I have lost my case with the B.C. College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM). A three-member panel found me guilty of “unprofessional conduct” for sharing my views on sex and gender ideology, in a manner that they have ruled as, at times, “discriminatory and derogatory” towards transgender identified persons.
The case, funded generously by the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms since it began in late 2020, opened with an investigation sparked by public complaints about my involvement in advocating for women’s sex-based rights, and closed with more than 20 days of disciplinary hearings spread out over two years. I have never once had a patient complaint, and the entire case was based solely on my conduct outside of work. Nearly one year to the day after the hearing concluded, I received the guilty verdict on Thursday.
The complaints made against me included an “I love JK Rowling” billboard in Vancouver that I and a friend commissioned, as well as various posts I’ve made online.
My indomitable lawyer, Lisa Bildy, has given sage advice that, in my current situation — facing a “sentencing” hearing for my alleged misconduct, barring an appeal to the B.C. Supreme Court — I must temper my words to avoid harsher punishment.
I can’t do that. I have reached the summit of my tolerance for catering to the demands of gender activists and the institutional forces that they weaponize against women who speak the truth. I have had it.
My ruling was given by a three-person panel consisting of a former nurse, a current nurse, and one public representative, with the assistance of a constitutional lawyer. “(T)he Panel is not concerned with the validity of the Respondent’s beliefs,” they wrote in their ruling.
That is simply untrue — as evidenced by the very statements given in the same ruling.
From my guilty verdict: “The panel understands that the statement that there are only two sexes — male and female — is an oversimplification that does not align with current medical or biological understanding.”
I have a one-word response to this: pseudoscience.
And, later: “It is discriminatory and derogatory to suggest that transgender women should not be in the same spaces as cisgender women,” they concluded. What does that mean? It means that the panel believes that to advocate for the protection of women’s spaces — as is our Charter-protected right — is wrong, improper, and discriminatory for any regulated professional to do. That is ludicrous.
Women are not doing anything wrong by advocating for our own shelters, prisons, sports, and safe spaces, free from males who identify as females. Full stop. Women are a distinct category, both in biology and — presently — in law (notwithstanding the clash of “gender identity” and “sex” in human rights legislation).
I’ve made it clear, publicly and repeatedly, that I do not believe in the mind-body dualism that underpins gender ideologues’ claims to the existence of “gender identity.” One would think that I am entitled to state such a belief without being accused of discrimination. However, the panel “agrees that the statements which discount a mystical belief in a gender soul are a form of discriminatory erasure as they deny the existence of transgender people.”
My rejection of mind-body dualism has not bestowed me with the power to erase anyone’s existence, let alone an entire category of persons. The language of “erasing the existence of” anyone is as much activist nonsense as the entire concept of a gendered soul that matters more than, and exists separately from, one’s physical body. I do not hold any other metaphysical or spiritual beliefs, and — shock and awe — that does not mean that I am phobic of, dislike, or want to strip away the rights of religious persons who hold those beliefs that I (sometimes vehemently) disagree with. It simply means that I disagree.
No one, living or dead, has ever had their existence dependent upon the recognition and validation of their internally held and unknowable self-perception. Nor has anyone died — ever — as a result of another person’s failure to recognize them as the person they would ideally like to be recognized as. Whether that be their belief about their gender or any other facet of their being.
Standing up for women’s rights is not transphobic. It is not wrong. It is not hateful. And it is not incumbent upon women to stand up for our rights while being polite or adopting a tone that gender activists or other persons — including professional regulators — find acceptable. From the ruling: “The Panel also considered it possible to respectfully advocate for sex-based cisgender rights without making statements that denigrate and discriminate against transgender persons.” Not only do I reject the tone policing nature of that statement, but the assertion blatantly contradicts their earlier one, which said that it is discriminatory to merely suggest that women deserve sex-segregated spaces at all.
How could I have possibly won this case, considering this? It would have been impossible. No tone, no word choice, and no self-flagellation or obedience would have sufficed: because I have been censured and accused of discrimination for the very act of advocating for women’s spaces.
I am profoundly sorry for all regulated professionals in Canada who will be discouraged from exercising their right to free expression because of this ruling. The JCCF and my legal team — all brilliant and principled — are blameless in this verdict. Our country has been on a dark path towards censorship and illiberalism for many years, and this case and ruling are but a symptom of the disease. I do not yet know what the next legal steps are in this case, but I do know that I am not done fighting.
From the panel: “(T)he respondent undermined the reputation and integrity of the nursing profession.” I could not disagree more.
How have I brought ill repute upon my profession, where the official and presently enforced doctrine asserts that transwomen are women, and pseudoscience is science?
I stand proudly in defence of the truth, and I lament and denounce a profession that has been subverted by a quasi-religious, metaphysical belief system that infringes upon the rights of women and girls, and harms youth.
My conscience does not permit me to lie, or to lie down, in the face of gender ideology.
Punish me harder, if you must. The truth always wins in the end.
Amy Hamm is a National Post columnist, based in New Westminster, B.C. She is a co-founder of the nonpartisan organization CaWsbar, Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights.