On this episode of What the Trans?! Flint, Alyx and Ashleigh spend precious minutes of their lives talking about:
- New segment Action Alley, a dedicated place to highlight protests, campaigns, and calls to action.
- The recent election. No, not that one, the other one, the one where Kemi Badench became leader of the UK Conservative party.
- A woman who was dismissed from her role due to her “gender critical” views is to receive a substantial payout from a tribunal.
- Developments in the EHRC, including Baroness Falkner remaining in post for another year and a deep dive with Sarah from Trans Safety Network about the EHRC’s draft code of practise, which is open for consultation until early January.
EHRC Consultation: Code of practice for services, public functions and associations: consultation 2024 | EHRC
References:
Puberty blocker ban extended.
Kemi Badenoch becomes Tory leader.
Kemi Badenoch wins Tory leadership election | Conservative leadership | The Guardian
Trump
Well, Shit – by Doc Impossible – Stained Glass Woman
ERCC
Woman unfairly dismissed over gender-critical views to get £69,000 payout – The Guardian
GC Activists Suing the Care Quality Commission
Telegraph article (archived copy) https://archive.is/nVh29
Anneliese Dodds
Equalities minister Anneliese Dodds meets with gender-critical group Sex Matters – PinkNews
Loser’s Corner
Lesbian bar accused of kicking out gender-critical activist responds: ‘The ejection was lawful’ – PinkNews
Met Police SEEN Network
https://bsky.app/profile/adiii.bsky.social/post/3lariieaa2k22
Trans Joy!
Play tells story of pioneering transgender woman who drove Ulsterbus in 1970s
EHRC
^^^ For the consultation, the link is at the top of the page! ^^^
Transcript
[intro music plays]Ashleigh: Hi everybody. Welcome to What The Trans?!
Flint & Alyx: What the Trans?!
Ashleigh: Yep, it’s us. We are back. How are you two?
Flint: Yeah I’m doing good. I recently have finally finished the entirety of the Alan Wake game. [laughs] The first one, remastered. So that’s been a point of personal pride recently. That game has a grip on me. It’s not even that I love it, it’s just, I have an attachment to it now, I guess. So that’s kind of what I’ve been doing recently.
Ashleigh: How about you, Alyx? How was your holiday?
Alyx: Oh, it’s been lovely. I came back from the Game Of Thrones land of Westeros, aka Croatia. It was very lovely. Not quite Game Of Thrones-ey, but fortunately all that death, sex and all that was…
Ashleigh: I was gonna say. That’s probably a good thing. You want to try and keep the betrayal to a minimum when you’re on holiday.
Alyx; Yeah definitely. Although some fucker poisoned me earlier – later on that bloody cruise. Because on the last day, where we could go to a location like Montenegro, I just had the worst food poisoning at the end of it. But every single person I’ve spoken to always goes “Oh yeah, that’s normal. You get terribly sick at one point during the trip”. And I’m like ‘That’s not fair!”, but aside from that, lots of alcohol. Which is probably part of that sort of series.
Ashleigh: Maybe, maybe.
Flint: Maybe. Maybe just a tad. [laughs]
Alyx: It’s not like I’m a raging alcoholic but… [laughs]
Ashleigh: Hey, your words.
Flint: Yeah. We said nothing.
Alyx: So it’s been a lovely holiday. Though now I’ve got planning my next one in Rome later on next month, but…
Flint: Ooh!
Ashleigh: Lovely.
Alyx: Yes. So that’s my holiday-ing fun. How about you, Ash? How have you been?
Ashleigh: Alright. So I now have a C-PAP machine, Constant Positive Airway Pressure machine. And it’s like a mask attached to a tube that I wear when I sleep. Because I have sleep apnea and quite badly, to the extent I’d wake up after sleeping for not very long and obviously not feel very refreshed. So I’ve got this machine. And I’ve kind of got a little obsessed with it, because you can connect it to, like, an app on your phone and see “Oh well I slept for seven hours and 54 minutes last night, which is better than the previous night when I slept for seven hours and 47 minutes”. I’m kind of getting a little bit obsessed with the number, and it kind of feels like that’s maybe not the way to approach it. It’s like try and sleep first and worry about the number second.
Flint: [laughs] Yeah. I had a weirdly similar thing happen when… This is not really super-relatable, but the gamification of sleep is I got Pokemon Sleep because I am both an early bird and a night owl. Which means, yes I’m an insomniac. So I figured ‘Oh! A game where you get to feed a Snorlax?” and then you collect Pokemon when you sleep? That’s great, I love that. Let me do that. At first, yes, I was just very excited to get to sleep. It was a fun time. But after a while you start – I just started to get stressed about the Snorlax. Because if I had a bad night’s sleep my Snorlax would pay the price. And my Pokemon would pay the price. And then I just started to feel like I am a single parent not doing strong enough and well enough by my kids. So I ended up uninstalling it when there was a period where glitches kept happening. Just kept happening. So like I had set it up and it wouldn’t record everything alright; I’d set it upright and then in the morning it’ll be like “Due to a problem we had to delete it”. So after about a week I was like, oh I guess it’s just isn’t gonna work anymore, and I stopped. But it’s weird how, when the numbers get into your head; once you get, like a sleep score or something, you start getting so hyper focused on it. And you’re like ooh!
