Michael Powell is an American writer and anti-transgender activist involved in the New York Times anti-transgender coverage crisis of the 2020s. In 2024, Powell moved to anti-trans publication The Atlantic.
Background
Michael Henry Powell was born on January 20, 1957. Powell earned a bachelor’s degree from The State University of New York at Purchase in 1978 and then attended Columbia University.
In 1982 Powell married Evelyn M. Intondi (born March 14, 1956), a midwife and reproductive health specialist. They have two adult children.
Powell worked at New York Newsday from 1988 to 1995. Powell next moved to The Washington Postin 1996. Powell was with The New York Observer before joining the New York Times in 2007. After writing on the “Gotham” column, Powell moved to Sports in 2014.
“We needed somebody who was deeply experienced at covering controversies in a panoramic way, who was experienced enough that they wouldn’t get intimidated or really shaken by some of the criticisms on Twitter and elsewhere.”
In June, Powell ended work on the “Sports of The Times” column and began writing about “free speech and thought, identity, campuses and so on.”
In 2023 Powell moved to the even more transphobic Atlantic, which has not had a trans journalist on their masthead since their founding in 1857.
Anti-transgender activism
In 2014 Powell boasted about interviewing “transvestite prostitutes from Ecuador.” No reputable journalist was using the term transvestite in 2014.
Lia Thomas non-interview
In a 2022 story on transgender athletes, Powell wrote one of thousands of articles that used Lia Thomas as outrage bait, even though Powell failed to interview Thomas for the piece. Where an earlier piece in the Times by Billy Witz adhered to objective reporting, Powell chose to frame transgender people as debates to be solved. Powell claims the debates center on “science, fairness and inclusiveness, and cut to the core of distinctions between gender identity and biological sex.”
Many people across the political spectrum are deeply invested in maintaining sex segregation and shoring up the study of “sex differences,” and Powell uncritically presents their pettifogging about rules and measurements and what-not.
To Powell’s credit, the story briefly mentions Anna Posbergh among the usual suspects fixated on minutiae within a fatally flawed and fundamentally unfair institution. Posbergh is one of many who believe that there is no ethical future for sex-segregated competitive sport, which largely exists to further the belief that one half of the human population is “inferior” to the other half.
Powell polishes the classic “science vs. activism” chestnut, suggesting only “activists” believe biology is socially constructed:
Even nomenclature is contentious. Descriptive phrases such as “biological woman” and “biological man” might be seen as central to discussing differences in performance. Many trans rights activists say such expressions are transphobic and insist biology and gender identity are largely social constructs.
Powell concludes, “The solution, a balance of gender and biology, looks distant.” While the solution is distant, it is not a balance of gender and biology. It is a recognition that sex-segregated sport, just like any sex-segregated institution, has no place in an ethical society.
Background on the Thomas non-interview
Powell contacted GLAAD in the course of the story, and after they told Powell that Martina Navratilova holds views they consider objectionable, Powell naturally included Navratilova because it violates some sort of perceived taboo.
Press room (July 18, 2023). The Atlantic Hires Michael Powell and Zoë Schlanger as Staff Writers. The Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/press-releases/archive/2023/07/atlantic-hires-michael-powell-and-zoe-schlanger/674739/
Sheila C. Kirk (April 5, 1930 – July 2019) is an American gynecologist and an important figure in the history of trans health services. Kirk authored several books on medical transition and served on many nonprofit boards.
Kirk was board certified in Obstetrics and Gynecology, and was a member of the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association (now WPATH). Kirk earned a medical degree from the Boston University School of Medicine in 1957 and was licensed in Pennsylvania in 1963. Kirk’s internship and main residency were at the University Hospitals in Buffalo, New York. Kirk completed her training in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, then set up a private practice there.
In 1992 Kirk retired from active practice and as Assistant Clinical Professor at the University of Pittsburgh to work with the International Foundation for Gender Education (IFGE) as a medical consultant to the trans and gender diverse community. Kirk was the first trans surgeon elected to the board of HBIGDA. Kirk also served on the editorial board of the International Journal of Transgender Health (then International Journal of Transgenderism) and was a member of TransPitt and the Gay & Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA).
Kirk’s medical information books were important pre-internet resources. Following decades of service to the community, Kirk retired from activism and moved to South Carolina.
Hormonal Therapy for the Male-to-Female Transgendered Individual (1994)
Medical, Legal, and Workplace Issues for the Transsexual (1995) [with Martine Rothblatt]
Feminizing Hormonal Therapy for the Transgendered (1996)
Transgender and HIV: Risks, Prevention, and Care, with Walter O. Bockting (2001)
“The Whole Person: A Paradigm for Integrating the Mental and Physical Health of Trans Clients,” with Claudette Kulkarni, in The Handbook of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Public Health: A Practitioner’s Guide to Service Michael Shankle (2013)
Derrick Jensen is an American environmentalist and author. Jensen is a founder of environmental organization Deep Green Resistance, a radical feminist group that has been criticized for anti-transgender views.
