Get ready for foot-stamping. For too long, a motley collection of trans activists and green zealots have only needed to threaten to withdraw from literary events, and the organisers have taken fright. Now the Oxford Literary Festival has discovered a backbone, inviting the gender-critical author Helen Joyce and the feminist campaigner Julie Bindel to take part in this year’s programme. Cue the predictable outrage.
There have been calls for authors to withdraw, on the dubious (some would say bonkers) premise that the invitation puts other writers at risk. Harry R. McCarthy, a lecturer in early modern literature, grandly announced that he had withdrawn from his scheduled session on “Shakespeare for the modern age” because Joyce and Bindel are part of the programme.
Then there was the American author, Hesse Phillips, who apparently uses “she/they” pronouns. “This decision was not taken lightly,” she/they declared in a lengthy statement this week. “I’ve conferred with other queer and trans authors, cis and straight authors, friends and family, and in the end I feel that stepping down from my panel is the only way forward, both for my personal safety and my conscience.”
At one level, it’s hard to take this nonsense seriously. But the reference to “personal safety” implies that the mere presence of gender-critical authors in the same city as adherents of the cult of identity politics puts the latter in danger. It’s a disgraceful slur, as is the suggestion that Joyce and Bindel are calling for the “eradication of an entire class of human beings”. Phillips has also smeared the organisers of the festival, accusing them of prioritising “hate speech over the safety of LGBTQ+ speakers and attendees”. It’s intended, I suspect, as a warning to other festivals of what to expect if they dare to platform heretics.
Pressure has worked far too often. Last year the Hay and Edinburgh book festivals announced they were suspending sponsorship from a company deemed unacceptable by activists against climate change and Israel’s conflict in Gaza. The Cheltenham Literature Festival went so far as to compare a belief in biological sex with racism and homophobia. The bullies appeared to be firmly in charge, as organisers in effect ceded a veto to groups of people who regard themselves as more important than anyone else.
Signs that the mood is changing, swinging against censorship disguised as inclusion, has evidently come as a shock. When gender warriors obsess about threats to their “safety”, they’re actually revealing that they can’t bear to be challenged. They’ve got used to mixing with people who stroke their egos and don’t question the ludicrous claim that their lives are in danger.
The Oxford festival must have anticipated this reaction. If it stands firm, it’s to be hoped that others will stop giving into an insidious form of authoritarianism. In countries such as Russia and Iran, writers face genuine threats to their lives. Literature in this country can survive the hissy fits of activists — and will be all the healthier for it.
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
SubscribeOk – but who started portraying this as an issue of safety rather than one of free speech. This is exactly the same treatment as was doled out to conservative speakers and particularly to those critical of feminism – by feminists themselves. They were happy to accuse opponents of hate speech and call for safe spaces, probably still are, and are certainly happy to accuse them of misogyny.
I agree with the authors point about free speech – but this really is the pot calling the kettle black.
There has never been a doubt in my mind that the trans phenomenon has grown out of excesses of feminism.
I think it’s completely obvious, both in terms of the ideology itself and the tactics used. But to say so on here will get you down votes.
My only explanation is that the trans issue is the first close encounter that many on here have had with what we would now call “woke”. For them trans = woke and second wave feminists are the good guys defending reason and freedom of speech. Actually they just don’t like getting a taste of their own medicine.
It’s not about getting down votes because of “saying so on here” – it’s simply that other people may disagree* with you. If you can’t handle that, you’re guilty of the same problems that writers flouncing out of literary festivals demonstrate.
*That doesn’t require them to provide a long and detailed analysis of exactly why; people have often got better things to do!
Firstly I am neither flouncing out nor closing down others. As must be obvious I relish debate and disagreement.
As to your last point: time is always short when you have nothing to say.
My exasperation is because what I am saying is really obvious. These are the tactics feminists used – shouting people down, no platforming etc – they are only unhappy now the shoe is on the other foot.
This year’s International Conference on Men’s Issues was due to be held at St Andrew’s Stadium, the home of Birmingham City Football Club. But at the eleventh hour the club pulled the plug on the event after it was decided that a conference on men’s issues wasn’t something a football club should be aligning itself with.This isn’t the first time the organisers have run into trouble. Two years ago, protesters fought for the conference to be cancelled, with some even reportedly threatening to burn down the venue if demands weren’t met.
Spectator 2018
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-s-the-truth-about-men-s-rights-activists/
Fine, but whingeing about downvotes is the equivalent of a flounce in my book.
Others are free to disagree.
