1./ The reaction to a @BBCNews article about sexual coercion of vulnerable lesbians has been both revealing and depressing. It's fine for critics to try to find flaws but where is the empathy for the victims? No wonder #IStandWithLesbians is trending.👇bbc.co.uk/news/uk-englan…
2./ Some criticism has focused on the small sample of just 80 lesbians. But much greater claims have been made on smaller samples. One famous survey's claims that 48% of young trans people attempted suicide turned out to be based on only 27 young people. 👇theguardian.com/society/2014/n…
3./ The researcher behind that study, Dr Nuno Nodin, dissociated himself from the spin on his report describing it as "misuse of evidence". But there's something more troubling about the reaction than arguments about samples: the suggestion the subject of the story doesn't exist. 
4./ Across what we used to think of as the gay press and beyond there's been a concerted attempt to suggest the story is fabricated and the idea of lesbians being pressured into considering sex by a small minority of transwomen is some sort of invention.
5./ We were founded, in part, out of anguish at hearing the sort of stories the BBC has now reported on. We're astounded anyone involved in LGBT politics could claim they knew nothing about this. Not least because @jameskirkup reported on the subject over 2 years ago, in 2019.👇
6./ At the heart of Kirkup's story -and the BBC's- is the fact some proponents of gender identity say it's transphobic for a lesbian to say she'd never consider dating a "woman with a penis". Kirkup cited an Assistant Professor of Psychology who effectively argued just that.👇
7./ Dr Karen Blair argued that not to consider dating a trans person "could contribute to discrepancies in mental and physical well-being within trans communities". We don't accept guilt about inequality is appropriate language to use in the context of dating. Period.
8./ We reject this approach not least because it resembles so closely the age-old homophobia we hoped we'd escaped which argued homosexuality was less valid and lesbians were somehow being "difficult" or unreasonable by excluding male-bodies from their sexual preferences.
9./ Young people quite rightly want to do the best they can for trans people. How might they therefore interpret Blair's suggestion: "We won’t be able to say, as a society, that we are accepting of trans citizens until they are also included within our prospective dating pools"?
10./ Blair is the tip of the iceberg. We know how this rhetoric plays out in real life. We hear from young lesbians who are made to feel their sexual orientation -which is focused entirely on people who are biologically female- is somehow contributing to discrimination. It isn't.
11./ Increasingly the notion is being popularised that homosexuality- the preference for the same biological sex- is akin to bigotry. When Myley Cyrus merely ridiculed the look of testicles in comparison with breasts she was slammed for excluding "women who have testicles".
12./ And when gay rapper Lil Nas joked he liked penis he was criticised for excluding men "who don't have male genitals". This sort of assault on homosexuality gaslights adults. Imagine how confusing it all seems to teen LGB people who are just discovering their sexuality.
13./ What we find baffling is that none of the critics of the BBC article have bothered to deal with the examples Lowbridge cited of prominent activists effectively erasing homosexuality and bisexuality (as defined in our laws). Take this video she cites by Riley J Dennis. 👇
14./ Essentially, Dennis seem to suggest that the only acceptable reason to exclude male genitals from your sexual preferences is an experience of trauma or triggering. No. Being a lesbian -or a heterosexual man - is a sufficient and perfectly acceptable reason.
15./ The video has been taken down but it was influential for years. As was the contention by the leading trans activist Veronica Ivy that "genital preferences are transphobic". Why did critics of the BBC story not seek to distance themselves from such claims?
16./ As Magdalen Berns made clear in 2016 lesbians have every right to refuse pressure to widen their dating "choices". It should not need to be said but lesbians get to date on the basis of their orientation and their preference. Homosexuality isn't bigotry. #IStandWithLesbians
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