The Trans Agenda: Streeting meets more anti-trans people as the papers spin Brianna Ghey's inquest and hound trans athletes
The Trans Agenda: Streeting meets more anti-trans people as the papers spin Brianna Ghey's inquest and hound trans athletes
News you need, the perspective you won't find anywhere else. The trans community's guide to UK news, media and politics and our place in it.
The Trans Agenda
[27 October 2024]
Welcome to The Trans Agenda, a newsletter that will arrive in your inbox every week if you are subscribed.
Full paper review below.
NEWS
Brianna Ghey inquest takes place
The inquest started on Wednesday, finished on Friday and was completely ignored by the Telegraph, who clearly don’t want their readers to see the real world consequences of their relentless campaign to remove trans people from society, no matter how that happens.
Other papers focussed on what a good kid one of the murderers was. They also spent a lot of time discussing Brianna’s online community and not very much discussing the two people who planned and executed her murder and immersed themselves in some of the worst parts of the internet while their teachers worried about isolating Brianna.
As Gemma Stone put it, “Teachers spent most of their time worrying about a trans kid with a sizeable tik tok following and support network rather than the two kids gearing up to commit murder - one of which was A CHILD OF ONE OF THE TEACHERS.” You can see more in the Paper Review below.
Charity commission tells Mermaids to rewrite puberty blocker guidance [Guardian]
A captured Charity Commission investigation found mismanagement within Mermaids, a charity supporting gender-diverse youth, but no misconduct. Mermaids was instructed to revise its guidance on puberty blockers to match recommendations from the Cass Review, although it is not clear why they should have to do this or how the Charity Commission can enforce this change.
You can read the full report here.
For extra context, here is the Charity Commission retweeting an anti-trans tweet on their official account.
Wes Streeting spends nearly an hour with four NHS nurses who are trying to discriminate against a trans colleague [Mail on Sunday, see Press Review for more]
It’s a ‘story’ I’ve covered in recent editions of the Trans Agenda, with the four nurses receiving obscene amounts of help to harass a trans colleague via the pages of national newspapers. In this latest piece, the Mail on Sunday not only reveal the trans person’s name in a way that would make it easy for anyone to identify her, they also discuss her genitals and accuse of her of sexually harassing the nurses.
Wes Streeting was only expected to meet with them for a ‘fleeting’ meeting, but ended up spending nearly an hour listening to their unhinged nonsense, most of which he probably agreed with.
UN calls for urgent action against discrimination of transgender athletes in sports [UN]
UN expert Alexandra Xanthaki urged states to address discrimination in sports, emphasising transgender athletes' rights. She criticised blanket bans on transgender women and restrictive practices targeting female athletes with sex variations as human rights violations. Xanthaki also called out the supposed "neutrality" of sports bodies, arguing it often fails to protect human rights. She demanded immediate revision of discriminatory policies and stressed the need for campaigns to promote diversity and inclusion, creating a positive and safe environment for all athletes.
Phoenix project offers free clothing to transgender, nonbinary people [USA]
Odessa, Texas enacts the first ever bathroom bounty law targeting trans people [Erin Reed].
This law could see trans people sued for $10,000 by members of the public simply for using public bathrooms.
Trump promises to direct the FDA to convene a panel to determine if HRT increases the propensity of aggression and violence among Trans people on day one of his Presidency [source].
He added: "I think most of us already know the answer".
MEDIA
British Journalism Awards [Press Gazette]
Sasha Baker has been nominated at the British Journalism Awards for their pieces “The parents group at the centre of a rollback of trans rights” and “‘One day they may thank us for that “abuse”’: Inside the Bayswater Support Group”
Anti-trans propagandist, Hannah Barnes, has three pieces nominated:
The Cass Review into children’s gender care should shame us all
Hundreds of doctors are challenging the BMA’s stance on puberty blockers
Telegraph attack more trans sports stars [Paper Review, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Sunday]
The Telegraph are once again concocting a ‘storm’ in women’s sport by going after a trans dart player. In their Monday edition, they portray Noa-lynn van Leuven's qualification for the PDC World Darts Championship as controversial, with an emphasis on alleged tension in women's darts over transgender participation. Despite their framing, van Leuven earned her place through merit, beating the world’s top-ranked female player, Beau Greaves. The article suggests discomfort among players like Deta Hedman who has previously refused to play trans women. Hedman is ranked 25th on the 2024 Order of Merit, meaning there are 23 cis women ranked above her.
Like most of her ilk, Hedman would probably have less to moan about if she was just simply better at her chosen sport.
Conveniently, the Telegraph leave out that the women’s number three, Fallon Sherrock, regularly competes - and wins - against cis men. Sherrock is the number two seed for the upcoming event that has angered the Telegraph so much.
As if that wasn’t enough, on Wednesday and Sunday, they turned back to Hailey Davidson in golf, informing us that 275 members of the International Women’s Forum signed a letter calling for Davidson’s removal from the tour. What they fail to mention is that the IWF has over 8,000 members globally.
Meanwhile, on Friday, they turned their attentions back to football as they continue to struggle with the FA ignoring their batshit demands.
Meanwhile…[Times]
Clare Balding believes the future of sport is mixed sex, with men and women competing in teams together. The GC cult have not taken this well, as you’d expect, challenging Balding to meet them while tagging all their favourite anti-trans sports propagandists like Oliver Brown and Sean Ingle.
![Forget battle of the sexes, sports fans want to watch mixed-sex teams, says Balding Rosamund Urwin - Media Editor Team GB’s Alex Haydock-Wilson and Nicole Yeargin in Paris: Clare Balding, believes events such as the 4 x 400m relay are the best way to draw in viewers Next image › Clare Balding believes the future of sport is mixed sex, with men and women competing in teams together. The sports presenter, who seemed rarely to leave our screens this summer with Wimbledon, the Olympics and the Paralympics, thinks viewers would rather see male and female athletes participate together than fight for funding and airtime. “I don’t ever want to fall into the trap of making it men versus women, because I genuinely believe that people doing stuff together in mixed environments is better for everyone,” she says. “We have had great success [in the Paris Olympics] in the mixed team triathlon, the mixed swimming relays, the mixed athletics relays — [viewers] really enjoy them, and you can see the teams really enjoying them.” Golf is top of her wishlist to go mixed at the next Olympics. “That would be so different to anything else on the golf circuit and would favour the nations that invest in women’s golf.” She even suggests Olympic football could have men and women on the same team, and raised the idea with former England forward Ellen White, who pointed out that Soccer Aid has already done this. “Football isn’t a game of machismo. It’s not about power, it’s about speed, skill, vision and incredible ball skills,” she says. Balding has spent 30 years championing women’s sport, and is a supporter of The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards. Before joining BBC Radio as a trainee in 1994, she was a leading amateur jockey and was named the Champion Lady Rider in 1990. When she moved into sports broadcasting, she says there were only about four other women — Sue Barker, Hazel Irvine, Eleanor Oldroyd and Helen Rollason. “People would say: ‘What’s she doing here? What does she know?’ Not at the racecourse, as that was the language I spoke, but there were times where I was the only woman on a trip, and I’d find out that the other journalists had been invited out for dinner and I hadn’t.” Things have changed. Balding recently totted up all the female reporters and pundits: “I was up to 100 names easily — and that’s happened in just 20 years.” It’s been a boomtime for women competing as well as commentating. Significant success for women at London 2012 changed how female athletes were perceived, she believes. “You had equal participation and more gold medal winners being female.” Over Zoom from the home in Chiswick, west London, that she shares with her wife, the former BBC newsreader Alice Arnold, Balding also discusses the National Lottery’s Game Changers. The list of unsung heroes who have made a difference in sport, the arts and in local communities marks the draw’s 30th anniversary. It includes Paul Sinton-Hewitt, who founded Parkrun, and Alice Dearing, an Olympic swimmer who campaigns for equal access to the sport for ethnic minorities. Another is Baroness Sue Campbell, who stepped down as director of women’s football at the Football Association this year. “She has been hugely involved in changing the setup of women’s football,” says Balding. Vote for The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year at sportswomenoftheyear.co.uk For more information about the National Lottery Game Changers, visit lotterygood causes.org.uk/gamechangers](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F487cf6be-cbed-47c1-b242-a536ed1263e9_1862x611.png "Forget battle of the sexes, sports fans want to watch mixed-sex teams, says Balding Rosamund Urwin - Media Editor Team GB’s Alex Haydock-Wilson and Nicole Yeargin in Paris: Clare Balding, believes events such as the 4 x 400m relay are the best way to draw in viewers Next image › Clare Balding believes the future of sport is mixed sex, with men and women competing in teams together. The sports presenter, who seemed rarely to leave our screens this summer with Wimbledon, the Olympics and the Paralympics, thinks viewers would rather see male and female athletes participate together than fight for funding and airtime. “I don’t ever want to fall into the trap of making it men versus women, because I genuinely believe that people doing stuff together in mixed environments is better for everyone,” she says. “We have had great success [in the Paris Olympics] in the mixed team triathlon, the mixed swimming relays, the mixed athletics relays — [viewers] really enjoy them, and you can see the teams really enjoying them.” Golf is top of her wishlist to go mixed at the next Olympics. “That would be so different to anything else on the golf circuit and would favour the nations that invest in women’s golf.” She even suggests Olympic football could have men and women on the same team, and raised the idea with former England forward Ellen White, who pointed out that Soccer Aid has already done this. “Football isn’t a game of machismo. It’s not about power, it’s about speed, skill, vision and incredible ball skills,” she says. Balding has spent 30 years championing women’s sport, and is a supporter of The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards. Before joining BBC Radio as a trainee in 1994, she was a leading amateur jockey and was named the Champion Lady Rider in 1990. When she moved into sports broadcasting, she says there were only about four other women — Sue Barker, Hazel Irvine, Eleanor Oldroyd and Helen Rollason. “People would say: ‘What’s she doing here? What does she know?’ Not at the racecourse, as that was the language I spoke, but there were times where I was the only woman on a trip, and I’d find out that the other journalists had been invited out for dinner and I hadn’t.” Things have changed. Balding recently totted up all the female reporters and pundits: “I was up to 100 names easily — and that’s happened in just 20 years.” It’s been a boomtime for women competing as well as commentating. Significant success for women at London 2012 changed how female athletes were perceived, she believes. “You had equal participation and more gold medal winners being female.” Over Zoom from the home in Chiswick, west London, that she shares with her wife, the former BBC newsreader Alice Arnold, Balding also discusses the National Lottery’s Game Changers. The list of unsung heroes who have made a difference in sport, the arts and in local communities marks the draw’s 30th anniversary. It includes Paul Sinton-Hewitt, who founded Parkrun, and Alice Dearing, an Olympic swimmer who campaigns for equal access to the sport for ethnic minorities. Another is Baroness Sue Campbell, who stepped down as director of women’s football at the Football Association this year. “She has been hugely involved in changing the setup of women’s football,” says Balding. Vote for The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year at sportswomenoftheyear.co.uk For more information about the National Lottery Game Changers, visit lotterygood causes.org.uk/gamechangers")
![Forget battle of the sexes, sports fans want to watch mixed-sex teams, says Balding Rosamund Urwin - Media Editor Team GB’s Alex Haydock-Wilson and Nicole Yeargin in Paris: Clare Balding, believes events such as the 4 x 400m relay are the best way to draw in viewers Next image › Clare Balding believes the future of sport is mixed sex, with men and women competing in teams together. The sports presenter, who seemed rarely to leave our screens this summer with Wimbledon, the Olympics and the Paralympics, thinks viewers would rather see male and female athletes participate together than fight for funding and airtime. “I don’t ever want to fall into the trap of making it men versus women, because I genuinely believe that people doing stuff together in mixed environments is better for everyone,” she says. “We have had great success [in the Paris Olympics] in the mixed team triathlon, the mixed swimming relays, the mixed athletics relays — [viewers] really enjoy them, and you can see the teams really enjoying them.” Golf is top of her wishlist to go mixed at the next Olympics. “That would be so different to anything else on the golf circuit and would favour the nations that invest in women’s golf.” She even suggests Olympic football could have men and women on the same team, and raised the idea with former England forward Ellen White, who pointed out that Soccer Aid has already done this. “Football isn’t a game of machismo. It’s not about power, it’s about speed, skill, vision and incredible ball skills,” she says. Balding has spent 30 years championing women’s sport, and is a supporter of The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards. Before joining BBC Radio as a trainee in 1994, she was a leading amateur jockey and was named the Champion Lady Rider in 1990. When she moved into sports broadcasting, she says there were only about four other women — Sue Barker, Hazel Irvine, Eleanor Oldroyd and Helen Rollason. “People would say: ‘What’s she doing here? What does she know?’ Not at the racecourse, as that was the language I spoke, but there were times where I was the only woman on a trip, and I’d find out that the other journalists had been invited out for dinner and I hadn’t.” Things have changed. Balding recently totted up all the female reporters and pundits: “I was up to 100 names easily — and that’s happened in just 20 years.” It’s been a boomtime for women competing as well as commentating. Significant success for women at London 2012 changed how female athletes were perceived, she believes. “You had equal participation and more gold medal winners being female.” Over Zoom from the home in Chiswick, west London, that she shares with her wife, the former BBC newsreader Alice Arnold, Balding also discusses the National Lottery’s Game Changers. The list of unsung heroes who have made a difference in sport, the arts and in local communities marks the draw’s 30th anniversary. It includes Paul Sinton-Hewitt, who founded Parkrun, and Alice Dearing, an Olympic swimmer who campaigns for equal access to the sport for ethnic minorities. Another is Baroness Sue Campbell, who stepped down as director of women’s football at the Football Association this year. “She has been hugely involved in changing the setup of women’s football,” says Balding. Vote for The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year at sportswomenoftheyear.co.uk For more information about the National Lottery Game Changers, visit lotterygood causes.org.uk/gamechangers](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F487cf6be-cbed-47c1-b242-a536ed1263e9_1862x611.png "Forget battle of the sexes, sports fans want to watch mixed-sex teams, says Balding Rosamund Urwin - Media Editor Team GB’s Alex Haydock-Wilson and Nicole Yeargin in Paris: Clare Balding, believes events such as the 4 x 400m relay are the best way to draw in viewers Next image › Clare Balding believes the future of sport is mixed sex, with men and women competing in teams together. The sports presenter, who seemed rarely to leave our screens this summer with Wimbledon, the Olympics and the Paralympics, thinks viewers would rather see male and female athletes participate together than fight for funding and airtime. “I don’t ever want to fall into the trap of making it men versus women, because I genuinely believe that people doing stuff together in mixed environments is better for everyone,” she says. “We have had great success [in the Paris Olympics] in the mixed team triathlon, the mixed swimming relays, the mixed athletics relays — [viewers] really enjoy them, and you can see the teams really enjoying them.” Golf is top of her wishlist to go mixed at the next Olympics. “That would be so different to anything else on the golf circuit and would favour the nations that invest in women’s golf.” She even suggests Olympic football could have men and women on the same team, and raised the idea with former England forward Ellen White, who pointed out that Soccer Aid has already done this. “Football isn’t a game of machismo. It’s not about power, it’s about speed, skill, vision and incredible ball skills,” she says. Balding has spent 30 years championing women’s sport, and is a supporter of The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards. Before joining BBC Radio as a trainee in 1994, she was a leading amateur jockey and was named the Champion Lady Rider in 1990. When she moved into sports broadcasting, she says there were only about four other women — Sue Barker, Hazel Irvine, Eleanor Oldroyd and Helen Rollason. “People would say: ‘What’s she doing here? What does she know?’ Not at the racecourse, as that was the language I spoke, but there were times where I was the only woman on a trip, and I’d find out that the other journalists had been invited out for dinner and I hadn’t.” Things have changed. Balding recently totted up all the female reporters and pundits: “I was up to 100 names easily — and that’s happened in just 20 years.” It’s been a boomtime for women competing as well as commentating. Significant success for women at London 2012 changed how female athletes were perceived, she believes. “You had equal participation and more gold medal winners being female.” Over Zoom from the home in Chiswick, west London, that she shares with her wife, the former BBC newsreader Alice Arnold, Balding also discusses the National Lottery’s Game Changers. The list of unsung heroes who have made a difference in sport, the arts and in local communities marks the draw’s 30th anniversary. It includes Paul Sinton-Hewitt, who founded Parkrun, and Alice Dearing, an Olympic swimmer who campaigns for equal access to the sport for ethnic minorities. Another is Baroness Sue Campbell, who stepped down as director of women’s football at the Football Association this year. “She has been hugely involved in changing the setup of women’s football,” says Balding. Vote for The Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year at sportswomenoftheyear.co.uk For more information about the National Lottery Game Changers, visit lotterygood causes.org.uk/gamechangers")
Bylines give space to anti-trans activist [North East Bylines]
Becks Rose's recent piece for Bylines, titled "Why do we still need to let women speak?", is yet another example of the media’s ongoing endorsement of anti-trans rhetoric. Framed as a reflection on the recent Let Women Speak rally in Morpeth, Northumberland [see last week’s Trans Agenda], the article promotes gender-essentialist views under the guise of defending women's rights.
Rose celebrates Emily Davison's historic legacy and ties it to contemporary activism by self-confessed not-a-feminist Kellie-Jay Keen (aka Posie Parker), whose Let Women Speak hate movement terrorises trans people. The article is replete with thinly veiled transphobic rhetoric, romanticising the fight to "let women speak their truth about the reality of sex and gender" while ignoring the harm such language causes to trans and cis women.
As per their own website, “North East Bylines is a trading brand of Bylines Networks Limited which is separate to, but allied with, Byline Times.”
