Canadian nurse facing disciplinary hearings for supporting JK Rowling, believing there are only 2 sexes
A Canadian nurse is facing a disciplinary hearing from a national medical board that could result in her losing her job after she publicly supported author J.K. Rowling's views about the harm gender identity ideology inflicts on women and children.
Amy Hamm, a single mom and a nurse in Vancouver, is the founder of the Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights (caWsbar), a non-partisan organization that advocates for women and acknowledges the biological reality that there are only two genders: men and women.
In a piece published in Quillette, Hamm said she has written and spoken out about what she sees as the harmful impact of gender-identity ideology since 2016. She has openly expressed her opposition to the housing of biological men in women’s prisons and the push by some institutions to refer to women as “pregnant people” in multiple articles published by The Post Millenial.
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Hamm also expressed support for Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, who has voiced similar concerns about the impact of gender identity ideology on women, via a billboard in 2020.
Rowling also raised concerns about the exponential increase in the number of young girls claiming to identify as trans. Similarly, Rowling fears that referring to women and girls as “menstruators” or “people with vulvas” reduces them to some sort of “costume” men wear.
Hamm faces several hearings before the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM), which has been investigating her since November 2020.
The first hearing was in June, with the second set of three-day hearings held last Wednesday through Friday. The remaining hearings are scheduled for Oct. 24-27.
A spokesperson for the BCCNM told The Christian Post that the organization was unable to provide any more information than what was already stated in the public notice about the hearing.
As The Post Millennial reported Wednesday, legal counsel for BCCNM, Michael Seaborn, who specified his pronouns are “he/him,” outlined that the hearing’s purpose is to determine whether Hamm made “derogatory statements” about trans-identifying people.
The nurse’s attorney, Lisa Bildy, who previously worked for the legal advocacy group Canada’s Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, argued that this is not a “normal disciplinary hearing.” She noted that in 10 years, Hamm has never once had a patient complain about her.
“We are here because she stands accused by her regulatory body of making what it says are discriminatory and derogatory comments about transgender people on social media,” Bildy said.
Seaborn said that Hamm’s competency is not a matter of concern, and the case is about her “off-duty conduct.” The college claims that it's not seeking to restrict Hamm’s right to free speech but argues that making such statements while identifying as a nurse poses a problem.
“It is important to emphasize that the college is not seeking to have Ms. Hamm fall silent on the issue of transgender people or any other issue. What the college is asserting is that there are legally proscribed limits on speech for a regulated professional,” he said.
As Hamm noted in her piece published in Quillette back in April, the J.K. Rowling billboard prompted two BCCNM members to complain to the organization and accuse her of being “transphobic” and incapable of “provid[ing] safe, non-judgemental care to transgender and gender diverse patients.”
Six months later, BCCNM sent Hamm over 300 pages of “investigation materials,” raising concerns that the nurse shared Rowling's “transphobic views.” The materials BCCNM sent contained her articles and social media posts, along with several questions they expected her to answer.
The college did not respond to Hamm’s lawyer who asked BCCNM’s in-house attorney, Aisha Ohene-Asante, whether “the characterization of J.K. Rowling’s alleged views as ‘transphobic’ are the words of the complainant, and not yours as a representative of the college.”
“Men are not women. Humans are a dimorphic species. Women and men are biologically different from one another,” Hamm asserted in a statement provided to BCCNM by her attorney.
“Women and girls have sex-based rights as a result of those differences,” she continued.
“Those rights are under threat. This is the truth. It has always been the truth. Speaking the truth should not be a punishable offense.”
In 2017, Canada’s Senate passed Bill C-16 by a vote of 67-11, adding protection of gender identity and expression to the Canadian Human Rights Code. Critics of the bill noted that it enables authorities to fine or imprison people whose beliefs run contrary to the law.
Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould issued a statement praising the bill after its passage, saying that the bill grants “trans and gender diverse persons” their “equal status in Canadian society.” He also claimed the bill safeguards people from discrimination and hate crimes.
Conservative Senator Don Plett, who voted against the bill, said in a statement before the Senate committee a month before the bill passed that "ideologues" are "using unsuspecting and sometimes complicit members of the so-called transgender community to push their ideological vanguard forward."
At the time, world-famous psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson, an invitee to the Senate committee, had told the committee that the bill was an unprecedented threat to freedom of expression. "We will seriously regret this," he tweeted after the bill was passed. At the time, Peterson was a professor at the University of Toronto.
