Heather Brunskell-Evans
Dr Heather Brunskell-Brunskell-Evans has been at the forefront of the campaign to protect the rights of gender non-conforming children and young people since 2015. She is a key figure in academia who has analysed and challenged the claims of Queer theory and the social construction of the ‘transgender child.’ Heather’s website is here: http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/.
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Dr Heather Brunskell-Evans is a social theorist, philosopher, Foucault scholar and (retired) Senior Research Fellow at King’s College in London.
She was previously a National Spokesperson for the Women’s Equality Party on Ending Sexual Violence, and a Trustee and Spokeswoman for FiLiA.
She was co-founder of Resist Porn Culture.
She is co-founder of the Women’s Human Rights Campaign (WHRC), created to lobby nations to maintain language protecting women and girls on the basis of sex rather than “gender” or “gender identity”.
Heather is co-author of the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights.
2015: Heather wrote a ‘Think Piece’ about Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner for Leicester University where she was a Senior Research Fellow in the Centre for Medical Humanities. It was published on an internal publication platform called ‘Think Pieces.’ Within 24 hours Natascha Kennedy, an academic who identifies as a woman, demanded that the university retract the article from publication because it would make trans identifying staff and students feel unsafe, and alleged it was in breach of the Equality Act 2010. The article was removed, sent to the university’s legal team, and brought to the attention of the Vice-Chancellor. The article was reinstated after the lawyers found that it was not in breach of the Equality Act, and contributed constructively to the debate about transgenderism.
2017, 15th November: Heather appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Moral Maze and expressed her views on gender identity and the medicalisation of children.
“If a child decides that it’s an astronaut, one can play along with this. One doesn’t have to moralise about it but quite clearly the child is not an astronaut. In fact, it’s incumbent upon adults who are responsible for the welfare, psychological and social and medical, of children not to go along with this story [of the boy that he is a girl and vice versa]”.
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/moral-maze-defining-gender-bbc-radio-4/
2017, November: Heather was subsequently placed under investigation by the Women’s Equality Party (WEP) after a trans woman party member alleged that her conduct on the Moral Maze “promoted prejudice against the transgender community” and that “she must be excluded” because she “brought the party into shame”.
At the time Heather was WEP’s democratically elected Spokesperson for the Policy on Violence Against Women and Girls and was informed that she was under review by the Executive Committee.
Heather released a public statement to the WEP.
2017, November: Heather was due to give a lecture to medical students at Kings College London on an unrelated topic but was no platformed because of the views she expressed on Moral Maze.
“She had been asked by medical students from the Reproductive and Sexual Health Society at King’s to give a talk this week on the subject of pornography and the sexualisation of young women, at the college’s Guy’s Campus in south London.
But days after appearing on the Moral Maze, the Radio 4 series hosted by Michael Buerk, she was told that the event had been cancelled because of concerns that her views on “transgender health . . . would violate the student union’s ‘Safe Space’ policy.”
2018, February: Heather was sacked from her position as spokeswoman for the WEP and resigned as a member of the party. A number of other members also resigned.
In a statement the WEP said:
“The Executive Committee of the Women’s Equality Party has completed its investigation…The Committee recommended that the official should not continue as party spokesperson after concluding her actions breached articles of the constitution and our volunteer agreement…
“Heather Brunskell-Evans [is] a tireless campaigner on ending violence against women, and we are sorry to learn that she has decided to resign her party membership.”
2018: The Society of Friends (Quakers) cancelled the book launch of Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (Eds) (2018) Transgender Children and Young People: Born in Your Own Body. The reasons given were that staff would feel unsafe by the ideas in the book and that transactivists may protest.
The Quaker Bookshop then declined to stock the book while having a section dedicated to Transgenderism, including children’s transition and Queer Theory.
2018, April: Heather was speaking at the We Need to Talk about Sex event in Bristol and endured intimidation and harassment from trans activists who physically blocked attendees’ way into the venue. Heather was forced backwards down the stairs and called a ‘Nazi.’
Film of the event was subsequently broadcast as part of the Channel 4 documentary ‘Trans Kids: It’s Time to Talk.’
2018, November: Heather was invited by the University Free Speech Society at the University of Bristol to give a lecture on the curtailment of free speech in the academy. Trans activist students interrupted Heather’s talk, took over the lecture theatre and attempted to read out all the names of trans people who had been murdered. The protesters were eventually removed by security guards specifically commissioned to protect Heather that evening.
2019, March. Heather is a co-founder of the Women’s Human Rights Campaign (WHRC), a global organisation launched in New York in the spring of 2019. The Women’s Declaration asserts principles which re-affirm women’s sex-based rights and demonstrates the discrimination against women and girls that results from ‘gender identity.’
Heather gave a paper at the UK launch of the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights in Leeds and was reported to the West Yorkshire Police for ‘hate speech’ by a trans-identified trainer for Trans Leeds, Natasha Handley. The West Yorkshire Police did not eventually charge Heather.
2019: The Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service attempted to prevent publication of Inventing Transgender Children and Young People (2019) through veiled legal threats and the demand that they could vet the transcript before publication. Cambridge Scholars eventually agreed to publish the book on schedule notwithstanding the demands of the Tavistock.
Heather’s Talks and Interviews
2018
2018, January: ‘How transgender identity self-declaration erases women’s rights’
2018, March: ‘PODCAST: Heather Brunskell-Evans wants to talk about the idea of ‘trans kids’
2018, May: ‘A Woman’s Place is Standing Her Ground’
2018, June: ‘Should you be able to self-declare your gender?’
