"...and you can't eat archaic and have it, too."

Brilliant. Should be nominated as a finalist in the OLO Frank Muir/Denis Norden pun of the year award.

My only surprise with Jocelynne Scutt's article is that she has not recommended the obvious solution to dealing with questions of rights, religion and entitlements in law…

Which must necessarily be the total adoption in policy, conventions, statutes, regulations and the application in all these of complete legal gender neutrality.

Such a principle automatically enshrines equality of rights and entitlements to everybody under the law – regardless of whether they are a woman or not.

So-called 'religious law' would be valid only if it conformed. Problem solved.

Just home again, temporarily.

Thanks, Poirot and particularly your comment, WmTrevor, which I agree with entirely! and I think my history of comments on this topic bear that out. Don't forget I said, 'it's worth responding to "rhetorically".
It's absolutely true that we're driven by primordial and ideological imperatives, and that's what we need to transcend. Scutt's solutions actually reinforce our illusions.
And yes, davidf, thanks for that witty rejoinder at your countryman.

Yes WmTrevor, but if a law is to achieve complete legal gender neutrality it must be enacted and interpreted with complete legal gender neutrality, accomplished by agreement between women’s and men’s legislatures and with courts of women‘s and men’s jurisdiction. The current arrangement of law enacted and interpreted in legislatures and courts men allow women to attend is the antithesis of neutrality.

Tony Lavis
"Too right: the last thing we need is some archaic religious legal system operating at cross-purposes to the secular laws of this nation.
Unfortunately we already have one which is firmly established and probably isn't going anywhere: Catholic Canon Law. This is the legal system under which the most severe punishments for child rape were until quite recently to be moved to a new parish or - in the most serious cases - to be defrocked: to be discharged from the priesthood so they can get a job in the secular world."

You are misinformed. Catholic Canon Law does not give anyone the right to misbehave or to cover-up misbehaviour.