John Bickley is a conservative American writer and anti-transgender activist. Bickley is editor of The Daily Wire and co-host of Morning Wire with Georgia Mae Howe.
Background
John Taylor Bickley was born on December 24, 1976 and grew up in Tallahassee, Florida. Bickley graduated from Leon High School.
Bickley earned a master’s degree from UNC-Chapel Hill and a doctorate from Florida State University. Bickley spent several years teaching college before moving into producing conservative propaganda. Bickley is personally, spiritually, and professionally responsible for The Daily Wire’s sustained attacks on America’s 300,000 trans and gender diverse children and adolescents.
Bickley’s spouse is Danielle “Dani” Su Armstrong Bickley (born 1980). They married in 2011. They have two children.
References
Staff report (Jul 19, 2021). The Daily Wire Enters The Daily Morning News Podcast Race. Inside Radio https://www.insideradio.com/podcastnewsdaily/the-daily-wire-enters-the-daily-morning-news-podcast-race/article_09e46eda-e8b6-11eb-a33b-e35aec9f2203.html
Leonardi, Anthony (July 07, 2020). Ben Shapiro steps down as editor-in-chief in shake-up at Daily Wire. Washington Examiner https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/ben-shapiro-steps-down-as-editor-in-chief-in-shakeup-at-daily-wire
Resources
Daily Wire (dailywire.com)
Muck Rack (muckrack.com)
IMDb (imdb.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Facebook (facebook.com)
Instagram (instagram.com)
Jeremy Boreing is a conservative American media executive and anti-transgender activist. He is a founder of conservative news and opinion website The Daily Wire.
Background
Jeremy Danial Boreing was born on February 5, 1979 in Slaton, Texas. After working in local theater, he moved to Los Angeles and produced several film and television projects.
In 2013, Boreing and Ben Shapiro founded conservative media watchdog Truth Revolt. In 2015 Boreing and Shapiro founded The Daily Wire.
Boreing has been involved in conservative networking in the entertainment industry. Boreing has advised PragerU on production, including using animation to avoid use issues around images and video.
After Hershey’s Chocolate included Canadian trans activist Fae Johnstone in a campaign celebrating five women for International Women’s Day, Boreing launched Jeremy’s Chocolate, with wrappers that said HeHim and SheHer.
References
Pritchett, Elizabeth (March 4, 2023). Daily Wire’s Jeremy Boreing offers alternative to Hershey’s after controversial International Women’s Day ad. Fox News https://www.foxnews.com/media/daily-wires-jeremy-boreing-alternative-hersheys-controversial-international-womens-day-ad
Resources
Jeremy Boreing (jeremyboreing.com)
I Hate Hersheys (ihatehersheys.com)
IMDb (imdb.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Daily Wire (dailywire.com)
- Jeremy Boreing [archive]
- https://www.dailywire.com/authors/jeremy-boreing
Michael Knowles is an American writer and anti-transgender extremist.
Background
Michael John Knowles was born March 18, 1990 in Bedford Hills, New York. He grew up in a Catholic family. As a teen he trained at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting. After he earned a bachelor’s degree from Yale University, he acted in Los Angeles.
In 2016, Knowles was invited to join The Daily Wire.
He married Alissa Mahler in 2018 and has two children.
Anti-transgender activism
Knowles opposes marriage equality.
In 2019, Knowles gave a speech at the University of Missouri–Kansas City titled “Men Are Not Women,” which led to protests.
In February 2023, Knowles called for the elimination of the concept of being transgender, arguing that those who identify as transgender are “laboring a delusion, and we need to correct that delusion”. At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in March, he further stated that “there can be no middle way in dealing with transgenderism”, and that “for the good of society, transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely.”
