Alastair Campbell has claimed senior BBC officials are “in the JK Rowling camp” when it comes to trans rights, following claims the organisation has a ‘pro-trans’ bias.
The 68-year-old journalist and former Labour strategist claimed he has often had “stand-up rows” with a large portion of the broadcaster’s senior staff, who he says share ‘gender-critical’ views.
It comes after BBC director general Tim Davie resigned over a leaked internal memo accusing the BBC of misleading viewers by editing a speech by US president Donald Trump.
Ex-BBC advisor Michael Prescott also claimed in the memo that the BBC was pushing a “pro trans agenda” by allegedly censoring content on LGBTQ+ issues.
Speaking with co-host and former Tory MP, Rory Stewart, during a livestream of his podcast, The Rest is Politics, Campbell said: “On transgender [people], I’ve had some stand up rows with really senior people at the BBC who are so far over in the kind of JK Rowling camp.
“And I think most young people – I’m not pretending I’m young here Rory, but I do talk to a lot of young people – I think they think on the trans issue that the BBC is the opposite of what Michael Prescott’s report is saying that it is.”
JK Rowling’s views on trans rights are well-documented and she regularly expresses her ‘gender-critical’ views online.
Criticism of BBC’s trans coverage
The BBC has, over the past few years, regularly faced criticism for its coverage of trans issues, with campaigners claiming it is institutionally anti-trans.
Most infamously was its October 2021 article spuriously claiming that cisgender lesbians were being “pressured” into having sex with trans women.
The article cites three anonymous cis women who claimed they had faced harassment for only dating “biologically female” women.
In the article, the BBC referenced a poll by gender-critical campaign group Get the L Out, which reported that 56 per cent of people had been pressured into having sex with trans women. The poll had a sample size of just eighty anonymous users on X/Twitter.
It faced further criticism in 2024 after featuring quotes from the Bayswater Support Group, an organisation infamous for its support of so-called conversion therapy.
Earlier that year, a report from The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ)uncovered leaked messages from Bayswater’s internal forums showing members admitting they are “abusive” towards their children.
PinkNews has contacted the BBC press office for comment.
The family of a young trans student from Iowa who took his own life earlier this month, has spoken out about the bullying he faced during his short life.
His mother, Ashley Campbell, told the Des Moines Register that he had been bullied in and out of school for years. He had tried to end his own life twice, even before attending the school.
“Protecting trans kids is important but so is not being cruel, just being understanding,” she said. “I think it’s a bigger issue than just gender. My child couldn’t handle it because that was what he was bullied [about] the most. He never should have had to endure that.”
Miles’ death came a day after a substitute teacher refused to use his preferred pronouns. Eleven months earlier, his family had informed the school that he was trans. School principal Tim Carver informed other parents and guardians in an email and directed them to resources, emphasising that counselling would be available to students.
“Our thoughts will continue to be with Miles’ family,” he has said. ”Please be sure to reach out if you or your child would benefit from additional support. We are here to help.”
Officials from the Urbandale Community School District said they remained “steadfast in our dedication to cultivating a safe, caring and supportive learning environment for all students and staff”.
According to a survey for The Trevor Project, across the US in 2024, 39 per cent of LGBTQ+ youngsters, aged between 13 and 24 – including 46 per cent of transgender and non-binary young people – had “seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year”.
‘You are enough. No matter what they say, you’re worthy’
The lyrics of a song, called “Love Worthy”, shared by Ashley read: “Even when the world feels cold and rough, you got to know that you are enough. No matter what they say, you’re worthy. Loved in every way. Just hold on and don’t give up ‘cuz you are, you are loved.”
Miles’ father Rocky Phipps told the Register: “If I could give one message to all the kids, [it’s] if you see someone bullying another person, call them out. Bullies don’t like to be called out. Always be kind because you never know what that person is going through.”
A GoFundMe has been launched to help the Phipps and Campbell families with funeral and memorial expenses, including the siting of a park bench outside Miles’ favourite place, the Urbandale Library.
The GoFundMe remembers him as “a kind, talented and creative soul who expressed himself through music” [who] loved “skateboarding, bicycling and spending time outdoors”.
It goes on to say: “Miles was a proud transgender male who was driven, and faced the world with courage, authenticity and grace, even in the face of bullying and misunderstanding. He is deeply loved and will forever be cherished by his family. His parents and older sister will forever celebrate his laughter, his music and his beautiful heart.”