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/the-big-questions/
2019
2019, January: Talks with James Caspian
Part One
Part Two
2019, January: Talk with Julia Hartley Brewer
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/talk-radio-julia-hartley-brewer/
2019, January: ‘Trans Activism vs Feminism (and the Wider World): Heather Brunskell-Evans in Conversation with Julian Vigo’
2019, January: ‘What is a woman anyway?
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/what-is-a-woman-anyway/
2019, February: Haringey ReSisters talk
2019, May: Talk given at UK Launch of the Declaration of Women’s Sexed Based Rights
2019, May: Heather discusses cancelling of women’s free speech with Meghan Murphy
2019, November: ‘Transgender and the New Education Curricula’
2020
2020, July: ‘FiLiA discusses transgendering children with Heather Brunskell-Evans’
2020, October: Podcast with FiLiA: Transgender Body Politics
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/thoughts/podcast-with-filia-transgender-body-politics/
2020, October: In conversation with Kellie-Jay Keen
2020, October: The Raw Report
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/the-raw-report/
2020, October: Savage Minds interview about liberalism, Foucault, and John Stuart Mill
https://savageminds.substack.com/p/heather-brunskell-evans
2020, October: Foucault & Butler for grownups: Heather Brunskell-Evans gets real about Queer Theory. Interview with Graham Linehan
2020, October: Launch of Transgender Body Politics
2020, November: ‘Women’s Rights and Academia in The Age of the Thoughtless Mob’ at Feminist Academics Talk Back! University of Bristol
2020, December: The Mess We’re In: Right Side of History: London’s High Court Declares Children Under 16 Do Not Have Ability to Consent to Puberty Blockers
2021
2021, January: Do Not Adjust Your Set Conference
2021, March: The Mess We’re In. Women Seize the Day
2021, April: ‘First Do No Harm: Liberal Principles Applied to Children with Gender Dysphoria’
2021, May: ‘The Illogicality of Transgender Theory’
2021, May: ‘The True & Faux Foucault’
2021, June: ‘Spinifex Founders in Conversation with Heather Brunskell-Evans’
Writings
2017
2017, November: Statement to the Women’s Equality Party
2018
2018, March: Letter to Times Higher Education: ‘Transgenderism, queer theory and the degradation of academic debate’
2018, April: ‘Quakers and Transgender Inclusion in Meetings’
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/transgender-inclusion-in-meetings/
2018, April: Open letter to Girlguiding published in the Sunday Times
2018, August: Statement on the Green Party
https://filia.org.uk/latest-news/2018/8/29/gu9weovvkuv6bu9f368v5ossflavcw
2018, October: Letter to the Guardian
2018, October: ‘Neo-Liberalism, Patriarchy and The Female Body’
2018, December: ‘A neoliberal concept of freedom has allowed gender identity ideology to take hold’
https://www.feministcurrent.com/2018/12/02/neoliberalism-patriarchy-gender-identity/
2018, December. ‘Children on the operating table’, Kvartal, Sweden
2019
2019, April: ‘A reply to Sally Hines’
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/a-reply-to-sally-hines/
2019, May: UK Launch Declaration of Women’s Sex-based Rights
2019, May: ‘Pink hearts in blue bodies: A proposed law in Sweden will put children on the operating table’
2019, May: ‘Women’s Rights are Human Rights’
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/womens-rights-are-human-rights/
2019, July: ‘Mini-Symposium on Sex and Gender: Foucault and The Construction of Transgender Children’
2019, October: ‘Censored’
2020
2020, January: ‘Transgender children: limits on consent to permanent interventions’, British Medical Journal
2020, June: ‘J.K. Rowling’
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/j-k-rowling/
2020, October: ‘Investigating the Tavistock’
https://savageminds.substack.com/p/the-care-quality-commission
2020, November: ‘Inventing the ‘transboy’
https://www.feministcurrent.com/2020/11/23/inventing-the-transboy/
2020, November: Feminist Academics Talk Back! Transcript of talk given at the University of Bristol, November 2020
http://www.heather-brunskell-evans.co.uk/body-politics/feminist-academics-talk-back/
2021
2021, May: ‘Gendered Intelligence at the Court of Appeal’, Savage Minds
https://savageminds.substack.com/p/gendered-intelligence-at-the-court
Books
Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (Eds) (2018) Transgender Children and Young People: Born in Your Own Body. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne
https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-0398-4
Michele Moore and Heather Brunskell-Evans (Eds) (2019) Inventing Transgender Children and Young People. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne
https://cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-3638-8
Heather Brunskell-Evans (2020) Transgender Body Politics. Spinifex: Australia
Book Chapters
Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (2018) The Fabrication of ‘The Transgender Child’ in Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (Eds) (2018) Transgender Children and Young People: Born in Your Own Body. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Heather Brunskell-Evans (2018) Gendered Mis-Intelligence: The Fabrication of ‘The Transgender Child in Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (Eds) (2018) Transgender Children and Young People: Born in Your Own Body. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Heather Brunskell-Evans and Michele Moore (2019) From ‘Born in Your Own Body’ to ‘Invention’ of ‘The Transgender Child’ in Michele Moore and Heather Brunskell-Evans (Eds) (2019) Inventing Transgender Children and Young People. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Heather Brunskell-Evans (2019) The Tavistock: Inventing ‘The Transgender Child’ in Michele Moore and Heather Brunskell-Evans (Eds) (2019) Inventing Transgender Children and Young People. Cambridge Scholars: Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Journal Articles
Heather Brunskell-Evans (2019) The Medico-Legal Making of ‘The Transgender Child’, Medical Law Review, June 2019
Heather Brunskell-Evans (2021) “The Violence of Postmodern “Gender Identity” Medicine,” Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence: Vol. 6: Iss. 3, Article 8. DOI: 10.23860/dignity.2021.06.03.08