References
Kilander, Gustaf (March 4, 2023). CPAC speaker sparks alarm with call for trans people to be ‘eradicated’. The Independent. [archive] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/cpac-transgenderism-daily-wire-michael-knowles-b2294252.html
Hawkinson, Katie (March 4, 2023). Michael Knowles Says Transgenderism Must Be ‘Eradicated’ at CPAC. The Daily Beast. [archive] https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-knowles-calls-for-eradication-of-transgender-people-at-conservative-political-action-conference
McClure, Kelly (March 4, 2023). CPAC speaker says, “Transgenderism must be eradicated,” while claiming it doesn’t exist. Salon. [archive] https://www.salon.com/2023/03/04/cpac-speaker-says-transgenderism-must-be-eradicated-while-claiming-it-doesnt-exist/
Zoledziowski, Anya (March 6, 2023). CPAC Speaker Calls for Eradication of ‘Transgenderism,’ Crowd Goes Wild. Vice. [archive] https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvjgnq/cpac-transgenderism-speaker-called-for-eradication
Rodriguez, Matthew (March 6, 2023). CPAC Speaker Michael Knowles Says “Transgenderism Must Be Eradicated”. them [archive] https://www.them.us/story/michael-knowles-transgenderism-cpac
Resources
Michael Knowles (michaeljknowles.com)
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
IMDb (imdb.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Instagram (instagram.com)
YouTube (youtube.com)
Facebook (facebook.com)
Daily Wire (dailywire.com)
James Damore is an American software engineer and conservative activist. Damore was fired from Google after writing a memo criticizing Google’s diversity policies, specifically about sex differences in cognitive ability.
Damore is considered part of the so-called intellectual dark web, a gateway to the far right. Damore was represented by anti-trans lawyer Harmeet Dhillon in subsequent legal matters. Damore was supported by many anti-trans activists and appeared on several shows connected to the alt-right.
Background
James Anthony Damore was born on April 24, 1989, in Romeoville, Illinois.
Damore earned a bachelor’s degree from University of Illinois and a master’s degree form Harvard. Damore left the Harvard doctoral program in 2013 to work at Google. Damore was determined to be autistic as an adult.
In 2017, after attending a diversity training that solicited feedback, Damore wrote a memo titled “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber,” which asserted that due to sex differences, men are more suited to working in technology.
Activism
Damore gave interviews to numerous outlets, including many conservative and anti-trans people associated with the intellectual dark web:
Damore was supported in some of these assertions about sex differences by a number of writers, and some commented on the public reaction, including
References
Shankland, Stephen (May 9, 2020). James Damore’s diversity lawsuit against Google comes to quiet end. CNET https://www.cnet.com/culture/james-damores-diversity-lawsuit-against-google-comes-to-a-quiet-end/#google_vignette
Damore, James (July 2017). Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber. https://diversitymemo-static.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Googles-Ideological-Echo-Chamber.pdf
Resources
James Damore (http://jamesdamore.com/)
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/)
RationalWiki (rationalwiki.org)
LinkedIn (linkedin.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Instagram (instagram.com)
Redbubble (redbubble.com)
- James Damore
- https://www.redbubble.com/people/jamesdamore/shop
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a Nigerian author whose comments about transgender people have been criticized as transphobic.
Background
Adichie was born 15 September 1977 Enugu in Nigeria. Adichie’s seminal parent was a professor, and Adichie’s birth parent served as a college registrar. Their family is Catholic, and Adichie has five siblings.
Adichie studied medicine and pharmacy at the University of Nigeria before coming to the US and enrolling at Drexel University before transferring to Eastern Connecticut State University, where Adichie earned a bachelor’s degree in 2001. Adichie then earned master’s degrees at both Yale and Johns Hopkins before winning a MacArthur Fellowship that took Adichie to Harvard.
Adichie began publishing work in 1997 and has since written many poems, short stories, and books that have earned a number of awards and prizes. Adichie gave a TED Talk in 2009 and a TEDx talk in 2012 that were well received.
Views on transgender issues
2017 comments
Although Adichie has criticized anti-LGBT laws in Nigeria, Adichie was accused of transphobia in 2017 when asked if trans women are women. Adichie said, “My feeling is trans women are trans women.”
Adichie later clarified on March 13:
Perhaps I should have said trans women are trans women and cis women are cis women and all are women. Except that ‘cis’ is not an organic part of my vocabulary. And would probably not be understood by a majority of people. Because saying ‘trans’ and ‘cis’ acknowledges that there is a distinction between women born female and women who transition, without elevating one or the other, which was my point. I have and will continue to stand up for the rights of transgender people.
