Escalating Violence of Trans Activists

GENEVA (22 May 2023) – Threats and intimidation against women expressing their opinions on sex and sexual orientation is deeply concerning, said Reem Alsalem, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls in a statement today. In the context of disagreements between some women’s rights activists and transgender in a number of countries in the Global North. Alsalem warned that violence against women and intimidation against people for expressing differing views.

“Discrimination based on sex and sexual orientation is prohibited in international and regional human rights law.

I am concerned by the shrinking space in several countries in the Global North for women and feminist organisations and their allies to gather and/or express themselves peacefully in demanding respect for their needs based on their sex and/or sexual orientation.

Law enforcement has a crucial role in protecting lawful gatherings of women and ensuring women’s safety and rights to freedom of assembly and speech without intimidation, coercion, or being effectively silenced. It is clear that where law enforcement has failed to provide the necessary safeguards, we have witnessed incidents of verbal and physical abuse, harassment, and intimidation, with the purpose of sabotaging and derailing such events as well as silencing the women who wish to speak at them.

I am disturbed by the frequent tactic of smear campaigns against women, girls and their allies on the basis of their beliefs on non-discrimination based on sex and same-sex relations. Branding them as “Nazis,” “genocidaires” or “extremists” is a means of attack and intimidation with the purpose of deterring women from speaking and expressing their views. Such actions are deeply troubling, as they are intended to instill fear in themshame them into silence, and incite violence and hatred against them. Such acts severely affect the dignified participation of women and girls in society. 

In the absence of any ongoing investigation, with no suggestion that the now dead Audrey Hale, the young woman responsible for the murder of six in the mass shooting at Nashville's Covenant Presbyterian Church, acted with any accomplices, law enforcement continue to stonewall requests from the media for access to the manifesto they acknowledge they obtained in a search. And local counsel are declining to represent System Update in pressing through the courts, their open records requests.

Woman opposing participation of trans women on women’s sports teams assaulted at SFSU

April 8, 2023 • 11:15 am

This is what is known as a “viral” story, probably because it encapsulates the vitriol heaped upon those who don’t think that transgender women (especially those who have gone through male puberty) should participate in women’s sports. That happens to be a hot issue, at least among political people, both Left and Right.

People are of course free to express their opinion about this issue one way or another, but what you cannot do, at least at a state university, is disrupt and, yes, PHYSICALLY ATTACK someone expressing a view you don’t like.

So here we are back at San Francisco State University (SFSU), site of another fracas involving a professor who showed a painting of Muhammad (see my report here). SFSU must be a hotbed of The Intolerant Offended.

In this case we have two reports; the first one below is from CNN, the second from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).  Both report the same incident: Riley Gaines, a former college swimmer, gave a talk at SFSU in which she opposed allowing transgender women to compete in women’s sports. This time the reaction was violent:  although I think she actually delivered the talk (through disruptions), she was physically attacked thereafter (as a “transphobe,” of course), and had to hide for several hours.

Click either screenshot to read.

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The misogynist mob strikes again. Its target this time was the American swimmer Riley Gaines. What was her offence? What did this young woman do to attract the attention — and the jeers and insults and threats —  of the woke witchfinder-generals? She said men should not compete in women’s sports. Obscene. Fetch the ducking stool.

This is Gaines’ heresy: to refuse to believe that trans women are women; to prefer the light of scientific and moral reason over the delusions of the mob

Ms Gaines was mobbed at San Francisco State University. She had just given a speech on why women’s sports must be for women only, not biological males who think they’re women. She has direct experience of just how unjust it is when people who’ve been through male puberty —  what we used to call ‘men’ — are allowed to hit the pool or the track alongside female athletes.

The organizers of a "Trans Day of Vengeance" rally in Washington D.C. at the weekend have vowed to go ahead with the event following the school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, stating: "We choose to fight for change."

The Trans Radical Activist Network (TRAN), a collection of transgender activist groups, rejected "any connection" between their event and the mass shooting, which police have said was perpetrated by Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who was transgender. The rally, on Saturday, is set to begin outside the U.S. [52]Supreme Court and will protest the various bills in numerous states limiting gender-affirming health care.

CAPTION: Transgender Rights Activists in Washington D.C. Transgender rights activists protest at Freedom Plaza on June 23, 2022 in Washington, D.C.  A separate collection of transgender rights groups plans to hold a rally in the capital on Saturday. Getty Images/Anna Moneymaker

This week I read the most extraordinary and chilling statement. It was issued by a fringe group called the Trans Resistance Network.  It was about the horrific gun attack at the Covenant School, a private Christian school, in Nashville this week.

The suspect in the attack is Audrey / Aiden Hale, a young woman who, according to the police, identified as a trans man. Hale was a former student at the Covenant School. She shot her way through the school doors and opened fire on anyone who crossed her path. Three kids, all aged just eight or nine, were killed, as well as three teachers. Eventually Hale was shot dead by cops.

It seems it is a short step from the narcissistic fantasy that you are the world’s greatest victim to thuggishly lashing out against those you imagine are your victimisers.

Shockingly, the Trans Resistance Network’s statement contains just one paragraph on the barbarism at the school and six – six – on the troubles facing trans people like Hale. That is, it expresses fleeting sympathy for the slaughtered, and lingering sympathy for the person suspected of carrying out the slaughter.

Far-left protesters clashed with police at a "Let Women Speak" event in New York City on Monday, leading to nine arrests, Fox News Digital reported. Transgender activists flocked to the pro-women event in Manhattan to demonstrate against a movement they claim fuels hatred toward the trans community.

Monday's rally in New York was the last of 10 stops in the four-week "Let Women Speak" U.S. tour hosted by Kellie-Jay Keen, a British women's rights advocate. The event gathered women across the nation to give them a chance to speak about the danger and impact of leftist gender ideology.

In a video, Keen stated that she could not attend the event because the New York Police Department refused to escort her to the rally.

"My event's going on without me," she said. "I think this is indicative of the United States in 2022 and how they feel about women speaking."

Leftist protesters yelled over the speakers and called the women "TERFs," which stands for trans-exclusionary radical feminists.

At one point, demonstrators chanted, "TERFS go home!"