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Why is Police Scotland so worried about rapists’ pronouns?

Isla Bryson, formerly known as Adam Graham, leaves court. Credit: Spindrift

September 9, 2024 - 10:00am

Transgender sex offenders in Scotland can breathe a sigh of relief. In the unlikely event that police find time between investigating hate crimes to question suspects, officers will ensure that their preferred pronouns and gender feelings are respected.

Yesterday, The Herald broke the news that Police Scotland had told a Holyrood committee that individuals charged or convicted of rape or attempted rape would be allowed to “self-declare” their sex. This was apparently to “foster a sense of belonging” because Scotland’s rapists deserve the warm and fuzzy glow of being members of a community too.

The report comes after a three-year campaign by policy analysts Murray Blackburn Mackenzie (MBM) calling for clarity on the recording of offenders’ sex.

A petition drafted by MBM in 2021 and signed by 13,000 people outlined their concerns. It explained that sex must be recorded “for data accuracy and trust in official statistics, public policy, media reporting, research, and for trust in public bodies”. But after being pushed for a response by Holyrood’s Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, Police Scotland overruled the petitioners’ concerns and stood by the policy of gender self-identification, arguing that it is in accordance with the force’s “values of respect, integrity, fairness and human rights”. Somewhat ironically, the force is currently asking for feedback on social media for how to help shape community policing.

Police Scotland’s adherence to an obviously flawed and unpopular policy is not only tone-deaf: it is reputational suicide. It was the debate over self-identification which helped to dislodge former first minister Nicola Sturgeon. Her successor Humza Yousaf didn’t fare much better, presiding over a catastrophic split with the Scottish Green Party over the issue.

Women’s groups have been calling for a return to sex-based sanity for at least five years. Meanwhile, the Scottish justice system has been thrown into disarray by multiple cases of trans-identified male offenders who have demanded to be treated as women.

The most high-profile of these was double rapist Isla Bryson — also known as Adam Graham. The dangerous offender memorably appeared in court wearing a blonde wig which partially covered his face tattoos. During the case he was referred to using female pronouns, and after sentencing he was initially sent to a women’s prison.

Even trans evangelist Sturgeon was unable to defend the decision, and eventually he was moved to the male estate. Bryson has since claimed to be a victim of “transphobia” in prison, complaining that staff have misgendered him and that he’s been denied access to women’s cosmetics.

That rapists like Bryson have the power to compel speech, and even help to bring down politicians, is precisely the reason Police Scotland should take note. Yet rather than listening to the likes of MBM, it seems decision-makers within the force are determined to prioritise trans inclusivity above sanity and safety. Despite the shift at the top of the SNP and Westminster ruling out Scottish gender self-identification, it will take decades to root trans ideology out of public institutions. Training by lobbying groups and indoctrination in schools have embedded the idea that trans rights are sacred.

Those of us south of the border can’t afford to be complacent. Most constabularies in England and Wales also operate policies of gender self-identification. It seems that, wherever they are, the forces of law and order are united in their determination to protect the feelings of rapists.

Ultimately, in chasing the approval of the trans lobby, the police have made themselves appear every bit as ridiculous and threatening as Isla Bryson in his dodgy wig.


Josephine Bartosch is a freelance writer and assistant editor at The Critic.

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Andrew D
Andrew D
1 month ago

‘The most high-profile of these was double rapist Isla Bryson — also known as Adam Graham’. 
I think the writer meant to say:
‘The most high-profile of these was double rapist Adam Graham — also known as Isla Bryson’ 

Clare Knight
Clare Knight
1 month ago
Reply to  Andrew D

One would hope so. It does get awfully confusing though, doesn’t it. I always think transwomen should be known as transmen. I always have to think twice when I’m reading these things.,

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago
Reply to  Clare Knight

I prefer the term ‘trans-identified man’ i.e. a man who thinks he’s a woman. What he actually is is up for debate.

LindaMB
LindaMB
29 days ago
Reply to  UnHerd Reader

In this case it is simply a rapist who wants access to more victims. That should be the only identity that concerns everyone

A J
A J
1 month ago

In California, a male rapist housed in a women’s prison, raped two women inmates and is now on trial for these extra rapes. The prison governor (a woman) insists she made the right choice in housing this dangerous man in women’s prisons.

I think all prisons should revert to the law passed following activism by Elizabeth Fry 200 years ago: all prisons should be strictly single sex. Women’s prisons should have only female prisoners AND female staff. And the same for men’s prisons – which should be obvious given the criminal cases of young women guards forming sexual relationships with male prisoners.

Ian Barton
Ian Barton
1 month ago
Reply to  A J

A pre-condition of being admitted to a women’s prison is to have all male genitalia removed beforehand. It’s really not complicated …

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago
Reply to  A J

The Geneva Convention stipulates that POW camps separate men and women. Women have separate sleeping wards and restrooms/ showers. Men are not allowed in the women’s camp. However, now women have to endure men in our restrooms and showers and sleeping wards—homeless shelters and domestic violence shelters for example. Nice to know that our enemies are treated with more dignity.

Clare Knight
Clare Knight
1 month ago
Reply to  A J

Exactly! Common sense.

A J
A J
1 month ago

Adam Graham says he’s being discriminated against because the prison won’t supply him with make-up. Does that mean women inmates are given make up paid for by the tax payer?

I’m willing to bet they’re not.