Suicide is preventable. Readers who are affected by the issues raised in this story are encouraged to contact Samaritans on 116 123 (samaritans.org), or Mind on 0300 123 3393 (mind.org.uk). Readers in the US are encouraged to contact the National Suicide Prevention Line on 1-800-273-8255.
Cambridge University’s women-only college is reportedly continuing to welcome trans women, despite the UK Supreme Court ruling on gender.
Newnham College, founded in 1871 and which counts broadcaster Clare Balding, novelist Iris Murdoch and actress Miriam Margolyes among its alumni, is believed to have created a new policy document that allows trans students to access single-sex spaces and facilities.
The decision, reported by MailOnline, comes little more than six months after a decision was handed down in the case of For Women Scotland vs Scottish Ministers, which deemed the definition of “sex” for the purposes of the 2010 Equality Act meant biological sex only.
In the wake of the decision, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) published interim guidance which recommended organisations, businesses and service providers ban trans men and women from single-sex services and spaces, such as changing rooms and toilets, which aligned with their gender. It also added in “some circumstances” from trans people could be barred from spaces based on “biological sex” too.
The EHRC later clarified that the “circumstances” referred to situations where “reasonable objection” could be taken to a trans person’s presence, such as in female spaces, when “the gender reassignment process has given [a trans man] a masculine appearance or attributes”.
Newnham College is reportedly flying in the face of the Supreme Court ruling. (Canva)
Criticising the college’s decision, postgraduate Maeve Halligan, who founded gender-critical student group the Society of Women, told the Mail: “The category of woman is being totally usurped, hijacked and attacked. Sexism is written into the history of Cambridge University and now it’s come back in disguise.
“This historic college has some of the most famous alumni, such as Germaine Greer. I can only imagine what she would think if she saw [the] new admissions policy.”
In a letter to students, seen by MailOnline, college principal Alison Rose said the policy had been “cleared by lawyers” and meant Newnham would remain inclusive.
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“We are open to all female applicants”
“We are a women-only college, under the provisions of Schedule 12 of the Equality Act 2010 and our charter and statutes,” Rose wrote.
“We are open to all female applicants [and] will consider at the admissions stage those applicants who hold a form of formal identification as female, on a current passport, driving licence, birth certificate or gender recognition certificate.”
Gender-critical campaigner Maya Forstater said Newnham “should have been urgently reconsidering its policy to bring it back into line with the law”, following the Supreme Court’s decision. “Instead it has been looking around for loopholes. This is fruitless and foolish.”
Elon Musk, CEO of the social media platform X, ex-Trump confidant, and founder of xAI, announced the launch of “Grokipedia” version 0.1 this week. The supposed competitor to the long-standing nonprofit website Wikipedia is AI-generated, and users have already flagged multiple pages that push far-right myths, including anti-LGBTQ+ disinformation.
“Wikipedia’s knowledge is – and always will be – human,” a spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation, which operates Wikipedia, told The Verge. “Through open collaboration and consensus, people from all backgrounds build a neutral, living record of human understanding – one that reflects our diversity and collective curiosity. This human-created knowledge is what AI companies rely on to generate content; even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist.”
Originally announced in September, Musk touted Grokipedia as a “massive improvement over Wikipedia” and “a necessary step towards the xAI goal of understanding the Universe.” However, the claim that it is an improvement over Wikipedia has been called into question because many of Grokipedia’s pages appear to be copied and pasted from Wikipedia itself.
The Grokipedia page for “cake” is identical to Wikipedia’s own page, except for formatting. At the end of Grokipedia’s page, there is a disclaimer stating that “The content is adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.”
The pages where that Wikipedia disclaimer appears to be missing and where the most new content can be found are those related to Elon Musk, his businesses, and the political issues currently discussed. That might explain a post from last week in which Musk said they were delaying the Grokipedia v0.1 launch so they could “purge out the propaganda.”
Grokipedia’s page on “Transgender” includes a section titled “Human Sexual Dimorphism and Immutability,” which defines gender entirely through a body’s ability to create either sperm or eggs and by using oversimplified biology around XX and XY chromosomes. It also claims that these identities are immutable, leaving no room for the many forms of gender and sex diversity, including intersex people. Much of this is directly in line with the president’s executive order on gender, which claimed there were only two sexes.
