Suzy Eddie Izzard blasts right-wing politicians for ‘stoking hatred’: ‘They’ve got it wrong’
Suzy Eddie Izzard has revealed she is open minded when it comes to pronouns people use for her. (Getty Images)
Comedian and Emmy award-winning actor Suzy Eddie Izzard is not here for right-wing politicians who use anti-trans dog-whistles in an attempt at stoking so-called culture wars.
Izzard, who also uses the name Eddie, came out as a trans woman and began using female pronouns back in 2020, after decades spent defining herself as a transvestite.
Ever since, the 61-year-old has been a beacon of hope for British trans people, opening up earlier this year about why she decided to start using the name Suzy. She revealed that she knew she was trans from a young age, and selected ‘Suzy’ as a potential name when she was just 10-years-old.
As well as sharing glowing examples of trans joy, Izzard has also began using her platform to speak up for trans rights, and slamming the right-wing politicians who seem insistent on pushing LGBTQ+ people back into the dark ages.
“Politicians on the right are trying to stoke hatred to create a war. That’s going back to the 1930s,” the Dressed to Kill actor said in an interview with the Evening Standard.
“Some of us are trying to drag the world towards the 2030s and say: live and let live, freedom of speech, tolerance and understanding.”
Politicians worldwide, including UK prime minister Rishi Sunak, US presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis, and Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni, have all resorted to anti-trans rhetoric and policies since gaining power.
Earlier this year, Sunak took the unprecedented decision to block Scotland’s historic gender reform bill, which would have made it simpler and fairer for trans people to change the sex marker on their birth certificates.
While, in recent months, the essential conversation around the need for self-identification for trans people has been reduced to illogical and obsessive debates about whether women “can have a penis”.
In her interview, Suzy Izzard, who made a bid to become a Labour MP in Sheffield back in 2022, refused to be drawn far into the conversation about self-ID, simply stating that those who are spew anti-trans remarks have “got it wrong”.
“I don’t have all the answers… I think we are all human beings on a spectrum: some people say the spectrum is not allowed to exist. I disagree with them. If they are homophobic or transphobic I just think they’ve got it wrong.”
Izzard has previously shared that she did face “heated” backlash after updating her pronouns and changing her name, but that she prefers to “ignore” the “angry people on the internet”.
“I was talking to a gay activist friend of mine from Salt Lake City where they have a great LGBTQ+ group of activists,” Izzard told ITV presenter Lorraine Kelly earlier this year.
“He said: ‘The tough times that trans people are going through now, the arguments – there weren’t any of those arguments 20 years ago.’
“When I came out, no one was talking at all about trans people; we were non-verbal, ‘the other’.
“This idea of culture wars, I think it’s the right wing – 90 to 95 per cent of the country, of the world are just saying ‘live and let live’; you’re being your authentic self.
“And then there’s two to five per cent of people who get very angry on the internet, which I just ignore.”
While the discourse roars on in Parliament and online, Suzy Izzard is keeping herself busy by starring in her one woman show, Great Expectations, which is on at London’s Garrick Theatre until 1 July.
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