April 19, 2024
I recently launched a series called FFS (Female Free Speech) Friday. Today’s post honors Sall Grover, an Australian woman who has been taken to court for refusing to allow a man to join her female-only app and who is refusing to stay silent.
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In 2020, Grover founded Giggle for Girls—a mobile women-only social networking app. It was intended as a platform centered around women connecting with, and supporting, other women. The purpose was to provide an app that allowed women to connect with each other safely.
In 2021, a man named Roxanne Tickle complained to the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) that he had been removed from the app, alleging that the removal constituted discrimination against him because he claims to “identify as a woman.”
This is him:
Photo: The Daily Aus
Photo: The Sydney Morning Herald
Photo: The Post Millennial
The AHRC offered conciliation between the parties, one condition of which was that Grover would agree to undergo “sex and gender reeducation” and allow men who claim to have woman identities to use the app. She refused.
In December 2022, he filed a lawsuit in federal court. He is seeking damages and aggravated damages amounting to $200,000.
According to a crowdfunder set up to cover legal fees:
The Federal Court of Australia is set to hear a landmark case that tests the boundaries of the Sex Discrimination Act as it relates to CEDAW, with significant international consequences. The applicant, Roxanne Tickle, is biologically male and legally recognised as female on his Queensland issued birth certificate. He alleges that Giggle for Girls Pty Ltd, the respondent, has discriminated against him based on his appearance not aligning with societal expectations of women who are biologically female.
This case is the first of its kind and holds considerable international significance, as it is the first to scrutinise the application of the Sex Discrimination Act focus on eliminating gender stereotypes, in the context of CEDAW, to the harmful entrenchment of those same stereotypes by gender-identity ideology. The case’s outcome will be a touchstone for whether gender identity can be accommodated when it conflicts with sex-based rights in the digital age, especially in sex-specific spaces. It will potentially set a global precedent.
In its recently filed legal submissions and evidence, which includes expert evidence from Dr Helen Joyce, Dr Kathleen Stock and Dr Colin Wright, the respondent argues that its policy is in the spirit of CEDAW and hence the Sex Discrimination Act, by aiming to protect and promote women's rights and well-being by providing a safe, women-only space. This case, thus, stands at the crossroads of domestic legislation's implementation of international agreements promoting women’s rights and the international insidious advance of gender identity ideology.
The decision by the Federal Court will have far-reaching implications, likely influencing not only the Australian legal system but also international law and policy regarding the intersection of gender identity and sex-based rights. It will serve as a crucial reference for future legal frameworks and discussions on sex discrimination and sex-based rights, and their direct conflict with gender-identity ideology worldwide.
Heading into the hearings, Sall gave an interview with Sky News Australia, where she explained that allowing men to claim to be women is a disaster for women’s rights and that it’s also:
a disaster for freedom of speech, freedom of belief, and of association, and if we don’t have those in a secular liberal society, we don’t have anything.
Throughout the hearings, which took place over the course of the past few weeks, Grover consistently refused to bend to the idea that Tickle is any form of woman. She consistently told the court that she would not address him as “Ms.” and that even if he claims to be female, she will see him as a man. I’m not sure when her legal team is expecting a ruling, but I’ll be looking out for it.
Sall has said repeatedly that she is being taken to court for saying no to a man. I don’t know who made this t-shirt featuring an image of Sall and the word “NO,” but I’ll be sure to buy one:
Sall, thanks for speaking out for women and girls as a sex class. Today’s FFS Friday is for you.
Sall Grover is a SUPERB choice for this great series of yours, Kara!
The ruling will be made before May 7th, as the Judge will be taking up another position after that.