When marginalised groups are so blatantly under attack, we must ask: who benefits from this manufactured moral panic? Last week, the UK Supreme Court ruled that a “woman” as protected by the Equality Act should exclude transgender women, including those who hold a Gender Recognition Certificate. It’s a significant setback for trans rights in the UK, but also women’s rights at large, especially when the feminist movement has for so long fought for women to be seen as more than our biology. But, none of this is happening in a vacuum.
Across the globe, from the U.S. to parts of Europe, we are witnessing a coordinated rollback of rights long fought for by women and LGBTQ+ people. At the centre of this backlash is the global far right, bankrolled by the super-rich, including the world’s wealthiest man. Their agenda is propped up by powerful corners of the British media, opportunistic pundits, and politicians who see vilifying a tiny, marginalised community as an easy route to attention, influence and political capital. This is not a grassroots uprising, it’s a top-down campaign of division, distraction, and ultimately, control. While some have been swept up in the panic in good faith, its architects know exactly what they’re doing.
What’s even more alarming is what has followed in the wake of the ruling. The Prime Minister’s spokesperson has since said that trans women are not women, despite Keir Starmer saying they were just a few years ago. Women and Equalities Minister Bridget Phillipson told BBC Radio 4 Today that trans women should use toilets according to their biological sex. I criticised both of these comments in my question to the Minister in the House of Commons this week.
Feminists have fought this battle before. They fought against gender essentialism – the idea that men and women are fundamentally different due to their biology and therefore have inherent characteristics. This struggle is part of that same fight. The push to exclude trans women from public life and vital services, including domestic abuse shelters and women’s health spaces, is not about women’s safety but control. I truly believe that those driving anti-trans campaigns aren’t interested in protecting anyone. Their goal is to divide women and pit marginalised groups against one another. To stall progress and distract from real issues: poverty, inequality, and gender-based violence.
Almost immediately, the conversation has shifted from legal definitions to something far more sinister: where trans people are allowed to exist. In just a matter of days, the focus has turned to restrictions on which single-sex spaces trans people can access, where they can go to the toilet, and how they can participate in public life.
To be clear: there is currently no law that forces trans people to use public toilets aligned with their sex assigned at birth because it’s not a crime. And frankly, enforcing such a law would be near impossible without resorting to deeply invasive and authoritarian measures. To put it bluntly: the only way to police bathroom use would be to require everyone to carry identification at all times – or worse, to submit to physical checks at the door. But the so-called “gender critical” lobby argues that even trans people who have had gender-affirming genital surgery don’t count if their sex assigned at birth is different, so what should they do? Provide proof of chromosomes? Even when those don’t always match people’s genitals, which is the case for intersex people? These ideas and questions aren’t just absurd, they're inhumane and do not belong in a democratic society.
The endless debates about who can go in which toilet prove that none of this is actually about “protecting women”. If it were, instead of eroding the rights of a tiny minority of people, gender critical “activists” For Women Scotland who brought the case to court would use the money backing their political project to campaign for better funding of domestic abuse services, fixing the criminal justice system's abysmal record on sexual violence, and protecting women’s rights in the workplace. These are real, material issues that affect all women’s safety. Instead, they’re focusing on a manufactured threat — the false idea that trans people pose some kind of danger to women, and in doing so, they’re making all women less safe.
The immeasurable harm from this ruling, and the media reactions that have followed, will have dangerous consequences for trans people. Anti-trans rhetoric has been steadily escalating for years, with a uniquely hostile UK media environment that routinely misrepresents and demonises trans lives. Nearly half of trans people already report feeling unsafe using public toilets. This ruling, and the hostile atmosphere around it, may force more trans people to avoid public spaces altogether, simply to protect themselves. For others, the result will be even more discrimination, more harassment, and more violence.
As long as the definition of womanhood continues to narrow, people who don’t neatly fit the idea of the perfect woman will be policed, excluded, and harmed. So-called gender critical activists claiming they can “tell” who is trans and who isn’t in single sex spaces; is untrue and a slippery slope, the consequences of which are already playing out with butch lesbians being misgendered and harangued out of women’s toilets. There are women with hormonal conditions like polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) who often experience hirsutism — thicker facial and body hair that falls outside what is deemed “normal” for women. And when Eurocentric beauty standards continue to define femininity, women of colour are often hypermasculinised, hypersexualised and misgendered, their womanhood constantly questioned or dismissed. Remember what happened to Imane Khelif last year?
The Algerian boxer, a cisgender woman, was the target of transphobic rhetoric and suspicion of having an unfair advantage at the World Championships after being deemed too “masculine” in appearance. She was penalised not for who she is, but for how others perceive her body.
Underpinning all this is the idea that trans people are a threat. Some will argue that they’re not “anti-trans” and are just worried about men abusing rights for trans people to attack women. But men don’t need to disguise themselves as women to perpetrate violence against us. When you misdiagnose trans people (especially trans women) as the threat, it prevents us from tackling the real problem facing all women, which is violent men. We’re currently living through a national emergency of violence against women and girls. Every year, two million women are estimated to be victims of violence perpetrated by men. Stalking, harassment, sexual assault and domestic violence affect one in 12 women in England and Wales, with the number of recorded offences growing by 37% in the past five years.
But here’s the truth: our rights rise and fall together. When one group’s humanity is up for debate, everyone’s freedom is at risk. This is the moment for us to choose solidarity over fear, because a just and inclusive world for trans people is a better world for all of us.
