In recent years, I have seen arguments published in newspapers and posted on social media that attempt to validate the so-called debate around trans rights, trans bodies and the spectrum of gender identity. These arguments seek to justify the viewpoints of the “side” that questions trans identities and supports trans exclusion. Often, those who embrace these viewpoints attempt to absolve themselves of hate and bigotry. But to call the “trans debate” a debate at all is problematic. Beliefs that cast trans people as a threat, question the validity of people’s gender, or promote trans erasure, come from a place of hatred.
Public figures with loud megaphones attempt to justify their transphobia by claiming not to hate trans people while simultaneously peddling anti-trans values. In a 2020 tweet that resurfaced in an article in Pink News, author and trans-exclusionary radical feminist J.K. Rowling wrote that the validation of transgender existence essentially erases the concept of sex, and therefore negates the “lived reality of women globally.” She added, “it isn’t hate to speak the truth.”
The “truth” in this case is Rowling’s subjective perception of reality, that trans bodies somehow nullify what others believe to be the definition of sex and what it means to be a woman. Pink News further reported that Rowling founded a sexual assault crisis center for cisgender women that overtly excludes trans women; she condemns trans activism; she doesn’t think trans women should be able to self-identify as their preferred gender or be allowed in “single-sex” spaces for women. Conversely, Rowling has stated that she does not inherently hate trans people and wants them to be safe. These hypocritical, antithetical mindsets legitimize the toxic mentality that it’s OK to advocate against trans rights to perpetuate a warped view of feminism, as long as you claim to still want the best for trans people. It doesn’t work that way.
Pseudoscience and sex essentialism often guide the beliefs that there are only two genders, that sex and gender are one and the same, that what it means to be a woman or a man comes down solely to anatomy and physiology. These misguided, simplistic viewpoints spread misconceptions about trans bodies and the concept of gender fluidity, and are the very building blocks of transphobia that activists have been fighting to dismantle for decades.
There’s no shortage of American and British politicians who publicly espouse transphobic views similar to Rowling’s. During Trump’s presidency, his administration made multiple attempts to revoke rights from trans communities, such as advocating to retract nondiscrimination protections that include gender identity; temporarily reestablishing a ban on trans people serving in the military; and rolling back federal recommendations for schools to institute trans-supportive policies. At the yearly Moms for Liberty summit in August 2024, Trump falsely claimed that U.S. schools are facilitating and providing gender-affirming surgeries for students. Trump’s transphobia was front and center in his 2024 presidential campaign in the form of anti-trans TV ads.
Republicans in Congress seem to make a full-time job out of perpetuating myths about trans people, claiming that they have an agenda of grooming minors. NBC News reported that at the Republican National Convention in July, Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson described the Democratic agenda as one that “includes biological males competing against girls and the sexualization and indoctrination of our children.”
In 2022, anti-LGBTQ+ activist Christopher Rufo publicly attacked the Philadelphia Trans Wellness Conference online. He framed the conference as a method of encouraging educators to indoctrinate children with “kink, BDSM and trans sex.” The conference is made up of hundreds of panels that range in subject matter geared toward educators, medical professionals and trans people. The panels for teachers instructed them to teach students about gender in an age-appropriate manner. Yet in a Fox News interview, Rufo called the conference “truly shocking and frankly disgusting to be directing this toward minors.”
Anti-trans politicians and activists misinterpret and conflate information to cast trans people as pedophiles and groomers. This kind of egregious disinformation gets further magnified on social media and breathes life into the fallacy that trans equality and trans rights are up for debate, and that trans people are somehow dangerous.
In the UK, former right-wing Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has publicly made numerous ignorant, trans-exclusionary comments about gender and trans bodies. LGBTQ+ publication Them reported that at the annual conference of the Conservative Party in 2023, Sunak said, “we shouldn’t get bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be — they can’t.” He has refused to recognize that trans women are women, and vowed to protect “single-sex” spaces. The previous Sunak-led government launched policy attacks on trans rights, including prohibiting trans women from accessing women-only hospital wards and attempting to institute a policy that would bar the teaching of gender identity in schools.
Newly elected Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, a political centrist, has vacillated on his public stance on trans rights. Although he has conveyed his belief that trans women are women and trans men are men, the BBC reported that in a recent debate, Starmer agreed with a comment from former Prime Minister Tony Blair, that women and men are defined by their anatomy. Starmer also said that he respects the position of Rowling on trans issues, Pink News reported.
The day after Starmer won the UK election on July 4, Them reported that the new Labour manifesto details plans to pass a conversion therapy ban that includes trans identities, as well as improvements to the Gender Recognition Certificate process, a method of legally changing one’s gender in the UK. However, Starmer told the press in June that he would not reverse a law implemented by the conservative government wherein schools do not legally have to recognize a student’s preferred pronouns, accept a student’s choice to transition at school, or permit a student to use single-sex school facilities that align with their gender. He also said that he does not support “gender ideology” being taught in schools, according to The Times.
These anti-trans policy choices and ignorant comments, even referring to the concept of the gender spectrum as “gender ideology,” take up residence in the hearts and minds of the public, many of whom have never even met a trans person, who then think that trans people and the idea of being trans pose a societal threat. Like so many aspects of one’s identity, gender is fluid. It is not problematic to teach kids about gender in an age-appropriate way. Trans and gender-expansive people have always been here, regardless of their level of visibility or the existence of gender-related vocabulary. Trans women are women; trans men are men. Every gender identity in the spectrum is valid and should be celebrated. Everyone, regardless of their gender or presentation, deserves to enjoy the full scope of civil rights and respect that make them feel like a complete human being.
We need to call out these trans-exclusionary mentalities and actions for what they are – toxic beliefs that undermine trans rights in all facets of society; that deprive students of a gender-inclusive education that reflects who they are; that equate to increased mental health challenges and thoughts of suicide for trans youth; and that drive up murder rates of trans and gender-expansive people. If it is not hate to revoke the rights of trans people, to question the validity of their identity, to vilify them based on gross misinformation, then I don’t know what is.