Kathleen Stock: life on the front line of transgender rights debate

So much for Sussex’s flagship ‘dignity at work’ policy

It is a cheap shot to call anyone whose views differ from our own "phobic" in any sense. It is also nonsense to claim that gender, a socially constructed idea of what feminine and masculine is, is the same an sex which is a biological construct. Academics should be vocal and support those who speak out about this. It is thought policing and very dangerous to block those of us who can see things as they are. To state that sex is innate and immutable is not to deny rights to anyone at all, but the transgender movement is increasingly denying women a say, and their rights.

What a complex arena of debate - everyone has a right to an opnion. An opinion is not by default 'hate'. On one hand why would any of us be so bothered as to challenge an individual's right to be viewed or known as whatever they want ? We should be living in enlightened societies. So socially it should be easy for people to live peaceful lifestyles as they would wish. If the debate is about biology should it even be on this particular debating list? Surely that is just an issue regarding medical treatment. The more complicated areas seem to be surrounding the rights of transgender people (especially male to female) and certain feminist voices who do not formally recongnise them. It seems the real issues here are based around agression, rounded debate and agreement on ways forward that ensure acceptance and inclusivity, but which also do not alienate.

Thanks for covering this story and I agree academic freedom and freedom of speech are being challenged as well as hard win women’s rights. I feel I can’t speak about this issue at work as well and women / feminists are being silenced and erased so that trans can have a voice (quite violently) and it begs the question as to why do one group’s rights have to trample on and erase another’s - how does this create an equal society with equal voices?

This is both biased and *sloppy* reporting. According to other professionals at that institution, the trans flags were put up to protest Trump, and there had been plenty of communication about it beforehand. The flags were not just "on doors near [Stock's] teaching room", they were on numerous doors. And Stock's own arguments have not been mere philosophical exercise, they have been actively dismissive of students' (and other people's) lived experience, and have also misrepresented any number of the issues which trans men and women have been trying to bring forward. Her actions have in fact contributed to a "hostile environment" for other people in the department and university, as well as outside it; certainly no-one wants to think of themselves as a villain, but painting herself as a victim (using, I note, extremely emotive language which again misrepresents many of the criticisms) for being called to account for promoting harmful myths about a small and vulnerable minority, is not justifiable. THE had a responsibility to look into the details of this situation. They evidently couldn't be bothered.

I don't agree with Stock's opinions regarding transgenderism, but she is as entitled to hold them as I am to hold mine. Hate is not an appropriate response, neither is name-calling and abuse. If you don't agree with someones' views, refute them. That's what academic debate is all about: it doesn't say much for the development of basic academic skills in a community where someone with dissenting views is so badly treated.

what is especially troubling is to read the discussions of Prof Stock and the issues here on social media, & to see how those discussions transfer into the academic setting. one of their main lines of attack is to say that "nobody is being silenced" as Prof. Stock says. well, I am being silenced, & that's part of why I am posting anonymously. I NEVER speak or write about this topic, though I have spent a great deal of time researching and thinking about it. further, in very tentative, private conversations with a few trusted colleagues, i hear the same thing. i think it is possible that the majority of academics, especially those with a strong inclination toward feminist values, are terrified to speak about this topic because of the variety of tactics trans activists use to attack us. it is remarkable to read carefully the trans literature and to ask: which parts of feminism do they actually support? because it turns out that that the answer is: virtually none of it. from women's sports to women's health to sexual harassment policies & even to equity in pay and work, trans activists are exclusively interested in extending those rights to trans people. what they call "cis" women are, to many of them, part of the problem. trans is the most dangerous political movement on the left I have seen in my 30+ years of research and activism. it is full of fascist and proto-fascist gestures and rhetoric, and despite the surface and real differences, has many things in common with far-right anti-feminist movements like the incels and MRA. Most frighteningly, it is impossible to talk about this in academia, without the very fact that we are talking about it becoming the object of conversation, rather than the issues we are trying to talk about. i do not agree 100% with Dr Stock's positions on gender, but many of them, and I admire her willingness to take the profoundly antifeminist attacks that are constantly lobbed at her. that they are lobbed in the name of feminism--but a feminism that has almost nothing in common with what we described with that name 20 years ago, and attacks that resemble exactly the other attacks on feminist women in the university we used to see and still do see--is profoundly disturbing. you don't have to dig for more than 5 minutes to see the proto-fascist logic at work in condemnations of Dr Stock: despite her decades of work, she "isn't really a feminist," they say. what is a feminist, you ask? someone who supports trans rights. Why can't trans rights be a separate thing from feminism, just as lesbian and gay rights are? that is hate speech and it is "killing people." the world is upside down.

