A tax expert and researcher in the United Kingdom was fired from her job, and lost the subsequent employment tribunal, after saying that transgenderism is not real and “men cannot change into women,” as The Independent reports.
Maya Forstater, 45 years old, worked as a visiting fellow at the Center for Global Development, an economics think tank based out of London and Washington, D.C., which seeks to fight global poverty. She was fired from her position over her statements, which were declared to be “offensive and exclusionary.” In the following legal dispute against her former employer, she claimed that her views were protected speech under the Equality Act, signed into law in 2010.
The judge presiding over the case, James Tayler, ultimately ruled against Forstater, saying that “if a person has transitioned from male to female…that person is legally a woman. That is not something Ms. Forstater is entitled to ignore.” He also stated that “that belief is not worthy of respect in a democratic society,” and that “people cannot expect to be protected if their core belief involves violating others’ dignity and creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating, or offensive environment for them.”
Forstater responded to the ruling by calling it an assault on women’s rights, saying that “this judgement removes women’s rights and the right to freedom of belief and speech,” while also cautioning that the ruling “gives judicial license for women and men who speak up for objective truth and clear debate to be subject to aggression, bullying, no-platforming, and economic punishment.”
Forstater’s case drew greater attention when author J.K. Rowling, most famous for her work on the Harry Potter series, voiced her support for Forstater on Twitter, saying that the case was an example of “[forcing] women out of their jobs for stating that sex is real,” and included the hashtag “#IStandWithMaya.” Her tweet subsequently came under attack from the far-left, accusing the author of displaying “transphobia.”