It’s been a while since I last wrote a blog post, and so it’s about time for a new one. However, as this may be the first blog post of mine that some people may read, I’m likely to cover some things that I have covered in some of my writing elsewhere. But the main point of this post is to reflect on what life is presently like for me, as a trans woman in Britain, and what changes I would like to see.

I was born in the eighties, and I had an awareness that I was trans when I was as young as 5. I didn’t know what to call it then, and trans issues weren’t spoken about. I didn’t tell anyone about it as I didn’t have a way to do so. But it was still there – a part of me that always knew that I should have been a girl.

This feeling never went away, and only grew stronger as I got older. And this was during the time when Section 28 was in place, when schools were prohibited from “promoting” LGBT+ issues.

It was many years later until I finally came out, in 2014, when I was 33, and felt that I couldn’t keep it a secret any longer. Even then, it took a while before I fully came out everywhere, and it wasn’t until 2016 that I came out at work.

At the time I worked for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). To the best of anyone’s knowledge, I was their first openly transgender member of staff. And I got a lot of support from my colleagues, including from every level of management above me – from my direct line manager, right up to the PUS, the top Civil Servant at the FCO, Simon McDonald (now Lord McDonald). Many years later Simon said, “As Sophie’s boss, all I had to do was act like a decent human being, and see her and treat her for who she is.”

I finally felt comfortable enough to live as my true, authentic self. Things weren’t perfect for trans people in Britain, but I felt like they were improving.

However, that has all changed in the 2020’s, as today trans people are regularly vilified. People who oppose trans rights, and even the very existence of trans people, regularly try to paint us as a threat to women and girls.

Take the issue of access to toilets. After I came out I started using the ladies toilets when out in public. I felt safer in there than I would have done had I used the gents, given the hostile reactions that some men have had to my appearance. And there were never any incidents when I did use the ladies.

Now we have new guidance set to come into force banning trans women like myself from such spaces, forcing us into either male spaces (where we may not be safe), or to seek out third spaces (which may not always be present). Despite there being no widespread issues of men going into female spaces to assault women.

Now, at this point, there are probably people with “gender critical” views reading this who are twitching, and wanting to make comments where they bring up examples where a trans woman has assaulted women or girls. I’m not going to pretend that all trans women are perfect. I’m not going to deny the fact that there have been some trans women who have committed serious offences against women and girls. But the vast majority of trans women, like myself, are not sex offenders, and have no desire to harm anyone.

Amongst any subset of people there will be examples of some people who behave appallingly. For example, there have been cases of cisgender women who have committed serious sexual offences against other women, and children. One such case is that of Nicola Murray. She was a prominent campaigner for domestic abuse victims in Scotland. However, in 2025, she was convicted for the physical, psychological, and sexual abuse of four children.

Should we judge all cisgender women based on the crimes of people like Nicola Murray? No, of course we shouldn’t. So why are all trans women being judged by the crimes of a few?

The new guidance that is about to come into force is going to do little to reduce cases of violence against women and girls. Any cisgender man determined to assault women and girls in the ladies toilets will still find a way to do so – for example, such a man may pose as a cleaner in order to enter such toilets, as there are many that have signs up saying that the toilets are cleaned by male and female attendants.

That’s not to say that women shouldn’t get angry when such cases occur. They shouldn’t have to tolerate them. But demonising all trans women is not the way forward. Marginalising us and placing us in harm’s way (by trying to force us into male spaces) will result in harm to trans women, including making some trans women feel that they can’t go out in public at all. Everyone has the right to be safe. The main threat to all women, cisgender and transgender, comes from cisgender men.

I have been a victim of abuse from cisgender men on multiple occasions.

In March 2018 I went out to buy milk – a normal everyday activity that doesn’t present any threat to women and girls. However, I was accosted by a man, who grabbed my arm, and ended up repeatedly spitting in my face. He was arrested the same day, pled Guilty when he appeared in court a few days later, and sentenced to 16 weeks in prison.