Kemi Badenoch is a true gay-rights champion [Spiked]
LGB Alliance founder, Malcolm Clark believes that Kemi Badenoch, who has been consistently anti-LGBTQ+ during her entire public career, is a “true gay-rights champions” showing there is no homophobe GCs won’t support as long as they hate trans people more than gay. Check out this ‘champion’s’ voting record on queer issues, for instance.
WHAT’S ON IN PARLIAMENT
Select business. Full House business can be viewed here.
🚨Tuesday 29 October
House of Lords, 2.30pm, Oral questions: Gender in Olympic and Paralympic competition - “Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town to ask His Majesty's Government what discussions, if any, they have had with the International Olympic Committee, British Olympic Association, or relevant governing bodies for British boxing, about reports of biological males boxing in the female category in the Olympics in Paris; and what discussions they have had with the relevant governing bodies about biological males competing in any female category of sport at the Olympics or Paralympics.”
Wednesday 30 October
House of Commons, 12pm: Prime Minister’s Question Time. This will be Rishi Sunak’s last PMQs as Leader of the Opposition.
House of Commons, after PMQs, The Chancellor of the Exchequer will deliver her Budget Statement.
Westminster Hall debate, 2.30pm, NHS readiness for winter 2024-25.
Westminster Hall debate, 4pm, COP29 and international climate finance.
Thursday 31 October
House of Commons, 9.30am+, Adjournment, Implementation of the LGBT Veterans Independent Review.
THIS WEEK
Monday, 28 October: Gérard Depardieu sexual assault trial in Paris.
Wednesday, 30 October: UK Budget.
Friday, 1 November: Equal Pay Day.
Saturday, 2 November: Tory leadership results.
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Women’s Equality Party founders urge members to call time after 10 years [Observer]
The Women’s Equality Party (WEP) leaders and founders are recommending that members vote to close the party at a meeting on 17 November. The decision is driven by financial difficulties and a changing political landscape that makes the party's campaign model less effective. Leader Mandu Reid, along with co-founders Sandi Toksvig and Catherine Mayer, acknowledge the need to channel energy into other forms of activism as major parties no longer embrace WEP’s policy ideas.
They highlight that populism, right-wing influences, and a shifting political landscape have reduced the impact of WE's approach. Both major parties have moved away from addressing the issues WE champions, while media platforms have become more hostile to progressive voices. Although funding has always been a challenge, Mayer and Toksvig stress that the decision to end the party is more about finding new, more effective ways to push for change rather than giving up.
Britain’s lobbying watchdog has opened an investigation into Peter Mandelson’s firm Global Counsel.
Imane Khelif to turn professional
Braverman sent files to private email 127 times [Times]
Suella Braverman, the former Conservative home secretary, forwarded government documents to her private email accounts at least 127 times between 2021 and 2022, while serving as Attorney General. This practice potentially breaches the ministerial code, which prohibits sharing government business with private accounts due to weaker security risks.
The revelation came from a Freedom of Information request filed by The Times, disclosing that the emails had at least 290 attachments. After an 18-month legal battle, a tribunal judge forced the Attorney General's Office to release these details. It remains unclear if any of the forwarded documents contained sensitive information.
Neither Braverman, the Attorney General’s Office, the Home Office, nor the Cabinet Office responded to requests for comment on the matter. Braverman was dismissed by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in November 2023 following controversial remarks about pro-Palestinian protests.
Miriam Cates continues to be stupid [Telegraph]
THE PAPERS
With 26 articles, this was the busiest week since the first full week of August (43) and, as usual, the Telegraph led the way with almost 50% (12). They could have raised this total significantly has they produced any coverage of the Brianna Ghey inquest that took place this week, but they opted to ignore the results of their handiwork completely.
GCs quoted this week include: LGB Alliance founder, Malcolm Clark, one of those ludicrous SEEN groups, Maya Forstater, and the Tax Payer’s Alliance. The former and the latter groups are both based out of Tufton Street and there are genuine questions about the true base of operations for Forstater’s Sex Matters ‘charity’ with suggestions it might also be located there.
JK Rowling featured because Kemi Badenoch wants to give her a peerage for her anti-trans views, while her opinion was also printed in regards to Mermaids, a puberty-blocker study, and NHS nurses who are fighting to discriminate against a trans colleague. A piece that was supposed to be about the new Harry Potter TV series, and her involvement, was mostly filled with nonsense about her anti-trans views.
As her supporters continue to ask ‘what has JK Rowling ever done that’s transphobic?’, the UK papers continue to treat her as the official face and voice of their anti-trans movement.
The Daily Mail were second this week with six pieces, the Times had five while the Guardian had three.
There wasn’t a single day without any content about trans people but we did have two days with seven articles (Monday and Thursday).
THE PAPERS Monday 21st October - Sunday 27th October
Monday Total: 7
The Guardian [0]
The Times [1]
Daily Mail [1]
Telegraph [5]
![Storm brewing as trans player secures PDC showpiece place The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024By Tom Morgan A transgender woman will take one of the two female qualifying spots at the PDC World Darts Championship after clinching her place over the weekend. Noa-lynn van Leuven booked her spot at Alexandra Palace with a 5-3 victory over world No1 Beau Greaves to win the Women’s Series 21. Her place at the sport’s top contest will be a bone of contention in the women’s game. Darts is one of many sports in civil war over protections for women’s participation, but female players have been threatened with disciplinary action if they refuse to face transgender opponents. Van Leuven takes one of two qualifying spots available from the Women’s Series Order of Merit. England’s Greaves, 20, is top of that list but is instead attempting to defend her WDF Women’s World Championship title. England’s Fallon Sherrock is in the second qualification spot, behind Van Leuven, but booked her place by winning the Women’s Series 23 title. Sherrock’s compatriot Deta Hedman, who has twice refused to play transgender opponents, pulled out of a match in May against Van Leuven over the effect that being forced to play a trans woman had on her “mental health”. However, last month the World Darts Federation issued a statement which read: “Once the first dart has been thrown in a tournament, any player that subsequently withdraws from playing a match may be considered to be bringing the game into disrepute and could face disciplinary action.” Van Leuven, 28, secured her place at the PDC top event following a dominant win over Greaves, with a 109.64 average in Leicester. Never before has a transgender woman competed in the highlight of the darting calendar, which will be held at Alexandra Palace from Dec 15 to Jan 3. “I set off well but before I knew it she [Van Leuven] just powerhoused me,” Greaves said after the loss. “Sometimes in darts you’ve just got to allow it to happen and that was one of those days for me. “Fair play to her, she played really well and she deserved the win. I fell asleep at times where I should have been hitting more trebles and she punished me.” Van Leuven also defeated Trina Gulliver, Mikuru Suzuki and Lisa Ashton in the event, and beat emerging Scottish talent Lorraine Hyde in the semi-finals on her way to a fourth title of the year. The Dutchwoman transitioned in 2021 and joined the Women’s Series the following year. She also created history by becoming the first transgender woman to play in a televised darts tournament in July when she appeared at the Women’s World Matchplay in Blackpool. Hedman has previously called on the PDC and the WDF to exclude trans women from women’s tournaments. Article Name:Storm brewing as trans player secures PDC showpiece place Publication:The Daily Telegraph Author:By Tom Morgan Start Page:15 End Page:15](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb9528c49-d5bb-4886-a809-46dbffd57ada_551x646.png "Storm brewing as trans player secures PDC showpiece place The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024By Tom Morgan A transgender woman will take one of the two female qualifying spots at the PDC World Darts Championship after clinching her place over the weekend. Noa-lynn van Leuven booked her spot at Alexandra Palace with a 5-3 victory over world No1 Beau Greaves to win the Women’s Series 21. Her place at the sport’s top contest will be a bone of contention in the women’s game. Darts is one of many sports in civil war over protections for women’s participation, but female players have been threatened with disciplinary action if they refuse to face transgender opponents. Van Leuven takes one of two qualifying spots available from the Women’s Series Order of Merit. England’s Greaves, 20, is top of that list but is instead attempting to defend her WDF Women’s World Championship title. England’s Fallon Sherrock is in the second qualification spot, behind Van Leuven, but booked her place by winning the Women’s Series 23 title. Sherrock’s compatriot Deta Hedman, who has twice refused to play transgender opponents, pulled out of a match in May against Van Leuven over the effect that being forced to play a trans woman had on her “mental health”. However, last month the World Darts Federation issued a statement which read: “Once the first dart has been thrown in a tournament, any player that subsequently withdraws from playing a match may be considered to be bringing the game into disrepute and could face disciplinary action.” Van Leuven, 28, secured her place at the PDC top event following a dominant win over Greaves, with a 109.64 average in Leicester. Never before has a transgender woman competed in the highlight of the darting calendar, which will be held at Alexandra Palace from Dec 15 to Jan 3. “I set off well but before I knew it she [Van Leuven] just powerhoused me,” Greaves said after the loss. “Sometimes in darts you’ve just got to allow it to happen and that was one of those days for me. “Fair play to her, she played really well and she deserved the win. I fell asleep at times where I should have been hitting more trebles and she punished me.” Van Leuven also defeated Trina Gulliver, Mikuru Suzuki and Lisa Ashton in the event, and beat emerging Scottish talent Lorraine Hyde in the semi-finals on her way to a fourth title of the year. The Dutchwoman transitioned in 2021 and joined the Women’s Series the following year. She also created history by becoming the first transgender woman to play in a televised darts tournament in July when she appeared at the Women’s World Matchplay in Blackpool. Hedman has previously called on the PDC and the WDF to exclude trans women from women’s tournaments. Article Name:Storm brewing as trans player secures PDC showpiece place Publication:The Daily Telegraph Author:By Tom Morgan Start Page:15 End Page:15")