Grokipedia’s “Transgender Health Care” page (which you are directed to if you search for “gender-affirming care”) includes a proliferation of debunked “rapid-onset gender dysphoria (ROGD)” theories, as well as inaccurate claims that trans identities often emerge “following social contagion,” which is “preceded by mental health deterioration in 57% of instances.” Pages on trans issues, including one pushing false claims around “detransition,” regularly cite statistics that are not supported by the studies they link to, or cite studies that use reasonable sample groups.
The page for the Stonewall Riots plays down the significance of the events at the Stonewall Inn that were pivotal to the LGBTQ+ civil rights movement. Meanwhile, it highlights the mafia’s ownership of the establishment in a way clearly intended to draw false connections: “The mafia’s exploitative role underscores that the venue was no bastion of community purity but a profit-driven enterprise amid broader criminal control of gay nightlife.”
Grokipedia also spreads disinformation about HIV, including a page entitled “HIV/AIDS skepticism” that says that there’s a “scientific critique” of the idea that HIV causes AIDS. Wikipedia’s equivalent page is entitled “HIV/AIDS denialism,” and it correctly states that it is a “belief, despite evidence to the contrary, that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) does not cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).”
In other instances, Grokipedia’s coverage of a topic tends to present issues in a light clearly intended to provide political bias. A page on the White House’s East Wing is keen to highlight support for the destruction and suggest that there has been no disruption caused by it.
A Florida teacher has been put on leave after requesting to use the gender-neutral title Mx at work.
The teacher at Alachua County Public Schools has been placed on administrative leave after requesting that students and staff address them with the title Mx.
Mx is a gender-neutral title pronounced as ‘mix’ which some trans, non-binary, gender non-confirming and cis people use as an alternative to gendered honourifics like Miss, Ms, Mrs or Mr. Mx does not indicate a person’s gender.
The state’s attorney general James Uthmeier accused the teacher of violating Florida House Bill 1069, which was signed into law by governor Ron DeSantis in July 2023.
The bill enshrines “sex as an immutable biological trait” and prohibits K-12 employees from using preferred personal titles or pronouns that don’t alight with birth-assigned sex. Florida officials said the teacher’s use of “Mx” violated state law.
The district confirmed that the educator has been placed on leave pending review, but did not released further details.
@pinknews A Florida teacher at Alachua County Public Schools has been placed on administrative leave after requesting students and staff address them with the gender-neutral title “Mx.”The state’s Attorney General James Uthmeier accused the teacher of violating Florida House Bill 1069, which was signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis in July 2023, which enshrines “sex as an immutable biological trait”. This law prohibits K-12 employees from using preferred personal titles or pronouns that don’t align with birth-assigned sex.Florida officials said the teacher’s use of “Mx.” violated state law. The district confirmed that the educator has been placed on leave pending review, but did not release further details. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier took to X writing “A female teacher at Talbot Elementary in Gainesville is forcing students and faculty to address her with the prefix ‘Mx.’ instead of ‘Ms.’ or ‘Mrs.’ This violates Florida law and Alachua County School District policy and must stop immediately.” #Florida#USPolitics#Mx#education#lgbtqia♬ Minimal for news / news suspense(1169746) – Hiraoka Kotaro
Uthmeier took to X writing of the case: “A female teacher at Talbot Elementary in Gainesville is forcing students and faculty to address her with the prefix ‘Mx.’ Instead of ‘Ms.’ Or ‘Mrs’. This violates Florida law and Alachua County School District policy and must stop immediately.”
In August, a Florida judge struck down parts of House Bill 1069. Part of the law sets out a process for parents to complain about books and material with which they disagreed, forcing educators to remove them from their libraries “within five school days… until the objection is resolved”.
The wording of the legislation broadly singled out books with “pornographic” content or those which “describe sexual conduct”. Titles pulled from shelves included The Color Purple, On the Road, Looking for Alaska, The Handmaid’s Tale and Slaughterhouse-Five, also known as The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death.
Following legal action by publishers, the Authors Guild, and parents from Escambia County against the removal of dozens of books from school libraries, District Court Judge Carlos Mendoza struck down large parts of the legislation.
“None of these books are obscene,” he said in his ruling. “The restrictions placed on these books are thus unreasonable.”
The prohibition of material that “describes sexual conduct” was “over-broad and unconstitutional”, he added, because the law “mandates the removal of books that contain even a single reference to the prohibited subject matter, regardless of the holistic value of the book individually or as part of a larger collection”. In addition, the law gave “parents licence to object to materials under a I-know-it-when-I-see-it approach”.
