'Why I glued my hands to the floor of the Oxford Union' | Kathleen Stock protest

earlier this week a talk by the gender critical philosopher Dr Kathleen stock was interrupted by trans activists and amongst those protesters was Riz Posner who silently glued their hand to the floor and Riz joins us now very good afternoon from us oh yeah thanks thanks for having me on uh how are you and how's your hand I'm well-ish my hand is completely fine um overwhelmed I'm currently hiding out at a friend's place because I've had reporters following me a little bit um but I'm well and like I said thanks for having me okay our pleasure um let's have a proper conversation about all of this Rosen let's start with the obvious place for someone who doesn't agree with your stand for Trans rights what would you hope that they thought when they saw you protesting yeah that's actually a really good question I think my answer would be well my hope with the protest was just to ensure that anyone who heard Kathleen's Hughes who heard her speak just had the opportunity or was encouraged to think about the consequences of that sort of speech and that attitude towards trans people or trans people and particularly for Trans kids um that was my hope in all of this so Kathleen stock has said many times that she doesn't think that she is transphobic but what she's trying to do is maintain her position which is shared by many many people a belief in a biological sex at Birth and what she would hope to do in her lifetime and in her work is to allow a better conversation to be had about how you protect the most vulnerable in society which may be some trans people it may be some women it may be some men it could be people of all ages so what would be your response to that yeah um I mean yeah like it's uh it's intuitive that um yeah it's absolutely scientific that people are born with Gen Xavier that almost always fits into one of two categories however when people emphasize biological sex over and over and over that's a really clear and resounding dog whistle as far as I'm concerned Kathleen is absolutely the academic and palatable front for this very Insidious very hateful movement and you can absolutely see that through uh how all of her fans how everyone who supported her has acted and how they've talked about trans people and that aftermath of this I I do feel really I feel very strongly about protecting the most vulnerable members of our community that's exactly what I was trying to do and I do believe that there is some nuanced conversation to be had about how do we make sure women are safe from men as Predators right that is a serious conversation we need to have but we can't have that in a way that that threatens the safety of trans people that's not Justice and that's not in my view what feminism should ever be about do you have some examples in your own life that can tell us more and our listeners more about how it feels to be trans and to have your safety put at risk because of that yeah I mean uh the most striking one I think for me is immediately after Kathleen's talk was announced that was total uproar and people picking sides and all of that and the lgbtq society uh it in Oxford University came out and organized trans Pride for the same day this was meant to be Pride right a celebration of joy and of resistance but really a peaceful protest and just a moment to remind the trans people in our community how loved they are and how important they are now Kathleen replied to that tweet announcing that with absolute babies a bit a bit artsy but fine and then the organizer received a death threat immediately afterwards in their Post in response to this event that was a peaceful and in my view uncontroversial protest I mean I've been called every Square Under the Sun in the last 36 hours and I'm resilient and I'm also in a place where I'm relatively protected I'm accepted at my University and by my family but there are so many more vulnerable trans people who are far less secure than me and threats like this and dialogue like this truly indeed endangers them so how do you and how do we take away some of the heat of that debate that is making those vulnerable people and particularly young vulnerable people feel less safe in our world because people could equally say a viewers that you are turning up the heat on the debate by your protests and by as you've said this need at the moment to feel that we are taking sides yeah I I do appreciate that as a point um and turning up the heat was something I wanted to avoid doing right I didn't expect this much outrage a relatively peaceful and undisruptive process Kathleen could have continued talking chose not to and then continued but you could not have glued your hand to the floor in my view that was a non-negotiable action on my point purely because I think her views are really dangerous and the union didn't invite any actual trans people to explain why that was dangerous okay so that's such a good point Riz can you explain a bit more to us you don't have to use personal experience but of what you know from other people because sometimes with this debate now we end up talking so much just as you and I have done over the last couple of minutes about who's right and who's wrong and who's taken aside and who's done this and actually what we really need to understand and hear more of is how trans people feel why they feel unsafe not because of demonstrations like yours not because of debates in the media but what makes a trans person feel unsafe at the moment because there's an enormous amount of attention and some really dedicated people trying to understand the issue for them yep uh I think uh so there are so many examples trans people are harassed in their workplaces preventing prevented from accessing housing uh their harassed online constantly in the streets I think I understand your point right about not wanting wanting to emphasize the rhetoric and narrative but I think the point here is that is at the center of this when it becomes mainstream and acceptable to talk about trans people in the way that Kathleen and many other gender critical authors or whatever uh the way that they do you normalize it and then it's more common that trans people get more serious more violent threats on the street that's that's not uh illogical that's how these things occur your placard had the phrase no more dead trans kids honor am I correct t-shirt t-shirt yep is it fair to say that the deaths of children at their own hands would ever be solely down to one thing in their life so I find it difficult to when people talk about suicide as like action you take against yourself in my view we should be striving to create a society where no one has to resort to that action and as far as I'm concerned it's unsurprising that trans people trans youth in particular feel unsafe feel unwelcomed are bullied in schools constantly and resort to self-harm and at times resort to Suicide I think that's really unsurprising considering how we talk about and talk to trans people uh and even if those kids aren't experiencing it because they're not out and they're not portraying themselves as trans they kids are aware of what goes on in the world um so I don't like to think about that as a child's decision I don't think a child should ever be able to rationally make that decision but rather we should be protecting them you know what I really have to say at the center of this to all of the people who've harassed me online to Kathleen stock to billboard Chris the notorious Canadian transphob I don't want to turn your kids trans I'm not interested in that I just want to ensure your trans kids those are the kids that are trans are safe and are protected and feel loved and feel like they have a right to exist as their true self yes is it not worth them being able to hear Dr Stock's argument though which when taken from her own personal experience is just very clear that at a time when she wasn't certain how she felt about her own body and about the changes that she felt were going on in her head if she had lived at this time in her teenage years were at this time she might have gone down a path that she then couldn't reverse when in fact when she was a little bit older she realized it was about her sexuality not about her gender and that is a lived experience and everybody has to respect someone who has that story don't they yeah I understand that experience uh but the implications that she draws from it I think it's on like totally misleading ideas the reality is we're not handing out drugs to kids uh in the streets like candy that's not happening most most trans people have to wait like up to 10 years to access affirming gender affirming Healthcare on the NHS it's simply not happening I think I think we should be uh giving children spaces to explore who they are and to feel safe in their identities whether that's as gay lesbian whether that's as trans or whether that's as straight like no matter what kids should feel protected and safe I'm absolutely on board with that but the answer is not um preventing kids from transitioning when that's potentially life-saving for them and if you were listening to this this afternoon as the parent of a child your own child who was really just trying to come to terms with who they are trying to understand the adult world trying to answer and this conversation that you and I are having now what would you say to reassure them because you can equally understand that all the noise that's going on at the moment would be frightening and not reassuring yeah my what I would want to say is there are people who love you no matter who you are and no matter what you identify as um trans kids are consistently forced to be brave right many many people who support me have said you are so brave for what you've done I I hate attention I didn't want to do this I did it because I felt it was necessary and I guess my dream is that we live in a world where trans kids don't have to be brave and they can just get on with their lives and have fun playing in fields like all other kids uh res thank you for your time this afternoon that's res posnet who had glued their floor to glue their hand to the floor of the Oxford Union during that debate attended by Kathleen stock

Channel: Times Radio

Views: 51,227

Keywords: oxford trans protest, kathleen stock, trans rights, pride month

Id: Ng_HZTRGNBY

Length: 11min 11sec (671 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 01 2023