Mick Hartley

Fun and games at the Times, after Pink News editor Benjamin Cohen gets to write his very own article bemoaning what he sees as the slowing down of the LGBT+ bandwagon. Westminster used to agree on LGBT+ rights. What happened? Well, people are getting wise is what happened. Pink News, of course, is up there with Stonewall as a leading voice for gender ideology, so it's no surprise that Cohen isn't happy as more and more people, inside and outside Westminster, have come to realise that the T doesn't go with the LGB.

Graham Linehan commented:

“This is typically dishonest of Cohen. Pink News was successfully sued by MP Joanna Cherry, is currently being sued by another lesbian, Julie Bindel, and had to remove a piece about me when they accused me of conversion therapy because I oppose the medicalisation of gender nonconforming children. Cohen ran 42 pieces attacking JK Rowling in a single week, in what was clearly an attempt to intimidate her and any woman who might feel brave enough to speak out against the effect of gender ideology on women's rights. Cohen's disgusting rag is probably the number one reason there is a 'culture war' at all.”

His comment was deleted as being "in breach of our community guidelines".

As he describes here, there followed a number of attempts by Graham, each of which was swiftly deleted. Quite a few Times commenters questioned this, only to have their own comments removed. Last time I looked – and there are a lot of comments – Graham's original comment has finally made it in by avoiding the dread word "Linehan". Thus:

Courtesy of a lovely Irish man who wrote the most beautiful gentle comedy and is now standing up for the rights of women but is being bullied and treated disgracefully at every turn. Quote:….

And the full quote follows.

But what's extraordinary is the almost universal panning of Cohen. It's quite a treat to see so many people, so eloquently, destroy the trans ideology that Cohen's pushing. 

I'll just quote the one, fairly typical, from Paul Barnes:

Benjamin Cohen is being disingenuous. He only has to read the comments on trans articles in Pink News to see that many gay people do not support the aggressive, bullying, no compromise, no platforming, no respect for the rights of others approach that that he and Stonewall take on trans rights.

Those of us who were there from the start of Stonewall knew that any minority group campaigning to make their lives better has to win the genuine support of both legislators and wider society. To do this you have to patiently, politely, rationally but robustly argue your case against those who oppose you. 

Many gay people are happy to support trans rights. What we object to is that organisations that have positioned themselves as the voice of all LGBT people have adopted an approach that forces people to accept that, in areas of genuine concern about the impact on others in society, trans rights must automatically and unquestionably take priority.

They wrongly portray all LGBT people as supporting this and so position us in conflict with wider society.

We see decades of hard work to establish gay people as valued and respected members of society being undermined by the activities of Pink News, Stonewall and others .

If your trans activism does not respect women’s boundaries, fails to understand child safeguarding, belittles homosexuality and regards differences of opinion as bigotry, then you are harming, not helping the daily lives of trans people.

That’s what happened Mr Cohen.