Cabaret group and furries to drown out Posie Parker’s latest anti-trans rally with song and dance

An event by notorious anti-trans activist Kellie-Jay Keen, known by alias Posie Parker, will be met with counter-protesters from Cabaret Against The Hate Speech and Furries Against Fascism.

Posie Parker, one of Britain’s most vocal “gender critical” activists, is bringing her “Let Women Speak” tour to Glasgow on 5 February.

At a previous stop on the tour, on 16 January, a “gender critical” activist was heard quoting from Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

The Glasgow event will be met with a counterprotest organised by Cabaret Against The Hate Speech – an ally and LGBTQ+ group that challenges hate speech in Scotland with live music and dance.

The group called for people to bring their “best singing voices and dance moves” to challenge the anti-trans activist’s event, and have also announced that they’re being joined by a group of people in the furry community. 

https://twitter.com/cabaretagainst/status/1617195401743843330

The term ‘furry’ describes a diverse community of people – from role players to artists and gamers – who are part of a fandom that spans online, local and international boundaries. Many furries create an anthropomorphised animal persona (fursona) with whom they identify and can be used as an avatar as they navigate the community.

Furries Against Fascism is “just a group of people who want to support trans rights and dance”, one member told PinkNews, and isn’t an “organised group beyond this one counter-protest”.

The group had been discussing how they could join the Cabaret counter-protest when someone suggested the name.

“They’ve essentially promised everyone a dance party in favour of trans people and for a very LGBTQ+ friendly community that loves to dance, this was perfect,” the member said.

“They are protesting with loud, joyful music against someone who brings hatred of trans people wherever she goes.”

Of Posie Parker, she added: “She doesn’t care about the struggles trans people face. So spreading joy despite her hatred is the best thing in my opinion.”

“A lot of the discussions about the trans community in the media are had by cis people discussing trans rights and lives and do not give trans people the chance to talk for themselves,” she added. 

“While discussions about the struggles trans people face are important and should be led by trans people, if I were given a platform, I would speak about trans joy, about the love and community trans people have, about the happiness that comes with being trans.”

Furry is not a sexuality or gender. Fundamentally, it’s a community of people with a shared interest, but there is a large number of people in the furry community who are also part of the LGBTQ+ community.

In a 2020 online survey with over 550 respondents from 40 countries, only about 10 per cent of furries identify as exclusively heterosexual. When looking at the demographics, it’s apparent there is an overwhelming number of gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual and other queer folks within the furry community.

A spokesperson for Cabaret Against The Hate Speech says the goal of the counter-protest is to “celebrate and challenge hate and be a positive presence”. 

“It’s just to challenge the hate in a joyful way, celebrate our community, share the love of music that we have altogether and use our voices in a positive way,” they said. “Because these people that don’t like us so viscerally aren’t going to change their minds by being shouted at.”

The spokesperson for Cabaret Against The Hate Speech added that there’s been “so much misinformation and lies” spread around trans people and Scotland’s gender recognition reform efforts.

Holyrood passed the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) bill in December, which was to remove some of the barriers trans people face while trying to get a Gender Recognition Certificate, but Westminster blocked the bill from becoming law in January. 

It was an unprecedented move, and it rightly outraged many Scottish politicians, LGBTQ+ advocates and trans allies.  

https://twitter.com/cabaretagainst/status/1615943471893827585

The Cabaret’s spokesperson hopes that people looking at the counter-protest will see the group is “there simply to sing together” as a community, challenge hate and show “we will still exist” no matter what. 

“We will exist whether you like it or not, whether you try to take away our rights or not,” they say. “We will still celebrate and be joyful no matter what you say about us or do to us.”

Posie Parker campaigns under her “Standing For Women” banner, which positions trans rights as in opposition to women’s rights.

Her Let Women Speak events are regularly met with fierce opposition from trans rights protesters.

At a Newcastle rally on 16 January, a speaker identified as UK Guild of Hypnosis Practitioners (UKGH) chair Lisa Morgan, told the assembled crowd: “I know about language, and I know that this [gestures to counter-protesters] is based on something that we call the big lie. 

“Do you know the big lie? The big lie was first described by Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf.

“The big lie is such a big lie that ordinary people like us think, ‘Well, that can’t be a lie because I would never tell such a big lie as that. We only lie in small ways.’”

She added: “The big lie is that trans women are women. But they’re not are they? They’re men and we know that.”