Legally, the 'gender war' has been won - but Swinney continues to sanction relentless attack on women's rights

An emphatic win in a case that, in a sane world, wouldn’t ever have needed to be fought.

The NHS Trust’s ‘Transition In The Workplace’ policy allowed said man, who uses the name Rose Henderson, to undress in front of female colleagues, while they, in much discomfort, were forced to put up with this. This created, the tribunal concluded, “a hostile, humiliating and degrading environment” for the nurses.

Gender-identity activists will retort my use of ‘man’ for ‘Rose’ is hostile and humiliating in turn. While potentially offensive to some, I maintain there’s nothing whatsoever wrong with causing offence in the interests of truth and clarity. Both have been in short supply in the ‘gender wars.’

Moreover, women have been put in a horrendous position: offend some men (and experience hell for that) by defending women’s rights with the language necessary; alternatively, placate said men and lose those rights entirely.

Unfortunately, similarly unlawful policies as faced by the Darlington nurses exist UK-wide, despite the Supreme Court’s crystal-clear judgment last April in favour of For Women Scotland (FWS).

The ruling confirmed they, alongside every woman fighting this battle, have been 100 per cent correct on the law: ‘woman’ means ‘biological woman’ in the Equality Act 2010. It has to, for women to retain their hard-won rights.

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FWS getting legal clarity was a vital step towards ending the ‘gender wars.’ It’s blindingly obvious to those who understand why women require single-sex spaces and services why rights are on the basis of sex and not subjective ‘female identity’. The latter is usually based on regressive, sexist stereotypes, or quasi-religious beliefs in ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’ souls of sorts.

People can feel all sorts of things about themselves that are perfectly harmless and can be tolerated. If said feelings demand total compliance and the destruction of other’s rights, they definitely can’t be, which has been the situation women like FWS and the Darlington Nurses have been up against.

Legally, the battle is won. It’s clear the SC judgment is influencing getting back to a place of sanity. But the backlash against FWS’s victory has been stupendous. ‘Hostile, humiliating and degrading’ are perfect adjectives for it.

Gender activists – both individuals and organisations – continue flouting the highest court in the land, displaying a depressingly widespread disrespect for women’s rights.

Shockingly – or, at least it should be - the SNP government continues to defend the Scottish prison service housing violent, murderous men in the female prison estate. So sure of the morality and legality of this, John Swinney’s administration is spending thousands more pounds of Scottish taxpayers money to put FWS through another emotionally and financially punishing ordeal, while withholding the costs long overdue to them from their last court battle.

It feels criminal this saga continues. All this, to defend housing dangerous men with extremely vulnerable women who quite literally cannot escape them. Why? Well, those male criminals say they’re women, so that’s the priority.

Hostile. Degrading. Humiliating.

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Whether opposing this untenable situation in NHS hospitals, in the arts, or in prisons, the levels of vitriol women have had flung their way for being legally and morally correct in their insistence women have rights on the basis of sex has made this era – the era of ‘gender wars’ – fundamentally abusive and often traumatising.

I do not use either of these words lightly.

Emotional coercion lies at the heart of the gender identity movement’s success. How often have women been told men who identify as transwomen, including those abusing them or doing their best to get them fired and/or ostracised, are members of ‘the most marginalised, vulnerable’ community in society?

Unconvincing. But, even were this claim granted, giving any man access to women’s most private of spaces and important of services doesn’t logically follow anyway. Woe-betide you point that out. Failure to adhere to these demands means severe punishment.

Even some sympathetic to the cause of the Darlington nurses undoubtedly harbour a niggle they could’ve avoided what they’ve gone through, letting someone else fight their battle. Why make the choice to speak out, taking on such a high-profile fight? Unfortunately, some people take the view that women who have been vocal in their opposition to the gender-identity movement are to blame for any consequences they then face.

“After all, you could have just never said anything to start with,” feminist writer Victoria Smith says, setting out such people’s mindset. “As many have done, you could have waited in the wings whilst other women took all the hits. For so many of us, describing our own reality is treated as an indulgence for which we should be willing to pay the price.”

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This is psychological and emotional abuse, whether women speak out or remain silent in the face of it. That this relentless attack on women continues to be sanctioned by the Scottish government, in service of male murderers being housed with imprisoned women, is a disgrace of unconscionable magnitude.

Following their tribunal outcome, spokeswoman for the Darlington Nurses, Bethany Hutchison said: “This judgement recognises the intolerable and degrading situations women have been placed in. No woman should ever have been told to ‘broaden her mindset’ or compromise when raising legitimate concerns for her safety and privacy.”

This is the most insidious backlash against women’s rights any of us could’ve imagined was coming. Brava to the Darlington Nurses for refusing to be cowed by it.