Holly Lawford-Smith
Holly Lawford-Smith is a New Zealander-Australian philosopher, author and associate professor in Political Philosophy, University of Melbourne.
Quotes
[edit]2021–2023
[edit]- I think it's outrageous that these changes are being introduced and people aren't even acknowledging the possibility of a conflict of interest. [...] No governments are gathering data on this, there's no place in the world for people to report where creepy things are happening in women's bathrooms or women's changing rooms or rape support groups.
I'd prefer the data, but in lieu of that we can at least have the stories, and maybe then that will give us what we need to go to governments and say, "Let's have a more nuanced conversation".- "'Transphobic' website puts Melbourne University academics at odds", The Age (Melbourne, 25 February 2021)
- About 100 academics demanded Lawford-Smith's website (www.noconflicttheysaid.org) be taken down by the University of Melbourne over its alleged transphobia. The website's introduction, according to The Age stated: "We're worried about the impacts on women of men using women-only spaces" including "rape and domestic violence shelters" because of legislation related to gender ideology and invited biological women to relate their experiences. An investigation by the university cleared Lawford-Smith of any breaches of teaching practice or the institution's policies.
The Australian interview (2023)
[edit]- Interviewed by Janet Albrechtsen, as cited in "As Holly Lawford-Smith's experiences show, feminism is not safe on our campuses", The Australian (8 July 2023)
- I walked into this big conference, maybe 300 or 500 people go, and there was security everywhere and I was thinking, "Oh, did something happen?’ And then I realised that they were there for me."
- Recalling her experience at the Australian Association of Philosophy conference in July 2019
- TERF is a slur. I'm trans women exclusionary from feminism. [...] It is indispensable to our form of feminism to have the concept of femaleness because women are the people to whom subordination, marginalisation has been done over centuries.
- [Can feminism include transwomen?] It's hard to see how it would be coherent. You could say we have this constituency of female people who, by their biology, have been treated over the centuries. Oh. And there are also trans women.
2024–present
[edit]- It seems to be that all permanent exemptions for women, in terms of affirmative action or protective safety measures for women, now have to be inclusive of men based on their gender identity. [...] There's just no more understanding of the history of women's oppression on the basis of sex as the rationale for those exemptions. I find that pretty astonishing.
- As cited in the "Trans woman wins landmark discrimination case against female-only app", The Sydney Morning Herald (23 August 2024).
- A transwoman, Roxanne (or Roxy) Tickle, won her claim in Tickle v Giggle at the Federal Court of Australia against Sall Grover, founder of Giggle for Girls, a social media app which was created for the benefit of biological women. In the ruling from Justice Robert Bromwich, Tickle was described as having received "indirect gender identity discrimination" by being blocked from accessing it.
