In her commentary on the recently published report by The Future of Legal Gender research project, Susanna Rustin argues – as if this is a criticism of the report – that “it is dangerous to pretend that female people are not vulnerable in specific ways to male violence and other forms of social control” (Trying to erase the biological definition of sex isn’t just misguided – it’s dangerous, 28 June). This strikes me as a misreading of the central research question that underpins the report. I take this to be whether “decertifying” sex and gender as legal categories makes it easier or harder to challenge the many gender-based forms of inequality in our society.
The whole premise, that is, is precisely that women do face multiple disadvantages as regards power, resources and visibility; that societies need strong and effective equality policies to address the gendered institutions and ideologies that shape and constrain our lives; and that any change with regard to the legal status of sex and gender therefore has to ensure that such policies are not weakened in the process. There is no pretence in this about female people somehow not being vulnerable to male violence or other forms of social control, and certainly no suggestion that gender is all in the mind.
