Ellen Pasternack vs. transgender people

Ellen Pasternack is a British biologist, sex segregationist, science communicator, and anti-transgender activist. Pasternack is an advisor to Sex Matters and has written for several anti-trans publications.

Background

Ellen Pasternack attended University of Oxford, earning a bachelor’s degree in 2016, a master’s degree in 2017, and a doctorate in 2023. Pasternack’s birthing parent’s background is German and Ashkenazi.

Anti-transgender activism

Pasternack has written for anti-trans publications, including The Critic, UnHerd, New Statesman, The Spectator, The Telegraph, Feminist Current, CapX, and Works in Progress.

Pasternack’s activism around trans people emerged in 2018, when Pasternack was upset that the Oxford University Student Union uninvited Jenni Murray in the wake of Murray’s 2017 anti-trans column, “Be trans, be proud — but don’t call yourself a “real woman.”

In 2022 Fiona MacKenzie, Louise Perry, Olivia Robey, and Pasternack joined forces for The OH Research Ltd d/b/a The Other Half, a UK nonprofit researching “practical, workable policy in the interests of women.”

References

Selected writing by Pasternack

Pasternack, Ellen (February 28, 2023). The uncomfortable truths of Hag feminism. The New Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/2023/02/uncomfortable-truths-hag-feminism

Pasternack, Ellen (May 3, 2023). Here’s why human sex is binary. UnHerd https://unherd.com/thepost/heres-why-human-sex-is-binary/

Pasternack, Ellen (June 14, 2022). Being ‘intersex’ isn’t that common. UnHerd https://unherd.com/thepost/is-the-trans-lobby-manipulating-science/

Pasternack, Ellen (May 5, 2022). You can’t be born in the wrong body. UnHerd https://unherd.com/2022/05/you-cant-be-born-in-the-wrong-body/

Pasternack, Ellen (22 September, 2021). “No debate” no longer an option. The Critic https://thecritic.co.uk/no-debate-no-longer-an-option/

Wheater, Emily; Pasternack, Ellen (November 2020). Transitioning to a medical scandal. The Critic https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/november-2020/transitioning-to-a-medical-scandal/

Pasternack, Ellen (November 2020). Written evidence submitted by Ms Ellen Pasternack (GRA1406) https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/17525/pdf/