@NadiaWhittomeMP Why do you care more about the rights of men identifying as women, than actual women? I don’t want to give up my rights to female only spaces and I don’t appreciate you trying to take them away from me. Please tell me why you are actively working against women.
I didn’t really get the problem with gender ideology at first.
I’m liberal-minded about most things. 'Live and let' live has generally been my motto. I believed inclusion mattered. I believed in being kind. In not using language that might upset people unnecessarily.
I knew people who identified as transgender. I knew some adults chose medical treatments or surgery to resemble the opposite sex. That seemed to me a matter of personal autonomy. Adults can do what they wish with their own bodies.
What I hadn’t realised - and I feel slightly embarrassed admitting this - was that I’d misunderstood what was being claimed.
I thought “transgender” meant a form of self-expression. A man who liked wearing women’s clothes. Someone changing their name. Gender non-conformity.
What I hadn’t grasped was that some activists weren’t just asking for tolerance. They were asserting that declaring yourself the opposite sex made you the opposite sex. Not metaphorically. Literally.
And that this wasn’t just cultural. It had legal consequences.
- It meant men who said they were women were demanding access to women’s sports, prisons, domestic violence shelters and hospital wards
- It meant the rewriting of healthcare language - “pregnant people”, “bodies with cervixes” - to avoid saying “women”
- It meant children struggling with identity being affirmed onto medical pathways with lifelong implications
And also redefining same-sex attraction. Lesbians called 'bigoted' for not wanting relationships with men who identify as women. Gay men accused of prejudice for saying they're not attracted to female bodies. None of which made any sense.
But I'd also overlooked how far this had travelled - into HR policies, professional bodies, schools, political parties and public institutions.
And how easily disagreement was framed as cruelty. Speaking up felt risky - because others were being publicly humiliated for doing so.
None of this is abstract.
Because sex is the basis on which safeguarding works. On which data is collected. On which cancer screening programmes run. On which fair sport and single-sex spaces depend. It’s written into law - including the Equality Act - because material differences matter.
If sex becomes a 'feeling' rather than a biological category, those protections become unstable.
And once reality becomes negotiable, everything does.
Once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it.
But I needed to be sure.
So I read. Books, research papers, policy documents. When I finally spoke publicly, there was backlash from all directions.
Many women thanked me - both quietly and publicly.
But some feminists criticised me for speaking too late.
Others were angry about a past interview I’d done with the parent of a transgender person, accusing me of promoting harm.
It takes courage to change your mind publicly.
It takes courage to speak when you know your reputation, friendships or livelihood may be on the line - when you know raising your voice could strain, or even end, relationships you value.
Once I understood what was at stake, staying silent was no longer an option. I lost my livelihood simply for saying I didn’t like the phrase “pregnant people”. That alone tells you something is deeply wrong. It shouldn’t be this way.
I will never judge any woman for when she finds her voice.
Because every voice adds value - whenever it is raised.
And I know how persuasive this ideology can be. I know how easily it bypassed me. And I know how much courage it takes to admit, publicly, that you got something wrong.
"I was alone in the locker room, had just come out of the shower. He was the only person in the locker room with me, and he immediately came over into my space." Bronwyn Sims recounts the thing that never happens. NH SB552
Our External Affairs Officer @_ConnieShaw was almost expelled from university.
Her crime? She had called a man a man, and defended the rights of women to single sex spaces.
Connie’s university claimed that the expression of her gender critical views amounted to transphobic harassment.
If she was found guilty she could have either been suspended and fined £500, or expelled entirely.
Luckily, Connie was a member of the Free Speech Union.
We instructed a top lawyer who wrote her a sixteen page legal defense.
It worked, and she was found not guilty and could finish her philosophy degree.
If you’re a university student with views that go against the woke orthodoxy, join the Free Speech Union. We will have your back if the mob comes for you. Annual student memberships are only £29.99.
Mmmm. Very pretty & professional looking, I’ll admit…
I’ll also admit I wasn’t instrumental in LGB activism, like Bev Jackson, Kate Harris or Fred Sargeant, but, if I may, I’d like to correct the multitude of errors that litter this statement (again, very pretty, all typed out neatly, by Miffy The Whiffy Gamer… either from some bot or his imagination)
But let’s get a few facts straight, shall we?
I’ve been a vocally out gay actor since 1990. In those days, if you were gay, & open about it, you were only cast in gay parts. And it was bloody difficult.
I worked for The London Gay Theatre Company in 1992 & 1994. I was in many different LGB plays throughout the 90’s, & was interviewed & spoke about being “openly gay” with Gay Times, Attitude, The Pink Paper & many other gay publications. In every interview I gave, it was mentioned (much to my eventual boredom & to the irritation of the gay press, who seemed to be frustrated at me for not believing that being gay was the most interesting thing about me.)
In 1993, I was part of the West End cast of “Elegies for Angels, Punks & Raging Queens”, alongside Regina Fong, Simon Fanshawe, Trudie Styler, Kim Cresswell & many others. The show was about those who’d died from AIDS, & every night, we raised a significant amount of money for AIDS charities. We also all performed on the main stage at Pride that year.
