Alex Salmond has accused Nicola Sturgeon of "throwing away" momentum for Scottish independence by pushing through gender recognition reforms at Holyrood.
The former SNP leader pointed to an opinion poll published last weekend which suggested support for both the Nationalists and ending the Union had dropped.
The survey was carried out at the same time as a row over the imprisonment of double rapist Isla Bryson was raging in Scotland.
Bryson, who committed two rapes while she was a man, was initially housed in segregation at Cornton Vale near Stirling – Scotland’s only all-female prison – before being moved to the male estate after public and political outcry.
The saga led to Scottish Justice Secretary Keith Brown pausing the movement of transgender prisoners into women’s jails if they have a history of violence.
Salmond told a Burns supper in Dundee for his Alba party on Saturday that he had assumed that the leaders of the nationalist movement "well understood" the need to win over "every part and section” of Scotland.
In a video clip shared widely on Twitter, the former First Minister said: "But to get to a position where you say to a majority of our people that you cannot have single-sex spaces – prized and worked and strived for – because of some daft ideology imported from elsewhere and, as we’ve seen imperfectly understood by its proponents in Scotland, borders on the totally absurd.
"And the six per cent decline in independence vote over a month – think about that. Thirty years of gradually building, building, building, building till we get independence over 50 per cent and then thrown away with some self-indulgent nonsense.
"Which even if it was right, which it isnae, would hardly be tactically the most astute manoeuvre when we’re meant to be taking Scotland to its next date with destiny."
Sturgeon was asked about the polling showing a dip in support for her party at a press conference yesterday but insisted it showed the SNP would still win a "landslide victory" if an election was held now.
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