People who believe men cannot become women should be sent to Soviet-era labour camps for re-education, according to Goldsmiths university’s LGBTQ+ society.
The student group used Twitter to claim gulags had a positive role in changing the minds of the despot Joseph Stalin’s opponents.
Estimates of the number of people who died in the camps, between the 1910s to the 1950s, run into the millions.
‘Compassionate’
On Monday, LGBTQ+ Goldsmiths said an opponent of theirs should be sent “to the gulag”, before defending the idea as “a compassionate, non-violent course of action”.
It then proceeded to “clarify” what a gulag was, saying the system sought to “correct and change” people’s ways and featured “book clubs, newspaper editorial teams, sports, theatre & performance groups”.
“Long story short, friends”, they concluded, the ideas of “anti trans bigots literally *kill* and must be eradicated through reeducation”.
Gulags saw around 20 million people incarcerated, with prisoners working up to 14 hours a day in extreme weather. Countless numbers died.
Rewriting history
Following the tweets, Goldsmiths Students’ Union disaffiliated the group, expressing disgust over the social media postings.
“We condemn the abhorrent content of the tweets and they are in complete opposition to the views and values of the Students’ Union.
“The Society have broken multiple Union policies and procedures, including failing to adhere to our code of conduct”.
An editorial in The Daily Telegraph said the students were ‘rewriting history’, while the paper’s news article said the students had been derided for being “blind to reality”.