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November 25, 2024 - 1:10pm
Britain in the third decade of the 21st century is a very strange place. In Scotland, men can die of cervical cancer, a disease which affects an organ they don’t have. Scottish women may be recorded as expiring from testicular cancer even though they don’t possess — how to put this diplomatically? — the balls.
Up and down the country, “women” are appearing in court charged with rape, an offence that consists of penetration by a penis. Most puzzling of all, official statistics suggest that Muslims in England and Wales are three times more likely to be transgender than the non-religious population. The figures imply that one in every 67 is transgender, revealing a previously undetected surge in interest in gender identity among observant Muslims in Britain.
Is any of this an accurate snapshot of the UK in 2024? Of course not: it’s what happens when institutions tasked to provide accurate data give in to the demands of activists. It distorts the figures governments depend on when they’re making decisions which affect all our lives, such as allocating resources. It inflates the size of the trans population, appearing to bolster activists’ demands for special treatment. And it provides a wholly false impression of who is responsible for violence against women, creating a previously unknown category of the “female rapist”.
The latest example of this dangerous process to come to light affects death records in Scotland. Trans lobbyists have persuaded National Records of Scotland to record the “gender identity” of the recently deceased, rather than sex. The risible outcome is that men with a Gender Recognition Certificate are appearing in official records as female, even if they died of a disease of the male reproductive organs. Even if they don’t have a GRC, they can be recorded on a death certificate as female to avoid upsetting relatives. All we need now is a Radio 4 documentary about the startling rise in “men” suffering from ovarian cancer. Maybe Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who once claimed that trans women can “grow” a cervix, could act as an adviser.
When did this country stop caring about accuracy? When did politicians decide that trustworthy statistics matter less than the sensitive feelings of a small number of people? You might think the Official for National Statistics, at the very least, would be immune to such pressure, but you would be wrong.
After concluding 18 interviews with trans people, the ONS included a question about whether “the gender you identify with” is the same as “your sex registered at birth” in the 2021 census. The results appeared to suggest that the East London borough of Tower Hamlets has the largest trans population in the country, larger even than Brighton and Hove. Dr Michael Biggs of Oxford University pointed out last year, however, that many inhabitants don’t speak English as a first language — and almost certainly misunderstood the question. The ONS has since had to admit, though gritted teeth, that it cannot say whether its estimate of the size of the trans population of the UK is accurate.
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SubscribeWhen left-liberals look approvingly on political and cultural Islam, they must find in themselves a spiritual vacuum left by their own abandoned European heritage.
In gender identity, however, they find the equivalent of all the key mystical tenets of Christianity, such as resurrection from the dead, the Holy Trinity, Virgin Birth, and most of all, transubstantiation in naming the communion wine as the blood of Christ.
It’s the bread broken at “the last supper” with the attributed words “this is my body” which forms the key part of transubstantiation, plus the wine/blood. Mystical indeed, and designed to enthral believers, which is mainly Catholics whilst other Christian denominations regard it as symbolic rather than actual.
The legacy of such beliefs are part of our European heritage: if intelligent and influential people have believed these things for centuries, the gender identity data manipulation is just following on from this mindset.
Lots of questions. One simple answer. This is all due to Gender Ideology.
How can you challenge it? Say and explain what it is.
But that’s not going to happen on Unherd. Gender Ideology is Feminist Ideology. It came out of Feminism. And that can’t be criticised.
So what will happen? More questions but no answers. Ad infinitum.
You’re right of course, but for many people this is already vanished history. I’d suggest you explain a bit more what you mean – but I fear you’d be wasting your time.
I’m saying if you don’t understand what ‘gender’ means then you will get endless articles like this one perpetuating, and validating, a very political, but misunderstood, concept. There will never be any answers. Which, of course, perfectly suits all the supporters of Gender Ideology. Then they can continue their gender narrative unchallenged.
Oh look! Another man blaming feminism for gender ideology, seemingly unaware of the fact that leading feminist writers have been critical of transsexualism (as it was then called) since the 1970s. See, for a classic example, “The Transsexual Empire” by Janice Raymond, or Gyn/Ecology, by Catholic scholar and feminist author Mary Daly, both published in the 1970s. Or anything by Sheila Jeffries, who has strongly criticised transgenderism in a whole stream of published books, from the 1980s up to 2022.
Blaming women for the harms that men do to them is a very old trope, and its wearying to see that blame popping up in UnHerd comments under any article on this subject.
That last sentence – precisely what happens, and it should be challenged every single time.
It’s simply not. No one blames women. Indeed I’m not sure what that might even mean. But some recognise that what is now referred to as “gender ideology” has its origins in feminism. And the point isn’t to blame them – the point is to understand the ideology, what it says and what its history is.
Kathleen Stock gives a reasonable potted history in her book.
Oh look! Someone ignoring what I said!
You’re simply not understanding what is being said.