Hannah Caldas has been banned by World Aquatics for five years for refusing to take part in a gender-verification test, but she says if the suspension is the price she has to pay to “protect my most intimate medical information” then she is “happy to pay”.
Caldas, who also goes by Ana, took part in the World Aquatics Masters Championships in Doha in 2024, finishing first in her age category in the women’s 100m freestyle, and also competed in the Spring Nationals run by US Masters Swimming (USMS) in San Antonio, Texas in April, winning several events.
In response to the Masters Swimming competition, anti-trans Republican governor Ken Paxton launched an investigation into the organisation and claimed in a suit it violated the state’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act by allowing trans participation.
Paxton’s office sought $10,000 for each alleged trade practice act violation, according to coverage at the time by the Texas Tribune, and the governor labelled Masters Swimming’s policies “insane” and said it “cowered to radical activists pushing gender warfare”.
In August, USMS declared Caldas is eligible to compete in the female category, with a report into her eligibility stating the “documents the swimmer submitted all demonstrate that she was assigned the female sex at birth and that she identifies as female, although she swam in the male category at USMS events 2002-2004”.
However, World Aquatics have ruled the 48-year-old will be suspended for five years until October 2030 and her swimming results from the previous three years – between June 2022 and October 2024 – have been disqualified after she declined to take a gender verification test.
In a statement attributed to a New York Aquatics press release, Caldas declined because “chromosomal tests are invasive and expensive procedures”.
“My life and privacy have been invaded enough”
“My insurance refuses to cover such a test because it is not medically necessary,” she said. “No US state requires genetic tests for recreational sports events like these.
“Not even US Masters Swimming, the national governing body for recreational adult swimming in the US, demands this for any of its events.”
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Caldas continued: “I understand and accept the consequences of not complying with a World Aquatics investigation.
“But if a five-year suspension is the price I must pay to protect my most intimate medical information, then it’s a price I am happy to pay—for myself, and for every other woman who does not want to submit to highly invasive medical testing just to swim in an older-adult competition.”
She added she had been “swimming in sanctioned events for over 30 years” and is “prepared to let it all go”.
“My life and privacy have been invaded enough,” she explained “It is time to prioritise my health and personal safety.”
Lia Thomas reacts after finishing tied for 5th in the 200 Freestyle finals at the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships on 18 March 2022. (Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire via Getty)
Back in 2022 World Aquatics voted to implement rules which ban trans women from competing in elite races if they have undergone any male puberty.
It was under this policy that trans former University of Pennsylvania swimmer swimmer Lia Thomas, who made history in 2022 as the first trans woman to win a National Collegiate Athletic Association swimming championship, was banned by the swimming body.
Thomas filed a legal dispute against World Aquatics policy with the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Switzerland in September 2023.
However, the court rejected her claim that the policy was discriminatory.
As reported by the BBC the ruling outlined that Lia Thomas was “simply not entitled to engage with eligibility to compete in WA competitions” as someone who was no longer a member of USA Swimming – “let alone compete in a WA competition” – and hence was “not sufficiently affected” by the rules to be able to challenge them.
World Aquatics welcomed the court’s decision and said the ruling was a “major step forward in our efforts to protect women’s sports”.
Dallas Cowboys wide receiver CeeDee Lamb refused to wear a rainbow armband during a game, Olympian Mollie O’Callaghan pledged to no longer compete if trans swimmer Lia Thomas is allowed to, and singer Sam Smith took issue with conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel, as two individuals, using they/them pronouns.
You might have seen these divisive posts on Facebook, you might even have been outraged by them or shared them, but they’re not real – they are anti-LGBTQ+ disinformation falsely framed as legitimate news content.
You only need to make a cursory Google search to see the claims can be easily disproven.
Sports editor David Evans, writing for Sportscasting, concluded the story about Lamb was fabricated because there is absolutely no source for his alleged quote nor did any reputable sports outlet run coverage on it.
Swimming Australia swiftly issued a public statement declaring the comments attributed to O’Callaghan, and subsequently fellow swimmer Kyle Chalmers, were fake.
Sam Smith has been the subject of online misinformation, claiming they are semibisexual. (Didier Messens/Getty)
As important as it is for those impacted by fabricated content to clarify when a piece of information is absolutely not real, the simple fact is that the truth alone is not enough to rectify the power of fake news in this predominantly digital-first era we live in.
