Australia: land of sun, surf and pregnant men

Australian trans activist Roxanne Tickle is as likely to get pregnant as the late Dame Edna Everage. This isn’t a jab at his dating prospects – it’s simply an acknowledgement that he’s a man. Yet Australia’s sex discrimination commissioner, Anna Cody, has in effect told a court that Tickle is perfectly capable of giving birth. In fact, Cody has argued that Australia’s pregnancy-protection laws should cover Tickle – and any other man who declares himself a woman.

This outbreak of lunacy comes courtesy of the most recent instalment of the Tickle vs Giggle saga. Last year, a court in Australia ruled that it was unlawful to exclude Tickle from a women‑only networking app called Giggle. The court heard that Tickle, who had gender-reassignment surgery in 2017, ‘feels in her mind psychologically that she is a woman’. In a now notorious judgement, Justice Robert Bromwich confirmed Tickle’s beliefs, finding that ‘sex is not confined to being a biological concept’ and therefore ‘can be changed’. Sall Grover, the app’s founder, was ordered to pay $50,000 in legal fees and an extra $10,000 in damages to Tickle. Grover’s appeal against last year’s ruling began in the Federal Court in Sydney this week.

Unfortunately, Grover’s opponents are just as delusional as they were in the first round. In a submission to the court, Cody – who is intervening in the case in support of Tickle – said that transwomen in Australia have the same legal protections as ‘pregnant or potentially pregnant women’. Apparently, parliament’s decision in 2013 to repeal the definition of ‘woman’ under the Sex Discrimination Act ‘confirms the that the term “woman” is intended to include a transwoman’.

This is precisely the kind of institutional insanity the UK Supreme Court ruled against earlier this year when it reaffirmed that ‘sex’ in law refers to biology. This means that in Britain, only women can access, say, maternity leave. This includes those who identify as men, because babies are made in wombs, not by wishful thinking. But in Australia, the Federal Court must now decide whether ‘sex’ is a fixed fact or a feeling.

Predictably, Australia’s ruling elites have landed on the side of Tickle. This includes Equality Australia – a well‑funded, government-backed LGBTQ+ lobby run by former Labor staffer Anna Brown – as well as the sex discrimination commissioner, a senior position within the all-powerful Australian Human Rights Commission. Supporting Grover – and women’s rights – are comparatively smaller, grassroots organisations like the Lesbian Action Group (LAG). Echoing the ‘lesbian interveners’ in the UK Supreme Court case in April, the LAG has warned that erasing sex from law ‘denies autonomy, dignity and safety’ to lesbians. Or as one of its members tells me:

‘There has been no negotiation or consent about males – no matter how they identify – having access to female-only spaces. It has been forced on us. When there is no consent, when something is forced upon women, that’s rape culture right there.‘

The contention that men deserve the same legal protections as pregnant women is one of many ludicrous claims to have come out of Tickle vs Giggle. The $10,000 damages bill Grover was forced to pay in the original trial, for example, was because she had a brief fit of laughter. This was prompted by being shown a scented candle depicting Tickle, along with the words: ‘I realised I was a woman because I hate the smell of balls.’ This was in reference to Tickle once saying that the bad smell of men’s changing rooms inspired him to transition. Justice Bromwich found Grover’s reaction to be ‘offensive and belittling’.

Of course, the weirdest thing about this case is the fact that it is happening at all. What we are witnessing has to be seen to be believed: in modern Australia, a man can sue a feminist because he wasn’t allowed on an app specifically designed to protect women from men. He can even claim pregnancy protections, and have the nation’s sex discrimination commissioner cup his balls while he does so.

Tickle vs Giggle might sound irresistibly funny, but the consequences are serious. If judges and senior politicians can’t tell the difference between fact and fantasy, it’s not just women‑only spaces that are doomed – so is the integrity of the law itself.

Jo Bartosch is co-author of the upcoming book, Pornocracy. Pre-order it here.