2020 comments
In 2020, Adichie voiced support for J.K. Rowling after Rowling complained about the “new trans activism” that had labeled Rowling a TERF and a transphobe. After Adichie got criticism for calling Rowling’s piece “perfectly reasonable,” Adichie complained about “cancel culture” and “the American liberal orthodoxy.“
There’s a sense in which you aren’t allowed to learn and grow. Also forgiveness is out of the question. I find it so lacking in compassion. How much of our wonderfully complex human selves are we losing?
I think in America the worst kind of censorship is self-censorship, and it is something America is exporting to every part of the world. We have to be so careful: you said the wrong word you must be crucified immediately.
[…] The orthodoxy, the idea that you are supposed to mouth the words, it is so boring. In general, human beings are emotionally intelligent enough to know when something is coming from a bad place.
2022 comments
In 2022, Adichie expanded on these views about “this whole trans thing” in The Guardian:
This is the driving logic of her fear for free speech: that she can’t say biological sex is inalienable without sparking a storm. “So somebody who looks like my brother – he says, ‘I’m a woman’, and walks into the women’s bathroom, and a woman goes, ‘You’re not supposed to be here’, and she’s transphobic?”
When the interview countered that if her sibling really were trans, “You’d probably think treating him with dignity and respect was more important than where he went to the toilet?”
[Adichie] “But why is that?” she asks. “Why can’t they be equal parts of the conversation?”
[reporter] “Maybe because dignity is more important?”
[Adichie] “Not if you consider women’s views to be valid. This is what baffles me. Are there no such things as objective truth and facts?”
Media
TED (October 7, 2009). The danger of a single story. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg
TEDx Talks (April 12, 2013). We should all be feminists. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hg3umXU_qWc
References
Novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Goes Anti-Trans Again. Advocate. 2 December 2022
Author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie doubles down on anti-trans views. PinkNews. 1 December 2022.
Williams, Zoe (November 19, 2022). ‘I believe literature is in peril’: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie comes out fighting for freedom of speech. The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/nov/28/chimamanda-ngozi-adichie-bbc-reith-lecture-freedom-truth-trans-rights
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. Clarifying. Facebook Archived from the original on 26 February 2022.
Flood, Alison (16 June 2021). ‘It is obscene’: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie pens blistering essay against social media sanctimony. The Guardian. Retrieved 30 June 2021. we have a generation of young people on social media so terrified of having the wrong opinions that they have robbed themselves of the opportunity to think and to learn and to grow. I have spoken to young people who tell me they are terrified to tweet anything, that they read and re-read their tweets because they fear they will be attacked by their own. The assumption of good faith is dead. What matters is not goodness but the appearance of goodness. We are no longer human beings. We are now angels jostling to out-angel one another. God help us. It is obscene.
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozie (15 June 2021). IT IS OBSCENE: A TRUE REFLECTION IN THREE PARTS. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Akhabau, Izin (18 November 2020). Akwaeke Emezi: Non-binary author shares heartbreak at Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. The Voice. Archived
Okafor, Chinedu (17 November 2020). Chimamanda Adichie comes under same fire as Rowling over transphobia. YNaija Archived
Allardice, Lisa (14 November 2020). Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: ‘America under Trump felt like a personal loss’. The Guardian Archived
Allardice, Lisa (28 April 2018). Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: ‘This could be the beginning of a revolution’. The Guardian. Archived
Crockett, Emily (15 March 2017). The controversy over Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and trans women, explained. Vox Archived
Resources
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (chimamanda.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Facebook (facebook.com)
Choire Sicha is an American writer and anti-transgender activist.
While running the New York Times Style section, Sicha claimed, “We will aggressively cover politics, gender, sexuality, health, crime, shoes and contouring,” but the only notable gender coverage was a piece by John McDermott sympathetically profiling numerous anti-transgender public figures.
Background
Choire Arthur Sicha was born November 19, 1971 and grew up in Southern California, according to self-reports.
Parent Jeffrey Sicha (born 1940) is a Rhodes Scholar and philosopher who currently lives in Atascadero, California with Sadie Kendall, creator of Kendall Farms Crème Fraîche. The elder Sicha occasionally publishes philosophical texts. Sicha’s other birth parent is often mythologized in various origin stories and appears to have been the primary caregiver. Sicha graduated from Evanston Township High School in Illinois in 1989.