![How the Stonewall gravy train came to an end Accused of mob rule in forcing trans laws on bosses, a ferocious backlash has seen organisations leave the LGBT charity in their droves, reports Sanchez Manning The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024 ‘A good idea turned bad’: Stonewall has engaged in disputed ideology; its office in London, below left ‘I thought BBC editors were afraid of Stonewall. It was a huge relief when we exited’ From a commercial viewpoint, the creation of its Diversity Champions programme was a genius move for Stonewall. It was initially a roaring success, with in excess of 900 organisations – from government departments and huge corporate names to NHS bodies and local councils – clamouring to be members. At its height in 2019, the programme – whose purported aim is to make workplaces more LGBT inclusive – brought in millions of pounds in income for the charity. Membership fees were around £3,000 per year. However, with a growing number of those who once trumpeted their membership deciding to leave, it appears that the wheels may be coming off Stonewall’s flagship initiative. The latest high profile dropout is the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCP), which was revealed last week by The Telegraph to have cut ties with Stonewall. “Stonewall helped us to become a more inclusive organisation,” wrote its chief executive, Sonia Walter, and its president, Dr Lade Smith, in a letter explaining their decision. “However, we are acutely aware that there is a risk in being affiliated with an organisation that may speak on matters relating to the professional practice of our members, but over which the college has no direct control.” Commentators say this statement is a clear recognition that there is a conflict between the tenets of psychiatry and Stonewall’s “ideological” position on transgender issues. More pertinently, the RCP’s explanation for exiting the programme goes to the very heart of why its popularity has nosedived. In recent years, the charity has engaged in an increasingly divisive crusade to push a disputed ideology that promoted “gender identity” over biological sex. Advice from the Diversity Champions scheme included promoting the adoption of genderneutral language. Encouragement to replace the word “mother” in workplace policies with the term “parent who has given birth” is one particularly controversial example. This pressure on employers to embrace gender ideology has – in the eyes of some critics – turned its once well-intentioned diversity scheme into little more than a mob shakedown that organisations sign up for to avoid accusations of transphobia. Malcolm Clark, who helped establish the LGB Alliance, a charity set up in 2019 to counter Stonewall’s trans activist focus, says: “Stonewall insisted that LGBT staff groups were set up internally to promote its position and these became stronger than any trade union despite no one electing them. Management then felt they had no choice but to pay thousands of pounds to Stonewall and comply with all the demands or risk being accused of transphobia. “The whole thing has become akin to some sort of protection racket.” The establishment of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions programme can be traced as far back as 2001. There was also the linked “Workplace Equality Index”, in which employers are ranked from one to 100 for their “progress on LGBT equality”. However, it was in the years after 2015 that these schemes really seemed to take off. Organisations from both the public and private sector were lining up to become members, desperate to win a public seal of approval for being LGBT-friendly via the gold, silver and bronze awards handed out by Stonewall. Numerous government departments all signed up to the diversity scheme. Many universities became members too, along with a whole raft of leading voluntary organisations ranging from Girlguiding and Barnardos to the Prince’s Trust. Meanwhile, businesses were also keen to jump on the bandwagon with many of the corporate world’s biggest beasts stumping up the £3,000 annual fee. These included Amazon, Tesco, Marks and Spencer and Unilever. The reach of the programme was frankly spectacular. So it is no surprise that the success soon began to be reflected in Stonewall’s bank balance. According to the charity’s annual accounts, in 2019 its income from “fees” – that were largely derived from the diversity membership schemes – reached a very healthy £3,269,447. This figure represented an 18 per cent rise on its revenue from the year before. But ironically, Stonewall has become a victim of its own success. In the end, it was this sheer pervasiveness that started causing unease among some and outright anger among others. Stonewall’s passionate support of the prescription of puberty blockers to young people was also a cause for concern. The tide was beginning to turn with regards to public opinion on this issue, particularly as a series of whistleblowers from the now defunct Tavistock gender identity clinic for children began to raise the alarm that youngsters were being hurried onto a medical pathway. Matters reached a head in 2021, with a full-blown backlash against Stonewall’s position on trans issues and its diversity programme. First to call it quits was the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), which left in May 2021, swiftly followed by Ofcom, the Department of Health and the BBC. Cath Leng, who was a senior broadcast journalist at the BBC, recalls: “It was definitely an activist scheme and its conduits inside the diversity team were gender ideology believers. I sometimes thought BBC editors were afraid of Stonewall. It was a huge relief when we exited.” (Shortly after the BBC pulled out of the Stonewall scheme, the broadcaster stated that “being a part of the Diversity Champions programme has never required the BBC to support the campaigns of Stonewall, nor its policy positions”.) In that same year, keen to stop gender ideology spreading through Whitehall, the then equalities minister Liz Truss urged all government departments to extricate themselves from the diversity scheme. And so the departures from the diversity champions scheme continued unabated. An analysis by the campaign group Sex Matters has revealed that 21 government bodies have dropped the scheme to date, notably including the Cabinet Office, the Department for Education and the Crown Prosecution Service. At the same time, almost 40 local authorities have dropped out along with 14 NHS and healthcare organisations. The numbers of those who have left may in fact be higher, but in 2021 Stonewall blocked access to the membership list to be seen on its website. Among those no longer included on the 2024 list are a string of FTSE 100 companies such as Unilever, Barclays and Amazon. Stonewall’s latest accounts seem to indicate that the downturn in popularity of the Diversity Champions programme is starting to have a financial impact. They show that in 2023 its “fees income” fell to £2,953,713, although Stonewall claims this revenue decrease is down to a combination of the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic slump. There may also be losses reflected elsewhere. “I went to its workplace conference in March and what I noticed was that Stonewall looked like it was basically on its knees,” says human resources commentator Tanya de Grunwald. “There was no branding and not even any programming. I did not see an organisation that was flush with money. I think Stonewall went in with good intentions, but organisations did not realise soon enough that this was not the organisation it once was.” Stonewall says: “There has always been a natural ebb and flow as organisations consider their priorities each year. As a regulated, registered charity, we adhere to the EHRC statutory guidance, which enables single-sex spaces to be enforced. Like all charities, Stonewall is fully regulated. It’s up to [individual organisations] to decide if and how they use our input. Stonewall is not responsible for the internal cultures of organisations or their internal management.” But Simon Fanshawe, one of the original founders of Stonewall who has since become concerned that the charity has lost its way, is pessimistic about the Diversity Champions programme’s future. “It was a very good idea when it started,” says Fanshawe, who is now rector of the University of Edinburgh. “I can see why it’s been an earner. But the problem is that it is no longer a signifier at work that you’re treating people fairly. “It’s now become a signifier about whether you’re compliant with a certain set of ideological views.” Article Name:How the Stonewall gravy train came to an end Publication:The Daily Telegraph Start Page:4 End Page:4](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F384eb1ba-4c4d-4587-9f91-390fccd817c3_971x726.png "How the Stonewall gravy train came to an end Accused of mob rule in forcing trans laws on bosses, a ferocious backlash has seen organisations leave the LGBT charity in their droves, reports Sanchez Manning The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024 ‘A good idea turned bad’: Stonewall has engaged in disputed ideology; its office in London, below left ‘I thought BBC editors were afraid of Stonewall. It was a huge relief when we exited’ From a commercial viewpoint, the creation of its Diversity Champions programme was a genius move for Stonewall. It was initially a roaring success, with in excess of 900 organisations – from government departments and huge corporate names to NHS bodies and local councils – clamouring to be members. At its height in 2019, the programme – whose purported aim is to make workplaces more LGBT inclusive – brought in millions of pounds in income for the charity. Membership fees were around £3,000 per year. However, with a growing number of those who once trumpeted their membership deciding to leave, it appears that the wheels may be coming off Stonewall’s flagship initiative. The latest high profile dropout is the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCP), which was revealed last week by The Telegraph to have cut ties with Stonewall. “Stonewall helped us to become a more inclusive organisation,” wrote its chief executive, Sonia Walter, and its president, Dr Lade Smith, in a letter explaining their decision. “However, we are acutely aware that there is a risk in being affiliated with an organisation that may speak on matters relating to the professional practice of our members, but over which the college has no direct control.” Commentators say this