ILLUSTRATION BY MIGUEL PORLAN
The votes are in and the people have spoken. From a list of 50 top thinkers we presented in the summer issue, our readers chose the philosopher Kathleen Stock as the winner— and by a significant margin. Stock’s 2021 book Material Girls argues that feminists should be worried that the biological differences between men and women, and thus the sex-based rights of women, are being eroded by “trans activist thinking.” Last year she resigned from the University of Sussex after protests by activists about her gender-critical position, turning her into an emblem for open inquiry and free speech. You can read more about her argument, and the opposite point of view, in the debate she conducted with trans lawyer Robin White for our winter double issue, which can be found on the Prospect website.