I support free speech but this is highly inaccurate: "As one of the UK’s leading gender-critical feminists..." Stock has been inolved in the debate quite late in the game and there were other scholars well-steeped in the debate before some women in the feminist movement started putting flagpoles on their perceived territory. Julia Long is one such academic who has been speaking and writing about this for years, well over a decade. It would behoove The Times Higher Ed to get facts straight because Stock is a latecomer and has written pieces plagiarising from other scholars on this subject. I think Stock believes citations are only due if it relates to academic material, but the stark reality is that she recylces women's work way before her.

Glad to say my daughter has rejected Sussex due to the bullying of Stock.Realised students are woke sheep far from the free thinkers as the university would like us to think.Shock you have a penis you are male.No amount of Trans bullying is going to change that. No amount of trying to erase the term sex and trying to replace it with gender will change this.Isnt it great that Sussex reinstates a convicted male lecturer who assaulted a woman.Do they use NDAs to gag female sexual assault victims.This is all deeply worrying misogyny.Death threats made to women who call for women only places made by trans.I call you out for what you are women haters.So petty to call for the removal of female symbol from sanitary towels.Disgrace.Sorry guys you will never be women.

Cause Celebre Why we must discuss what is happening to our young women, Why did you make my teen your cause Celebre, your virtue signaling tool, your evidence of inclusivity? Maybe I missed her distress signals, maybe I thought my kid felt loved and unique, maybe she was at home. I missed the distress she felt in the social networking, socially competitive world teens navigate in middle and high schools at the onset and apex of puberty. I missed the destructive pull of the inclusive agenda pushed by well intentioned student governments, students, staff and school board. That world is the perfect environment for a previously overlooked, socially awkward vulnerable confused teen to find celebrity and solace as the mascot for a social justice group agenda as their congratulatory gender identity pet. My child became the pet once she declared herself transgender of entire clubs, psychologists, teachers, virtue signaling individuals and school board members. They could all point to her and congratulate themselves on how kind and compassionate and inclusive they were. She could then go on to a college that advertises proudly how inclusive they were by posting pictures of inclusive clubs where all identities are welcome. None of these virtuous warriors, well intentioned institutions, gentle affirming therapists will be present in my daughters life when the deleterious affects of cross sex hormones gripe her healthy body. When here uterus collapses, when her vaginal walls atrophy, when her bladder leaks as her kidney become increasingly damaged, when her risk of heart disease and suicide escalate. All the virtuous warriors that were “understanding” and “available to talk” because her parents “didn’t know” are gone, retired, some may have moved on with their lives, their healthy bodies and families. Most won’t even remember her name. My daughter was the “buffer girl”, the girl placed between to rambunctious jocks because she was quiet and good, the one no one noticed. Finally she got noticed, she got celebrated, she was championed, at what cost? Virtuous inclusive warriors, will you carry away the Surgical discard vessel that contains her amputated breasts, her surgically evacuated uterus? Will you hold and comfort her precious, beautiful young body post op? A lithe young body that built fairy houses in the woods, and set out birdseed for the warblers? You probably won’t, you’ll be too busy congratulating yourself on what a wonderful person you are, you will probably be busy at your next speaking engagement as you talk about your work on the inclusiveness committee. You might even be running for public office, loudly proclaiming how compassionate you are and how you love every body; even as I alone hold my beautiful baby and wonder what could I have done to reassure her that she was born perfectly made, no committee present. I also know that I will be dismissed. Labeled as some kind of crazy phobic person. My years supporting my gay child overlooked, my years believing in birth control for all rejected. What will history say about me? About you? About this?