Contents
Anti Trans Arguments & Logical Fallacies
Intro
This article is on the arguments used against trans people by the Gender Critical Movement and logical fallacies they might step into.
I wrote this shortly after the April 16th 2025 changes to The 2010 Equality Act, which is an act that protects employees and the public from discrimination in the workplace and in business practices. Gender reassignment has always been one of the 7 Protected Characteristics, but this change in April meant that Sex pertains to the phenotypical sex assigned at birth, which had the impact of not recognising a trans person’s gender – even with a Gender Reassignment Certificate. The change to this act, alongside anti trans movements outside of the UK, seemed to cause a spike in anti-trans propaganda. This article is simply examining some of the arguments used against trans rights, and logical fallacies those arguments might fall into.
Logical Fallacies
logical fallacies are errors in reasoning that undermine the logic of an argument, and so the integrity of that argument.
Strawman Arguments
A strawman argument either oversimplifies arguments or creates an extreme exaggeration of the argument and then rather than logically arguing with the point itself, argues against this extreme simplified version and defeats it with ease – appearing as though the argument is sound when you just sidestep the point. I notice a few of these within anti-trans media
Get Into The Wrong Toilets
The argument is effectively saying that trans people are sex offenders and the way I phrase that sounds ludicrous – “who thinks that every trans person is a sex offender?” but you’ll see articles against trans people using their choice of toilets with examples of somebody who might be a sex offender and has disputed their gender to try and get away with it.
Sex offenders are dealt with by criminal law. We shouldn’t be changing policies because there are a small number of people who are both trans and sex offenders, because that’s going to be minuscule, a bit like putting security tags on everything in Tesco because there are thieves who steal. Similar examples existed after 9/11 where Islam and terrorism were associated with one another, when just because somebody is a Muslim does not mean that they are extremist and the ones that do will be dealt with by criminal law.
The average innocent trans folk is just trying to access the bathroom for the gender they recognize themselves to be – they are not going into the bathrooms for insidious purposes.
I had an interesting comment on the YouTube Video for this saying that the Gender Critical Movement do not see Trans Folks as sex offenders and I was actually straw manning them, and in response I wonder – Why are people against trans folks using the bathroom of the gender they have transitioned to?
Competitive Advantage
This argument seems to be that trans people are trying to gain a competitive advantage in sport. Parkrun had a lot of controversy because one of the female best times was held by a trans woman, and around this same time Parkrun removed the finishing times from their website (partly in their attempt to rebrand the weekly 5k race from finishing-time focussed speed races to inclusive events that people can run or even walk at their pace). Similarly we had the Olympics last summer and there were posts on socials with different athletes who were either trans or suspected of being so, criticising them as trying to change their gender for a competitive advantage.
The International Olympic Committee showed around one in every 100,000 athletes is trans. It’s not a common thing in the Olympics, and most trans folks are not pro athletes. It’s again, a strawman because we of course want sports to be as fair as possible, and I again – do not think most folks are transitioning to try to get an easier life and edge up on the competition.
Take away cisgender rights & brainwash children
The argument is that trans people are setting a woke agenda to take away cisgendered rights or that they are trying to brainwash children into transitioning at an impressionable stage of life.
Human beings want freedom, and this argument threatens that and the freedom of vulnerable children.
To me, this confuses equality with reasonable adaptions, and oppression of typical cisgendered rights. To give an analogy, lets pretend there are stairs to a shop and we put a wheelchair ramp up them or a lift for disabled access. We haven’t taken away access for abled body people – we have put in reasonable adaptations for disability and that may inconvenience able bodied people (e.g. the stairs aren’t as wide now). So what I’m saying is that reasonable adaptations are convenient, but that doesn’t mean they are taking cisgendered rights. In the same way, a e.g. a gender-neutral toilet isn’t taking toilets away from cisgendered toilets, it’s increasing accessibility. Inclusion doesn’t take away people’s rights – it extends rights to other people. There might be a perception that if we work on inclusion for trans people it might take away from cisgendered people’s rights, but really what we’re talking about is inclusion for another group who were previously excluded.
Inclusion can be uncomfortable. It means facing our prejudices – are we in any way transphobic? Because in order to be inclusive, we need to face those parts of ourselves, as uncomfortable as they might be, and then we can begin to recognize it and move past it, rather than chucking it on other people because we’re too afraid to admit our own prejudices.
It may be that there are examples of trans folks trying to take the rights of cisgender people, but again I think it’s disproportionate in the same way maybe there are children who are being gaslit or brainwashed into being told that they are trans, but the bigger issue is the multitude of children who aren’t allowed to question their gender identity and introject that any gender dysmorphia is to be ashamed of.
When the telescope was first invented and they could look up into the sky and see the stars did the people go “Wow loads of stars have been created?.” No you’ve just got different technology so that you can see the sky better, in the same way if there is more acceptance of a protected characteristic lo and behold that protected characteristic goes up.