From 1991 to 1997, Sicha did HIV/AIDS activism at organizations including Larkin Street Youth Services, People with AIDS Coalition, HIV Law Project, and Visual AIDS. From 1997 to 2003 Sicha was director of Manhattan art gallery Debs & Co. During that time Sicha reportedly shared a “shitty East Village rabbit warren with Dale Peck” and was a key figure in developing “blog voice,” the snarky Gen X tone that further metastasized into millennial Twitter and Tumblr voice.
On October 22, 2011, Sicha married commercial real estate executive David Michael Valdez. They spend much of their time in the Hudson Valley north of New York City.
Gawker
Nick Denton founded Gawker in 2002 and appointed Elizabeth Spiers editor. When Spiers left, Sicha served as editor for a year before Jessica Coen replaced Sicha in August 2004. While Sicha was editing at Jared Kushner’s New York Observer from 2005 to 2007, then writing for Radar, the Gawker feature “Gawker Stalker” became more and more invasive. Sicha returned to Gawker and continued ramping it up:
Gawker had always sold itself as mean but it now became, actually, very mean. Sicha, who liked to pretend to be a news organization, had sent “correspondents” and “interns” to official media events. Coen found more of them, and she sent them not only to launches and readings but also to private parties, where they took embarrassing party photos. This was the important development: the decision to treat every subject, known or unknown, in public or private situations, with the fascinated ill will that tabloid magazines have for their subjects. Spiers had invented the best-known element of Gawker, “Gawker Stalker,” which compiled reports of celebrity encounters. Really this had started as a support group for Condé Nast assistants, who wrote in to say what it felt like to see Anna Wintour in person and, also, what she was wearing. As the feature expanded, under Spiers and Sicha, it remained a record of that nice New York moment: seeing a Hollywood face. During Coen’s tenure, Gawker Stalker morphed from a list, to a list with photographs, to an interactive map that tracked its subjects through Manhattan with unnerving immediacy.
Sicha later called Gawker Stalker “the bane of my existence.”
Libertarian anti-trans activist Nick Gillespie named Sicha one of the “50 Most Loathsome NYers.”
When Spiers left, […] she handed the reins to Choire Sicha (yes, folks, that’s pronounced “Cory”, and yes, it’s a dude) who turned Gawker into an unreadable circle-jerk for the cream of New York City’s wannabe media asshole crop. To read Gawker now is no longer an enjoyable five minutes in the morning; it’s stumbling into a horrifying online cocktail party hosted by a humorless, obnoxious prick and attended by his even less interesting obnoxious prick friends.
The Awl and 2013 book
Sicha co-founded The Awl with David Cho and Alex Balk in 2009 and edited there until taking the Style section job at the New York Times. The Awl folded in 2018.
Sicha authored the 2013 book Very Recent History.
2019 New York Times piece
Sicha claimed on many occasions that gender would be covered at the Times:
“[The] Style desk covers change, it covers generational change, it covers change in how we talk about gender, it covers young people. It covers technology, and it covers love, marriage and how we look. Those are all things that are incredibly fraught at this time, and they’re supposed to upset people.”
Bienaimé (2019)
Gender was conspicuously absent from subsequent coverage, with one notable exception. Sicha greenlit and published John McDermott’s 2019 puff piece about gender critical media figures. Sicha and McDermott interviewed zero trans people or media watchdogs critical of these bigots.
As Melissa Gira Grant noted in The New Republic:
Conspicuously absent from the Times piece are quotes and stories from the people who have been deemed—both by the canceled and their chroniclers—supporting players in the culture war debate: the trans individuals the canceled have concerned themselves with, and whose lives and health are at stake.
Grant (2019)
People Sicha and McDermott profiled sympathetically include:
Vox Media
Sicha has had a relationship with Vox Media starting in 2016, returning to their property New York after the stint at the New York Times. Sicha profiled Daniel and Grace Lavery and their partner, Lily Woodruff in 2024.
Sicha has wisely deleted almost all tweets interacting with anti-trans media figures. Those have been left out for now as a courtesy. In 2024, Sicha scrubbed the account, noting for a time “find me on other less transphobic platforms.”