statement is a clear recognition that there is a conflict between the tenets of psychiatry and Stonewall’s “ideological” position on transgender issues. More pertinently, the RCP’s explanation for exiting the programme goes to the very heart of why its popularity has nosedived. In recent years, the charity has engaged in an increasingly divisive crusade to push a disputed ideology that promoted “gender identity” over biological sex. Advice from the Diversity Champions scheme included promoting the adoption of genderneutral language. Encouragement to replace the word “mother” in workplace policies with the term “parent who has given birth” is one particularly controversial example. This pressure on employers to embrace gender ideology has – in the eyes of some critics – turned its once well-intentioned diversity scheme into little more than a mob shakedown that organisations sign up for to avoid accusations of transphobia. Malcolm Clark, who helped establish the LGB Alliance, a charity set up in 2019 to counter Stonewall’s trans activist focus, says: “Stonewall insisted that LGBT staff groups were set up internally to promote its position and these became stronger than any trade union despite no one electing them. Management then felt they had no choice but to pay thousands of pounds to Stonewall and comply with all the demands or risk being accused of transphobia. “The whole thing has become akin to some sort of protection racket.” The establishment of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions programme can be traced as far back as 2001. There was also the linked “Workplace Equality Index”, in which employers are ranked from one to 100 for their “progress on LGBT equality”. However, it was in the years after 2015 that these schemes really seemed to take off. Organisations from both the public and private sector were lining up to become members, desperate to win a public seal of approval for being LGBT-friendly via the gold, silver and bronze awards handed out by Stonewall. Numerous government departments all signed up to the diversity scheme. Many universities became members too, along with a whole raft of leading voluntary organisations ranging from Girlguiding and Barnardos to the Prince’s Trust. Meanwhile, businesses were also keen to jump on the bandwagon with many of the corporate world’s biggest beasts stumping up the £3,000 annual fee. These included Amazon, Tesco, Marks and Spencer and Unilever. The reach of the programme was frankly spectacular. So it is no surprise that the success soon began to be reflected in Stonewall’s bank balance. According to the charity’s annual accounts, in 2019 its income from “fees” – that were largely derived from the diversity membership schemes – reached a very healthy £3,269,447. This figure represented an 18 per cent rise on its revenue from the year before. But ironically, Stonewall has become a victim of its own success. In the end, it was this sheer pervasiveness that started causing unease among some and outright anger among others. Stonewall’s passionate support of the prescription of puberty blockers to young people was also a cause for concern. The tide was beginning to turn with regards to public opinion on this issue, particularly as a series of whistleblowers from the now defunct Tavistock gender identity clinic for children began to raise the alarm that youngsters were being hurried onto a medical pathway. Matters reached a head in 2021, with a full-blown backlash against Stonewall’s position on trans issues and its diversity programme. First to call it quits was the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), which left in May 2021, swiftly followed by Ofcom, the Department of Health and the BBC. Cath Leng, who was a senior broadcast journalist at the BBC, recalls: “It was definitely an activist scheme and its conduits inside the diversity team were gender ideology believers. I sometimes thought BBC editors were afraid of Stonewall. It was a huge relief when we exited.” (Shortly after the BBC pulled out of the Stonewall scheme, the broadcaster stated that “being a part of the Diversity Champions programme has never required the BBC to support the campaigns of Stonewall, nor its policy positions”.) In that same year, keen to stop gender ideology spreading through Whitehall, the then equalities minister Liz Truss urged all government departments to extricate themselves from the diversity scheme. And so the departures from the diversity champions scheme continued unabated. An analysis by the campaign group Sex Matters has revealed that 21 government bodies have dropped the scheme to date, notably including the Cabinet Office, the Department for Education and the Crown Prosecution Service. At the same time, almost 40 local authorities have dropped out along with 14 NHS and healthcare organisations. The numbers of those who have left may in fact be higher, but in 2021 Stonewall blocked access to the membership list to be seen on its website. Among those no longer included on the 2024 list are a string of FTSE 100 companies such as Unilever, Barclays and Amazon. Stonewall’s latest accounts seem to indicate that the downturn in popularity of the Diversity Champions programme is starting to have a financial impact. They show that in 2023 its “fees income” fell to £2,953,713, although Stonewall claims this revenue decrease is down to a combination of the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic slump. There may also be losses reflected elsewhere. “I went to its workplace conference in March and what I noticed was that Stonewall looked like it was basically on its knees,” says human resources commentator Tanya de Grunwald. “There was no branding and not even any programming. I did not see an organisation that was flush with money. I think Stonewall went in with good intentions, but organisations did not realise soon enough that this was not the organisation it once was.” Stonewall says: “There has always been a natural ebb and flow as organisations consider their priorities each year. As a regulated, registered charity, we adhere to the EHRC statutory guidance, which enables single-sex spaces to be enforced. Like all charities, Stonewall is fully regulated. It’s up to [individual organisations] to decide if and how they use our input. Stonewall is not responsible for the internal cultures of organisations or their internal management.” But Simon Fanshawe, one of the original founders of Stonewall who has since become concerned that the charity has lost its way, is pessimistic about the Diversity Champions programme’s future. “It was a very good idea when it started,” says Fanshawe, who is now rector of the University of Edinburgh. “I can see why it’s been an earner. But the problem is that it is no longer a signifier at work that you’re treating people fairly. “It’s now become a signifier about whether you’re compliant with a certain set of ideological views.” Article Name:How the Stonewall gravy train came to an end Publication:The Daily Telegraph Start Page:4 End Page:4")
![Taxpayers foot £650k bill for Pride parties Drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges take precedence over better services, says critics The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024By Connor Stringer SENIOR REPORTER SWEETS LGBTQ+ ACCESSIBLE VAN RAINBOW CROSSING Taxpayers have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges as part of Pride celebrations. Spending on Lgbt-themed events totalled £655,700 across NHS trusts, councils and fire services, it can be revealed. They include Humber Health NHS Partnership, which spent £770 on rainbow badges, and North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust spent £950 painting rainbow colours alongside two pedestrian crossings. TAXPAYERS have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges as part of public sector Pride Month celebrations. Spending on Lgbt-themed events and merchandise totalled £655,700 across NHS trusts, councils and fire services, it can be revealed. They include Humber Health NHS Partnership, which spent £770 on rainbow badges. North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust spent £950 commissioning LGBT rainbow colours to be painted alongside the zebra stripes on two pedestrian crossings. The Greater London Authority, Southwark council and Newcastle upon Tyne council were among the biggest spenders, according to data compiled by the Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA). Joanna Marchong, the TPA’S investigations campaign manager, said the public sector needs to “dial down” celebrations until it gets a grip on its finances. ‘The public sector needs to “dial down” [Pride] celebrations until it gets a grip on its finances’ She said: “Taxpayers will be shocked by the growing cost of Pride celebrations. Public sector bodies, from councils to the NHS, constantly complain of financial pressures putting strain on front line services, yet are prioritising extravagant events and paying for pointless gimmicks.” The Taxpayers’ Alliance sent 786 public sector organisations a Freedom of Information request (FOI), with 667 answering in some form. It asked for the number of events organised for Pride month, including the name data and event time and whether any Lgbt-themed merchandise had been purchased for Pride month since the beginning of the 2024-25 financial year. Gloucestershire county council, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust were found to have organised the most Pride-related events. Elsewhere, University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust organised drag bingo while Hartlepool borough council hosted a drag queen storytime event. Meanwhile, Caerphilly county borough council spent £619.94 on a large deckchair and Croydon council spent £3,313 on Croydon Carnival puppets. In March, then-chancellor Jeremy Hunt ordered town halls to ditch diversity schemes as part of plans to clamp down on wasteful spending as more struggling councils risk going bust. Six councils have announced bankruptcy in England since 2020 while others have warned they face increasing financial pressures. Earlier this week, the Government launched a major crackdown on waste in the NHS in a bid to save millions of pounds a year. Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, said: “The NHS is broken. It is the mission of this Government to get it back on its feet and we can’t afford a single penny going to waste. Because the NHS deals in the billions, too often it doesn’t think about the millions. That has to change. This government inherited a £22billion black hole in the public finances, so we will have a laser-like focus on getting better value for taxpayers’ money.” The Local Government Association said: “It is for individual councils to make decisions about how best to invest their resources on behalf of their residents.” An NHS spokesman said: “Every pound of public money is precious v... and it is important our LGBT+ patients know they can come forward for the care they need.” Article Name:Taxpayers foot £650k bill for Pride parties Publication:The Daily Telegraph Author:By Connor Stringer SENIOR REPORTER Start Page:7 End Page:7](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F12416a33-2651-4a07-93eb-3b0396e8b5a8_753x616.png "Taxpayers foot £650k bill for Pride parties Drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges take precedence over better services, says critics The Daily Telegraph21 Oct 2024By Connor Stringer SENIOR REPORTER SWEETS LGBTQ+ ACCESSIBLE VAN RAINBOW CROSSING Taxpayers have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges as part of Pride celebrations. Spending on Lgbt-themed events totalled £655,700 across NHS trusts, councils and fire services, it can be revealed. They include Humber Health NHS Partnership, which spent £770 on rainbow badges, and North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust spent £950 painting rainbow colours alongside two pedestrian crossings. TAXPAYERS have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for drag bingo, rainbow fudge and pronoun badges as part of public sector Pride Month celebrations. Spending on Lgbt-themed events and merchandise totalled £655,700 across NHS trusts, councils and fire services, it can be revealed. They include Humber Health NHS Partnership, which spent £770 on rainbow badges. North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust spent £950 commissioning LGBT rainbow colours to be painted alongside the zebra stripes on two pedestrian crossings. The Greater London Authority, Southwark council and Newcastle upon Tyne council were among the biggest spenders, according to data compiled by the Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA). Joanna Marchong, the TPA’S investigations campaign manager, said the public sector needs to “dial down” celebrations until it gets a grip on its finances. ‘The public sector needs to “dial down” [Pride] celebrations until it gets a grip on its finances’ She said: “Taxpayers will be shocked by the growing cost of Pride celebrations. Public sector bodies, from councils to the NHS, constantly complain of financial pressures putting strain on front line services, yet are prioritising extravagant events and paying for pointless gimmicks.” The Taxpayers’ Alliance sent 786 public sector organisations a Freedom of Information request (FOI), with 667 answering in some form. It asked for the number of events organised for Pride month, including the name data and event time and whether any Lgbt-themed merchandise had been purchased for Pride month since the beginning of the 2024-25 financial year. Gloucestershire county council, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust were found to have organised the most Pride-related events. Elsewhere, University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust organised drag bingo while Hartlepool borough council hosted a drag queen storytime event. Meanwhile, Caerphilly county borough council spent £619.94 on a large deckchair and Croydon council spent £3,313 on Croydon Carnival puppets. In March, then-chancellor Jeremy Hunt ordered town halls to ditch diversity schemes as part of plans to clamp down on wasteful spending as more struggling councils risk going bust. Six councils have announced bankruptcy in England since 2020 while others have warned they face increasing financial pressures. Earlier this week, the Government launched a major crackdown on waste in the NHS in a bid to save millions of pounds a year. Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, said: “The NHS is broken. It is the mission of this Government to get it back on its feet and we can’t afford a single penny going to waste. Because the NHS deals in the billions, too often it doesn’t think about the millions. That has to change. This government inherited a £22billion black hole in the public finances, so we will have a laser-like focus on getting better value for taxpayers’ money.” The Local Government Association said: “It is for individual councils to make decisions about how best to invest their resources on behalf of their residents.” An NHS spokesman said: “Every pound of public money is precious v... and it is important our LGBT+ patients know they can come forward for the care they need.” Article Name:Taxpayers foot £650k bill for Pride parties Publication:The Daily Telegraph Author:By Connor Stringer SENIOR REPORTER Start Page:7 End Page:7")
Tuesday Total: 2
The Guardian [0]
The Times [1]
Daily Mail [0]
Telegraph [1]
Wednesday Total: 2
The Guardian [0]
The Times [0]
Daily Mail [0]
Telegraph [2]
Thursday Total: 7
The Guardian [0]
The Times [3]
![Have you been cancelled? We can help with that When Denise Fahmy and Rosie Kay lost their jobs, they founded Freedom in the Arts to fight for freedom of speech. Now they want to hear from fellow creatives, they tell Laura Freeman Denise Fahmy and Rosie Kay Next image › The two women sitting opposite me in a rented meeting room in central London shouldn’t have to be here. They have been cancelled, silenced and ostracised. But here they are: bloody-minded and unbowed. Rosie Kay and Denise Fahmy are the founders of Freedom in the Arts (Fita), and they believe there is a serious problem with freedom of speech across the arts: theatre, dance, music, literature, film, TV, museums, galleries and heritage institutions. They want Fita to be an “umbrella” organisation that can “speak on behalf of artists, some of whom have gone public, some who can’t go public because they are terrified”, Kay says. Since setting it up a year ago, more than 50 people in the arts have come to them for advice. When I ask them to tell their stories, they do so without bitterness but still with a certain amount of disbelief. Kay is a choreographer and the founder of the Rosie Kay Dance Company. In 2021 she was rehearsing a production of Romeo and Juliet with her young dancers under pandemic restrictions. They had to wear masks, and a video camera was “surveying all the time” in case Covid rules were broken. It was a “really horrible atmosphere”. At a team-building evening at Kay’s house, she brought up the subject of her next production, an adaptation of Orlando, Virginia Woolf’s novel about a time-travelling, gender-switching heroine-hero. Two of the dancers, who identified as non-binary, took exception to Kay’s belief that while a person could live as a different gender, biological sex was innate. The dancers complained and Kay was accused of transphobia. She was put through a ten-week investigation, was shut out of the company’s bank account, social media and email address and lost access to the organisation she had created. Kay has since relaunched as the K2CO dance company and is making new work. Fahmy had been at Arts Council England for 15 years when in 2024 £10,000 was granted to LGB Alliance to make the film Queens, about the lives of older gay men who had come of age during the reign of Elizabeth II. The grant was withdrawn after protests from trans activists because LGB Alliance had previously expressed views that the conflation of gender identity with sex denies the very idea of homosexuality. There was an all-staff meeting at which Fahmy was subjected to a “massive pile-on” for holding gender-critical views. An online petition against her followed. She subsequently brought a claim against Arts Council England, which she won. Fahmy and Kay met at an event at the House of Lords in 2023. “We said to the lords and ladies, ‘You need to do something about this. If we — at the top of our trade, women at the top of our professions, academia, the arts, arts administration — are being sacked and destroyed and we know what’s happening elsewhere, you’ve got to do something about this.’” This week they are launching a national survey aimed at arts professionals, seeking testimony from those who have been bullied, harassed, censored or sacked for expressing, or even being suspected of harbouring, beliefs that do not accord with the present accepted views. The survey comes at a time when freedom of speech is under threat across all fields. University curriculums and reading lists are policed for “problematic” texts and ideas. Debates and lectures are cancelled at the first sign of trouble. Academics are bullied out of their posts. Authors of the past are rewritten to make them more palatable (Roald Dahl) or prefaced with warnings about language that readers may find triggering (Mark Twain). Authors of the present may discover that their publishers will not stand by them when their work comes under fire. Kate Clanchy, author of Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, was dropped by Picador when her book about teaching poetry and creative writing in state secondaries was deemed to contain racist stereotypes. The Oxford academic Nigel Biggar was dropped by Bloomsbury because it felt that his book Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning went against “public feeling”. It was later taken on by HarperCollins. It’s easy to point a finger and go, ‘They’ve been really offensive’ Some cases make headlines. The singer Róisín Murphy was vilified for expressing concerns about the use of puberty blockers for children. The author John Boyne was subjected to online harassment for supposed transphobia and misgendering in a book that had set out to be a sympathetic portrayal of a transitioning teenager. JK Rowling takes on allcomers. But Fahmy and Kay are approached every week by people in the arts who have less of a voice and more to lose if they were to speak out. As Fita, they have identified several worrying trends. There are the artists who are investigated, exonerated but still blacklisted, unable to get work or grants. There is also the phenomenon of “silent precancellations”, in which firms take the view that rather than put an employee with, say, gender-critical views through disciplinary procedures, it’s simpler to pay them off and make them sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). In the week before we meet, Fahmy and Kay had seen two new NDAs. They tell me about the case of an actress who was dropped by her agent because “word got out” that she held gender-critical views. Despite the actress being in recent successful, money-making and critically lauded productions, the agent wouldn’t take the risk of association. The actress had not at this point said a word publicly. Then there’s the director who wasn’t told what he was accused of, who was cleared by a complaints procedure but nevertheless received a letter from a conservatoire saying that his contract was terminated and they would never work with him again. There is, furthermore, a “crisis of leadership” in many arts organisations, Kay says. When it comes to governance, boards of trustees often prove toothless. When a difficulty arises there’s “such a fear of reputational smearing that they’ll do anything. It’s much easier to point a finger and go, ‘It’s their fault. They’ve been really offensive.’” People are attracted to the perks of being on arts boards — the “white wine, red carpet, premiere” bit, as Kay puts it. But at the first sign of trouble the boards bring in lawyers or refer to the charity