An observation isn’t a whinge. If I got downvotes for saying the Earth is (roughly) spherical I’d be equally surprised. I’d be expressing surprise at the number of flatearthers.
“simply that other people may disagree* with you”
“doesn’t require them to provide a long and detailed analysis of exactly why”
You are on a website where people add comments. No one’s asking for long boring essays.
He is not “whingeing about downvotes”, merely pointing out that those down votes, in the absence of any credible disagreement, show that those are from hypocrites.
David simply pointed out that
a. His views are pretty obvious and accurate
b. They are met with large numbers of disagrees from people who clearly have no logical counterpoint, that simply hate the truth even as it hits them in the face.
So when he says
“exactly the same treatment as was doled out to conservative speakers and particularly to those critical of feminism – by feminists themselves. …this really is the pot calling the kettle black.”
It is very obviously true.
But there are clearly a lot of people who know it’s true, but resort for down voting voting him even though he is merely stating what is effectively a fact.
Hooey. Does that explain why TRAs are the new misogynists? They pervert notions of non-conformity to gender stereotypes, then determine that notions of gender transcend sex, all the while upending the meaning of the language with regard to pronouns. I cannot think of anything less feminist, but forgive me for not living in the world of antifeminism.
You’re taking your own, rather odd, assumptions for reality. TRAs and their supporters are largely feminists not misogynists. They are continuing the project of deconstructing gender stereotypes. They are playing similar games with language.
If there is a major criticism to be directed at trans activists – it’s their glaring lack of originality.
Stupid feminists invented this nonsense. Now they are reaping what they sowed.
Feminists were calling for ACTUAL spaces safe from physical and sexual attacks by males. We were not whinging about hurt feelings.
Check your history.
https://reason.com/2015/04/22/interview-wih-christina-hoff-sommers-saf/#:~:text=That%20was%20feminist%20scholar%20Christina,had%20cause%20to%20feel%20unsafe%3F
Christna H S is a self described feminist critical of mainstream feminism. Not even a “male”. But safe spaces were needed.
https://youtu.be/XQPN7OfDoOE?si=yvrdT_IwSWB3KAoA
“Feminists were calling for ACTUAL spaces safe from physical and sexual attacks by males.”
What an astonishingly dishonest comment.
Feminists were not calling for any such thing because safe spaces – separate female toilets, jails, sports categories – were already in place, thanks to men and the “patriarchy”.
Feminists were, in fact, calling for ignoring evidence of biological differences,
which initially led to men’s spaces being abolished, and which later directly led to the attacks on women’s spaces.
And the implication that women were supposedly under “attacks by males”
Disgusting.
99.9% of men don’t “attack” females, more men are subject to violence than women, 80% of domestic violence has male victims or has women initiating/ co-initiating violence.
Unfortunately, your type have been allowed to spout this stuff for decades, and even distort societal norms based on these, and the bill is now coming due.
A literary festival is, as should be obvious to anyone who reads the title and fully comprehends it, a festival of literature. Not, and this must be stressed to all those who think otherwise, a festival of literature only for adherents to a pseudo-religious cult which is seeking to demonise and silence all those with views which do not precisely accord with the, at best, questionable tenets of its belief system.
If a person considers themself to be ‘queer’ or trans or is, for whatever reason, gender questioning or has a sexuality other than heterosexual – that is absolutely fine by me. And fine by the vast majority of people in the UK I would opine. But there are very many people in that assumed vast majority who, it seems, and by the way I am unashamedly one such person, don’t want to be lectured to by a disparate group of narcissistic, self-absorbed egotists who have convinced themselves they can prove their perceived victimhood by pronouncing themselves as ‘unsafe’ of ‘liable to harm’ if they even share the same space as someone with an opinion different to theirs.
Those who give support to such censorious, bullying groups of people are guilty of self-aggrandising virtue signalling of the first order and they should be called out and roundly condemned and derided at every opportunity by any, and all, right thinking people.
As is the silly claim that women are being “erased” by trans activists.
It would really help if both sides turned down the rhetoric.
If men can self-identify as women, and be legally recognised as such, then the sex class of women really is erased. (As, by extension, is the sex class of men – but there doesn’t seem to be the same clamour for women to have access to men’s spaces, with the exception of the Garrick Club.)
Actually there was an enormous clamour for women to have access to men’s spaces – which is why they are now few and far between.
As for the rhetoric – my point is that we should stop using the language of genocide where no one’s actual life is threatened, let alone that of a whole group.
Also while there are now trans men, if these get categorised as men officially and socially I won’t feel in anyway erased, either as a man or otherwise. I will feel just the same as I always have.