Alyx: I’ve got, like a smart watch which has the feature for sleep tracking, but I always take my watch off during the night. So that’s like a cool feature that I’m just missing out on because of my habits.
Flint: Oh yeah, you’re always counting the steps on those things actually though, aren’t you? I remember when we were doing Trans Pride, yeah.
Alyx: Oh yeah, Trans Pride London. Good old 30,000 steps. Not as impressive today, though. Only 8,787, if I’m honest.
Ashleigh: Yeah. I used to have a step counter on my phone at various points when I was walking to work. Obviously not doable anymore, but I got a little bit obsessed with the numbers. I think that’s kind of what we do as humans. Like, we kind of can get a bit obsessed with the minutiae, rather than the overarching “Hey, you’re getting a lot of steps in” or “Hey, your sleep’s better now” kind of thing. Anyway… Okay, away from the gamification.
[laughter]Ashleigh: So before we get into the news properly, there’s just something we want to pick up on from the last episode. We talked about psychogenic illnesses, and the fact that a man named Simon Wesley has weaponised that term to try and imply that psychogenic illnesses are not real, are not worthy of respect or interaction or care. That is obviously not how we feel on it. Psychogenic illnesses are very real.
Flint: Of course.
Ashleigh: But we were highlighting that the person who’s been now appointed to a very high position within the Children And Young People’s Gender Dysphoria Research Oversight Board has, in the past, worked with the DWP and defined and considered psychogenic illnesses to be people who suffer from them are actually just malingerers. Or actually just lazy, you know? And that’s not the case, obviously. That is absolutely not our interpretation of it at all. That is Simon Wesley’s interpretation of it, and we condemn that in the strongest possible terms.
Flint: Yes, absolutely. And if we didn’t come across clear enough on that, that is our bad. Our apologies. It’s an important thing to make sure that we’re being clear; the last thing we would want to do is to end up putting out any kind of ableist sentiment, when the very thing we were trying to do with that part was to have a conversation about tackling ableism and about the way in which both of those parts of our identities intersect.
Ashleigh: And with that out of the way, Alyx, we have some slightly more fun news don’t we?
Alyx: Yeah, exactly. We’ve got some really cool things coming up. And that thing is the What The Trans?! awards.
[trumpet fanfare]Alyx: We recently just announced on our socials earlier this month that we are now doing an awards show on the end of the year.
Ashleigh: So we’ve got a whole swathe of different categories… you can suggest people, you can even suggest categories, people who should be awarded, should be noticed for their work, for their contributions. We’ve got book of the year, Queer film of the rear, activists of year…
Alyx: …Journalists, lawyers.
Ashleigh: All sorts of things. So we’re going to take a lot of suggestions, and then we’re going to collate those suggestions and put those out to a public vote to say “Well, here’s what’s been voted on” and that, you know, the results of that voting process will be the awards show. Which we will do in late December.
Alyx: Yeah.
Ashleigh: Something a little bit more fun.
Alyx: Indeed. The nominations form will be closing on the 25th of November so that we can put together the voting form by the first.
Flint; Yeah. Get your thoughts in. It’ll be really cool to see what people want to put forward.
Ashleigh: Yeah. Definitely. And I think there’s a couple of pretty obvious ones that are emerging so far, and… fantastic. But we’ll talk about those in December. But yeah, if you have any suggestions for the different categories you can find those categories on our social media. Get involved. Chip in. Give us your two cents.
Alyx: Yeah, chuck it in. No corporate sponsors, none of that sort of stuff. Now with that… that’s the first bit. We’ve also got another thing we’re introducing.
Ashleigh: Yes.
Alyx: A new segment called Action Alley.
Ashleigh: Ta-daa.
Alyx; Ta-daa. I’m sure we could find a sting for that.
[old Windows startup sound]Alyx: Yeah, that’ll do! [background music: panpipe moods]
Alyx: So with all the shitty news you’ve seen, you can probably hear the majority of it in our US edition of our podcast. And we were like “Things are gonna get a lot harder”, so we wanted to see what we could do to help coordinate people and give calls of action to show what you, dear listener, can do. Things from upcoming protests, letter writing campaigns, consultation guides and other actions. And we’re going to dub this segment Action Alley. If you have any events or campaigns that you want us to highlight, get in touch. We have a whole channel on our discord where you can submit things. Alongside this, feel for its email or message, or get in touch with us on our social media, and we can include them in this segment.
