• Nicola Sturgeon resigned as Scotland’s first minister due to her party’s declining poll ratings and the troublesome coziness of the pro-independence Scottish National Party, of which her husband is the chief executive.
• Her resignation was also due to the failure of her Gender Recognition Reform Bill, which proposed reducing the waiting period for adults to change their legal gender from two years to three months and removing the need for a medical diagnosis of dysphoria.
• Sturgeon’s political dominance in Scotland led her to disregard critics and ignore obvious problems until they escalated into scandals.
• Her resignation speech showed some of her best qualities: dignity, seriousness, conscientiousness, and her fierce defense of her beliefs.
• The Gender Recognition Reform Bill passed in the Scottish Parliament, but was blocked by the British government.
• Sturgeon ignored warnings from women’s groups, the UN special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, and the U.K.-wide Equality and Human Rights Commission.
• Her resignation marks a generational shift in Scottish politics, as no one else looms quite as large as she did.
Published February 15, 2023
Visit The Atlantic to read Helen Lewis’s original post What Happens When Politicians Brush Off Hard Questions About Gender