What is ‘Let Women Speak’?
With a website touting events, forums and a store, ‘Let Women Speak’ boasts that its events are the only events hosted by Posie Parker / Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, the transphobic, anti-feminist and far-right political campaigner. Such an event has been scheduled on 6th April in Edinburgh.
As the Australian press wrote when she arrived on their shores last year,
“Parker’s speaking tour, ‘Let Women Speak’, has explicitly transphobic premises. It is claimed to bring people together from across “the political spectrum, ethnic backgrounds, socio-economic backgrounds”, united by the conviction “that women are adult human females—not a costume, not a feeling or a drug to be dependent on”.
A false claim for women’s rights: ‘Let Women Speak’ and its links to transphobia
The last time ‘Let Women Speak’ gathered in Scotland, at George Square in Glasgow in February 2023, signs in the crowd included slogans such as “Nicola Sturgeon: destroyer of women’s rights,” “Defy the gaystapo,” and “A man can’t become a woman. Simple”. The last of these belonged to the Scottish Family Party, well-known for their anti-feminist and anti-choice views.
Additionally, Parker’s campaign has received funding from the right-wing Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), whose recent conferences have included quasi-genocidal calls to ‘eliminate transgenderism’.
Posie Parker: “CPAC came along and said that they would sponsor our events and cover all of our insurance throughout our whole trip, which is really kind of them. But what we would need to do is we would need to show that we were working for them—working with them.” (Quote from KJK’s Adult Human Female show, transcript from Contrapoints video essay)
Parker has also made explicitly transphobic statements about “transgender ideology”, including calls for sterilisation and violence against the trans community. Notably, she has also stated that she is “not a feminist”, and now has a stance so steeped in racism, white nationalism and the far right that even the Gender Critical movement has criticised her. It begs the question: is she a fascist who’s found gender critical talking points a useful wedge or is she a gender critical ideologue who finds fascists useful allies and a willing audience?
A cesspool for fascism
It is the fact that she attracts the fearful and the isolated that makes Posie Parker’s events irresistible to fascists. Such human dust is their recruiting ground, and they also feel legitimised when her core ideas are presented as mainstream. Most tellingly, her rallies in Australia and New Zealand are regularly attended by some nasty fascist stereotypes – Azov battalion colours, Nazi salutes etc.
Posie Parker’s record was summarised in the Australian Press when the ‘Let Women Speak’ tour arrived there last year:
“Parker is a member of the Hands Across the Aisle Coalition, a group that aims to build political connections and relationships between prominent transphobic celebrities and public figures (including the author J.K. Rowling), and the far right.
She has appeared on radio and television alongside the Proud Boys, Capitol Hill rioters and Hans Lysglimt Johansen, a far-right Hungarian politician, Holocaust denier and Islamophobe. Parker has defended far-right activist Tommy Robinson, claimed Trump represents the lesser evil in American politics and teamed up with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative anti-LGBT think tank, to campaign against including sexual orientation and gender identity in US civil rights law.”
Putting an end to intolerance: Protesting KJK’s rallies
KJK exposes the ‘Gender Critical’ movement for what it really is: a form of far-right hate speech. She represents an ideology that is a danger to anyone who exists outside of its narrow patriarchal ideals and that is a magnet for larger, more dangerous ideas. Clearly, the images painted by her rallies have no place in Edinburgh. It is imperative to make this message loud and clear.
Also have a look at:
Resisting Transphobia in Edinburgh 