[panpipe moods fades out]Alyx: In terms of what there is at the moment there aren’t really many protests coming up, but there are some vigils for Trans Day Of Remembrance coming up all over the country. So we’re going to link to Trans Protest UK’s Google doc, where they have listed all of them. Trans Protest UK is a fantastic resource for protests and other actions and all that sort of stuff, so check that if you can. There’s also a fundraiser for the Outside Project, and more specifically they’re going to be launching a new shelter for homeless trans folk to come to. So if you’ve got some money, donate to their fundraiser while they’re getting supplies and all that good stuff, to make sure that the folks out there can get the support they need. So we’re going to link that in the description as well, So check that out if you can. Another sort of action you can take: early of last week TransActual went to parliament with a bunch of trans folks to make sure as many MPs in Parliament got to meet a trans person, to put a face to those they’re trying to oppress. And we’re going to link that campaign in a description, as that campaign is looking to be ongoing. And it’s going to get people to meet their MPs. But this time TransActual is wanting people to report back on which MPs people have gone to, and how it went. And identifying which MPs have yet to meet trans constituents, and supporting people are doing that as well. And with that, earlier this week they spoke to a bunch of people in Parliament and we spoke to TransActual about this, and this is what they had to say.
Helen: Hi, I’m Helen Belcher from TransActual. And with me is…
Chay: I’m Chay Brown, my pronouns are he/him, from TransActual.
Helen: So we’ve just done a Meet Us, Hear Us event in Parliament, which was brilliantly attended. I’ve done an event in Parliament before, many years ago, where I had 13 MPs come. And one of the MPs said “This is an absolutely outstanding turnout, normally you get five to six”, you know, that’s a good turnout. We had 27 people through the door, of all different parties. Lots of very good, supportive conversations. Lots of people asking how they can help. I think that it’s been an overwhelmingly positive and brilliant event.
Chay: Yeah. And I think it’s really good as well that, you know, the people from the community that were part of the drop in event for MPs come from lots of different backgrounds, different lived experiences. And some of the people that were there were not people that would normally be in meeting rooms with MPs, so actually the MPs and members of the Lords that came along were able to see different perspectives, and not from the sort of people who, you know… Mine and Helen’s jobs are to have these conversations, but people just talking about their own experiences, you know? And it was lovely, as well, we had some people who had individual one-to-one meetings, and that’s something that we’re encouraging people to do. And have patience if you’ve written to your MP, especially the new ones who have got lots of… still setting up their offices. And people don’t have to take part today to be part of the Meet Us, Hear Us campaign. Over the next few years it’s about getting MPs hearing what we’ve got to say, and about the reality of our lives. And just cutting through all the nonsense in the press and all the misinformation they’ve heard.
Helen: And I think the important thing that Chay said was that there were other one-on-one meetings going on, which weren’t counted in the 27 so I know of at least two MPs who had meetings with constituents who didn’t come through the door, so weren’t counted in those 27. So yeah, keep going. There are a lot of people who are worried about what’s happening to trans people in the UK, but don’t quite know what to do about it. So they need to hear our voices, our experiences, to help them formulate their thoughts and get the wording right, and get some ideas flowing.
Alshleigh: Was puberty blockers discussed at any point at all?
Helen: Yes it was. Some people were specifically concerned about puberty blockers and Cass, the Cass Review and the potential overreach that Cass has had in terms of education policy or charity commission recommendations. I think more people are worried about general healthcare and how Cass fitted into that overall mix. We were able to, well I certainly was able to introduce our report from last month, where we had a couple of hundred adults saying that their GPs had withdrawn from shared care agreements, or refusing to prescribe, and explaining the impacts that that would have on trans people. And people were very interested and concerned about that, and wanting to move that one forwards. A lot of these things are moved forwards not in terms of public questions, but in terms of behind the scenes discussions. So whilst there have been a number of those going on, I think there will be more of those going on, and the information that we’ve provided… The background that we provided, and the real life experiences that people in the room were able to give, I think moves those conversations, enables those conversations to move on in a much better way.
Chay: Yeah. And so, for example, in just one conversation there were two of us talking to a member of the House of Lords and saying “Yeah, we both had the experience of relocating and having a GP hum and haw about our hormone prescription, and the other prescriptions that we’ve had”. So it is, you know, straight away sort of bringing our lived experiences into it, making us more than just… Statistics are all well and good, and useful. So people please do use our reporting tool if you’re refused a GP prescription by your GP. But also, putting a human face on it. And this is… it shouldn’t be where we’re at, but where we’re at the moment is reminding people that we’re human beings and we’re not a hypothetical debate. We’re not scary, horrible people, we’re just human beings like anyone else.
Helen: And I think about a lot of it is also, people are very aware of how divisive trans issues, trans people in our lives have become, with very polarized views. So it was interesting to be able to say to a couple of MPs ‘Well okay, you want to find a middle way. Well the middle way between me living as Helen all the time and me not being allowed to live as Helen is what? That maybe I should only do it before lunch times, or Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays? I mean what is that middle way? And that point got across very, very strongly. And it was able, then, to point to things like the Trump election campaign pouring so much money into anti-trans ads and how Trump had relied really on disinformation, and tying what we’re experiencing – we’re not the only people, not the only community experiencing this. Other communities like immigrants, Muslims, Gypsy Roma Traveller community, disabled people increasingly as well, all experiencing this othering and this disinformation campaign. And how what its fundamental purpose is is to destroy trust in Democracy and the systems that hold it to account. And if we value our society, if we value our democracy then that is worth fighting for. And it’s worth seeing what’s happening to trans people in that bigger picture. And a lot of MPs understood that very easily.
