The TERF wars are far from over

On Saturday, women’s rights activists gathered in central London, Edinburgh and Cardiff to demand the full implementation of the UK Supreme Court’s transgender ruling – which affirmed the biological definition of sex in law. The protests were organised under the slogan ‘199 Days Later’ – to emphasise just how long it’s been since the Supreme Court ruling.

When the ruling was announced back in April, it was a moment of joy and relief for women who had been fighting doggedly for women’s sex-based rights. It meant that transwomen, otherwise known as men, were no longer entitled to access women-only spaces, from changing rooms to women’s refuges to sports competitions. But over the past seven months, too many in positions of power have been very slow to act on the ruling.

Indeed, there has still been no concrete official guidance for institutions on how to actually implement the ruling. Interim advice from the Equality and Human Rights Commission was issued shortly after the decision was made, but has since been scrapped after intimidation from the trans lobby. Activists branded the guidance ‘exclusionary’, seemingly oblivious to the fact that this is its entire point.

What’s more, certain institutions have been openly defying the ruling. Newnham College, the oldest women-only college at Cambridge University, is still admitting biological men, providing they ‘identify’ as women. The Trades Union Congress voted unanimously to reject the Supreme Court ruling, calling it ‘flawed’. And it took months for the Scottish government to require Scottish schools to provide separate toilets for boys and girls.

All this umming and ahhing over a ruling that could not have been simpler to understand is telling. There was no such hesitation when organisations and institutions were letting hairy-chested blokes muscle in on lesbian speed-dating events, or making them the face of feminine hygiene brands, or awarding them Olympic medals for dominating women’s sports categories. It is only when institutions are asked to protect female spaces that the bureaucratic handwringing begins.

After years of sidelining women and bending the knee to the new, full-glam face of misogyny, institutions are unwilling to give up gender ideology so easily. The fight, it seems, is far from over.

Georgina Mumford is an editorial assistant at spiked.