In June 2021 I was posting some letters at a letterbox – again, a normal everyday activity that doesn’t present any threat to women and girls. However, I was then approached by an abusive man who was filming me on his phone. When I told him his behaviour was unacceptable he revealed that he had a weapon on him – at the time I believed it to be a knife which he was prepared to use. (It subsequently turned out to be half a pair of secateurs, but that can still cause serious harm and he had shown it to me to threaten me.) He was arrested on the same day. When he eventually appeared in court he initially pled Not Guilty. A trial date was set, and I subsequently attended court prepared to give evidence against him. However, he then decided to change his plea to Guilty. The magistrates felt the case was serious enough to be referred to a Crown Court for sentencing, where the man was sentenced to eight months in prison.

In August 2025 I was standing on a train platform, on my way to meet a friend. Once again, I wasn’t doing anything that presented a threat to women and girls. It was an unfamiliar part of London to me, and I was looking up at a platform information board, to make sure I was in the right place for the train I needed to take next. As I was doing so a man came up behind me and groped my leg and buttock. He walked past me, turned around and came back, where he then proceeded to lift up my skirt. He then told me that I should throw myself in front of the next train to come into the station. Other people came to my aid, directing the man’s attention away from me, until station staff came and removed him from the station. I reported the matter to the British Transport Police, who proceeded to obtain CCTV footage from the station, which showed the whole incident. However, they were unable to identify the man – he hadn’t used a card to get through the barriers (barging his way through instead), and they had hoped to trace him through such a card. The man remains at large.

Whilst I admit that I don’t have any statistics to hand, I feel confident in saying that trans women are far more likely to be the victims of abuse than the perpetrators of it.

And yet in the media and online many people seek to vilify trans people.

In April 2025, when the Supreme Court ruling about the definition of “women” for the purposes of the Equality Act came out, a protest was quickly arranged, where a large number of people gathered in Parliament Square. I was one of them. The protest was largely peaceful, and the fact that so many people gathered together at short notice showed the strength of feeling that there was against this ruling.

Unfortunately, there were some people who vandalised some statues at the protest. Whilst I don’t condone vandalising statues, it is far from the worst thing someone could do at a protest – we didn’t set fire to any buildings, and we didn’t attack the police and send police officers to hospital.

I live in Harrow, and a local news website, Harrow Online, chose to cover the story. The headline is “Statues vandalised during trans rights protest in London – police appeal for information”. The story itself has little to do with Harrow. The main focus of the story was on the vandalism of statues. It briefly mentions why the protest took place, but doesn’t seek to show the views of trans people. It mentions that a debate about the Supreme Court ruling had been taking place on their Facebook page, but doesn’t share any of the views expressed there. The story comes across as one sided, trying to paint trans people as bad people, despite the fact that the vast majority of the people at the protest didn’t vandalise any statues. Harrow Online could have sought to interview trans people in Harrow, or anyone in Harrow who attended the protest, to get their views and share those views in its story, but it chose not to do so.

On social media there were plenty of people seeking to vilify trans people. I saw one person claim that trans women were planning to urinate en masse in Parliament Square at this protest. No such mass urination took place, nor did I see, in any of the various online trans groups that I’m in, any plans or any suggestions for any such action. But it didn’t stop someone claiming that it was going to happen, in order to try and paint trans women as disgusting people. (When claims like this are made, it would not surprise me if they are “false flag” incidents – it’s possible that someone with gender critical views went online posing as a trans woman and made outrageous claims and suggestions such as those described above, and then other people with gender critical views see this and believe it to be the views of actual trans women, because it supposedly confirms their hateful views of trans women.)

So, what am I doing to try and improve things for trans women? Back in April 2025 I wrote a detailed letter about the Supreme Court ruling to my MP, Gareth Thomas.

I received a response from him which read like a stock reply, and didn’t address the specific questions that I had raised. He did say, “It is essential that people in positions of authority, such as politicians, speak out about the importance of treating everybody with dignity and respect.” He went on to reiterate what the Supreme Court had said, that their ruling was not about the triumph of one group over another, and that trans people are still protected in law, and “should be able to live their lives free of harassment and discrimination.”

