Kellie Maloney, Newsnight and the debate the transgender community refused to have

On 11 August, I was asked to appear on the BBC’s Newsnight with two other transgender journalists. Hours later, they pulled out - amid a welter of accusations that I was a "violent transphobe" who does not believe in trans people's "right to exist". As a trans woman myself, is what I have to say really so unsayable?

By Miranda Yardley

(Photo By Kellie Maloney being interviewed on ITV's Good Morning Britain, 13 August)

On Monday 11 August, I was asked to appear on the BBC’s Newsnight with two other trans activists and journalists, Paris Lees and Fred McConnell. In light of Frank Maloney’s announcement that she is well into the process of gender transition and is now known as Kellie Maloney, we were going to discuss what it means for someone to “identify as a woman”.

A researcher from the BBC approached a number of feminists, including the journalist Julie Bindel and the broadcaster Gia Milinovich, asking them to participate. Both declined because, in Milinovich’s own words, “anything even slightly ‘gender critical’ or with a feminist analysis will [be] met with death threats . . . that’s the real story.” The researcher then asked for suggestions, adding: “Should say we’re not looking for hostilities.”