Stonewall, and pass on the responsibility for making decisions. Kay has also noticed an increasing number of women over 40 being “pushed off” boards. One senior woman on a board was asked: “You’re not an effing terf, are you?” (Terf is a non-neutral term for a “transexclusionary radical feminist”.) “In the end she was kicked off.” Kay and Fahmy put me in touch with two arts professionals they have met through Fita. I rang the poet Jenny Lindsay on the afternoon of the launch of her book Hounded: Women, Harms and the Gender Wars. Lindsay’s hounding started in 2020 when she liked a tweet defending the right of lesbians to assemble and peacefully protest at a Pride march without being physically attacked. It was the beginning of a period of public and personal persecution that resulted in her leaving Edinburgh because she had lost so much work as a freelance poet and spoken-word promoter. “That’s what happens when you get thwacked with the terf label,” she says. It was being gender-critical that resulted in Lindsay getting in trouble, but she says that there is “a whole host of orthodoxies, not just over gender” that artists can no longer touch. Productions, from plays to poetry, “lack joy and audiences feel lectured rather than entertained”. She says she is “aghast at how much it [speaking out] has taken out of me and how much I’ve lost for doing so”. For the past five years she’s found herself being a campaigner: “I just wanted to write poems.” The ceramicist Claudia Clare likens her experience to “ghosting” more than hounding. Her pots had always been political, but as early as 2010 she began to notice attempts by galleries to hide her work when it had been accepted for display, or to have it excluded from exhibitions altogether. In 2016 she was labelled an Islamophobe for a jug she made that expressed solidarity with the Charlie Hebdo team after the massacre of the satirical magazine’s staff in Paris. The jug, titled How the Prophet Was Driven to Drink, was painted with an image of the Prophet Muhammad and a poem in which Muhammad rails against those who “invade and ransack” in the name of Islam. Strong stuff, but it is not illegal in the UK to depict the prophet, even if Islam forbids representation. Since then, each time Clare was asked to exhibit or speak in a public space, activists would “knock it back and persuade the organisers that they should revoke the invitation or lecture”. Organisations would go silent when Clare tried to ask for an explanation. I could have spoken to many others. When I wrote a comment piece for The Times over the summer about the tribal nature of art-world thinking, I had dozens of emails and Instagram messages from those working in the arts and publishing who felt they couldn’t break cover. Three Jewish students at London art colleges wrote to say how unsafe and unwelcome they had been made to feel on campus. Message after message echoed Lindsay: “I just wanted to write poetry/make art/direct plays.” Kay and Fahmy care passionately about the arts. They are fired up while talking about Fita but are at their most animated when we start swapping notes on plays and exhibitions. Kay is just rushing off to rehearsals. Both worry about the use of the words “divisive” and “controversial” to shut down debate. “I mean, we’re the arts,” Fahmy says, half-laughing, half-exasperated. “We’re constantly doing controversy. It’s pretty much all the Arts Council funds.” But as the list of “problematic” subjects grows, they worry that artistic groupthink is leading to “bland, boring and of-one political ideology”. They hope Fita’s survey will lead to more openness, experiment and greater freedom to speak. “Everything that we grew up with,” Kay says, “and loved about going to a theatre and not knowing what was going to happen or going into an art gallery and feeling really stimulated — we just don’t have that feeling any more.” One of their aims is that Fita should act as a sort of matchmaker, introducing artists willing to take risks to theatres, galleries and concert halls prepared to take them on. I ask how they have weathered the stress of being cast as villains, the online pile-ons, the loss of livelihood and reputation. “If you can find your voice, even though it’s really hard, you end up mentally healthier,” Kay says. She has noticed that artists who don’t speak out “sort of wither and die because it goes against every instinct; it attacks your integrity and so you’re sort of eaten up from inside. Whereas we’re not eaten up.” The Freedom of Expression survey is available at freedominthearts.com](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F677b53c3-bdf9-4c18-90c9-085b7cce49ec_1076x846.png "Have you been cancelled? We can help with that When Denise Fahmy and Rosie Kay lost their jobs, they founded Freedom in the Arts to fight for freedom of speech. Now they want to hear from fellow creatives, they tell Laura Freeman Denise Fahmy and Rosie Kay Next image › The two women sitting opposite me in a rented meeting room in central London shouldn’t have to be here. They have been cancelled, silenced and ostracised. But here they are: bloody-minded and unbowed. Rosie Kay and Denise Fahmy are the founders of Freedom in the Arts (Fita), and they believe there is a serious problem with freedom of speech across the arts: theatre, dance, music, literature, film, TV, museums, galleries and heritage institutions. They want Fita to be an “umbrella” organisation that can “speak on behalf of artists, some of whom have gone public, some who can’t go public because they are terrified”, Kay says. Since setting it up a year ago, more than 50 people in the arts have come to them for advice. When I ask them to tell their stories, they do so without bitterness but still with a certain amount of disbelief. Kay is a choreographer and the founder of the Rosie Kay Dance Company. In 2021 she was rehearsing a production of Romeo and Juliet with her young dancers under pandemic restrictions. They had to wear masks, and a video camera was “surveying all the time” in case Covid rules were broken. It was a “really horrible atmosphere”. At a team-building evening at Kay’s house, she brought up the subject of her next production, an adaptation of Orlando, Virginia Woolf’s novel about a time-travelling, gender-switching heroine-hero. Two of the dancers, who identified as non-binary, took exception to Kay’s belief that while a person could live as a different gender, biological sex was innate. The dancers complained and Kay was accused of transphobia. She was put through a ten-week investigation, was shut out of the company’s bank account, social media and email address and lost access to the organisation she had created. Kay has since relaunched as the K2CO dance company and is making new work. Fahmy had been at Arts Council England for 15 years when in 2024 £10,000 was granted to LGB Alliance to make the film Queens, about the lives of older gay men who had come of age during the reign of Elizabeth II. The grant was withdrawn after protests from trans activists because LGB Alliance had previously expressed views that the conflation of gender identity with sex denies the very idea of homosexuality. There was an all-staff meeting at which Fahmy was subjected to a “massive pile-on” for holding gender-critical views. An online petition against her followed. She subsequently brought a claim against Arts Council England, which she won. Fahmy and Kay met at an event at the House of Lords in 2023. “We said to the lords and ladies, ‘You need to do something about this. If we — at the top of our trade, women at the top of our professions, academia, the arts, arts administration — are being sacked and destroyed and we know what’s happening elsewhere, you’ve got to do something about this.’” This week they are launching a national survey aimed at arts professionals, seeking testimony from those who have been bullied, harassed, censored or sacked for expressing, or even being suspected of harbouring, beliefs that do not accord with the present accepted views. The survey comes at a time when freedom of speech is under threat across all fields. University curriculums and reading lists are policed for “problematic” texts and ideas. Debates and lectures are cancelled at the first sign of trouble. Academics are bullied out of their posts. Authors of the past are rewritten to make them more palatable (Roald Dahl) or prefaced with warnings about language that readers may find triggering (Mark Twain). Authors of the present may discover that their publishers will not stand by them when their work comes under fire. Kate Clanchy, author of Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, was dropped by Picador when her book about teaching poetry and creative writing in state secondaries was deemed to contain racist stereotypes. The Oxford academic Nigel Biggar was dropped by Bloomsbury because it felt that his book Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning went against “public feeling”. It was later taken on by HarperCollins. It’s easy to point a finger and go, ‘They’ve been really offensive’ Some cases make headlines. The singer Róisín Murphy was vilified for expressing concerns about the use of puberty blockers for children. The author John Boyne was subjected to online harassment for supposed transphobia and misgendering in a book that had set out to be a sympathetic portrayal of a transitioning teenager. JK Rowling takes on allcomers. But Fahmy and Kay are approached every week by people in the arts who have less of a voice and more to lose if they were to speak out. As Fita, they have identified several worrying trends. There are the artists who are investigated, exonerated but still blacklisted, unable to get work or grants. There is also the phenomenon of “silent precancellations”, in which firms take the view that rather than put an employee with, say, gender-critical views through disciplinary procedures, it’s simpler to pay them off and make them sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). In the week before we meet, Fahmy and Kay had seen two new NDAs. They tell me about the case of an actress who was dropped by her agent because “word got out” that she held gender-critical views. Despite the actress being in recent successful, money-making and critically lauded productions, the agent wouldn’t take the risk of association. The actress had not at this point said a word publicly. Then there’s the director who wasn’t told what he was accused of, who was cleared by a complaints procedure but nevertheless received a letter from a conservatoire saying that his contract was terminated and they would never work with him again. There is, furthermore, a “crisis of leadership” in many arts organisations, Kay says. When it comes to governance, boards of trustees often prove toothless. When a difficulty arises there’s “such a fear of reputational smearing that they’ll do anything. It’s much easier to point a finger and go, ‘It’s their fault. They’ve been really offensive.’” People are attracted to the perks of being on arts boards — the “white wine, red carpet, premiere” bit, as