LETTERS
NOT A DISCUSSION
I have been listening to the series of “discussions” on sex and gender run by Woman’s Hour, the most recent coupling your own Linda Riley with Julie Bindel. As a trans woman, I became more and more alarmed, upset and angered by the programme which increasingly seemed more interested in confrontation than a discussion which might have opened up the issues and taken listeners forward. Linda impressed me with her refusal to rise to Bindel’s provocation and vitriol, and with her solid support for the trans community. I am familiar with Bindel’s lines of attack – her attempt on the programme to belittle the hostility and struggle trans women face by prejudicially setting it in opposition to the experience of the wider lesbian community and women in general, as if it was some form of grotesque competitive scorecard, was more of the same. It just exemplified the hostility we face. Woman’s Hour knows this too. What did they hope to achieve? The presenter did nothing to counter the sheer nastiness of Bindel’s language and her vitriol. I’m left wondering whether, given the nature of previous programmes with this theme, it fed into its own agenda. This is not a “discussion” but the feeding of further hostility and conflict.