At a time when social media fact-checking and moderation is in decline, algorithmic rules govern our social media feeds – often reinforcing our own unconscious biases and echo chambers – and the lines between reality and fantasy are increasingly being blurred by AI, it is more and more difficult for many people to consistently tell fact from fiction.
A user who viewed such fake anti-LGBTQ+ posts as referenced earlier and instantly believes it to be true, perhaps because of their own prejudices and/or lack of skills at verifying the validity of media, would be unlikely to purposefully seek out any fact-checking. They would not think they need to – they saw it on Facebook, you see, so it must be true.
A more discerning user, however, might instantly be able to tell the post is nothing more than clickbait and/or engagement farming, or at the very least it is misleading and perhaps twisting someone’s original words.
Indeed, there are large swathes of the population who believe they are good at spotting fake news but studies frequently find they are often overconfident and still extremely susceptible to it.
They, as much as those who come to their social media feeds with already prejudiced opinions towards LGBTQ+ folks, are being targeted by bad actors seeking to weaponise anti-LGBTQ+ content to sow division in society.
These bad actors create content with the purpose of reaching average people in a society, honing in on their fears and anxieties about the state and future of their community, outraging them and, ultimately, shifting their opinions on queer rights, legislation enacted by their government, the trustworthiness of their elected leaders and undercutting democracy as a whole.
Misinformation and disinformation – two distinctly different but intertwined concepts – are certainly nothing new and have been a part of the media ecosystem as long as verifiable news has been.
While misinformation refers to the spread of falsehoods via genuine misunderstanding or mistake, disinformation is far more sinister and instead refers to the process by which entirely false information is created, propagated and disseminated on purpose, with the aim of pushing a particular narrative or agenda to achieve a set of political goals.
Anti-LGBTQ+ disinformation, on the other hand, includes the far-right “groomer”conspiracy theory which inherently links LGBTQ+ people to vile child abuse, claims pushed by Donald Trump that school teachers are performing gender-affirming surgeries on pupils in classrooms, and the recent posts above falsely attributed to notable athletes and other famous names.
In recent months, there has been an increasing number of posts appearing on social media – namely Meta platforms Facebook and Instagram – which are stylised to look like the image-based breaking news posts often used by media organisations, despite the fact they are being posted by the furthest thing from a news source.
The posts are usually overlaid with a quote or headline and captioned with some sort of breaking news kicker and the start of what looks like copy for a published news story.
In many cases, the same post – using the same image and caption – is shared across various different pages for maximum reach.
Many of the posts consistently appear to be about trans rights, namely the hot button issue of trans inclusion in sports or specific gender identities, with many referencing trans American swimmer Lia Thomas.
In 2022, Thomas made history as the first trans woman to win a National Collegiate Athletic Association swimming championship. She has since become a key figure in the right’s war against trans athletes.
PinkNews was unable to verify who was behind the Facebook pages which are sharing the current wave of anti-LGBTQ+ disinformation.
Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference
However, similar tactics have been used by bad actors in the past and in national security circles as Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI), which the EU defines as a “pattern of behaviour that threatens or has the potential to negatively impact values, procedures and political processes” wherein such activity “often seeks to stoke polarisation and divisions inside and outside the EU while also aiming to undermine the EU’s global standing and ability to pursue its policy objectives and interests”.
The report found that anti-LGBTQ+ FIMI is politically motivated and seeks to harden public opinion in opposition to LGBTQ+ rights, along with sowing divisions in communities and undermining democracy.
“The reach of FIMI cases targeting LGBTIQ+ goes beyond this community,” the report reads. “According to the evidence collected during the investigation, FIMI actors aimed to provoke public outrage not only against named LGBTIQ+ individuals, communities, or organisations – but also against government policies, the concept of democracy as such, and local or geopolitical events.
“While undermining LGBTIQ+ people was a common theme in many of the FIMI cases identified, the overarching narrative in many of them was that the West is in decline.
“By leveraging the narrative of decline, FIMI threat actors attempt to drive a wedge between traditional values and democracies.
“They claim that children need to be protected from LGBTIQ+ people, that LGBTIQ+ people get preferential treatment in sports and other fields – to the detriment of others – and that Western liberal organisations or political groups are demonstrably weak because they surrender to “LGBTIQ+ propaganda”.”
Fake content “keeps debates falsely alive”
Speaking to PinkNews, Dr Dani Madrid-Morales – lecturer in journalism and global communication at the University of Sheffield and co-Lead of the university’s Disinformation Research Cluster, said the style of anti-LGBTQ+ posts currently being shared on Facebook are “a very common approach that different actors use”.
