Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

-----of this issue. I assure those who might think that Senators McDowell and Keogan and I are standing up here for the good of our health because we found a kind of argument to make that it is a lot more serious than that. There is no rational basis for not separating gender and gender identity as two separate characteristic groups in the list of characteristics. Lesbian, gay and bisexual people want this separation. Let us be clear - it is the BeLonG To organisation, and nobody else, that wants to change the definition of "gender". It is its submission that the Minister has chosen to hear. It is an example of the groups - Senator McDowell mentioned TENI - that are pushing the idea of the gender spectrum, the idea that people may be neither male nor female. That attitude, that politics and that unscientific, non-evidence-based ideology is proving toxic to children not just in Ireland but all over the western world.