Read on Twitter
The SMH may or may not back down over yesterday’s rancid anti-trans piece but the broader issue is that the paper has an anti-trans and anti-queer track record, esp in the opinion section. For example… (1/7)
In 2018 they published an op-ed calling for politicians to “protect the community” and “manage the threat” of... gay men on PrEP. They removed the story without correction or apology after experts complained (2/7) https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1014688252480008192
Then in 2019 they ran this inflammatory and absurd opinion piece about “queer fascism” [sic] that was loaded with well known anti-trans terms, which they 100% refused to back down on (3/7)
https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1124499498317766656?s=20
This is in addition to some dodgy framing of political issues which affect trans and queer people, e.g. adopting antagonistic language, running false claims, quoting hostile sources at length etc (4/7)
https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1159324207794180097?s=20
This goes hand in hand with the exclusion of trans and queer voices from the stories that affect their lives, while priority goes to e.g. anti-gay lobbyists for whom this is all merely academic (5/7)
https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1171604259072167936?s=20
Finally, and this is a minor point, but I take issue with the flippant use of homophobic & transphobic slurs. They’ll censor “fuck” because it’s indecent but not hateful and triggering language (6/7) https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1027052736666251264
Editors who take a “gatling gun” approach to covering trans and queer topics hurt us. They evade the predictable consequences of their decisions while community is left to pick up the pieces (7/7) https://twitter.com/joshuabadge/status/1337907525128110082?s=20