Alyx: So yeah. That was a fantastic interview
Ashleigh: Yeah, definitely. Nice quick interview.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: People do need to get involved in this.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: Really.
Flint: Yeah, definitely.
Ashleigh: We’re trying to, TransActual and ourselves, to try and stress that it’s different from the usual “Try and meet your MP campaign”, although that is part of it. Hearing that this one is something rather productive compared to some other campaigns, and from what we’re told reporting back to TransActual is going to have an impact as well. Because they’ll be able to coordinate “Oh okay, this constituency, this constituency and this one haven’t responded at all; how can we try and get them on side? How can we get a trans person in front of that MP to share their story?”. So it’s all a bit strategic.
Flint: And this kind of thing, I think, is going to be really helpful for us getting a better understanding of just how… I think it could be a really good litmus test for where some people in Parliament are at, regarding respecting our rights and protecting them. The more we know about that, the more that we know about people who are positive/negative towards that, whatever, it gives us… that knowledge gives us more ability to know how we’re going to handle it and respond to it, and push further for our rights.
Alyx: All exciting stuff.
Ashleigh: Yes. Well, and I hope that campaign goes well. I hope it sort of continues, but now we’ve got to do our thing. Those classic What The Trans?! hijinks that you’ve come to know and tolerate. So yeah, let’s let’s do the news.
[crowd sighing “Awww”]Alyx: Not the news!
Ashleigh: So to start with just quickly, there has been another extension of the puberty blocker ban. It seems that the ban has been extended again through until the end of this year. This was done without fanfare or announcement. The only place that it appeared was on the website legislation.gov.uk and was shared from there to Reddit. Now, as someone pointed out there, a government ruling by constantly renewing what is supposed to be a temporary legislation that requires no additional parliamentary vote, is maybe not a good precedent to set.
[Chancellor Palpatine in Attack Of The Clones] I love democracy. I love the Republic. The power you give me I will lay down when this crisis has abated.Flint: I was not surprised that they had extended it. I was I guess a little bit surprised that they were so… how can I put this neutrally? Slimy about it. I don’t know, no that’s not the right word. They were sly. Sly is the word. Because they – I believe this change happened just as the US election was the big news.
Ashleigh: Yes.
Flint: There wasn’t any kind of large statements that I could see. You had to search for that and find it out, basically. And then it was up to the community to spread that news and go “Whoa, they’ve done this”. So I’m a little bit surprised because so far they’ve really been trying to bang the drum and say “We’re doing the right thing! Blah blah blah”. This doesn’t look like that, this looks like “We know we’re doing the wrong thing but we’re going to keep doing it”.
Alyx: When I saw the puberty blocker ban being extended after the depression I was feeling after the election, I was “Oh for fucksake! Not another shitty thing to come up”.
Flint: Yeah. Also even Cass didn’t call for an indefinite extension.
Alyx: Or even a ban.
Flint: Or even a ban. And it’s been pushed further and further… I mean it’s just, the way you give an inch, takes a mile. Isn’t it?
Ashleigh: Yeah. Yeah. It is. So yeah. Fuckers.
Flint: Yeah. Yeah.
Ashleigh: Letting us die by inches.
Alyx: But yeah, it’s another shitty thing from another shitty person like Wes Streeting. But speaking of shitty people, we all naively hoped that we’d never have to talk about her again, but it’s time for calamitous Kemi to take the stage again. [sighs] Because Kemi Badenoch has been elected to lead the Conservative Party. She won the internal election on November the second, saying, after she was chosen for a role, “We have to be honest, honest about the fact we made mistakes, honest about the fact that we let standards slip”. Did you really, Kemi? Good heavens, we barely noticed. This does make her the first black leader of a Westminster party, but it’s just a shame it had to be her. Keir Starmer issued a pro forma congratulations to Badenoch, saying…
[ acapella God Save the King]Alyx: …”I look forward to working with your party in the interests of the British people”, which suggests to us he has not been paying attention, given how often Badenoch has demonstrated she just doesn’t care about the interests of the British people. Like when she’s suggested during the leadership contest that maternity pay is excessive. But other Labour members went on the offensive, with chairman Ellie Reeves saying that “The Conservatives have learned nothing since the British people resoundingly rejected them in July. Kemi Badenoch’s election as leader shows they are incapable of change”.
Ashleigh: Of all the people. They have two choices, right? They could either say “Right, campaigning on this culture war bullshit lost us the last election, and we have to do an about face and get away from doing that, or we lean more into it”.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: And, you know, get themselves a Trumpian vibe. And we’ll come back to him in a minute.
Flint: That’s kind of how I feel like she’s pulling… I really do feel like she’s pulling a Boris Johnson here. I think she’s doing exactly what he’s doing: make yourself loud, and make yourself almost unreasonably conservative in a way for most people. But it doesn’t matter how many people initially balk at what you’re saying. The fact is you’re putting those conversations on the table, and you’re saying to those few who would want to take away, you know, maternity pay, those who would want to lessen the rights of so many people, that you are willing to do that. That you are willing to go that far. And I think that’s entirely what she’s doing. She is signposting more than she is trying to make actionable claims. It’s concerning because she is going to be making those connections, even if it seems like she is putting herself further and further into untenable territory, I don’t think that’s the case. I think she is just pushing further and further right. She’s moving that Overton window further to the right for the Tory party. As if it could be any fucking further, but anyway.
