Women marching in Edinburgh to protest the new Scottish Hate Crime Act, which critics including JK Rowling have warned will chill the expression of dissent against gender ideology, have criticised intimidatory behaviour by pro-trans counter-protesters.
The Let Women Speak event took place over the weekend amidst “harassment and intimidation” from trans activists. As reported by the Telegraph, pictures from the march showed demonstrators draped in the trans pride flag holding abusive placards.
One sign read “trans dogs bite Terfs”. The term “Terfs” is used by transgender campaigners to describe women who oppose the view that gender is unfixed and can change according to how people self-identify.
Two other activists were shown proudly holding a placard that read: “Pronouns darlin [sic] or I’m gonna have to make your pronouns WAS/WERE.”
Another sign suggested that lesbians are attracted to the male genitalia of transgender people [“girl dick”], and another that they are attracted to transgender breasts.
For Women Scotland, a campaign group, said: “It’s pure harassment and intimidation. Women are trying to talk about their lives and are being subject to torrents of sexist and homophobic abuse.”
The march was organised by Kellie-Jay Keen, a gender-critical campaigner who has led a number of Let Women Speak rallies around the world. Many of those events have attracted counter-protests by pro-trans demonstrators.
As widely reported, almost 1,000 new Scottish members have joined the FSU in the past fortnight, most of them women, and all concerned at the threat to free speech posed by the country’s draconian new Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act.
In response we’ve set up a Hate Speech Hotline in case any of them get into trouble with the police about something they’ve said. We’ve also put an arrangement in place with Levy & McRae, a top firm of criminal lawyers in Scotland, so if any of our members are arrested or interviewed under caution for something speech-related we can come to their aid.
Speaking to the Times about the work we’re doing to support our members, FSU General Secretary Toby Young said: “We felt we needed to put a hotline in place in case any of them get into trouble with the police about something they’ve said. If they’re arrested or interviewed under caution for something speech-related, we will do our best to get them a lawyer.”
The FSU is already supporting the Conservative MSP Murdo Fraser, who is considering a legal challenge against Police Scotland, which he claims has breached human rights laws, data protection laws and equality laws over its recording of a complaint against him as a hate incident. (You can find out more about Mr Fraser’s case here).
If you’re an existing FSU member, you can find the Hotline number, as well as detailed instructions about what to do if you’re arrested in Scotland for a speech-related offence in the following set of FAQs.
The Hotline number is also available to members in this separate set of FAQs, which answers questions about the new criminal offences created by the Hate Crime Act.
The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act, which was activated on April Fool’s Day, broadens the offence of ‘stirring up racial hatred’, extending it to the protected characteristics of disability, religion, sexual orientation, age, transgender identity and ‘variations in sex characteristics’.
Putting aside race (which is handled slightly differently to the other protected characteristics) committing the ‘stirring up’ offence requires:
1) Behaviour or communication to another person of material that a “reasonable person” would consider threatening or abusive; and
2) Intention to stir up hatred against a group of persons defined by a protected characteristic.
As per the legislation’s protections for freedom of expression, it will not be deemed “abusive and threatening” to engage “solely” in “discussion or criticism” about age or any of the other protected characteristics.
Scots are also expressly permitted to voice “antipathy, dislike, ridicule or insult” for religion.
However, that carve-out does not apply to the legislation’s other protected characteristics, raising serious free speech concerns, not least for those who hold and manifest the gender critical belief that the category of biological sex must take precedence over a person’s ‘gender identity’ in policy and law.
Another free speech concern is that unlike the Public Order Act, which applies to England and Wales, Scotland’s hate crime legislation removes what’s known as the ‘dwelling defence’ (i.e., that an offence cannot be committed if both the defendant and the person threatened are in a private dwelling). This means that Scots can now be prosecuted for ‘stirring up’ hatred in their own home, which raises the spectre of children testifying against their gender critical parents in court.
The Bill won the backing of a majority of MSPs in March 2021, despite concerns that the entire section on stirring up hatred (section three) was “fundamentally flawed” and represented an “attack” on freedom of speech.
Activation of the legislation was then delayed while Police Scotland began the process of “training, guidance and communications planning”.
Two-and-half years later, in September 2023, the national police force established a dedicated hate crime unit to help identify, record and prosecute the new crimes created by the Act. It also began training its 16,400 officers in preparation for the Act’s activation.
A series of ‘third party reporting centres’ have also been established by Police Scotland, on the basis that victims or witnesses “sometimes… don’t feel comfortable reporting the incident to the police” and “might be more comfortable reporting it to someone they know”.
The nationwide network of walk-in snitching parlours are located everywhere from charities, council offices, caravan sites and housing associations – Glasgow’s easily offended can even drop-in to ‘Luke and Jake’, an LGBT+ sex-shop where specially trained staff are available seven days a week to help you report a ‘hate crime’.