Background
Jensen was born on December 19, 1960. Jensen earned a bachelor’s degree from Colorado School of Mines in 1983 and a master’s degree from Eastern Washington University in 1991.
In 2011, Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Aric McBay founded Deep Green Resistance. McBay left due to the organization’s positions on transgender people.
Anti-transgender views
Jensen’s concerns center around postmodernism and queer theory. Jensen believes these theories are attempts to justify nonconsensual sex with minors. Jensen also claims any dissent from acceptable views will lead to cancelation:
This is the cult-like behavior of the postmodern left: if you disagree with any of the Holy Commandments of postmodernism/queer theory/transgender ideology, you must be silenced on not only that but on every other subject. Welcome to the death of discourse, brought to you by the postmodern left.
Jensen has laid out these anti-trans views in a number of essays and posts:
The Emperor’s New Penis
Liberals and the New McCarthyism
Letter to a Publisher: On the Destruction of Discourse and the Cult of the Postmodern Left
Derrick Jensen Resistance Radio
Jensen is host of a show that has included many environmentalists, some trans-inclusive feminists, and anti-transgender activists:
Houlberg, Laura (2017). “The End of Gender or Deep Green Transmisogyny?”. Routledge Handbook of Gender and Environment. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-315-88657-2.
Pellow, David Naguib (2019). Eco-Defence, Radical Environmentalism and Environmental Justice. Routledge Handbook of Radical Politics. Routledge. p. 112. ISBN 9781315619880.
Tim Ferriss is an American podcaster and lifestyle influencer. Although Ferriss is sometimes considered part of the intellectual dark web for having a few guests who are part of that movement, Ferriss has not engaged in anti-transgender activism.
Coleman Hughes is an American writer and anti-transgender activist.
Background
Coleman Cruz Hughes was born February 25, 1996 and grew up in Montclair, New Jersey. Hughes earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University in 2020.
Like Glenn Loury, Thomas Chatterton Williams, and John McWhorter, Hughes has gained a reputation for criticizing progressive views and policies around race.
“Zuby” is the stage name of Nzube Olisaebuka Udezue, a British rapper and anti-transgender activist.
Background
Nzube Olisaebuka Udezue was born on August 19, 1986. Udezue has four siblings and split time between the UK and Saudi Arabia while growing up. Udezue earned a bachelor’s degree from Oxford in 2007. Between 2006 and 2016, Udezue released several songs and albums while working as a consultant.
Podcast
In 2019, Udezue started a podcast, Real Talk with Zuby. Anti-trans guests include:
In 2019, Udezue performed an anti-trans stunt involving a women’s deadlifting record. Udezue claimed to have broken it while identifying as a female as a way to mock transgender athletes.
In 2020, Udezue signed a letter supporting anti-trans activist JK Rowling.
Stefan Molyneux is an Irish-born Canadian podcaster and key figure in the alt-right and the so-called intellectual dark web. Molyneux’s anti-feminist and white nationalist views have resulted in removal from many online platforms.
Michael McClure is an American web developer and “autogynephilia” activist.
Background
Michael John “Mike” McClure was born in 1987, grew up in California, and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a music degree in 2007. McClure then held a variety of software development roles and did guest and substitute teaching in the San Francisco Bay area. McClure worked at General Assembly, Apple, Fitbit, and Foxconn, as well as contract work at several firms.
McClure is part of the “rationalist” movement associated with sites like Slate Star Codex.
This book has caused quite a stir as the reviews below suggest. The subject matter is controversial, and the author’s approach–first-hand accounts and summaries of the literature–will not appeal to everyone. Despite a reliance on secondary sources, Bailey breaks new ground in this unusually lucid review of the causes of male homosexuality and transsexuality. Most arresting is his claim that there are two types of transsexuality, one related to homosexuality, the other totally different and caused by male identification with the female form. He concludes that both types of transsexuals are rooted in biology. The book should be of interest to therapists who treat transsexuals, as well as preoperative and postoperative transsexuals seeking more information. There is also a helpful “how-to” section on the transition process from male to “female,” including surgery, hormones, etc.
Note: This site erroneously attributed writing published under the pseudonym “Mark Taylor Saotome-Westlake” to McClure. Transgender Map apologizes for the error.