Kay puts it. But at the first sign of trouble the boards bring in lawyers or refer to the charity Stonewall, and pass on the responsibility for making decisions. Kay has also noticed an increasing number of women over 40 being “pushed off” boards. One senior woman on a board was asked: “You’re not an effing terf, are you?” (Terf is a non-neutral term for a “transexclusionary radical feminist”.) “In the end she was kicked off.” Kay and Fahmy put me in touch with two arts professionals they have met through Fita. I rang the poet Jenny Lindsay on the afternoon of the launch of her book Hounded: Women, Harms and the Gender Wars. Lindsay’s hounding started in 2020 when she liked a tweet defending the right of lesbians to assemble and peacefully protest at a Pride march without being physically attacked. It was the beginning of a period of public and personal persecution that resulted in her leaving Edinburgh because she had lost so much work as a freelance poet and spoken-word promoter. “That’s what happens when you get thwacked with the terf label,” she says. It was being gender-critical that resulted in Lindsay getting in trouble, but she says that there is “a whole host of orthodoxies, not just over gender” that artists can no longer touch. Productions, from plays to poetry, “lack joy and audiences feel lectured rather than entertained”. She says she is “aghast at how much it [speaking out] has taken out of me and how much I’ve lost for doing so”. For the past five years she’s found herself being a campaigner: “I just wanted to write poems.” The ceramicist Claudia Clare likens her experience to “ghosting” more than hounding. Her pots had always been political, but as early as 2010 she began to notice attempts by galleries to hide her work when it had been accepted for display, or to have it excluded from exhibitions altogether. In 2016 she was labelled an Islamophobe for a jug she made that expressed solidarity with the Charlie Hebdo team after the massacre of the satirical magazine’s staff in Paris. The jug, titled How the Prophet Was Driven to Drink, was painted with an image of the Prophet Muhammad and a poem in which Muhammad rails against those who “invade and ransack” in the name of Islam. Strong stuff, but it is not illegal in the UK to depict the prophet, even if Islam forbids representation. Since then, each time Clare was asked to exhibit or speak in a public space, activists would “knock it back and persuade the organisers that they should revoke the invitation or lecture”. Organisations would go silent when Clare tried to ask for an explanation. I could have spoken to many others. When I wrote a comment piece for The Times over the summer about the tribal nature of art-world thinking, I had dozens of emails and Instagram messages from those working in the arts and publishing who felt they couldn’t break cover. Three Jewish students at London art colleges wrote to say how unsafe and unwelcome they had been made to feel on campus. Message after message echoed Lindsay: “I just wanted to write poetry/make art/direct plays.” Kay and Fahmy care passionately about the arts. They are fired up while talking about Fita but are at their most animated when we start swapping notes on plays and exhibitions. Kay is just rushing off to rehearsals. Both worry about the use of the words “divisive” and “controversial” to shut down debate. “I mean, we’re the arts,” Fahmy says, half-laughing, half-exasperated. “We’re constantly doing controversy. It’s pretty much all the Arts Council funds.” But as the list of “problematic” subjects grows, they worry that artistic groupthink is leading to “bland, boring and of-one political ideology”. They hope Fita’s survey will lead to more openness, experiment and greater freedom to speak. “Everything that we grew up with,” Kay says, “and loved about going to a theatre and not knowing what was going to happen or going into an art gallery and feeling really stimulated — we just don’t have that feeling any more.” One of their aims is that Fita should act as a sort of matchmaker, introducing artists willing to take risks to theatres, galleries and concert halls prepared to take them on. I ask how they have weathered the stress of being cast as villains, the online pile-ons, the loss of livelihood and reputation. “If you can find your voice, even though it’s really hard, you end up mentally healthier,” Kay says. She has noticed that artists who don’t speak out “sort of wither and die because it goes against every instinct; it attacks your integrity and so you’re sort of eaten up from inside. Whereas we’re not eaten up.” The Freedom of Expression survey is available at freedominthearts.com")
Daily Mail [1]
Telegraph [1]
Friday Total: 4
The Guardian [0]
The Times [1]
Daily Mail [1]
Telegraph [2]
Saturday Total: 2
The Guardian [1]
The Times [0]
Daily Mail [1]
Telegraph [0]
Sunday Total: 3
The Observer [0]
The Sunday Times [0]
Mail on Sunday [2]
![JK Rowling’s TV role... in a chamber of secrets The Mail on Sunday27 Oct 2024 WHEN the Hollywood producers behind a forthcoming big-budget Harry Potter TV series announced they wanted an ‘inclusive’ cast, they were accused of pandering to a woke audience who had threatened to boycott the show over creator J.K. Rowling’s views on transgender issues. But while studio executives at HBO and Warner Brothers have tried to avoid any potentially damaging culture war row, it appears the author has a more significant role in the show than they would like advertised. Ms Rowling was announced as an executive producer on the project, not a writer, but I understand she has been ‘dipping into the writers’ room’ where scripts and storylines are being developed. And when I asked an industry insider about her presence there, she recoiled and asked for it to be kept ‘secret’. Why such coyness about the involvement of one of the world’s biggest-selling authors? Perhaps it’s down to her being a pariah in some quarters after she was labelled transphobic by her critics in 2020 for ridiculing the phrase ‘people who menstruate’. She tweeted sarcastically: ‘I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?’ Quite opposite to the language in last month’s casting call, seeking actors for the show ‘regardless of ethnicity, disability, race, sexual orientation [or] gender identity’ – which prompted some critics to complain such wokeness would ruin the franchise. But some in the opposing trenches of the culture war have said that they would not watch anything in which Ms Rowling was involved. At a press conference announcing the series retelling the Harry Potter stories over a decade, HBO boss Casey Bloys declined to comment on Ms Rowling’s views that trans women are not women, saying: ‘I don’t think this is the forum. That’s not something we’re going to get into.’ Ms Rowling was not credited as a writer on the original Harry Potter movies, but she did give direct assistance to screenwriters Steve Kloves and Michael Goldenberg. Succession’s Francesca Gardiner is lead writer on the TV version. Filming starts next year. Article Name:JK Rowling’s TV role... in a chamber of secrets Publication:The Mail on Sunday Start Page:27 End Page:27](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7b327765-69e2-4c8b-9025-70d190ff2d0c_223x448.png "JK Rowling’s TV role... in a chamber of secrets The Mail on Sunday27 Oct 2024 WHEN the Hollywood producers behind a forthcoming big-budget Harry Potter TV series announced they wanted an ‘inclusive’ cast, they were accused of pandering to a woke audience who had threatened to boycott the show over creator J.K. Rowling’s views on transgender issues. But while studio executives at HBO and Warner Brothers have tried to avoid any potentially damaging culture war row, it appears the author has a more significant role in the show than they would like advertised. Ms Rowling was announced as an executive producer on the project, not a writer, but I understand she has been ‘dipping into the writers’ room’ where scripts and storylines are being developed. And when I asked an industry insider about her presence there, she recoiled and asked for it to be kept ‘secret’. Why such coyness about the involvement of one of the world’s biggest-selling authors? Perhaps it’s down to her being a pariah in some quarters after she was labelled transphobic by her critics in 2020 for ridiculing the phrase ‘people who menstruate’. She tweeted sarcastically: ‘I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?’ Quite opposite to the language in last month’s casting call, seeking actors for the show ‘regardless of ethnicity, disability, race, sexual orientation [or] gender identity’ – which prompted some critics to complain such wokeness would ruin the franchise. But some in the opposing trenches of the culture war have said that they would not watch anything in which Ms Rowling was involved. At a press conference announcing the series retelling the Harry Potter stories over a decade, HBO boss Casey Bloys declined to comment on Ms Rowling’s views that trans women are not women, saying: ‘I don’t think this is the forum. That’s not something we’re going to get into.’ Ms Rowling was not credited as a writer on the original Harry Potter movies, but she did give direct assistance to screenwriters Steve Kloves and Michael Goldenberg. Succession’s Francesca Gardiner is lead writer on the TV version. Filming starts next year. Article Name:JK Rowling’s TV role... in a chamber of secrets Publication:The Mail on Sunday Start Page:27 End Page:27")
Sunday Telegraph [1]
TRANSWRITES YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED
JK Rowling’s latest anti-trans rant is 292 words long but you can debunk it with 2, by Gemma Stone
Mridul Wadhwa quits Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre after sustained anti-trans campaign against her, by Gemma Stone
“Transitions The Unheard Stories” review; A useful resource hampered by an inconcise introduction, by Laura Kate Dale
Enraged industry professionals slam The Bookseller for promoting anti-trans social media accounts, by Gemma Stone
When was the T added to LGBT? A quick history, by Sarah Clarke
Trans people are the greatest assault on women in JK Rowling’s life time, apparently, by Gemma Stone
The 32 things The Cass Review recommends and why they are concerning, by Gemma Stone.
NHS & puberty blockers: Former GIDS patients reflect on long wait times, invasive assessments, by Sasha Baker.
The Cass Review: A government-sanctioned attack on trans lives, by Lee Hurley.
SUPPORT THE TRANS AGENDA
Tired of the same old news narratives? Get 'The Trans Agenda' delivered right to your inbox – news with the trans community at the forefront. Subscribe now!
The Trans Agenda also needs your help. Your donation powers my reporting efforts, amplifying trans voices and keeps you in the know. Support independent trans journalism. Help keep in-depth reporting in 'The Trans Agenda' available and accessible by donating today!
CALL FOR STORIES
Seen something newsworthy related to the trans community in the UK? Send me a tip! I’m always looking for leads and underreported stories.