Perth Voice Interactive

THE thorny question of ‘what is a female’ has been posed to Perth council by a determined elector with a growing range of disagreements with council policies. 

Stuart Chapman is a frequent sight in public question time, where he poses many questions to the council over issues such as his right to protest against Covid vaccines in public spaces (“A blaring sign of over-reach?,” Voice, November 2, 2024).

This week amid his list of 23 questions, Mr Chapman interspersed his usual queries about protestors’ rights with a couple of non-sequential diversions into what constitutes a female.

“Question number two,” Mr Chapman began. “In the city of Perth car parks, the lowest level is reserved for female parking. What is the definition of a female according to the City of Perth?”

Perth council’s GM for commercial services Steve Holden answered out of the council’s own LGBTI+ plans glossary, which reads: “The City of Perth supports the right of people to identify their sexual orientation, gender identity, or intersex status as they choose.”

That’s in-line with recent state government reforms to abolish the Gender Reassignment Board: Previously people had to apply to the board to change their gender, but WA Labor’s changes allow adults to decide for themselves. 

After several questions about his right to protest in public places, Mr Chapman revisited the issue: “Question 18: What authoritative source does a city use to keep up to date with the latest gender classifications?”

The council’s GM for corporate services Wendy Attenborough fielded this one, advising “the City is guided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics standard for sex, gender, variations of sex characteristics, and sexual orientation variables,” and directing Mr Chapman to the ABS website.

Mr Chapman’s queries were a variation on the popular question “what is a woman?” often posed by those critical of transgender women using women’s spaces. It is a question that many interviewees struggled to answer in a 2022 film titled “What is a Woman?” by conservative activist Matt Walsh. 

However critics of the film have pointed out that defining the necessary and sufficient qualities of most concepts are surprisingly difficult: Many people struggle to define a chair in conclusive and exclusive terms, as simple answers like “something you sit on” could describe a chair, a horse, or the floor.

If Mr Chapman was building to a point, he never got time to make it at this meeting: Lord mayor Basil Zempilas had noted he’d already used up the time allocated to questions and allowed him one final query. 

Rather than persist down the sex/gender rabbit hole, Mr Chapman decided to use his final question to revisit his protest-related queries. Mr Zempilas advised that the remaining queries among his initial list of 23 questions would be answered in writing. 

While the questions had been lengthy, highly detailed, and sometimes unusual for a municipal setting, Mr Zempilas said: “I also want to take the opportunity to thank you for being involved in our process. We welcome everybody, every member of our community coming into this chamber and asking questions.

by DAVID BELL