References
Staff report (June 7, 2021). Choire Sicha to join New York Magazine as Editor-at-Large. New York https://nymag.com/press/2021/06/choire-sicha-to-join-new-york-magazine-as-editor-at-large.html
Dean Baquet, Joe Kahn, and Sam Sifton (April 16, 2021). A New Role for Choire Sicha. New York Times Company https://www.nytco.com/press/a-new-role-for-choire-sicha/
Bienaimé, Pierre (December 3, 2019). New York Times Style editor Choire Sicha on covering boomers, Gen Z and the generations between. Digiday https://digiday.com/media/new-york-times-choire-sicha-style-generations/
Grant, Melissa Gira (November 6, 2019). Fixating on “cancel culture” in an age of transphobia. The New Republic https://newrepublic.com/article/155606/fxating-cancel-culture-age-transphobia
Hiltner, Stephen (October 26, 2017). What constitutes style? Choire Sicha, our new Styles editor, answers your questions. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/26/reader-center/choire-sicha-styles-editor-q-and-a.html
Heinzinger, Kristen (September 21, 2017). Choire Sicha on his plans for NYT Styles, his Gawker days, and more. Fashion Week Daily https://fashionweekdaily.com/preaching-to-the-choire/
Moses, Lucia (27 April 2016). Vox Media’s Choire Sicha is the unlikely platform wrangler. Digiday https://digiday.com/media/vox-media-choire-sicha-unlikely-platform-wrangler/
Alpert, Lukas I. (February 17, 2016). Vox hires Choire Sicha to oversee partnerships with Facebook, Snapchat. Wall Street Journal. https://www.wsj.com/articles/vox-hires-choire-sicha-to-oversee-partnerships-with-facebook-snapchat-1455714001
Dzieza, Josh (July 9, 2015). Why are the most important people in media reading The Awl?”. The Verge https://www.theverge.com/2015/7/9/8908279/the-awl-profile-choire-sicha-john-herrman-matt-buchanan
Chafin, Chris (June 3, 2014). The Awl and the rise of downtown Brooklyn. Brooklyn Magazine http://www.bkmag.com/2014/06/03/the-awl-and-the-rise-of-downtown-brooklyn/
Gregory, Alice (August 13, 2013). Choire Sicha, the anti-blogger. The New Yorker http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/choire-sicha-the-anti-blogger
Wayne, Teddy (October 28, 2010). The definitive interview with Choire Sicha, Editor of The Awl, on the state of the media, writing, and New York. GQ https://www.gq.com/story/the-definitive-interview-with-choire-sicha-editor-of-the-awl-on-the-state-of-the-media-writing-and-n
Blumenkranz, Carla (Winter 2008). Gawker: 2002–2007. n+1 https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-6/reviews/gawker-2002-2007/
Selected writing involving Sicha
Sicha, Choire (July 13, 2024). Keeping Up With the Laverys: The Brooklyn literary power throuple all working and baby-raising from home. New York https://www.thecut.com/article/daniel-lavery-grace-lavery-lily-woodruff-brooklyn-interview.html
McDermott, John (November 2, 2019). Those people we tried to cancel? They’re all hanging out together. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/02/style/what-is-cancel-culture.html
Sicha, Choire (March 9, 2008). Patricia Arquette talked about her sibling Alexis’ gender transition. Los Angeles Times https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-ca-arquette-20090309-snap-story.html
Sicha, Choire (July 13, 2004). Stanley Crouch Punches Critic: The Literary Wars Turn Violent. Gawker https://www.gawker.com/topic/stanley-crouch-punches-critic-the-literary-wars-turn-violent-017590.php [archive]
Resources
Choire Sicha (choiresicha.com) [archive]
X/Twitter (x.com)
- choire [posts scrubbed in 2024]
Substack (substack.com)
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
Instagram (instagram.com)
LinkedIn (linkedin.com)
New York (nymag.com)
Gender Wars are a set of “gender critical” playing cards depicting people involved in activism around gender identity and expression. Black suites (clubs and spades) depict people who annoy or offend gender critical activists. Red suites (diamonds and hearts) depict gender critical activists and their supporters.
