Are you "hideously transphobic"? A thread about beards, a gay rights icon, a best selling novelist, and a twitter spat that's a tale of our times. Earlier this week @PinkNews which is to factual accuracy what the Beano is to, say, epidemiology, denounced @jk_rowling (again).

2./ The writer had DARED to like a tweet by @FredSargeant the gay rights icon. He's loathed by gender activists because he insists in correcting their rewriting of the history of gay rights, in particular the Stonewall riots. In the rewrite the riots were led by transwomen.

3./ Fred denies this fabrication. Annoyingly for his opponents he happens to know more about Stonewall than almost anyone alive because he and his lesbian and gay male comrades were actually there. This is a great piece about the rewriting of Stonewall. https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/transgendering-stonewall

4./ By the way if you want to hear more from Fred directly you can see him in a wonderful convo with @BevJacksonAuth on Youtube where he pays fulsome tribute to the strong women (of the actual biological sort) who helped win all gay peeps our rights.

5./ Fred's tweet that caused such a storm in a T-cup was about Alex Drummond, the trans activist and "mentor" who goes into schools to talk to kids about "her" life as an...err.. lesbian. You may have noticed Alex actually looks nothing like a lesbian. https://twitter.com/FredSargeant/status/1261225513122779137?s=20

6./ Alex has had neither surgery nor hormones. And as for that beard, here's Alex claiming it "deconstructs gender". That may sound like just some harmless if hilarious academic theory. But for kids in schools and for young lesbians in particular it's far from funny.

7./ At most schools being a young lesbian is still difficult and confusing. Going into schools as Alex does and telling kids that lesbians look and behave like Alex, (ie almost indistinguishable from a bloke) isn't deconstructing anything except young lesbians' confidence.

8./ I know I'm banging on about the beard and for @PinkNews this might be cited as more proof of "hideous transphobia" because apparently Alex "has become a point of fixation for transphobic activists online because she has a beard". But here's why that beard actually matters.

9./ Partly, it's an insult to women and lesbians because Alex seems to care so little about the club "she" says "she's" joined (the women one) "she" can't even be bothered to shave. But it also reminds us of a key problem with transwomen's access to single sex spaces.

10./ It's true that in the past a tiny number of transsexuals accessed women's spaces. It wasn't strictly legal but it mostly passed without much comment. That's cos they often looked "like women", most had had surgery and actual women wanted to be kind. Then along came Alex.

11./ Alex and other trans activists who want to "deconstruct gender" have redefined trans to mean almost anything from cross-dressing to "gender queer"But that now means lots of people who often look just like Alex expect and demand access to single sex spaces.

12./ So how would we know if someone who looks like a bloke with a beard IS trans like Alex or just a non-trans bloke who wants to hang out in girls changing rooms? The answer from supporters of trans access to single sex spaces is we should just assume they're trans. Always

13./ If you think that's naive & dangerous are you unwittingly half-way to hideous transphobia? Maybe not. For here's an intriguing thing: @PinkNews regularly interviews @jammi_dodger94 a trans man activist who appears to have a similar attitude to blokes with beards to us.

14./ I like Jamie who has 400K+ subscribers on Youtube. He's engaging and funny even when talking obvious nonsense such as sounding surprised that trans men who are biologically female like "him" can have periods. Knock me down with a tampon.

15./ In this video Jamie claims the likes of @ALLIANCELGB argue he and his female partner must be lesbians. We'd NEVER presume to describe people's relationships but interestingly Jamie's proof they cannot be lesbians is because he says they OBVIOUSLY don't LOOK like lesbians.

16./ In other words Jamie looks too much like a bloke with a beard possibly to be a lesbian. But if looking like a bloke with a beard makes you obviously NOT a lesbian how can Alex Drummond be a lesbian? Jamie then talks about single sex spaces.

17./ Jamie says trans women should have the right to go into women's spaces. His proof? As a biological female he says HE could go into women's spaces but he wouldn't. Why? "Can you imagine ME going into a women's bathroom. I don't think they would be happy". Well, why not Jamie?

18./ Jamie clearly assumes women would not be happy if "he" went into women's bathrooms because "he" doesn't LOOK anything like a woman. So why on earth would women be happy if Alex Drummond and other blokey looking peeps entered their spaces? Bearded or otherwise.

19./ So does all this mean that Jamie and Pink News who regularly feature him are also "hideously transphobic"? Let's hope not. Maybe, it just reminds us trans activism's arguments are now so full of contradictions it's almost impossible NOT to fall foul of them eventually.

20./ Some of those contradictions might be resolved if gender activists were willing to debate with their critics. Instead, inside their own sealed bubble absurdities multiply and the obsessive policing of discussion feeds purity spirals that deny even logical consistency.

21./ That's a shame. Any movement, even the gender identity movement, can develop interesting insights, and fascinating new perspectives. Right now these are being crowded out by a culture of compulsory affirmation, denunciation and a refusal to take child safeguarding seriously.

22./ As for declaring war on the rights of women, this is a strategic mistake of historic proportions. In the long run you can't beat 51% of the population no matter how many women you bully and no matter how many kids you confuse or try to medicalise.

23./ The angry righteousness is also a disaster for trans people. If a trans-friendly author liking a tweet by a trans- friendly gay rights icon is a form of "hideous transphobia" then what on earth isn't? With this lack of proportion almost anything can fall under that rubric.

24./ Ironically it's @PinkNews and its army of triggered witchfinders who are now normalising transphobia by finding it everywhere they look. They're the ones who've unwittingly become the real danger to trans people who deserve nothing but our respect, love and concern.