Julie Bindel is a British author, sex-segregationist, and anti-transgender activist. Bindel is a key historic media figure in British anti-trans activism. Bindel has written hundreds of anti-trans articles for UnHerd, The Guardian, The Critic, Daily Mail. and on a personal Substack.
Background
Julie Bindel was born on July 20, 1962 in Darlington, County Durham, England. At age 17, Bindel moved to Leeds and joined anti-pornography activist organization Leeds Revolutionary Feminist Group. At the time, “Yorkshire Ripper” Peter Sutcliffe was committing serial murders in the area. Bindel described being followed one night in 1980 by someone who appeared similar to Sutcliffe.
In the late 1980s. Bindel became involved in anti-violence campaigns. In 1991, Bindel co-founded Justice for Women, which provided legal support to women who were convicted after resisting violence from men.
From the mid-1990s onward, Bindel worked as a journalist, becoming a regular columnist for The Guardian in the late 1990s. Bindel continued to write for the publication for more than two decades. During the 2000s, Bondel reported on issues including domestic violence, prostitution, trafficking, and the treatment of women in conflict zones.
Bindel has published several books, including Straight Expectations (2014), The Pimping of Prostitution (2017), and Feminism for Women (2021).
Anti-trans activism
Bindel was deeply influenced by anti-trans extremist Janice Raymond and others who frame trans women as a threat to cisgender women.
A 2004 Guardiancolumn by Bindel titled “Gender Benders, beware” led to over 200 letters of complaint. The public pushback was a turning point in Bindel’s anti-trans activism. Bindel apologized for the tone, then began expressing anti-trans views more frequently and stridently over the ensuing decades.
When Stonewall nominated Bindel for Journalist of the Year in 2008, protesters picketed the event.
In 2020, Bindel sued British LGBTQ publication PinkNews for libel over an article on abuse within the anti-trans feminist movement. The article did not mention Bindel by name. The case was settled, and both parties released a joint statement.
During 2025 Pride Month, Bindel claimed it was now a “pride of perverts,” writing:
Women like me are sick of being lumped in with trans-identified people, with kinksters, with those that just call themselves ‘asexual’, ‘non-binary’, ‘sapiosexual’ or ‘aromantic’ – people who are never going to face oppression or discrimination for their sexuality. The Pride movement is redundant.
Bindel, Julie (December 31, 2025). What a terfing year it’s been!Julie Bindel’s writing and podcasts https://juliebindel.substack.com/p/what-a-terfing-year-its-been
Bindel, Julie (November 07, 2025). Sex Change Surgery is Unnecessary Mutilation.Julie Bindel’s writing and podcasts https://juliebindel.substack.com/p/sex-change-surgery-is-unnecessary-c76
Bindel, Julie (April 1, 2024). Twenty years a Terf.UnHerd https://unherd.com/2024/04/twenty-years-a-terf/
Bindel, Julie (February 8, 2024). Twenty years a target of the trans cabal.Julie Bindel’s writing and podcasts https://juliebindel.substack.com/p/twenty-years-a-target-of-the-trans
Andrew Sullivan is a conservative gay cultural critic and anti-transgender extremist. The Advocatenoted that Sullivan “represents everything wrong with the gay rights movement.”
Sullivan is an LGB separatist who subscribes to the “gay erasure” conspiracy theory that healthcare for trans and gender diverse youth is a plan to eliminate gay, lesbian, and bisexual people.
Sullivan says Catholic upbringing and values inform this conservatism. Sullivan’s gender critical views include:
Criticizing legal protections based on gender identity
Criticizing affirmative care for gender diverse youth
In 1986, Sullivan took a role at The New Republic, rising to editor in 1991 before being fired in 1996. Sullivan’s 1989 article “Here Comes the Groom” is frequently cited as an important moment in shifting conservative opinion on marriage equality.
Sullivan wrote for The New York Times Magazine from 1998 until getting fired in 2002. During that time Sullivan started a blog called The Dish that ran until 2015. From 2016 to 2020 Sullivan wrote for New York magazine, then moved to Substack.
Anti-trans activism
Sullivan frequently appears in the media to attack trans people, especially gender diverse children.
Brantley, Will [editor] (2024). Conversations with Sarah Schulman. University Press of Mississippi, ISBN 978-1-4968-4836-9 https://doi.org/10.2307/jj.10782311.10
Sullivan, Andrew (September 20, 2019). When the Ideologues Come for the Kids. Intelligencer https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/09/andrew-sullivan-when-the-ideologues-come-for-the-kids.html
Sullivan, Andrew (February 1, 2019). The Nature of Sex.Intelligencer https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/andrew-sullivan-the-nature-of-sex.html
The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan and Brianna Wu (December 27, 2024). Brianna Wu On Trans Life. https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/brianna-wu-on-trans-life