Background
The cards were created in 2023 by Heterodorx podcasters Nina Paley and Corinna Cohn and illustrated by Paley. Paley offered the cards via pre-payment because a previous crowdfunding campaign for Paley’s Agents of H.A.G. comic was cancelled for violating Indiegogo’s terms of service.
Cards
Clubs
Diamonds
Hearts
Spades
Jokers
Resources
Heterodorx (heterodorx.com)
Jennifer Pritzker is an American investor and philanthropist who focuses on military causes. Pritzker is the first out transgender billionaire.
Background
Jennifer Natalya Pritzker was born on August 13, 1950 in Chicago, Illinois. Pritzker has two siblings and two half-siblings. Pritzker’s family founded the Hyatt hotel chain and controlled a diversified holding company that was sold to Berkshire Hathaway in 2013. In 2023 the family’s net worth was estimated at about $37 billion, with Jennifer Pritker’s share around $2 billion.
At age 23, Pritzker enlisted in the army, rising to the rank of sergeant. Pritzker earned a bachelor’s degree in 1979 from Loyola University of Chicago, then returned to the Army to serve as a commissioned officer until 1985. Pritzker then served in the Army Reserves and Illinois Army National Guard until 2001 rising to rank of lieutenant colonel.
In 1995, Pritzker founded the nonprofit Tawani Foundation. In 1996 Pritzker founded wealth management firm Tawani Enterprises. In 2003 Pritzker founded the Pritzker Military Library. Pritzker is involved in a number of private equity and national security ventures.
Pritzker has been married three times and has three children. Pritzker came out as transgender in 2013.
Transgender philanthropy
In 2003, the Tawani Foundation made a $1.35 million donation to the Palm Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara, to study the feasibility of transgender people serving in the military and in the ranks of police and fire departments.
In 2016, through Tawani Foundation, Pritzker gave a $2 million donation to create the world’s first endowed academic chair of transgender studies, at the University of Victoria in British Columbia; Aaron Devor was chosen as the inaugural chair.
Pritzker was a major Republican donor until the party began sustained legislative attacks on transgender people un Donald Trump.
Some anti-transgender activists, including Rick Wiles, Jennifer Bilek, and Helen Joyce, have concocted a conspiracy theory that a cabal of Jewish billionaires including Pritzker are behind the transgender movement.
References
ADL (January 24, 2023). Antisemitism & Anti-LGBTQ+ Hate Converge in Extremist and Conspiratorial Beliefs. Center on Extremism https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/antisemitism-anti-lgbtq-hate-converge-extremist-and-conspiratorial-beliefs
Butler, Jack (June 28, 2022). The Money behind the Transgender Movement. National Review https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-money-behind-the-transgender-movement/
Dodds, Io (June 26, 2022). How paranoia over trans rights became catnip for QAnon and the far right. The Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/transgender-far-right-qanon-violence-b2108235.html
Bilek, Jennifer (June 14, 2022). The Billionaire Family Pushing Synthetic Sex Identities (SSI). Tablet https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/billionaire-family-pushing-synthetic-sex-identities-ssi-pritzkers
Joyce, Helen (August 8, 2021). Trans Activism’s Long March through Our Institutions. National Review https://www.nationalreview.com/2021/08/trans-activisms-long-march-through-our-institutions/
Leveille, Lee (July 5, 2021). The Mechanisms of TAnon: Where it Came From. Health Liberation Now! https://healthliberationnow.com/2021/07/05/the-mechanisms-of-tanon-where-it-came-from/
Lorber, Ben; Greenesmith, Heron (April 28, 2021). Antisemitism Meets Transphobia. The Progressive https://progressive.org/magazine/antisemitism-meets-transphobia-greenesmith-lorber/
Leveille, Lee (April 12, 2021). The Mechanisms of TAnon: What is “TAnon”? Health Liberation Now! https://healthliberationnow.com/2021/04/12/the-mechanisms-of-tanon-what-is-tanon/
Resources
Pritzker Military Museum and Library (pritzkermilitary.org)
Tawani Ventures (tawaniventures.com)
Tawani Foundation (tawanifoundation.org)
LinkedIn (linkedin.com)
The Daily Signal is a conservative American media organization. By 2025, they had published over 2,500 anti-trans posts.
