The Green party’s gender intolerance problem

Is the Green party determined to make its female members feel unwelcome? After voting down women’s sex-based rights at their spring conference, the party has now suspended the co-chair of its women’s committee, Emma Bateman. The reason? According to Bateman, her decision to question whether trans women are female is to blame.

As a trans woman, who also happens to be a science teacher, I know that trans women are most definitely male. Indeed, it is only because we are male that we can be transwomen. But where gender ideology is concerned, the Greens appear to have lost touch with reality.

Bateman is no transphobe but – as with many other women – she thinks that being female is rather more than a feeling. She is also well respected in the party. In the words of writer and activist Beatrix Campbell: ‘Bateman is a calm, splendid Green activist. Many people treasure her.’

But is there a place in the party for people like Bateman? Campbell, who has herself faced