Jo Jo
Jo Jo
1 month ago
Reply to  A J

I believe female inmates can buy make-up in UK prisons, it’s not free. At least that’s the theory.

Robert
Robert
1 month ago

This is so bizarre. It’s almost like it is a test to see if anyone notices or speaks up. A prank. Like laying a fake corpse in the street to see if anyone reacts. It’s hard to believe this is still going on after Sturgeon gave that disastrous unscripted interview a short while ago. Even she started to see how nutty she sounded. Yet, on it goes.

2 plus 2 equals 4
2 plus 2 equals 4
1 month ago
Reply to  Robert

Its certainly a test but not a prank.
They are testing how far their power extends. The more fantastical the thing which they can compel you to concede to, the more complete is their tyranny.

Caradog Wiliams
Caradog Wiliams
1 month ago

“Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small. …I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, not to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think that if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect or is intended to do so.” Wrote Theodore Dalrymple.

Steven Carr
Steven Carr
1 month ago

The Scottish Police want to reduce hate crimes.
Why aren’t we allowed to hate Isla Bryson?

T Doyle
T Doyle
1 month ago

This is madness. Nothing else.

Charlie Two
Charlie Two
1 month ago
Reply to  T Doyle

No. its very advanced and exceptionally clever. Queer Theory, cultural marxism, whatever you want to call it is based on “everything that exists must be destroyed” and that “we must destroy the very concept of a stable and prosperous society”. It is very well thought through, being enacted very effectively, and aims to literally destroy everything, as that is the only way in which the socialist paradise can be brought about. even more clever, we pay for it as its chiefest exponents are on the public payroll (cops, civil servants, uni professors). we pay in every conceivable way for our own destruction.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
1 month ago

Stories like this make one wonder how satire is even possible anymore

2 plus 2 equals 4
2 plus 2 equals 4
1 month ago
Reply to  Alex Lekas

It isn’t really.
That’s why modern comedy mostly consists of apolitical one-liners on the one hand and, on the other, virtue signalling denunciations as “transphobic” of any public figure who hasn’t drunk the trans Kool Aid.

Alison R Tyler
Alison R Tyler
1 month ago

And is not even mildly humourous

LindaMB
LindaMB
29 days ago
Reply to  Alison R Tyler

Progressives seldom have a sense of humour as a sense of the absurd is needed, along with the ability to laugh at yourself. They are the new Puritans, dour, humourless, and unforgiving.

2 plus 2 equals 4
2 plus 2 equals 4
1 month ago

There are of course numerous ways in which this is utterly repellent.
Compelling victims to affirm that they were raped not by a man, as they know perfectly well they were, but by a woman is simply atrocious cruelty. There’s no other way to describe it.
Making women as a group implicit through sleight of hand for male levels of sexual abuse is extreme misogynist gaslighting on a population scale.
And it is another nail in the coffin of logic and reason.

Charlie Two
Charlie Two
1 month ago

No. its very advanced and exceptionally clever. Queer Theory, cultural marxism, whatever you want to call it is based on “everything that exists must be destroyed” and that “we must destroy the very concept of a stable and prosperous society”. It is very well thought through, being enacted very effectively, and aims to literally destroy everything, as that is the only way in which the socialist paradise can be brought about. even more clever, we pay for it as its chiefest exponents are on the public payroll (cops, civil servants, uni professors). we pay in every conceivable way for our own destruction.

Clare Knight
Clare Knight
1 month ago

And yet another situation where women lose. Men hate us but want to be us.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago
Reply to  Clare Knight

Not all men. However, it certainly seems to be the case that the men who want to be women are the ones who hate women.

LindaMB
LindaMB
29 days ago
Reply to  UnHerd Reader

Autogynephilia? They want what woman naturally have.

Charlie Two
Charlie Two
1 month ago

If you peddle a graduate profession and demand degrees for promotion, simultaneously allowing the unis to peddle ‘Queer Theory’ and ‘cultural marxism’, you end up with the spavined, brainwashed, inept, hated by left and right, Plod Force that we have today. run by the retarded, for the demented, that utterly loathes normal people. it is now a force of foreign occupation; foreign dogma enacted increasingly by non-British employees without a basic grasp of our history, traditions, or in some cases, language.

Charlie Two
Charlie Two
1 month ago

This is all very advanced and exceptionally clever. Queer Theory, cultural marxism, whatever you want to call it is based on “everything that exists must be destroyed” and that “we must destroy the very concept of a stable and prosperous society”. It is very well thought through, being enacted very effectively, and aims to literally destroy everything, as that is the only way in which the socialist paradise can be brought about. even more clever, we pay for it as its chiefest exponents are on the public payroll (cops, civil servants, uni professors). we pay in every conceivable way for our own destruction.

John Tyler
John Tyler
1 month ago

It’s all dribbling , babbling nonsense.

Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
1 month ago

I thought one of the most valuable observations was that in England we should not be complacent, as this virulent thought worm has been thoroughly implanted in institutions and schools.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago

Graham is just one of many violent men who suddenly realize they are women as soon they are arrested and charged with a crime. This leads to rape victims being forced to use “she” for her rapist when testifying. Basically, these men think that they will be sent to a women’s prison, which would mean they would avoid a harsher men’s prison. For some, it means they can harass, intimidate and sexually assault women (see: Karen White).

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago
Reply to  UnHerd Reader

I think I’m right in saying that there are four murderers in Scottish prisons who are men who say they’re women.