This post is on the BDSM Activism web board.
| Fri 19 Jun 09, 10:25 AM Degenerate  UK(M), 5 yrs    |
Copied over from the thread about Sun newspaper doorstepping members of this site alandra and SMDoctor. http://www.informedconsent.co.uk/posts/240049/0 CAAN has another letter waiting to be dealt with by EHRC (3rd letter now). At the moment but I'm feeling pretty cheesed off so I called them to check we are talking to the right person. Apparently we are, but things are soo slow. I have mentioned to Maurice Shaw from the department that there's more press harassment and intimidation of BDSM people happening this week and that we urgently want to talk in person to Andrea Murray (the head of the relevant department) about why they will not join us in stopping the discrimination people experience around sexuality matters which don't just relate to the gender of our partners (they keep telling us that orientation only means being gay or lesbian or bi - ie that orientation is only about gender). I am being told to wait for our letter to be dealt with. I am feeling pleased to have found out though, that the person we are dealing with is based in Manchester. If we do not get the requested meeting following this letter, I shall go and visit them anyway, cos I'm done with being polite. If anyone wants to join me, send a memo. If anyone wants to contact Andrea Murray in support of CAAN's letter asking them to begin to cover all matters relating to sexuality, not just gender, I think her direct email is andrea.murray@equalityhumanrights.com and you can get a copy of CAAN's email from me, if you want to see it.
Otherwise, if anyone here works within the EHRC it won't hurt to spread rumours that we're reaching the end of our tether. Andrea Murray is the person dealing with correspondence from CAAN. Maurice Shaw, who was very nice actually, says she heads the team which deal with matters relating to orientation. De Sign up to CAAN's statement www.caan.org.uk Edited Fri 19 Jun 09, 10:45 AM by Degenerate | ||
| 22 Jun 09, 12:53 PM Degenerate UK(M), 5 yrs |
Just to clarify, here is the original document CAAN sent to EHRC in October 2008. We are not asking for BDSM to be recognised as a sexuality, we are asking for all consenting adults to have sexual rights. De
Sign up to CAAN's statement www.caan.org.uk | ||
| 22 Jun 09, 1:35 PM Thoughtleader UK(NW), 7 yrs  |
I applaud your campaigning, and hope you succeed. I'm not a great campaigner myself, partly because of concerns for my own privacy, and partly because I just couldn't agree with the extreme porn campaign. I never knew what I thought about it, and so couldn't support it, or any campaign that associates the wider BDSM cause closely with it (like the CAAN statement). So by all means discount my views if you think they're not representative. I think it's important though to make sure we're clear what we're asking for here, and making it realistic. However right it is, I don't think we're going soon to win a battle to have the law read as including BDSM as a sexual orientation. The CEHR is just too conservative for that, and there are powerful lobbies against it - not just conservatives but some feminists who disapprove of BDSM and some gay people who think sexuality discrimination is and should be about them, and not diluted. But campaigning against outings isn't about equality - it's about human rights. You don't have to approve of someone's private life or think they're equal to you to think they are entitled to privacy, nor do you have to think BDSM is equal to being gay, or a sexuality, in order to think it's something that should be private about someone's life. Backing us on that wouldn't mean the CEHR would have to piss off any other campaigning group - isn't this the most profitable area to campaign about? So it's not the sexual orientation team we should be lobbying, is it? Shouldn't we be pestering whoever at the CEHR deals with media and privacy? Edited 22 Jun 09, 1:36 PM by Thoughtleader | ||
| 22 Jun 09, 2:46 PM Degenerate UK(M), 5 yrs |
Hiya thanks for your message you raise some good points which need investigating via EHRC. As it is they are just trying to brush us off. We originally wrote to Trevor Philips, head of the EHRC.. and it is the section which deals with orientation which has been given CAAN's query to deal with. We have not asked for BDSM to be recognised as a sexuality, just that everyone should have sexual rights (all consenting adults that is) It is now an interesting question, as to why that is happening, if sexual rights are not about orientation.. De Sign up to CAAN's statement www.caan.org.uk Edited 22 Jun 09, 3:00 PM by Degenerate | ||
| 22 Jun 09, 3:20 PM Tanos UK(M), 14 yrs  |
Something I'd keep stressing (maybe you are already) is that the human rights convention doesn't mention sexuality or orientation: it protects private and family life. It's legislation derived from the convention (and the UK human rights act) that narrows this down to sexual orientation, and to orientation only meaning which gender(s) you're orientated towards. I know the EHRC has those narrowly defined strands in the legislation that created it, but it has more general human rights responsibilities too. Regards, Tanos
www.tanos.org.uk | ||
| 22 Jun 09, 3:50 PM Missy_Cinnamon 4 yrs |
We are still rattling the charity can at the end of the bar at the STudio events, and Tipping The Velvet are donating some money from the door on each event.
Anything else you need, just ask Misssy My mind is a mess of yarn, out of which I will create a rich and beautiful tapestry woven with pleasure and pain... although I have knitters block at the moment! | ||
| 24 Jun 09, 2:13 PM Degenerate UK(M), 5 yrs |
Thank you for this Tanos. Yes this is important and apart from pressing the general human rights angle, I am not certain whether we have referred to the issue of right to a family life specifically but I will certainly make sure I think about how I personally refer to this, as I refer to it vaguely as a right to privacy and that is incorrect. (I don't write CAAN's documents, so need to check), if we haven't we should make sure we do. If I understand correctly, I think this opens avenues. This problem, I seem to be gathering, stems from some compromises which were made by the gay movement about how their rights were protected, in a very specific way instead of generally affording consenting adults the right to form relationships with whoever they like and engage in whatever sexual practices they want to. If we go by Peter Tatchell's school of thought, which already included us (us being BDSM people) specifically in his early writings, this would not have happened. I think we need to learn lessons from this and make sure we do not compromise on anything which might have this affect again, so possibly the wider the context the better?. EG only affording rights to people who can prove a BDSM related identity or role or practice is their orientation or sexuality, would exclude some BDSM people from rights, and some others from sexual rights. De Sign up to CAAN's statement www.caan.org.uk Edited 24 Jun 09, 6:39 PM by Degenerate | ||
| 24 Jun 09, 2:13 PM Degenerate UK(M), 5 yrs |
Thanks for this! De Sign up to CAAN's statement www.caan.org.uk | ||
| 24 Jun 09, 3:44 PM Thoughtleader UK(NW), 7 yrs |
It seems to me what you're trying to do is ask the CEHR to back Max Mosley's stance about the need for newspapers etc. to notify people before outing them so they can go to court to try to prevent publication if it's not in the public interest. Isn't that what's needed? You originally asked specifically about outing, and it seems to me lobbying on that could be diluted if it's mixed up with broader stuff about sexual rights more generally. | ||
| 24 Jun 09, 4:33 PM TeddyXxBearies UK(CR), 4 yrs |
At the risk of playing Devil's Advocate, how do people feel about those policemen who were 'outted' as being members of the BNP not so very long ago ? It's Better To Be Hated For What You Are-
Than To Be Loved For What You Are Not ! | ||
| 24 Jun 09, 4:49 PM Lady_Anna_Bradford UK(BD), 5 yrs   |
You can't compare. Being a member of the BNP *would* actually affect your ability to carry out your job, as a police officer, in a lawful way. "If no sexual offence is being committed it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence," Lord Wallace of Tankerness |
We know that there are kinky people in there, and we know you need us to press hard enough to make anything happen. Get ready, cos we're comin' 
.