Conflict over Durham Union’s Helen Joyce talk

Conflict has arisen over Durham Union Society (DUS)’s invitation to gender critical writer and activist Helen Joyce. Joyce, author of “Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality”, will speak at DUS later today (Monday 15th).

Durham SU, the SU Community Officer, Durham SU Trans Association, and QueerSphere have published a statement about this issue.

“DUS have invited Helen Joyce, a journalist and gender critical activist, to speak in June. Fundamentally, that’s DUS’ legal right.”

It also stated: “the Associations, with Durham SU’s support, [have] asked DUS to account for itself.”

“The right to shock and offend isn’t a duty to do so. DUS isn’t neutral when it repeatedly invites provocative speakers only to sell tickets rather than encourage genuine debate. Inviting her is an irresponsible and uncaring decision.

“We’ll be meeting with DUS in the next few weeks to ask for confidence that its event design will support the audience in exercising their right to challenge. DUS has hosted too many addresses from reactionary individuals in the past for us to simply take it at its word. We hope the society is sincere in wanting debate, not a rally.”

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The SU has promised an alternative event this evening promoting trans voices. They “urge those who choose to attend DUS’s event to ask Helen Joyce the difficult questions she needs to answer about her views.” However, Helen Joyce’s address is members-only, potentially restricting the possibility of this.

Kathleen Stock, a colleague of Helen Joyce and author of “Material Girls: Why Reality Matters for Feminism”, spoke to the Tab about the issue. “Gender critical speakers should be in universities and everywhere else because what they have to say is perfectly reasonable.”

She also said: “It’s not that gender critical speakers are extreme, it’s that people want them to be portrayed as extreme in order to ban them. And it’s not worked, thank goodness, and Helen Joyce is a brilliant speaker so I’m sure she’ll have lots of interesting things to say.”

If you have been affected by content in this article, you can contact the Samaritans by calling 116 123. Alternatively, Switchboard is an LGBTQ-specific helpline.

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