Ashleigh: Yeah.
Alyx: No definitely. But I was just looking at the election thinking regardless of the outcome, it was a pick between a piss-filled soup or a shit-filled sandwich.
Ashleigh: On the subject of people winning elections that they shouldn’t have…
[acapella Star Spangled Banner]Alyx: Ugh.
Flint: Yeah. Yeah. Well I have a feeling that the hosts at our lovely sister podcast, the USA What The Trans?! will have covered this wonderfully.
Ashleigh: They very much have.
Flint: And if you want to check out a full debrief of all that, then go there. But fuck that guy, right? [laughs]
Ashleigh: Oh yes, fuck that guy.
Alyx: Don’t fuck him!
Ashleigh: Not literally. Not that way, no. But as in screw. Screw that guy. Just disregard him. Obviously do you check out the sister podcast, What The Trans?! USA, which covered a lot of slightly difficult territory this week.
Flint: Yeah. They really did.
Ashleigh: So just really quickly, there’s a couple of things that the Trans Literature Preservation Project has suggested that international based trans people do, and one of the things is to ensure and establish secure communication with your American friends. So, you know, not something that’s owned by Facebook, for example. So something like Proton or Signal or Telegram.
Flint: Yeah. We’re not saying emotionally secure, we’re saying like, encryption secure, just to be clear.
Ashleigh: Yeah, definitely.
Alyx: You can also make it encrypted secure alo emotionally secure, but that’s up to you. [laughs]
Flint: Yeah. I mean, hopefully any friends that you have, American or not, your connection with them is emotionally secure. But aside from that, make sure that you’re encrypted as well.
Ashleigh: Definitely.
Flint: I think signal is a good one for that.
Ashleigh: And it also suggests, there’s a selection of things that this article points out, I will obviously put a copy of that article in our link in the description. It’s a long one. It’s like 24,000 words, so it’s a chunky one. But towards the end there’s a list of things we can do. And part of that is to campaign and ensure fascism doesn’t rise in other countries as well.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: Let’s do that.
Flint: We’re trying. We’re definitely trying.
Ashleigh: We will do our best.
Flint: We’re gonna keep trying.
Alyx: Oh we can certainly try. [laughs]
Ashleigh: Yeah. Yeah yeah. That also, there was a really great article, but I read about it and the article was just titled “Well, shit”.
Flint: [laughs] Yeah. Maybe we should link to that, I think that’s gonna be a good article.
Ashleigh: Yeah, we definitely will. We definitely will.
Flint: Our next story is an update on one that we have already covered. Just to say, there is a content warning: we are going to be discussing the Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre. So if stories relating to anything like that might be difficult for you, then feel free to skip this one. Just a heads up.
[tape recorder button click]Ashleigh: And if you are skipping, skip to 30 minutes and 46 seconds.
[tape recorder button clicking]Flint: We last spoke about the center in episode 114. A former employee named Roz Adams, who was dismissed by the center for her gender critical views, has unfortunately won a nearly £69,000 settlement from a tribunal. Former chief exec of ERCC Mridul Wadhwa, who is herself trans, had apparently formed the view that Adams was transphobic, which led to a completely spurious and mishandled disciplinary process. That’s a quote, that’s not my opinion. As well as the payment to Adams the ERCC also has to publish an apology on its website, and start referring sexual assault survivors to Beira’s Place, which is a support center for female victims of sexual violence which was set up by none other than JK Rowling. Beira’s Place is also where Adams now works. I wonder what their equalities procedures look like. In a statement Adams said “My priority remains that all victims/survivors of sexual violence can make a genuinely informed choice about the service they seek, and have confidence in who will support them. To restore that confidence, I urge these organizations to give a clear definition of woman”. And oh, what’s that ? What’s that I can hear in the distance?
[dog whistle]Flint: Is it a dog whistle? Am I suddenly a border collie? What the fuck?
Ashleigh: Yeah. A really high pitched something.
Flint: Yeah, no. I thought it was just a Tory screaming in the distance, but no. No, it’s definitely a dog whistle.
Alyx: No it’s definitely not my dog clicker.
[clicking] [laughter]Flint: This is shit. This is horrible. I hate this. I really don’t like it. I’m annoyed. Yeah. There’s a lot of feelings there.
Ashleigh: Yeah, for sure.
Alyx: Yeah, it’s just like multiple punches here of “Oh take it to Beira’s Place” and “Oh, give us 69,000 grand” like a fucking insult, honestly.
Ashleigh: Yeah well it was 68,000 and something, so… I didn’t want to over complicate writing it by putting in a very specific high number, I just thought I’d round it up.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: So yeah, and just that little bit right at the end, just to let you know where Adams is coming from: “I urge these organizations to give a clear definition of woman”. So what ERCC are going to kind of have to do, is, they’ve already published the apology on their website. But they’ll have to say “And if you’d prefer to go to a centre that doesn’t help trans women, you can go to Beira’s Place”.
