Post-Brianna Ghey verdict, the media is ignoring its transphobic output – not least the Guardian

In the final ruling, transphobia was judged to be a motive in the slaying of Warrington teenager Brianna Ghey. Many were unsurprised this happened in England given the steady transphobic output of our media. They’re equally unsurprised the same media is reporting on Ghey’s case without any attempt to question their own reporting over the past decade.

Unsurprised but horrified, of course:

Both the judge and the CPS concluded that anti-trans hatred partly explains Brianna Ghey's hideous murder.

So much of Britain's media and political elite have dehumanised trans people.

They should reflect on the fact that trans people are humans, and words have consequences. https://t.co/mNKNPivsMT

— Owen Jones (@owenjonesjourno) February 2, 2024

The right-wing media

Zoe Williams wrote in the Guardian:

We know that when the rightwing media selects a hate group and constantly demonises it, it has real-world consequences. We can see so plainly how language gives licence to real-life violence – the judge highlighted the “dehumanising” language Radcliffe used to describe Ghey prior to the murder – and yet it is somehow still considered melodramatic to say so.

And also:

Trans people have been used instrumentally as a muster point for the right, and the far right, in media and in politics, and this has concrete, foreseeable results.

There’s certainly a lot of shame to go around for the tabloids and broadsheets of the right:

> Checking those front pages this morning I see even my low expectations haven't been met. The Telegraph has chosen to run with a huge glamour picture of one of the murderers, alongside a story explaining part of her motivation was to become famous. Staggeringly inappropriate. >

— Duncan Hothersall (@dhothersall) February 3, 2024

> The Daily Mail has "He stabbed Brianna because he hated trans people" in its headline, continuing in a long tradition at this paper of being able to divorce seemingly genuine concern over hate crimes from its own endless deliberate hatemongering of minority groups. >

— Duncan Hothersall (@dhothersall) February 3, 2024

> And the Sun relegates the story to a tiny box under the masthead, though with an explicit acknowledgement of the anti-trans motivation mentioned by the judge in sentencing. Like the Mail and Express, there is no concern over their own contribution to an atmosphere of hate. >

— Duncan Hothersall (@dhothersall) February 3, 2024

These outlets aren’t the only ones which should be ashamed, however.

The Guardian

The Guardian has also been criticised for rampant transphobia, with multiple trans journalists having flagged the issue, writing:

For far too long, the UK’s supposedly most progressive mainstream media outlet has routinely monstered trans women, undermined non-binary people and misrepresented our desire to simply live in peace and safety. It has amplified conspiracy theories about trans healthcare and trans and gender non-conforming children and has contributed to attempts to smear those working to support trans people. On social media, it’s even worse, with prominent writers routinely amplifying and generating misinformation about trans women, trans men and nonbinary people.

The issues have been obvious for a long time:

This is a very good article, but parts of it don’t ring true, particularly this. Placing the blame for transphobia on right wing media ignores the fact that the Guardian has published (and continues to publish) pieces by the likes of Sonia Sodha, Suzanne Moore, Hadley Freeman etc https://t.co/rqgK1HmYG8 pic.twitter.com/eLxs4mvTZ1

— Paul | @katamaridumassy.bsky.social (@katamaridumassy) February 3, 2024

c/w transphobia, Nazi genocide

UK Guardian columnist Hadley Freeman says healthcare for trans kids is like the Nazis experimenting on children.

This is one of the most disgusting things I've ever read.

Things are going seriously wrong in the UK. pic.twitter.com/9cUaG989vK

— Lilian Mae Ball (@MaegrenOfWithy) December 6, 2020

#CW #transphobia
Sonia Sodha really out here in full defense of transphobia, claiming the term TERF is misogynistic (hint: it's not) and insisting that freedom of expression be used to protect those actively harming trans people by attacking their human rights. JFC. pic.twitter.com/epuwOuOPTy

— Samira Nadkarni (@SamiraNadkarni) January 2, 2022

Worth reading Zoe Williams' piece alongside the Guardian's general coverage. For example (see this archived version) early reporting yesterday, after the sentencing, went out of its way to deny that transphobia was a motivation for the killing. https://t.co/5tnFPLsQao

— Jo Maugham (@JolyonMaugham) February 3, 2024

UK media problem

The mainstream British media in its entirety has an issue with its reporting on transphobia. As openDemocracy reported:

“When the trans community is discussed in the British media, there is a particular word that crops up again and again,” said Niamh Simpson, a trans illustrator and community organiser from Oxford. “That word is ‘debate’.

“Trans people cannot simply exist. We must justify our existence in the public arena – in a format that is inherently dehumanising because it assumes that a fundamental aspect of our personhood is up for discussion.”

Simpson was one of more than a dozen speakers who addressed a crowd of trans people and allies outside the BBC’s London headquarters on Saturday (8 January), protesting against the broadcaster’s “agenda of hate and discrimination”.

It’s good there’s now a glimmer of self-reflection, but we’re a long way off the issue being properly acknowledged – not least in the Guardian.

Featured image via the Canary