I then wrote a second letter to Gareth, reiterating some of my previous points, and pointing out a motion that had been passed by his local party back when I was a member of it. 

He didn’t write a response to this second letter, but, in September 2025 I did meet with him face-to-face to discuss these issues with him. I reiterated the same points that I made in my letters, and made the point that the Government should be making it clear that trans people are more likely to be the victims of abuse than the perpetrators of it. At the time of our meeting he said he did not know where things stood on the forthcoming guidance, and that he had written to a minister to find out more. I spoke to him about the hateful rhetoric about trans people that can be found on social media, and he agreed that, despite people having freedom of speech, they should not be allowed to advocate for violence against any group of people.

As already alluded to, I am involved in local politics in Harrow. I am a member of the Harrow Green Party, and in the recent local elections I stood as a candidate in the Greenhill ward. (And, before anyone feels the need to point it out, yes, I was Sophie Green, for the Green Party, in Greenhill ward! I am very Green…) Sadly, although not unexpectedly, when my candidature was publicly announced by the local party, it attracted a lot of unpleasant comments. There were people commenting on my appearance, and people trying to guess what my birth name was. There was someone claiming my IQ didn’t reach double figures. There was someone else telling me to seek psychiatric help. Most hurtful of all is where people tried to imply that I was a child sex offender – I have always taken child safeguarding seriously (such as when I worked in local schools), and I have no desire to do anything to harm a child.

Fortunately, the Harrow Green Party has been supportive of me and doesn’t tolerate hate like this. And there were comments in support of me as well. Unfortunately, I wasn’t elected on this occasion. However, I will continue to work with the Green Party to promote trans rights and trans acceptance.

Many people with gender critical views will say that they are fighting to protect women’s rights. However, making disparaging comments about my appearance and intelligence has nothing to do with protecting women’s rights – it is just mean, and unwarranted. Women’s rights should not be viewed as being in conflict with trans rights. If someone supports trans rights it does not mean that they want to roll back rights for women. All women – cisgender and transgender – have the right to live freely and safely. Attacking trans women isn’t going to tackle the real threat that all women face, the real source of violence against women and girls, which is the behaviour of cisgender men.

Now, I’m not saying all cisgender men, or even a majority of them, are bad people. But the vast majority of instances of violence committed against women and girls are carried out by cisgender men. Focusing on attacking trans women is not going to address that. Take the example of the man who sexually assaulted me on the train platform last summer. He thought it was OK to assault me, and so he may well feel that it’s acceptable to assault cisgender women as well (he may not have realised that I was trans when he first approached me from behind). Everyone should be working together to challenge behaviour like this. It is not trans women who are posing a threat to women, it is cisgender men like the one described here.

Fortunately, there are many cisgender women who are supportive of trans rights. The project Not In Our Name (NION) is a collective of cisgender women who “reject the weaponisation of [their] identities to justify discrimination.” They have gathered over 100,000 signatures of cisgender women who “reject – completely and categorically – the active discrimination and exclusion of trans, non-binary and gender-diverse people.” The views of these women need to be heard loud and clear by everyone in our society.

People with gender critical views will often ask trans people, “What rights do you want that you don’t already have?”, highlighting that we are already protected in law. But, for me, whilst legal rights are important, what really needs to be addressed are people’s attitudes to trans people. To stop seeing trans people as perverts and sex offenders when the vast majority of us are not. To stop making disparaging comments whenever they see a trans person, whether online or in person. And to stop trying to treat trans people as an enemy to be defeated and eradicated.

I want to be able to go out and buy milk without having someone spit in my face.

I want to be able to post some letters without someone threatening me with a weapon.

I want to be able to stand on a train platform without being sexually assaulted and then told to kill myself.

I, like all people, want to be able to live my life freely, and without harassment.

Trans people exist. No matter what guidance is put in place, or what laws are passed, or how many hateful comments are made about us in the media and online, trans people will not be going anywhere. What we want is to be treated with dignity and respect.

I will continue to fight for these ideals, and I invite everyone to join me in doing so.

Speak up for trans people.

Speak out against hatred.

And build a safe and tolerant society for all.