Flint: Which is horrifying. The fact that you have to say that like that, like you’re doing something wrong by supporting trans people who have gone through sexual assault is so… it’s levels of angry that I struggle to put into words that I think would be productive.
Ashleigh: Yeah.
Flint: Because it’s such a serious thing to go through. It’s such a serious thing to have to seek help for. And to then have all of this fuckery on top of that. As if it’s not enough. As if it’s not enough to already go through whatever you have gone through to need that help. It – mmm.
Ashleigh: Making it overcomplicated, and needlessly so as well. Like… [sighs] Well. Onward.
Flint: Yeah.
ALyx: Some begrudged anti trans activists have also decided to sue The Care Quality Commission regarding approving the gender clinic Gender Plus, citing the usual crap like the experimental treatment spiel they keep blathering on about. And ring that bell…
[bell rings]Alyx: Waving the usual stuff about their shitty Cass Review, which didn’t even call for a ban on puberty blockers. CQC said but they couldn’t comment on the ongoing legal proceedings, and Gender Plus said the following:
[baroque organ plays]Alyx: “In line with NHSC policy for a young person to be accepted into the hormone pathway at GPHC, they must first pass through a multi-disciplinary team review. This includes an independent consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist, in addition to other mental health and pediatric specialists not directly involved in the formation of the individual’s care plan. Successful CQC registration has meant that Gender Plus and GPHC offer a pathway to safe, effective healthcare for transgender young people under 18 years of age in the UK, which is in line with the current NHSC policy and international best practice. This is at a time when access to this essential care in the NHS is extremely limited. Indeed a recent FOI demonstrates that NHSC’s children and young people’s gender pathway saw only eight new patients for assessments between January 2023 and July 2024. In contrast, during the same period, Gender Plus saw 388 new young people. Like any other patient population, transgender young people deserve access to timely, compassionate, regulated healthcare. Without access to regulated services, those under 18 years of age and their families will be forced to seek out medically unsafe and unregulated means accessing the health care they need. This would present a significant safeguarding risk”.
Ashleigh: So they’re just trying to shut down…
Alyx: …another healthcare provider.
Flint: Yeah.
Ashleigh: Trying to shut down Gender Plus.
Flint: Yeah. And this feels like a similar playbook to what happened with Gender GP, you know?
Alyx: It’s always the bloomin’ anti-trans activists with their bloody lawsuits, just throwing money.
Ashleigh: Yes. Yeah, definitely. They’re just trying to erase any way at all for trans people to even exist, I think.
Flint: Yeah. Well I mean, this is the thing, though. We will still exist.
Ashleigh: Yeah.
Flint: We just won’t be visible. We will just, [laughs] we won’t be capable of living a life in the same way that everyone else does. Well, I say everyone else, everyone else that fits the power, you know, fits the demands of hegemonic power. And the notion that you get to – the notion that this is gonna stop trans people existing is like… I think for them it may be that simple. But we know that what happens when we don’t have these things set up, as they said, is people will still do it. They will just have to, like back in the old days, give up their entire life and potentially become a missing persons case in order to be able to do so. Or other such things, have to access things unregulated, run away from home when, you know, HRT starts showing changes, or things like that. Like, there’s so many ways in which trans people will persist, because we are still going to be born. Because people are still born. And guess what, fuckers, we’re just people. But at the same time, if we have no ability to access the basic shit we need to live, to be ourselves, then it is going to cause severe continual harm. It’s only going to be those people who feel capable of… who knows someone who can help them, that are going to be able to make any differences. And every time I see yet another attempt to shut down healthcare, it’s as if you think the healthcare is what makes us trans. No, actually we’re trans before that. [laughs]
Ashleigh: Oddly enough, yes.
Alyx: I remember when Gender Plus was originally verified by the Care Quality Commission, I remember doing a story. And I think it’s a bit of a tangent away from the story, but I remember at one point saying, oh it felt like people like Gender Plus, their clinicians went away from gender identity clinics because they abandoned trans people for money. But I think – I just want to clarify because, this was a while back, and I remember hearing some stuff about that comment. And I just want to say I’ve spoken to people now. I just want to retract that sort of comment and apologise for that one as well. I remember saying that and causing some issues, so I just want to put that out there. But yeah I think it’s very annoying for them to try to shut down a vital service like Gender Plus.
Ashleigh: So yeah, onto our next story, which again involves lots of anti-trans people. Anti-trans actors. Because our brand spanking new equalities minister, Anneliese Dodds met with the gender critical group Sex Matters back on November 6. The group, widely known to trans people as an anti-trans pressure group, gleefully posted on Twitter that the meeting had taken place. The tweet reads:
[Emperor’s Theme from Star Wars]“Sex Matters had a positive and constructive meeting with Anneliese Dodds. She reiterated that the government will provide single sex spaces for biological women. We said this requires the law to recognise biological women as a group that needs protection”. Now according to sex matters they “Provide clarity about sex in law policy and language in order to protect everybody’s rights” and that they “Believe that ideas and behaviors promoted in the name of gender ideology are misguided and harmful”. But this year what they are mostly famous for is for their advocacy director Helen Joyce being caught reading Harry Potter pornographic fanfiction on a train, which apparently was for research purposes, although for what we search is yet to be adequately explained.
