Prejudice and equality

Abigail Maxwell writes about transphobia

by Abigail Maxwell 5th May 2017

My Friend prefers First Class on the train, especially after a group of youths in the vestibule began shouting abuse. ‘It’s a Tranny!’ And: ‘It’s a Man!’ They kept shouting until they got off the train. That might be described as societal transphobia, where boisterous young men think that men in dresses are ridiculous, and should be ridiculed. But some people have a similar and disproportionate response to transsexual or transgender people akin to arachnophobes’ reaction to spiders.