Summary
Many of the arguments that are anti-trans are actually just transphobic or logical fallacies, straw men, which are looking at very small portions of people in order to make wide claims which don’t represent the average trans person. I’ve looked at four arguments:
1. Trans people are trying to get into the bathroom they’re not allowed into and that taken to an extreme is logicking that all trans people are sex offenders
2. Trans people are trying to gain a competitive advantage, specifically in sport, which taken to an extreme is saying that all trans people are cheaters.
3. Trans people are trying to take away your rights by looking for inclusion, which taken to an extreme is saying that trans people are a threat.
4. Trans people are trying to brainwash children to recruit them into their cult, which taken to an extreme as saying that trans people are manipulative.
These arguments are often exampled with individuals who prove this, but that doesn’t mean we should extrapolate it to the entire trans community, and to do so would create oppressive views contrary to the average trans person.
These are straw men misrepresenting the trans community based on a couple of individuals or scenarios, some of which have been exaggerated disproportioned or completely made up.
The average trans person has gone through quite the ordeal in order to be recognized and accepted. They’re not looking to in interfere with the rest of humanity, take away rights, or be a threat. They just want to exist and be accepted for the gender they recognize themselves to be.
So when you see other anti-trans propaganda look at it deeper. Don’t just take it on face value. Ask yourself, ‘is this talking about the trans community as a whole, or is this a strawman’?
Likewise, if you see other oppressive media:
– Muslims campaigning for Shariah law or against Christmas
– Refugees with expensive mobile phones coming to take our council houses and benefit money
Question if this accurately portrays the people group it is trying to represent, or if it is a strawman designed to make you dislike a people group.
Bonus Logical Fallacies
If you Google logical fallacies you will find many more of them, so here are three bonus ones.
Ad hominin arguments
You attack the person rather than attacking the point so you might say Boris Johnson’s ideas for covid were wrong because he has silly hair when actually herd immunity was bad because of the science, or you might say Simon’s a counsellor, he’s leftwing, therefore this is why wrote this article and you should distrust the content of it.
A common thing might be posts on social media of somebody who was born male and is early on in their trans journey. They are discovering their style, they’re experimenting with the use of makeup, they might be newly wearing clothing that matches their gender more closely, but this person is just beginning their trans journey – they haven’t started any hormone treatments yet. You may have seen posts on social media about a person like this, who looks much more masculine, and you’ll see critical posts against this person with the underlying message kind of coming across of “
You don’t look like a woman therefore you are wrong to be transitioning”
What a horrible thing to say. Can you imagine if you don’t feel at home in your gender, and you had plucked up the courage to start dressing in a way that feels natural to you. You had started experimenting with makeup, embracing your gender identity, and then your picture gets plastered on the internet and people criticize you for the way you look? If somebody is being brave enough to dress in a way that feels comfortable to them and they’re getting the message that that’s wrong because they’re at the start of their journey, it’s cruel.
Either / Or Arguments
This is where you take a broad spectrum of answers and you simplify it into two binary black and white choices. You might, for example, say you either recycle or otherwise you want the world to burn – when actually you might be fairly positively minded when it comes to green policy but for some reason you don’t recycle.
To apply this to LGBTQ plus rights, you might have heard people say “You are either an ally or an enemy.” And that puts people into two camps – you are either enthusiastically campaigning for equal rights, or otherwise you’re against it.
I don’t think it is a binary though with you either being pro or anti-trans. I think actually there are a huge spectrum of people who are undecided, indifferent, unaware, or just neutral and if we say that you’re either an ally or an enemy this can be problematic because it puts a lot of people in the middle of this spectrum into the enemy camp. The reality is, that if you’re not part of the solution, you can choose to not also be part of the problem, and being supportive doesn’t need you to go on campaigns. It can be as simple as increasing your awareness and acceptance.
Bandwagon or the Ad Popular Arguments
Which is doing something because everyone else is doing it, herd mentality.
With trans examples, I think there is a lot of outrage on both sides- so my suggestion would be don’t be persuaded by whatever the newspaper you read is saying or the agendas of the Equality Act after it was subtly changed on the 16th. Just because something is popular or there seem to be more oppressive trans practices coming in, doesn’t mean that we have to agree with something.
Take time to reflect, look out for fallacies, and see where you stand. Have a think, ‘is this a thing I actually believe? Am I anti-trans? Or is it more that there’s a rhetoric going around that I’m sucking up.
Think about the average trans person who is just trying to be accepted for the gender they are. Are they really so bad? Or has it been swamped up with arguments and rhetorics?
Simon is a Person-Centred Counsellor in Oxford working remotely and in person. He has lived in the county his whole life, and the city for almost 20 years. He appreciates the beauty of the city, nature, and connecting with people to help bring about meaningful change.
He is also a geek – who gets tremendous joy from gaming, crafting, cosplay, and creativity
