Disney princesses have many positive qualities besides being rescued by men, and celebrities should know that

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Thursday 18 October 2018 16:38 BST
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Keira Knightley has recently revealed that she bans her daughter from watching certain Disney films like Cinderella because the heroine “waits around for a man to rescue her”. Had she delved deeper she would have discovered positive qualities of kindness, forgiveness, resilience and diligence in this fairy tale character!

Should she have turned down the starring role in Pride and Prejudice after having read the script and assessed Mrs Bennet's sole goal for her daughters?!

W Watson
Well End, Buckinghamshire

How exactly do you ensure total democracy with Brexit?

In your editorial of 24 July you began by stating that: “The Independent today launches a campaign to win for the British people the right to a final say on Brexit.” Do you mean “the British people” or just some British people?

I have read that the 2015 EU Referendum Act denied about three million British people living abroad from voting in the referendum, of which one million are said to live on the European mainland. These British people had no say in the referendum yet their lives were, in the case of those living in Europe, more affected by the referendum than those living in the UK. These British people were denied direct representation in the referendum by the parliament. They were excluded from representation in the passage of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill. And parliament intends to deny them representation in the forthcoming debate over the actual withdrawal.

Since the referendum, a few voices have speculated publicly what the outcome would have been if suffrage were universal for “the British people”. Fewer still have asked a far more important question about whether universal suffrage should be a right for “the British people”. The election manifesto of the governing party on this issue has been ignored by the government. A private members’ bill languishes in the parliament that has already expressed its disdain.

Tom Gameson​
Seville

It’s never too late to back out

Many people I know voted for Brexit as a protest against our first-past-the-post politics and/or the effects of globalisation on our everyday standard of living. Much in the same way many voted for UKIP in the general election, as a protest against the main parties that were not listening or providing any tangible choice. It wasn’t anything to do with their views on whether we should be in the EU single market or not – it was a protest, simple as that.

Now that this protest has been heard loud and clear and that MPs from both sides have been well and truly exposed, along with no plan for a deal with the EU or any other country, can we open this back up to a vote and see if the same protestors still feel the urge to mess with our children’s future?

Marc Cutworth​
Cambridgeshire

We can learn something from this guy

I came across this quote today along with many others from Mark Twain and thought it summed up the state of politics everywhere. Hope you can share with the readers of the paper.

“In religion and politics people's beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.”

Bonnie Green
Gloucestershire

The subject of transgender prisoners needs our attention

The recent case of the convicted child abuser Karen White, previously known as David Thompson, has angered many women. While on remand for rape, White carried out four sex attacks at a women’s prison. White had been allowed to transfer from the men’s estate despite never having had genital surgery, because White identified as a woman. Fewer than 5 per cent of individuals born male who identify as transgender ever have genital surgery.

Fair Play for Women campaigns for women’s rights to safe single-sex spaces, including shelters, rape crisis facilities and prisons. We recently carried out an extensive study on the number of transgender prisoners in England and Wales who are in jail for sex offences. The study found that at least 41 per cent of transgender prisoners who identify as female were convicted sex offenders. Our methodology and study limitations were published on our website to facilitate rigorous peer review.

In an article published by this newspaper in November 2017, the transgender campaigner Owl Fisher claimed those figures were in some way trumped up. We stand by our conclusions.

Figures released by the Ministry of Justice last year identified 125 transgender prisoners as of April 2017, 100 of whom were from male prisons. Of these 125 transgender prisoners, 60 have been convicted of at least one sexual offence, including 27 convictions for rape. This we believe confirms our results. The proportion of sex offenders in the male prison population is much lower.

We are not the only group to raise the alarm. The British Association of Gender Identity Specialists recently warned MPs of a rise in the number of sex offenders choosing to transition while in prison.

This issue has never been more urgent, as the government is holding a public consultation, closing on 19 October, on a proposed change to the law, which would allow anyone to self-declare their legal sex. Our study and the case of Karen White shows the grave consequences this could have for the safety of women and girls in the UK. We would urge readers to make their voices heard.

Dr Nicola Williams

Director of Fair Play for Women, an apolitical group that fights for girls’ and womens’ rights

Money goes a long way

It is now clear that Jamal Khashoggi – a journalist with a record of opposition to the despotic regime in Saudi Arabia – was tortured, murdered and his corpse dismembered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in early October.

Yet Western leaders, usually so quick to lecture the conduct of governments across the world in the name of respect for “human rights” and “rule of law”, have been as reluctant to criticise the Saudi’s about the Khashoggi murder as they have been to condemn the Saudi’s record of state executions. The Saudi regime beheaded 48 people in the first four months of 2018 alone.

The reason why the West has treated the Saudi dictatorship with such deference was explained by President Trump when he reminded the American public that the Saudis are “a tremendous purchaser of not only military equipment, but other things”.

He has captured the real principles behind Western foreign policy with uncharacteristic honesty.

Sasha Simic​
London, N1

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