And there is nothing kind about undermining the Supreme Court judgment on the Equality Act
Wearing a badge which says “You’re safe with me” can be a very dangerous move. It enables predators — offering them cover amongst people who might themselves be unlikely to harm others. No one can know who is which and a badge doesn’t have the special power to tell us.
Whenever a woman vouches for a man as “one of the good ones” I feel my hackles rise, because she has no way of knowing this and should not be telling you to lower your boundaries for a man because he has not, as yet, committed an act of sexual or domestic violence against her. Rapists and abusers are rarely honest with their friends, colleagues, bosses or neighbours, but instead go to great lengths to hide the fact. Branding any man as “safe” is pointless and dangerous for this reason alone.
Dr Ronx Ikharia, a Children’s BBC presenter, is self-described as “black, queer, transmasculine, non-binary” — a tasteless word-smoothie leaving the average person baffled. Ikharia believes that single-sex services for “women”, recently clarified by a Supreme Court judgement to mean “biological females”, can be barged into by a man simply by recruiting a woman he finds wearing a badge saying “safe with me”.
Nothing in existence can mark a man out as definitively “safe” to be in a woman’s single-sex space
This powerful badge, according to Ikharia, will require the wearer to be an “ally” to “transgender people” and escort them into spaces like toilets or changing rooms which they “prefer” according to their identity. She says the Supreme Court Ruling “means trans+ people may be forced into spaces where they don’t feel safe”, adding “toilets are one of the most dangerous of these spaces.”
Nothing in existence can mark a man out as definitively “safe” to be in a woman’s single-sex space given the epidemic levels of male violence against women. He is certainly not made more safe for other people by a badge being worn by a woman stupid enough to wear one, or who is wearing one to consciously and deliberately help him trespass into women’s single-sex spaces.
Despite emotive language used by Ikharia to suggest how threatened trans people feel following the ruling, what is being urged is that men pretending to be women, and women happy to pretend along with them access space intended only for women. In this instance the term “safety in numbers”, offered by such a badge, translates directly into “numbers mean less safety for women”.
Ikharia is not being entirely forthcoming about what this campaign involves. If she was clear, she would tell us it involves a woman wearing the badge and if a man approaches her saying “can you get me inside that woman’s toilet?” she is obliged to take him or she is a bad woman or “not an ally”.
If a confrontation should occur with a lone woman he finds there, objecting to his presence in her space, then he has both protection and support — and she is not only placed at risk but also demonised, in a space where he should not be. This is all done under the influence of a “badge of kindness”.
Supposing a man is a danger to women, and I don’t differentiate men’s ability to sexually offend based on whether or not they are wearing a dress, then it is quite possible for him to approach such a badge-wearing female “ally”, ask her to accompany him to a female changing room or toilet and then make it significantly easier for him to assault her. She has, after all, gone willingly — and we know how courts treat women who allege sexual offences.
The women in single-sex spaces are likewise placed at greater risk of men who wish to sexually offend, by the women who wear these badges and bring those men into their single-sex space.
These women are failing us. Women worked hard to ensure the law on single-sex spaces has been clarified as reserved only for female people. Ikharia is especially disappointing, encouraging other women to help her bring men into women’s spaces.
Ikharia’s real campaigning, and the funds being raised for it, are designed to undermine the Supreme Court Judgement under the guise of “kindness”. She should be embarrassed to think that she can slip it past the women determined to defend other women’s right to safety.
The attendant fundraising is currently over £10,000 and the badges are produced by a company called “Rainbow and Co” , whose best-selling product is a “TERF Repellent Spray pin”. This is a hostile badge, which declares that women should be “repelled” if they have gender critical politics. Men have attacked women before, and I fear that one of these violent men will eventually use a spray to injure women. Women should not take “jokes” about being “sprayed” lightly. Spraying women is an extremely misogynistic concept and the connotations of acid attacks terrifying. There has been a 75 per cent rise in such attacks in one year with 502 female victims. This sort of badge is not a “bit of fun”.
It is time that the government was firmer with everyone and anyone determined to undermine the Supreme Court Judgement which was clarified to protect female people. They/Thems like Ronx Ikharia can play around with their own ridiculous descriptions for their identity choices as much as they wish — but they should be careful not to play around with the law.
