Primary school teacher Lucy Meadows has been found dead at her home in Accrington, Lancashire. The news was announced to pupils and parents on the school’s website. Headteacher Karen Hardman wrote:
It is with great sadness that I have to inform you of the death of Miss Lucy Meadows. Our staff will be working closely with bereavement teams and are here to offer the children and yourselves any support in any way we can.
The Manchester Evening News reports that police and paramedics attended the address in Accrington on the evening of 19 March, and where the body of a 32-year-old woman was found. The death is not being treated as suspicious. An inquest will be held.
Meadows had only recently made her transition public – the school wrote to parents at Christmas to announce that staff member Nathan Upton would be returning to work after the break as a woman and was now to be addressed as Miss Meadows.
The news made several papers, including the Sun and the Mail. In the latter, columnist Richard Littlejohn – for whom transsexualism is a regular topic – argued in a piece published in December that Meadows’s gender reassignment was too “challenging” for children to deal with. After news of Meadows’s death broke, the online version of his column was edited to remove the item. However, it can still be read here.
While the circumstances around Meadows’s death are not yet known, there has long been concern for the way gender reassignment is treated in the media. Writing for newstatesman.com’s Trans Issues Week earlier this year, Jane Fae said:
You know progress has been made, when Richard Littlejohn, scourge of the politically correct, can be found writing relatively encouragingly about such matters. But. Ah yes: there’s always a but. While transphobia has become increasingly unacceptable, there remains that last line of reactionary defence: “just think of the children”.
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The coverage of trans issues in the mainstream media remains far from perfect – a problem that was dealt with in admirable detail by Trans Media Watch’s submission to the Leveson Inquiry (pdf).
For advice about the issues raised in this post, you can read more on the Samaritans website or contact them on 08457 90 90 90
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