[mocking laughter]Flint: Jesus Christ.
Ashleigh: So yeah, Sex Matters. That’s these guys.
Flint: Well yeah, sex matters so much that you’re reading not on the train you fucking fool.
Ashleigh: But apparently we’re the weirdos.
Alyx: It’s always very frustrating when you see anti-trans activists meet with senior members of government.
Ashleigh: Yes.
Alyx: And we’re trying to speak to some orgs to see whether they’ve been meeting with government ministers as well, in the same high level way. Even if it’s just like, in a back room somewhere being quiet and off the record. And so far everyone’s going oh no, I don’t see it happening from anyone I’ve talked to, which is not really great.
Flint: Yeah, it’s concerning. I feel like we’re going to have to operate on the understanding that this government has chosen a side, in something that really shouldn’t need a side taken, because you’re choosing between respecting human’s dignity and, you know, representing your constituents right to a safe and comfortable life. Or not that. So that’s the choice that’s been made by this government it would seem.
Ashleigh: Yes.
Flint: And they keep making that choice every fucking time they meet with one of these hate groups. I mean sorry, charities with questionable motives.
Ashleigh: I’d be interested to see if Anneliese Dodds has met with any LQBTQ supportive groups. I don’t want to say pro-trans, because even some organizations that are supposed to be supporting us have gone suspiciously quiet about trans people.
Alyx: Well they know our messages if they want to reassure us. Like I keep trying to find a new course of actions for different stories and such. And I was just checking some people…
Ashleigh: Yeah
Alyx: …in a trade union I’m in, into a trans network and such. And, you know, there’s still a lot of people in the Labour Links side of things, in Unison. And if you are part of a trade union, or joining one, you don’t have – there’s a bit more that you can do instead of just joining a trade union. There’s a whole bunch of LGBT committees you can join. There’s trans networks. And with that, if you could join one of those you can find a whole bunch of actions you can take in those to then push trade unions as well. Because that might provide some pressure. God knows. But it’s a route you can take if you want to take some kind of action, because the more your pressure on trade unions to be more painful towards the government, the more likely things can go well. And the larger these LGBT or trans groups are, the more power they have in the union.
Ashleigh: There is power in a union, as the song says.
Flint: So we’ve been covering a lot of difficult news, so how about a little bit of a jaunt into Loser’s Corner, folks?
[singing: Loser’s Corner]Ashleigh: Ooh, is it that time?
Flint: It’s that time. That’s right folks, it’s time for your favorite segment dedicated to the ancient universal law of fuck around and find out. An annoyingly vocal transphobe in London has decided to start a campaign of bigoted harassment against a lesbian bar called She Soho in London, and the bar has put out a statement to correct the record. The loser in question, Jenny Watson, went crying to the Daily Mail that she had been thrown out for being gender critical, pompously claiming that someone recognised her from online and complained until she was ousted. However, speaking to Pink News, a spokesperson for She Soho had this to say: “Recently a group of individuals with trans exclusionary beliefs, who have never visited our venue have targeted us with misleading and hurtful comments. They have misgendered our staff and patrons, spread false information about our space, and left fake reviews on our social media platforms. This occurred following the lawful ejection of a well-known gender critical feminist. Our security team followed standard protocol using reasonable force to remove the individual after multiple attempts to invite her outside for a private discussion. A police officer patrolling the area was informed of the situation and engaged with both parties. After reviewing the circumstances the officer confirmed that the ejection was lawful and that the venue had acted fully within its rights. Our team consistently adheres to procedures designed to minimise harm in such situations, and the police affirmed that these procedures are appropriate in this instance. We have documented the police details for future reference”. So there we have it. As a complete surprise to no one Karen, [coughs] I mean Jenny, clearly went in with an intention, and when the venue exercised its rights she decided to weaponize what celebrity she has in the hopes of having them shut down. Or forcibly turn them into a TERF bar. Removing the political comedy for a second, we need to really address the fact that this is on the face of it, like, clearly a stitch up, because if you didn’t know this already, she owns her own venue where she sets her own anti-trans rules. So she could have just decided to drink anywhere. She could have gone in there, had a rough time, decided to leave and literally go to her own bar. But no, she didn’t. Instead it’s quite clearly… to me it looks like a pathetic attempt at PR boosting for her bigot bar and grifter career. She’s made herself a nuisance at this place, and then when getting the consequences of that, she’s thrown her toys out the pram. Because bearing in mind, to be clear, she’s made comments and acted in a way that does infringe upon the workers’ rights to work in a safe space free from abuse. So, you know, it’s clearly obvious that they were acting within their rights here. This actually does remind me of that common parlance in punk and anti-facist circles: “You only need to allow one Nazi at your bar for it to become an Nazi bar; they will bring friends, and it’s harder to kick out five Nazis than one”. This bar did the right thing by protecting their staff from people with violent beliefs. I have a feeling, a personal hunch, that she is trying to kick up enough fuss to start a legal battle that, regardless of winning, will be able to be manipulated and will yet again be testing the mettle of the Equality Act. Maybe with the hopes of having gender critical beliefs bolstered. But I personally see as connected to the code of practice changes at EHRC, which we will talk about in a moment. Until then, show She Soho some love. If you have the funds, maybe get a drink there. Show them that the trans community sees them standing up for us, because, yeah… Good on ‘em. And because also this feels way more calculated than they first want us to believe. So let’s be calculated in our support.
