Guardian columnist Owen Jones has branded parents who do not affirm LGBT lifestyles as “child abusers”.
His comments came in response to a statement from Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer that children should not be making life-altering decisions to appear like the opposite sex without the consent of their parents.
Jones baulked at the statement, claiming LGBT people have had “their lives damaged or frankly wrecked by their parents failing to affirm them”.
‘Potential child abusers’
The 38-year-old activist said: “‘Parents know what is best for their kids’ is not a universal rule. Some parents are child abusers – and that includes parents who don’t affirm LGBTQ+ kids.”
He added: “When I see the people who have allowed their brains to be rotten by anti trans hysteria, I constantly worry about whether they have trans kids, because I’ve seen what happens when LGBTQ kids don’t have supportive parents.
“Every transphobe is a potential child abuser. The end.”
Accusations
Jones was also dismissive of those who suggested it is natural for parents to have a say in their child’s upbringing in order to protect them from harm.
He retorted: “You’re not protecting your children if you refuse to affirm them, you are abusing them and imposing upon them trauma which they may never recover from.”
In May of this year, he made similar comments, saying: “Parents who refuse to affirm their LGBTQ+ children risk inflicting terrible lifelong harm on them, putting them at heightened risk of poor mental health, and developing problematic relationships with alcohol and other drugs. It is child abuse.”
Hadley Freeman
His accusations come as long serving Guardian journalist Hadley Freeman shared that she had resigned over the newspaper’s stance on transgender issues, citing a culture of hostility towards anyone willing to speak out against radical gender ideology.
In recent years she had called for The Guardian to investigate controversial trans charity Mermaids over its treatment of children, but she said her efforts were “to no avail, either because of the editors’ ideological beliefs or — more likely — their fear of the reaction in the office”.
After spending more than 22 years at the newspaper, in her resignation letter Freeman told editor-in-chief Katharine Viner: “It is astonishing to me that the progressive media has handed such an own goal to the right, closing its eyes to concerns about the safeguarding out of fear that to do otherwise would lead to accusations of bigotry.
“You have said that both sides in the gender debate are equally passionate – but only one side demands censorship. It seems to me that at the Guardian that side has won.”
Media censorship
Earlier this year, Freeman took a swipe at progressive media organisations for allowing activists to shut down criticism of transgender ideology.
She said many in the media are “loath to raise any questions about the transgender movement”, and that “unless I repeated the mantra ‘trans women are women’, I was a bigot”.
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