnerable. Examination won't be pleasant, 7/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
but it can be made less unpleasant by having some control over who may be invading your body, again. From @ForwomenScot's blog they note that the bill wording, worryingly, mentions the gender of the FME, not the sex 8/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
The consequence of this is that a female victim may ask for a woman to examine them, but may be presented with an examiner who presents as a woman. As a woman, in that position, I'd demand a female examiner to carry out an intimate exam. 9/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
Regardless of your own sex, is it really unreasonable to be able to specify the sex of person sticking their fingers or swabs inside you? Who here would want to risk re-traumatising victims by not granting their request (where practicable)? 10/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
Rape Crisis Scotland provided the following evidence during the creation of the Bill, emphasising the need for women to be able to access a female FME. NHS Lanarkshire want this guaranteed! Hooray! 10/ #SexNotGender #SixWords
In the Stage 1 of the Bill, the Health and Sport Committee recommended that the sex of the examiner was to be chosen by victims. The Scottish Government disagreed. 11/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
The Scottish Gov. wanted to retain the use of gender, despite it having no legal definition in law, while sex is a protected characteristic as is clearly defined as female or male in the Equality Act 12/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
I don't know about you but I really couldn't care less about how someone performs their femininity. I want to know they are female, that's all. 13/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
So, we approach Stage 3 and Scot Gov is holding fast onto gender. However, @JohannLamont has submitted an amendment to try and force a last minute change of heart from the Gov. Six simple words :
14/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
14/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
Votes on this amendment are tomorrow, Thursday 10th Dec. We are hearing arguments that there is no difference between sex and gender, but we know there is a difference in law. and if there is no difference then why not just change it to sex 15/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
to avoid ambiguity? What is the downside? Why risk additional trauma to victims? What conclusions can we draw about our political parties, and individual MSPs, who vote against this amendment? Here is some additional reading
https://forwomen.scot/07/12/2020/sixwords/#more-2998
16/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
https://forwomen.scot/07/12/2020/sixwords/#more-2998
16/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
And here from Murray Blackburn Mackenzie 17/ #SexNotGender #sixwords https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2020/12/07/sex-and-gender-in-the-forensic-medical-services-bill/
We can safely say that regardless of the outcome of this vote (& it looks like the SNP/Green MSPs are voting to retain gender) women will be watching MSPs who're ignoring survivor evidence, support group evidence, law & the voices of many, many women
18/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
18/ #SexNotGender #sixwords