Ashleigh: Yeah, so I wasn’t aware – I came across the story but I wasn’t aware that Karen, sorry, Jenny owned her own venue as it is, you know?
Flint: Yeah. Yeah.
Ashleigh: Like, not that that stops people – like, if you own your own venue that doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to go into other places, obviously. You can still do that. But it looks like it might be more of a publicity effort than anything else.
Flint; It really does make me wonder whether this is something that breaches into…
Alyx: …anti-competitive practices.
Flint: Exactly, yeah. Like, anti-competitive practices to like, bad business practices, in like a legally problematic sense. I’ve no idea; it’s not an area of law I’m in any way versed in. I’m not a lawyer in any way. But… [laughs]
Alyx: Has her company just tanked so bad in trying to do business, that she’s then resorting to stupid stunts.
Flint: Maybe. Or maybe she’s still just trying to drum up support for it and turn it into the, you know, the bar set up by this aggrieved woman, but it’s not. She was in the news cycle a while ago for some other anti-trans shit. She’ll end up in the news cycle again whenever the Daily Mail have a bit of paper that’s blank enough. It’s, you know, she’s a grifter. She’s a grifter.
Ashleigh: Yes.
Flint: She’s trying to get anyone anywhere to put a little bit of money into her pocket so that she can make our lives worse for it. Go fuck yourself Karen. I mean, sorry, Jenny.
Ashleigh: And speaking of anti-trans people just not getting their way, we’ve got a quick story about those SEEN networks. We’ve talked about them before, the Sex Equality and Equity Networks, which is the hip new way to say gender critical, which was the new way of saying TERF, which is the old way of saying anti-trans. We’ve covered it before, in that we’ve seen these networks popping up in the civil service in finance, various other industries. But the good news is that the SEEN network within the Metropolitan Police will not be recognised as a legitimate group. This is according to a Bluesky post from Adi Elisa, who is a cofounder and liberation officer within the Feminist Greens, who wrote: Following a briefing from senior Met officers today, I can confirm that the anti-trans Police SEEN Network is not recognised as an official Met Staff Association, will not be granted official status within the Met, and does not represent the Met in any capacity. Please spread the word. So you know, it took a while, but we finally got a couple pieces of good news and it’s a shame again, that it had to be the police who actually took a stand against this lot. It’s a bit like when the very worst person you know makes a good point about something.
Flint: Yeah, that’s kind of how I feel about this, like, that’s cool buds, you’ve got a lot more work to do than just that. If you think that’s going to make me trust you then – ooh!
Ashleigh: This episode of what the trans was written and presented and produced by Ashleigh and Flint, and will be edited by Amber Roberts, Amber Devereux, Oli Morris and Larianne, and with music composed by Waritsara Yui Karlberg.
We would especially like to thank our producer-level Patreons, who are…
Flint & Ashleigh: Tim Rufo, Maestrum, Danny Gould, Lex Phoenix, Sebastian Sings Soprano, Joe the low -quality enby, Andrea Brooks, Jack Edwards, Emily Roberts, Dulcie, Stefan Blakemore, [unclear], needles and threads, Flaming Dathne, Dr McGee, Gen, Rachel Harris, Katie Reynolds, Georgia Holden Burnett, Grabilicious, Mx Aphen, Rootminusone, Grey, Elisabeth Anderson, Bernice Roust, Ellen Mellor, Jay Hoskins, Trowan, Ashley, Matty B, Setcab, Jane, Roberto de Prunk, Rose Absolute, Sarah, Sinna, Kiki T, Dee, Skye Kilaen, Eric Widman, Bee, Jude, [French accordion plays] monsieur squirrel, Fergus Evans, anubisajackal, Camina, Brandon Craig, braykthasistim, Sian Phillips, Heidi Rearden, Ezra, Lentil, clara vulliamy, Amelia, Samantha Raven, Corvina Ravenheart the trans metal DJ from Twitch and VR chat will play St Lucifer for props, Tabitha Jo Cox aka Candy, Fiona Macdonell, Murgatroid, ontologicallyunjust, Stella, Cyndergosa, Rebecca Prentice, [in echoey whispers] Crazzee Richard, danoblivion, Florence Stanley, Helen_, Elle Hollingsworth, Nick Ross, Melody Nix, Fiona Punchard, John, a mysterious, anonymous patron (ooooh! [X -Flies theme plays], CB Bailey, Gordon Cameron, Ted Delphos, Kai Luren, Vic Parsons, Patreon User, Vic Kelly, Katherine, Sabrina McVeigh, Cassius Adair, Melissa Brooks, Karaken12, April Heller, Sofie Lewis, Alexandra Lilly, Claire Scott, Ariadne Pena, Lauren O’Nions, Bernard’s Pink Jellybean, Lenos, Chris Hubley.