Madrid-Morales noted that whilst political actors certainly use these coordinated strategies for a particular end goal, they are also used by isolated individuals who “benefit economically from creating this content that is highly polarizing [and] that’s likely to get a lot of engagement”.
He went on to explain that the content, of course, has a negative impact on the community it is focused on directly but “more broadly, it sort of keeps these debates sometimes falsely alive in the sense that in the political arena”.
“By keeping these debates really highly active on social media, certain groups benefit from being able to say, ‘oh, look, people are really interested in us talking about this’, because a lot of people on social media are discussing these topics and sometimes it’s very artificially inflated.
“We’ve seen that before with other topics, for example health disinformation and anti-vax campaigners, where they create false information.
“They use amplification techniques on social media to get that widely spread, and then they create the false illusion that’s a topic that people are really concerned about when in reality it’s not.”
New research has revealed that transphobia in the UK has left 84 per cent of trans people feeling unsafe.
The YouGov poll, commissioned by the Good Law Project and published last week, revealed that almost two-thirds of transgender and non-binary people in the country had been verbally abused in public, and almost 25 per cent had suffered physical violence.
Fifty-nine per cent of trans people also reported facing barriers in accessing general NHS care.
Trans people’s right to access public spaces has become a major issue in the UK. (Getty)
Conducted in the wake of the UK Supreme Court’s judgement which determined that the 2010 Equality Act’s definition of a woman related to biological sex only, the poll also asked about key issues facing trans people in the UK such as access to public facilities. More than half of those who responded said they had difficulty going into changing rooms, while 49 per cent said the same about using public toilets.
Younger trans people were more found to be more likely to fear accessing certain spaces, with 81 per cent saying they found entering changing rooms difficult.
Respondents were also asked to rate the trustworthiness of UK institutions and political parties. The police were the least trusted, with 76 per cent saying they don’t trust them very much or at all.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission, which has been accused of “deeply disturbing” actions, was found to be distrusted by 66 per cent of transgender men and women. The UK’s human rights regulator has submitted guidance on public facilities provision based on proposed updates which call for the exclusion of trans people from facilities consistent with their gender identity.
Reform UK was the least-trusted political party among trans people, with 98 per cent expressing some or total distrust. Conservatives (96 per cent) and Labour(91 per cent) were not far behind.
Trans people facing ‘abject terror’ in UK, activists claim
Good Law Project’s trans rights lead, Jess O’Thomson, said the poll revealed the stark reality in the UK, with people living in “abject terror”.
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Elaborating, O’Thomson, said: “They are afraid of being harassed, outed and discriminated against. It is appalling that nearly half of trans people report they are now finding basic toilet access difficult, despite the EHRC’s claims that they are protecting people.
“The fact that only 14 per cent of trans people feel safe in this country represents a devastating humanitarian crisis.”
Earlier this month, the European commissioner for human rights, Michael O’Flaherty, expressed concern regarding potential anti-trans laws in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling. Any “blanket practices or policies” excluding trans people from gendered spaces would pose significant breaches to international human rights laws, he said.
O’Flaherty recommended drafting “clear guidance on how inclusion of trans people can be achieved across all areas” and how “exclusion can be minimised to situations in which this would be strictly necessary and proportionate, in line with well-established human rights principles.”
Activists have thrown a spotlight on past comments made about rape by prominent anti-LGBTQ+ Republicans.
An online post from left-wing outlet Occupy Democrats revealed the comments made by six officials over the years, apparently justifying or downplaying the rape of women and girls in the US.
The post on Facebook and Instagram included quotes from Clayton Williams, Todd Akin, Rick Santorum, Richard Mourdock, Jodie Laubenberg and Lawrence Lockman.
Fact-checked by Snopes, the quotes included Todd Akin (R-MO) saying: “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to shut that thing down.”
Rick Santorum was a US senator for 12 years (Getty)
Santorum, a notoriously anti-LGBTQ+ former US senator, was quoted as saying: “Rape victims should make the best of a bad situation.”
Another of the quotes, made by Williams during his failed campaign to become governor of Texas governor in 1990, read: “Rape is kinda like the weather. If it’s inevitable, relax and enjoy it.” He died in 2020.
In the 80s, Lockman, a former member of the Maine house of representatives, described LGBTQ+ people as biologically insane.
