Opinion
By Julie Bindel
California is dismantling women’s hard-won rights – in the name of progressivism
Are there still women in California? They seem to have ceased to exist – at least as far as the state’s laws are concerned. A new raft of legislation currently under consideration seeks to both criminalise parents who wish to protect their children from harmful medical interventions, and further entrench the notion that it is possible to change sex.
When you think about California, you probably envisage vast blue skies and ocean, white sand and hippies, lolling around smoking homegrown marijuana. Well, let me disabuse you of your fantasy.
In September 2022 the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, signed a bill that would make the state a ‘sanctuary’ for parents moving from any of the states that outlaw surgery and hormonal intervention on trans-identified minors. Some states have introduced bills making it a felony for medical professionals to perform medical interventions on those under the age of 19, while others like California allow it. In other words, those that do allow it are in favour of taking a surgeon’s knife to what is undoubtedly quite often a psychological and social problem, namely that of children presenting as gender dysphoric.
If that weren’t bad enough, California’s proposed Assembly Bill 957 would brand as ‘abusive’ parents who refuse to ‘affirm’ the identity of their child who claims to be the opposite sex. Failing to go along with the fantasy could mean losing custody, so that – rather than helping these kids work through the terrible pain and turmoil they are undoubtedly suffering, by finding an appropriate psychologist or counsellor – parents could feel compelled to march them down to the gender clinic and start them on puberty blockers.
Imagine you have an eight-year-old son who claims to be a girl, and it becomes obsessive. Perhaps he is on the autistic spectrum, traumatised due to something that has happened at school of which you are unaware, or going through a mental health crisis of some kind. You could, fearful of the law, find yourself compelled to begin calling him ‘her‘ – alongside whatever girl’s name he chose.
Your son would be sent to school in female attire, and, because this is California, with its laws allowing for self-identification, teachers would of course affirm him as the opposite sex.
Last year, Newsom signed a Bill outlawing what is known as ‘deadnaming’ in the California Community College (CCC) system. This means that community colleges and public universities are prohibited from using the original name of transgender and nonbinary students on their diplomas and academic records.
It would appear that biological sex in California only continues to exist when it comes to commercial surrogacy. As if the state were not already bonkers enough, California – which legalised commercial surrogacy a decade ago and is now dubbed the ‘rent-a-womb capital’ of the US – has now pledged to introduce measures to enable any ‘infertile person’ to access IVF and surrogacy services, paid for by insurance. Gay male couples (and other men) would be able to access surrogate services in the name of ‘fertility equality’. Indeed, infertility has now been defined as a ‘status’ rather than a medical condition – which is quite extraordinary given that men cannot bear children, as a matter of biological fact. Nevertheless, the legislation – which is progressing through the state’s legislature now – will require insurance companies to cover procedures relating to IVF and surrogacy. The organisation ‘Men Having Babies’ claim this as a victory for equality and diversity.
In this scenario, the needs of the child and the birth mother come secondary to those of the men. It is beyond me how anyone can fail to see the misogyny inherent to these positions: men being able to define themselves as women and destroy our sex-based rights, and men renting the wombs of poor and desperate women to fulfil a lifestyle choice. When are we going to wake up to the fact that we are living through one of the most woman-hating periods in modern history? No wonder feminists are fighting back.
[Sourced from The Telegraph]
