EU Mission ‘Perplexed’ by Spain’s Latest Feminist Laws ━ The European Conservative

The EU Parliament’s latest feminist fact-finding mission to Spain returned to Brussels, shocked by the government’s nonchalant response to concerns over two new laws, ‘Only Yes is Yes’ and the ‘Trans Law’, which are already direct, negative affect women.

The delegation of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality was in Madrid from 20 to 22 February and met with Spanish Minister for Equality Irene Montero Gil, Minister for Justice Pilar Llop and members of the country’s judiciary, including a Supreme Court judge, together.

According to a press release from the committee, the delegation’s task was to study “developments in gender equality policies in Spain”. The majority of the women’s rights delegation had hoped to find an example of progressive feminism in Spain. The Spanish MEP Margarita de la Pisa Carrion with the Group of European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) and member of the delegation explained in an interview with El debate that the trip had been planned since the summer as a congratulatory trip to Spain’s gender equality policy. According to the ECR MEP, the real purpose of the mission was to “assess the Spanish model of equality legislation, but as an international reference model”. According to de la Pisa, however, it was overshadowed by the negative effects of the recently passed “Only Yes is Yes” law and the controversial “Trans law”.

The “Only Yes is Yes” law, which has been touted to protect women by criminalizing all non-consensual sexual activity as sexual violence and placing the onus on the accused to prove that they had obtained their consent, has also reduced penalties led by over 500 sex offenders, including the parole of rapists. This is due to the legal formalities of how the law was written and the requirement of the Spanish Constitution that the conviction must always be in favor of the prisoner, even retrospectively. Various legal experts had alerted Montero to the dangerous legal ramifications, but she insisted on passing the law as written by her ministry.

Many feminists are also concerned that the “trans law” essentially wipes out women and the legal protections that feminists have gained for them, including strict legal protections in the face of domestic violence. The law allows legal sex reassignment surgery without having undergone cross-sex hormone treatment or sex reassignment surgery, meaning any man can simply claim to feel like a woman and then be entitled to the same protections afforded to natural women becomes. A man convicted of sexual violence against women can serve his sentence in a women’s prison after having had his sex reassigned legally.

It was De la Pisa’s desire to “demonstrate the complicity that the EU can have with Spain in proposing a mission with such characteristics to give more glory to the policy as carried out by the Ministry of Equality” .

According to the delegation’s findings, this complicity could at least be over with the current government.

El debate reports that sources close to the meetings between MPs and Spanish officials and judges said the delegation was “perplexed” by Montero’s attitude, “especially her way of relating and behaving towards the judiciary” and her ” refusal to bear the consequences”. the misfortune.” The head of the delegation also reminded Montero that judges make their decisions according to the law, not ideology OKDiario.

Montero continues to defend both laws as they stand, blaming the judges’ misogynist interpretation of the law for the reduced sentences of male sex offenders.

The delegation also asked Spanish Justice Minister Llop if she had taken into account the possible negative consequences for women in relation to the “trans law”. She reportedly admitted she hadn’t.

Montero is a member of the far-left Unidas Podemos, the minority party in the coalition government led by the Socialists and President Pedro Sánchez. Llop is a socialist.

Prime Minister Pédro Sánchez promised weeks ago to reform the Yes is Yes law, even against opposition from his coalition partners, but nothing has yet been tabled in Parliament, while the parties blame each other for delaying negotiations.

The delegation is expected to publish its report on the mission in March or April. If true, it should question whether progressive feminism mixed with transgender ideology is good for women.