In 1994, I was in New York during the Gay Games, where I made a film about lesbian ice skating, which we shot on location. I marched with Ian Mckellen (who was also in the film) & Martin Sherman, to celebrate the Games.
In 1996, myself & 6 other openly gay actors were part of a successful little indie film called “Boyfriends”. Again, we all vocally supported gay rights in various interviews.
In 1997, Stonewall invited me to their Equality Show at the Albert Hall, to high kick with the Tiller Girls, as part of a small group of out performers, including Stephen Fry, Jimmy Somerville, Simon Fanshawe, to encourage others to come out & be proud. Yes, we were actually “celebrated” by Stonewall back then, believe it or not.
In 1999, I played a controversial, purposefully vile gay character in Jonathan Harvey’s sitcom ‘Gimme Gimme Gimme’. It was controversial because it was one of the first gay characters that was entirely comfortable with his sexuality, was vulgarly open about it & wasn’t always portrayed in a positive light. The gay press were not happy, initially, but it apparently grew on them. The series continued until 2001. Again, I did interview after interview discussing & championing gay rights.
In 2000, I played Bette Midler’s ‘openly gay’ musical accompanist, Oscar, in the short lived sitcom ‘Bette’. Being a series regular, I used my voice in interviews to speak up for gay rights.
In 2004, I took part in the first series of Gordon Ramsey’s Hell’s Kitchen, raising £40, 000 for my chosen charity The Terence Higgins Trust, which I publicly supported & endorsed endlessly.
Do bear in mind, there was no social media as we know it now.
I joined Twitter in 2014. From 2000 to 2014, LGB people had achieved equality & for the first time, it seemed to be ok to be gay.
I rejoined the fight online when I saw the damage the TQ+ was now was doing to the rights we’d, as gay people, had already won, at much cost. I was reluctant & angry, as I’d thought we’d been there, done that, bought the t-shirt etc. But no.
So if you mean I played no part in the fight for LGB rights, you’d either be wrong or lying. The world didn’t start with the advent of the internet.
Perhaps if I stuck on a red beret, a dress, held an Antifa flag & hollered at a crowd through a megaphone to “punch terfs in the f**king face”, I’d already be lauded as a “champion of LGBTQIA+ rights”.
Maybe that was my mistake…🤷
Please RETWEET as my reach is yet again severely restricted. Thank you.
As 2026 begins, I urge everyone to focus on exposing the utterly unethical and essentially homophobic basis for the proposed puberty blockers trial and on doing all we can to stop it.
The PATHWAYS trial is designed for children with “gender incongruence”. This silly jargon syndrome generally describes a girl or boy who is unhappy with sex stereotypes. Most of those concerned are LGB teens.
LGB teens are not sick!
Nor are other “gender non-conforming” children.
Giving them drugs known to cause harm, which will place them on a path to lifelong medicalization, as well as leading to sterility and numerous health risks, and in many cases to impaired sexual function as adults, is inexcusable. That is why the drugs were rightly banned in the first place.
It is time to stand up to the unscrupulous and/or deluded activists who are pushing this trial!
Wes Streeting must be urged to prioritise the Data Linkage Study on the 2000 children who have already taken these drugs. Let’s look at the information already held before we risk the health of any more.
Anyway, the most annoying thing you can do as regards the book-hiders, is to buy the book. You'll get 34 women with important stories to tell, and we're donating any profit from sales to organisations helping women and girls elsewhere in the world.
https://t.co/HTz11MkJTl
Thanks to @WomensRightsNet for starting this campaign. If you want to stop the trial of puberty blocking hormone drugs on children, #StopthePBTrial please write to your MP using the link here.
https://t.co/NlJjdOTmTx
No child is born in the wrong body.
I cannot believe we are back to square one, with NHS England backing an experimental trial of puberty blockers on healthy, vulnerable children, ignoring the damage already done.
The No1 rule of medicine is "do no harm".
This is activist ideology masquerading as research. I'm urging MPs of all parties to sign this letter from me and Shadow Health Secretary @stuartandrew, calling for Wes Streeting to step in and stop this trial before more damage is done to children who are too young to understand what they are doing to themselves.
New: The Telegraph has seen letters, going back five years, where BBC Sport chiefs were warned repeatedly by own staff about running celebratory ‘puff pieces’ on biological males in female sport – with next to no balancing coverage on the women affected https://t.co/8ARTb5MksT
Claire Hallissey & I represented Team GB at London 2012. Now we are retired & trying to stay fit. Both of us have run against males in the Female category in parkrun.👎😤Claire has been robbed of 1st Female by a man twice! Women & girls deserve fairness! #savewomenssports
💥 Girl Guides faces legal action.
It is a “charity for the benefit of girls and young women” it exists to meet the specific needs of this group, which are different from the needs of boys and men with protected characteristic of gender reassignment.
https://t.co/95BYsmsDI8
Before Police Scotland charge a woman for breaking an umbrella perhaps they might check out the complainant’s own footage which proves it was broken before and was barely touched as a defensive measure to make sure it didn’t swing into her face.
But that would mean them doing some actual investigating rather than acting as enforcers for trans ideologues.