A pair of women associated with a transphobic group interrupted a meeting that included a transgender spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and deliberately misgendered her before alleging that she has a “hatred of lesbians.”
Trans-exclusionary radical feminists Posie Parker and Julia Long, who insist that the definition of a woman is limited to those who are assigned female at birth, recorded a Facebook video of their January 30 verbal onslaught against HRC national press secretary Sarah McBride, who was working at a table following a meeting with parents of transgender youth and the Congressional Transgender Equality Task Force regarding the proposed federal Equality Act.
Parker and Long echoed messages usually reserved for the darkest corners of conservatism.
“Why are you championing the rights of men to access women in women’s prisons?” Long asked. “And rape and sexually assault them as recently happened in the United Kingdom?”
Parker chimed in to ask McBride why she doesn’t “care about lesbian girls at 14 having double mastectomies? Why don’t you care about that, Sarah?”
The pair also blasted McBride for her work on the Equality Act, which would extend the 1964 Civil Rights Act and related legislation to implement discrimination protections on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Parker wrote on Facebook the day after the incident that McBride “is hell bent on pushing through a bill that literally erases women. I’m so sorry for all the fragile feminists who thought asking Sarah questions was harassment and wrongthink.”
McBride ignored the women throughout their tirade and was seen packing up her belongings at the end of the clip.
McBride said on Twitter following the incident that she “won’t let this incident diminish the love, pride, and solidary that filled the room just moments before,” referring to the meeting with parents and members of Congress.
Human Rights Campaign president Chad Griffin defended McBride later that day when he tweeted that she “is one of the strongest, bravest advocates I know, and I’m proud to call her a colleague and friend. Hatred and bigotry will never win.”
Transgender actress Laverne Cox also came to McBride’s defense on Twitter.
“So sorry this happened to you, Sarah,” Cox wrote. “Thank you for foregrounding the vital, life saving work of valuing the lives of trans people, especially trans children.”
