Spiked vs. transgender people

Spiked is a British group blog that publishes consistently anti-transgender content. It is a key global source of anti-trans rhetoric in English language.

Background

In 1988, members of the Revolutionary Communist Party in the UK founded Living Marxism. It was rebranded as LM in 1999. LM was closed following a 2000 loss in a libel suit brought by ITN. Many of the writers connected to LM went on to found Spiked in 2021.

The original staff was:

Mick Hume – editor
Helene Guldberg – managing editor
Jennie Bristow – commissioning editor
Brendan O’Neill – assistant editor
Josie Appleton – spiked writer
Sandy Starr – press and PR
Rob Lyons – IT manager

The publication sometimes styles its name sp¡ked.

Anti-trans activism

Spiked has published work by many of the biggest names in anti-trans activism, including Ben Appel, Jo Bartosch, Tim Black, Heather Brunskell-Evans, Julie Burchill, Carrie Clark, Malcolm Clark, Kara Dansky, Laoise Uí Aodha de Brún, Andrew Doyle, Rakib Ehsan, Paul Embery, James Esses, Marcus Evans, Simon Evans, Ann Furedi, Frank Furedi, Luke Gittos, “Genevieve Gluck,” Mick Hume, Inaya Folarin Iman, Bev Jackson, Dennis Kavanagh, Joel Kotkin, Graham Linehan, Meghan Murphy, Fraser Myers, Stella O’Malley, Brendan O’Neill, Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, Lou Perez, Sarah Phillimore, Brad Polumbo, Wilfred Reilly, Gareth Roberts, Raquel Rosario Sanchez, Fred Sargeant, Lionel Shriver, Tom Slater, Vaishnavi Sundar, Batya Ungar-Sargon, Patrick West, Ella Whelan and Joanna Williams.

It has occasionally published work by conservative trans activist Debbie Hayton. After Brendan O’Neill posted an unhinged review of Please Miss by Grace Lavery, Spiked published Lavery’s response. Beyond that, Spiked publishes diatribes attacking trans people while consistently excluding trans authors.