Should transmen convicted of a crime be put into men only prisons?
Why not? It is the logical thing to do.
Aren’t so-called “transmen” actually individuals born female? That means that they are women, not men, and if sent to prison that has to be a prison for women, not one for men. The suggested alternative would be to follow the ludicrous and illogical ideology of a tiny minority of loudmouth activists.
Irony
“there doesn’t seem to be the same clamour for women to have access to men’s spaces”
Until the emergence of trans in recent years, it was precisely women who were demanding access to men’s space and simultaneously refusing to allow male spaces. Whether forcing boy scouts to allow girls or shutting down attempts to open shelters for male domestic violence victims.
“the sex class of women really is erased”
Correction – sex class of both men and women are erased.
By definition, women equally have the right to enter male athletics events or bathrooms.
Of course, for decades women have argued precisely that think of the two sexes as separate classes is “sexism” and “misogyny”. Turns out, as with the military draft or working in dangerous occupations, women really don’t like their own arguments being applied to themselves.
Samir. I completely agree with you. I can clearly recall the successful efforts in the 90’s and early 2000’s by feminist groups to demand female access to all previously male-only organisations or, where that was resisted, to get that organisation banned.
At that point, female-only spaces (whether clubs or toilets) were still to be preserved of course. Now that too iis under threat, the protests (with which I agree, incidentally) start.
I would just say it’s not ‘women’ who are behaving hypocritically. It’s some women.
It is entirely strange that the Oxford Literary Festival is being congratulated for inviting two ladies who pose no danger to anyone to speak. The trans mob will carry on as will their fellow travellers. I would advise parents to ensure their daughters are accompanied to toilet by an adult female lest one of these mentally ill males attempts to dress up as a woman and use the facilities. Our grandchildren will look back in wonder as to how this nonsense of transgenderism was tolerated.
Since chromosomes demonstrate that being ‘trans’ is impossible, it’s hard to see how these people can be ‘eradicated’. They never existed in the first place.
I totally agree! Actually, it is precisely because these people do not exist that trans activists are so afraid of their supposed ‘eradication’: the mere questioning of their existence is therefore seen as the utmost form of ‘genocide’ (the new trendy concept in so-called progressive circles).
Unfortunately these f-heads do exist. I rely on the forthcoming Caliphate to stone them all.
Gosh what a tragedy. Two authors who have sold a total of 47 books are withdrawing
“I’ve conferred with other queer and trans authors, cis and straight authors, friends and family, and in the end I feel that stepping down from my panel is the only way forward, both for my personal safety and my conscience.”
Really ?
I don’t need to ask other people to know if my personal safety is at risk or for advice on my conscience.
It sounds rather like author Hesse Phillips doesn’t actually know her own mind. So not someone I’d be looking to for “thought leadership”.
Perhaps 2025 is the year when we finally start turning back this nonsense.
We long ago should have put a solid stop to this business of hard-left pressure groups claiming that mere disagreement with their agenda literally amounts to “violence” that puts their very lives and safety at risk. It’s freaking nonsense and should have been laughed out of the conversation immediately.
Yes, totally agree. Though of course my point stands: this did not start with trans or trans activists. They are standing on the shoulders of pygmies.
Helen Joyce and Julie Bindel should sue these idiots alleging that their presence puts the lives of these idiots at risk of violence for defamation. They would be hard put to establish that anything either Helen or Julie have to say will make an iota of difference to the idiots safety and to suggest otherwise is nothing but a disgraceful slur on their professional competence entitling them to damages.
“business of hard-left pressure groups claiming that mere disagreement with their agenda literally amounts to “violence”
The delightfully ironic thing about this is that it’s primarily leftist women who used that argument over decades to shut down opposition. And now it’s being used by aggressive males targeting female spaces.
And of course, considering that the primary support group for trans is leftist women, it’s not surprising they are using these tactics, is it?
“Eradication of an entire class of human beings”? Such as the pedophile-class who seek out and rape children? Count me in. Such as the professional-class that wields power to convince children to make unalterable medical decisions and then lie to parents in order to perform sexually mutilating operations at ages where children are prohibited from making decisions about smoking, drinking, or getting tattoos? Count me in. Such as the grooming-gang-class who target and abuse vulnerable, lower-class girls before gang-raping them? Count me in. Such as the political and public safety official class that ignores or even protects the above crimes and criminal activities, while attacking and arresting parents and others who object? Yes, count me in there too.
No-one is so sure of themselves as simple-minded folk
Hip hip Hurrah! Another green shoot.
Good development. I hope Oxford stands its ground.