Trans scholars being ‘pushed out of academia’, researchers warn

Trans academics in the UK have described a climate of fear and uncertainty in the wake of two high-profile rulings, saying that the effects could push them out of the university sector.

April’s Supreme Court ruling concerning the definition of “sex” in the Equality Act 2010, as well as the record fine issued to the University of Sussex in March over its trans and non-binary equality policy, “didn’t invent transphobia, but they have really shifted the landscape”, said Kit Heyam, a historian and trans awareness trainer.

Chris Parkes, a senior lecturer in history education at King’s College London, told Times Higher Education that “to be a trans person in the UK right now is to be exhausted and terrified”.

After the Supreme Court ruled that mentions of “sex” in the Equality Act refer to a person’s sex assigned at birth rather than their lived gender, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) issued interim guidance on access to “single-sex facilities”, stating that trans women should be blocked from using women-only facilities and trans men blocked from men-only facilities.

In “some circumstances”, the EHRC said, trans people could be denied access to gendered spaces altogether. While the interim guidance was subsequently withdrawn – and is currently being challenged in the High Court – the official guidance, now under consideration by the government, is expected to make similar instructions.

According to a leaked copy of the official guidance seen by The Times, service providers “will be able to question transgender women over whether they should be using single-sex services based on how they look, their behaviour or concerns raised by others”. 

In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling and interim EHRC guidance, trans and gender non-conforming people have already faced an uptick in harassment and abuse when using toilets and other gendered spaces, according to an October report by the researchers Jack López and Florence Corvi. Some respondents said they now avoided using public toilets altogether because they feared for their safety.  

If the expected EHRC guidance is adopted, “this is going to be a safeguarding issue,” Parkes said. “People are going to get hurt.”

Heyam told THE that trans academics “are going to have to choose between being open about their transness and being safe at work”.

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“Future trans academics, those of us who aren’t already out, are going to be making judgement calls about whether they research trans-related topics or not, thereby potentially outing themselves and making it impossible for them to safely use the toilet that is right for them,” they said.

In March, the Office for Students (OfS) issued a record £585,000 fine to the University of Sussex, stating that the university’s trans and non-binary equality policy created a “chilling effect” and “placed constraints on freedom of speech and academic freedom”.

The OfS objected to four statements in particular: that university curricula should not “rely on or reinforce stereotypical assumptions about trans people”; that “transphobic abuse, harassment or bullying” would result in disciplinary action; that course materials should “positively represent trans people and trans lives”; and that “transphobic propaganda [would] not be tolerated”. The regulator said at the time that the policy had the potential for “staff and students to self-censor and not speak about or express certain lawful views”.

Sussex is challenging the ruling with a judicial review and the regulator said it couldn’t comment while these proceedings were active.

“The message that the censure of Sussex by the OfS sends to universities is they should allow transphobic abuse, they should allow stereotypical portrayals and they should allow negative portrayals,” Heyam said. “That is a hostile work environment.”

The fine, said Parkes, “enhanced this utterly false notion that there is a zero-sum game between treating trans people with respect and having freedom of speech or academic freedom”.

Natacha Kennedy, a lecturer in education at Goldsmiths, University of London, said that in the wake of the OfS action, “universities are going to be afraid to be trans inclusive”.

“Universities are scared because they don’t know where the line is. The potential fines are huge, so they’re going to err on the side of caution,” she said. “Gender-critical researchers talk about a chilling effect on their research – but [the OfS ruling] is having a very big chilling effect on universities.”

As a trans awareness trainer, Heyam said, they frequently encounter “tension” between an institution’s desire to “make it clear that the university is trans inclusive” and its efforts to avoid censure. “It is not possible for them to allow all views to be voiced without consequence and provide a safe and affirming experience for trans students,” they said. “But they’re still trying.”

This tension, they expect, will only intensify when the EHRC guidelines are released. “People are going to want me to give them a magic answer about how they follow the law while keeping their trans staff safe, and I’m not going to be able to do that,” they said.

If the expected guidance on single-sex facilities is implemented, trans researchers will find themselves “having to make judgements about whether it’s safe to go to conferences; whether it’s safe to work on campus”, said Heyam. “Maybe you should work at home so you can go to the toilet, which deprives you of academic community and the chance to develop new ideas in collaboration with others.”

The well-documented overwork crisis in UK higher education is compounded for trans academics, they added: “Imagine that your workload now includes trying to work out when you can go to the toilet safely, explaining to your colleagues what the law says, advocating for why they should treat trans people in a particular way and providing pastoral care to trans students.

“This is an environment where trans academics are not able to produce anything like their best work in research and teaching.”

Kennedy, too, said she took on additional pastoral duties alongside her academic work. “I constantly keep an eye out and watch out for the trans students at my institution, just so they know they’ve got someone to talk to if they need to.

“I think that’s important – there’s a lot of ambient transphobia around.”

Calling on institutions to “stand up for their trans employees and students”, Parkes said institutions “gain a great deal from being places where trans people can work in peace and with respect from their colleagues and their administration. It feels preposterous to have to say this, but that includes being able to use the facilities that are appropriate to them.”

“Trans people are part of the great diversity of humanity. They’re not an objection, they’re not a problem, they’re not a provocation. They’re just human beings,” they said. “Universities can teach whole generations the truth of that.”