Background
The Heritage Foundation started a blog called The Foundry in 2008. In 2014, The Foundry was redirected to The Daily Signal (dailysignal.com) in June 2014. In June 2024, it became an independent publication.
Ad Fontes Media rates The Daily Signal in the Strong Right category of bias and as Unreliable, Problematic in terms of reliability.
Resources
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
The Daily Signal (dailysignal.com)
Heritage Foundation (heritage.org)
- The Foundry
- blog.heritage.org (2008–2014 – archive]
X/Twitter (x.com)
YouTube (youtube.com)
Facebook (facebook.com)
Instagram (instagram.com)
Truth Social (truthsocial.com)
Candace Owens is a conservative American writer and anti-transgender activist. Owens is part of a group of conspiracy theorists involved in “transvestigations,” where they make claims that public figures are secretly transgender.
Background
Candace Amber Owens was born on April 29, 1989. Owens grew up in Stamford, Connecticut, graduated from Stamford High School, and attended University of Rhode Island, dropping out before completing a degree. After an internship at Vogue, Owens worked at a private equity firm in administration.
Owens married George Farmer in 2019. They have two children.
In 2021, Owens joined The Daily Wire and hosted Candace, a political talk show. Owens left Daily Wire in March 2024, reportedly over remarks about Israel.
Anti-transgender activism
In 2017, Owens supported banning transgender people without bottom surgery from serving in the United States military.
In 2022, Owens falsely claimed the Robb Elementary School shooter could be transgender.
In 2022, Owens described Drag Queen Story Hour as “child abuse,” adding that parents who take their children “should have their children taken away from them.”
In 2022, Owens said that society would benefit by discriminating more against transgender and non-binary people.
In 2023, Owens said “It is worse than Jim Crow laws because we are mutilating the bodies of children. […] It is Frankenstein. These are human experiments that are being performed on children.”
In February 2025 Owens released Becoming Brigitte, a “transvestigation” into Brigitte Macron, First Lady of France and spouse of French president Emmanuel Macron. Owens concludes that Brigitte Macron is trans, and there’s a vast conspiracy to keep this information hidden.
References
Smith, Ian (February 4, 2025). Why are false rumours about Brigitte Macron being transgender resurfacing? MSN https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/why-are-false-rumours-about-brigitte-macron-being-transgender-resurfacing/ar-AA1yom8r
Staff report (April 6, 2023). Candace Owens says the existence of trans people is “worse than Jim Crow laws.” Media Matters for America https://www.mediamatters.org/candace-owens/candace-owens-says-existence-trans-people-worse-jim-crow-laws
Assunção, Muri (December 13, 2022). Candace Owens calls for discrimination against trans, nonbinary people: ‘Society would be safer if we discriminated more’. New York Daily News https://www.nydailynews.com/snyde/ny-cancace-owens-discrimination-trans-nonbinary-people-sam-brinton-20221213-irewcydb2jg4bgwgdarw2jgupi-story.html
Sardarizadeh, Shayan; Devlin, Kayleen (May 27, 2022). Texas shooting: How false rumours spread that gunman was trans. BBC News https://www.bbc.com/news/61607042
Yurcaba, Jo; Goggin, Ben; Collins, Ben (May 25, 2022). Trans woman’s photo used to spread baseless online theory about Texas shooter. NBC News https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trans-womans-photo-used-spread-baseless-online-theory-texas-shooter-rcna30511
Alcorn, Chauncey (June 23, 2018). Critics call out Candace Owens’ transphobic views and want Kanye West, Caitlyn Jenner to do the same. Mic [archive] https://mic.com/articles/189887/critics-call-out-candace-owens-transphobic-views-and-want-kanye-west-caitlyn-jenner-to-do-same
Bernstein, Joseph (May 15, 2018). The Newest Star of the Trump Movement Ran a Trump-Bashing Publication – Less Than Two Years Ago. BuzzFeed [archive] https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/the-newest-star-of-the-trump-movement-ran-a-trump-bashing
Resources
GLAAD Accountability Project (glaad.org/gap)
Candace Owens (candaceowens.com)
X/Twitter (x.com)
Facebook (facebook.com)
YouTube (youtube.com)
Instagram (instagram.com)