MSPs were up until the early hours last night at Holyrood debating amendments to the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland Bill). Make no mistake, this is an exceptionally bad piece of legislation in the making – though it might have been less bad had a few more of those amendments been accepted by Nicola Sturgeon’s government.
But the SNP weren’t the only party painting Scottish politics in a bad light. During the debate, Labour MSP, Mercedes Villalba, took it on herself to start policing the language of others in the chamber. Villalba aimed her fire at the SNP’s Kenny Gibson – for daring to say something that many people also believe: that trans women are not women.
‘Would the member like to clarify in what way the previous contribution demonstrated respect? From where I was sitting, it was extremely disrespectful and bordered on hate speech,’ said Villalba.
So, what had Gibson said? Despite the way his words were described by Villalba, the reality is rather mundane:
‘The inconvenient truth is that trans women are physically male and, as a group, present the same hazard that other men present—those who pretend to be trans, even more so.
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