Richard, gender ideology arises out of a *misinterpretation* of a branch of feminism which arose in the 70s. Were I to take the time and effort to explain it to you I fear that my efforts would be wasted so I’ll “save my breath to cool my porridge.”
Why would your efforts be wasted? Go ahead and explain it.
You could just as easily say it came out of the sexual revolution of the 60’s.
However, as the trans siblings tell us, trans has been around for a long time, well before the feminism of the 60’s & 70’s. Before, in fact any feminism at all.
In the Molly Houses of the 18th century, men became “women” with like-minded fellows without a feminist I sight.
If anyone pushed this onto the public arena it was Mr Foucault onh with some others such as John Money and to put it as some child of feminism is disingenuous to the extreme.
If future generations of archaeologists uncover a hoard of engineering career posters, they’ll assume all our engineers were female. Strange days indeed.
That was quite funny
they will also be surprised that the normal family had a white blond wife, a black husband with asian children and that they were all at home having breakfast together at around nine am.No one appeared to have a job but they lived in a £500,000 house ?
Presumably the record office has to deal with the name change on the Death Certificate somehow, in a non-confusing way, so the gender change probably isn’t such a big deal.
Sadly I think you’re presuming a great deal.
For so many, for decades now, the mantra the morning begins with has been – “Now let’s pretend!”. I only wish now that I hadn’t taken my fellows going completely bonkers so much to heart. I feel like Canute, stood on the beach sopping wet and as if someone had just said to me “Poor thing! Didn’t you realise that tide was coming in?”
“When did this country stop caring about accuracy?”
I don’t think most of the population stopped caring; just those hooked on postmodernist claptrap and identity nonsense. Let’s remember: accuracy is whatever you perceive it to be in your own lived experience. Wheeeee! I’m a flying porcine!
I think this issue runs even deeper—it’s not just about religion like culture being far removed from reality; it’s the entire speculative financial system that touches much closer. The fact that people are convinced that financial policies are independent of government control, is simply not true. There’s a lot happening behind the scenes just like China…any president or prime minister can sunk or support any industry with one tweet! how is this separate?
The problem is that the entire culture and political system are focused on pointing fingers, while simultaneously engaging in the same behaviors they criticize in others as socialism or communism or blah. This hypocrisy is becoming increasingly visible, especially with the rise of social media and the widespread access to technology.
We need to shift towards being more reality-based rather than myth-based. For hundreds of years, myths like “we rule the world” or “we colonize and gain power” dominated. But just like religion, these myths eventually amount to nothing at critical juncture. While some people profit greatly from an exploitative “free market,” the market isn’t truly free—there’s a great deal of coordination happening behind the scenes. If you can lie so much like that why are we surprised others may also fall for the same style of being?
The resulting inequality has grown too extreme. Of course, other countries are not necessarily better, as their financial systems are often directly controlled by their governments. However, what sets them apart is that their people are not blatantly lied to about this relationship. They understand that economics relies on predictability and that governments control the banks.
In contrast, many in the West are misled, and that deception is the core issue.
This kind of scrutiny will likely extend further—into gender issues and every other aspect of the social fabric…and if we often thought why those countries are corrupt, now we are realizing believing a virgin having babies was nothing like believing markets are free of human interference? Gender, biology, science in general….one can see clearly all things being called upfront. Reckoning time!
It’s not enough to put the gender on the death certificate. An archeologist in the distant future might mis-gender you!
How can this disaster be avoided?
cremation – all men are cremated equal.
Can someone explain why a persons felt sense of gender is worth recording on a death record?
They’re dead. At this point a sense of felt gender is kind of irrelevant.
Surely at the point of death biological reality takes charge, right?!
You do illustrate what I was saying in my comment. No feminist writer will explain gender. That would be to expose Feminism to criticism.
To answer your question. In the early 1990s Feminism ‘advanced’ after massive infighting, and prioritised gender over biology.
You won’t know why that happened because no one will write about it.
Steven Pinker – the Blank Slate
My Ancestry DNA records recently show my male born niece as a female. Isn’t geneology confusing enough as it is? Imagine future relatives trying to sort this out.,,or just give up because “who cares anymore”.
No one can make sensible policy without reasonably reliable data. How many men are there with Gender Recognition certificates claiming to be women and vice versa. They must know how many certificates they have issued.
Anecdotally it would seem there are rather more men trying to get into the ladies showers than ladies trying to get into the men’s showers . and if we knew the data on that it might help us to deal with the issue.
My money is on a men trying to be women will be well over 75%. Men claiming to be ladies can be good at ladies sports- other way round not so much. Men claiming to be women in private spaces will scare women -other way round ladies claiming to be men will not scare men much .
Cui Bono ?
So what does this suggest about other data collection of UK residents? Do we dare assume that this unprofessional sacrificing of accuracy on the altar(s) of ideologies is confined to this one corner of population data or are other data also demonstrably false? How about data on school attendance, disease prevalence, home based violence and abuse? And aren’t significant policy decisions taken based on data generated by these sources?
I wouldn’t ask David Lammy for advice on anything.