No true Scotswoman — breaking down the understanding of sex and gender at law
When we come to define sex and gender under the UK common law there are accepted ordinary meanings outlines in Corbett and the Equality Act 2010 which we can draw upon. However, there is a crucial weakness in these definitions, namely that the more criteria that are added to an ordinary meaning the more restrictive it becomes, and the more people are excluded from the legal umbrella that the law provides. Due this, any attempts at bounding sex and gender within a legal framework needs to tread carefully, and thus this article interrogates the notion of sex and gender before the law. While the primary focus is UK law, the intent is that this can be applied to any attempts at legally codifying sex or gender at law.
No true Scotswoman (NTS) is an adaption of the idea that no true Scotsman would do X, to the point that you are left with no actual Scotsmen in reality. The NTS fallacy is the idea that one you move beyond the idea that a woman is a woman because she understands herself to be one you essentially restrict womanhood (or manhood) based on a subjective criteria that the observer creates. At law this is problematic because is you choose to restrict sex based on chromosomes, gametes, genitals, secondary sex characteristics or any other line in the sand you will create an ordinary meaning that excludes women who…