According to a 2014 article from blogger Mike Tipping, Lockman also became involved in anti-abortion activism. During his stint as a director of the Pro-Life Education Association in the 90s, he said: “If a woman has [the right to an abortion], why shouldn’t a man be free to use his superior strength to force himself on a woman? At least the rapist’s pursuit of sexual freedom doesn’t (in most cases) result in anyone’s death.”
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He later apologised for his remarks, saying he held “no animosity toward anyone by virtue of their gender or sexual orientation”.
Laubenberg, who died last month at the age of 68, sat in Texas house of representatives from 2003 to 2019.
During a debate about abortion legislation in 2013, while opposing the addition to a bill that would have made an exception for women who had been raped, she reportedly said: “In hospital emergency rooms, we have funded what’s called rape kits that will help the woman, basically clean her out [to avoid pregnancies]… basically like an emergency contraception, where they can also do the morning-after pill.”
Rape kits are not used to terminate pregnancies, but to gather and preserve physical evidence for any possible prosecution.
Asked about abortion and contraceptive rights, former US senate hopeful Mourdock was quoted in the post as saying: “Even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that is something God intended to happen.”
He later clarified his comments in a press conference following the debate, saying that he had intended to say that “God creates life,” and that any interpretation of his comments to mean God “pre-ordained rape” were “sick” and “twisted.”
“What I said was, in answering the question form my position of faith, I said I believe that God creates life. I believe that as wholly and as fully as I can believe it. That God creates life. Are you trying to suggest that somehow I think that God pre-ordained rape? No, I don’t think that. That’s sick. Twisted. That’s not even close to what I said. What I said is that God creates life.”
Snopes contacted Santorum, Mourdock and Lockman for comment: the only three people mentioned in the meme who are still alive. They have yet to receive a response.
Studies have shown that survivors of sexual violence in the US are significantly more likely to attempt suicide than their peers. One report from 2020 revealed that 13 per cent of respondents had tried to take their own life.
Suicide is preventable. Readers who are affected by the issues raised in this story are encouraged to contact the Samaritans on 116 123 (samaritans.org), or Mind on 0300 123 3393 (mind.org.uk). Readers in the US are encouraged to contact the National Suicide Prevention Line on 1-800-273-8255.
The independent left-winger secured 63 per cent of the first-preference votes last week, and will become the Republic of Ireland’s 10th head of state, succeeding Michael D Higgins, who has served the maximum-allowed two terms in office. The result was announced from Dublin Castle.
Speaking in Irish and English, Connolly said: “I will be a voice for peace, a voice that builds on our policy of neutrality, a voice that articulates the existential threat posed by climate change.”
She also promised to advocate for those who have no voice. “Our public and democracy needs constructive questioning. Together, we can shape a new republic that values everybody, that values and champions diversity and that takes confidence in our own identity.”
Catherine Connolly supported LGBTQ+ marriage equality
Although the president’s post is mainly ceremonial, Connolly has been an advocate for reproductive rights, social justice and neutrality and pledged to fight “racism, bigotry and violence”, which, she said, had “no place in our society”.
A statement on her website said: “I campaigned for marriage equality in Galway and have spoken out in Dáil [the lower house of the Irish parliament] for LGBTQ+ rights abroad and at home, including in support of the Gender Recognition Act and against conversion therapy. Inciting fear and hatred towards the LGBTQIA community is abhorrent.”
Talking about the legislation, she said: “It aims to provide for the disregarding of certain criminal convictions that arose… all through the 19th century and, indeed, one act going back to the 17th century, as well as the Common Law. It had nothing to do with justice or fairness. It was homophobia at its worst and a set of values that had nothing to do with love between two people.
“It is high time we got rid of it. We are not only recognising the injustice but actually setting up a process that will allow us to undo that injustice and to finally bring fairness.”
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“We need an inclusive society”
The new president has also voiced her support for the trans and non-binary community.
Asked where she stands on “gender ideology”, she responded: “We need an inclusive society. We don’t need division, we don’t need language to divide.
“I worked as a clinical psychologist, and trained in England. I know the pain and suffering someone goes through when they feel that they’re not in the right gender. I know that’s a painful, painful process and it’s something that I won’t comment on lightly.
“But I will say that, prior to my time and it was a good act, the government passed the Gender Recognition Act, and it’s law that someone can decide to change their gender and register accordingly, over 18 years of age.”
