You are listening to a stage talk titled Mapping
the Anti -Rights Movement from the US to the
UK. This week Amnesty International, UK's gender
justice director, came in to discuss their research
on the UK's anti -rights movement. From pro -life
arguments to anti -trans rhetoric, voices against
rights that have long been established in the
UK appear to be growing louder. Kiara explained
why you might feel like the UK is following the
footsteps of the US. and what that might mean
over the next few years, as well as highlighting
gaps researchers could cover when it comes to
accountability for these groups. You can find
links to all the resources mentioned in the talk
in the podcast description. This talk was hosted
by me, Charlotte Mar, on Thursday the 12th of
February, 2026, in the Bell and Cap Discord server.
Welcome to this week's Stage Talk. We are joined
by Chiara Caprero, Gender Justice Director at
Amnesty International UK. Last year, Amnesty
shared a research report on the growing anti
-rights movement in the UK, which I've just popped
in the chat for your perusal. It mapped the nature
and finances of 65 anti -rights groups operating
across the UK. Over the next few minutes, Chiara
will unpack the patterns they observed of American
anti -rights rhetoric travelling overseas. and
highlight how they found that the same key actors
are driving the conversation in the UK. This
is not a debate on political views, but a discussion
on how political influence structures manifest
across oceans. Whilst we talk, you can place
your questions in the chat accessible on the
right -hand corner of your screen. But please
remember that this is being audio recorded for
the podcast, so if you do not want me to mention
your username, please add that as a note in your
question and I will absolutely avoid doing that.
Okay. Kiara, over to you. The floor is yours.
Thank you so much, Charlie. Hi, everyone. I'm
really excited to be here. I'm a big fan. So
thanks so much for having me today. As Charlie
said, I work at Amnesty International UK. So
that's the UK branch of Amnesty International.
I've been there for about eight years and my
role focuses on bodily autonomy issues. So that
means policy and advocacy on issues of abortion,
trans rights and sex workers rights. 90 % of
my work is domestic facing, so UK policies and
load. And I've been working on these issues for
about 12 years. So to start with, I wanted to
set the context of where the research kind of
comes from and how it fits in the current context
of the worsening human rights situation in the
UK, because we need to understand the erosion
of LGBT rights, especially trans rights in this
wider context. So if there are people from the
UK, you would know that successive governments
have eroded human rights protections. So we've
had even ever more draconian legislation on asylum
and regression of economic and social rights.
severe restrictions to the right to protest,
especially in the past three, four years, I would
say. And then there is the sort of like ongoing
narrative around taking the UK out of the European
Convention on Human Rights. This kind of comes
and goes. Right now is a time where it's very
much present. So the erosion of LGBT rights and
trans rights as a side needs to be seen in this
context. So the UK used to be the first in the
European ranking of LGBTI equality in 2015, and
now it's 22nd. And the situation of trans people
is one of the main causes of this. Over the past
seven years or so, trans people have been dehumanized,
have been portrayed as the other, a dangerous
other in the media. And I think we're talking
about that tiny, tiny minority who is already
marginalized. There's also another tiny minority
which is people seeking asylum that kind of has
the same treatment in the media. So I'm gonna
talk specifically about gender issues. We kind
of need to see the demonization of minorities
and the otherization of minorities as really
like a very powerful force at play here. So I'm
just going to whisk through a timeline that kind
of again sets the context for the findings. So
the starting point I would say was 2018 when
the government at the time was Theresa May, Prime
Minister, that feels like centuries ago. But
she proposed a reform of the Gender Recognition
Act, which is the law that kind of regulates
how a trans person can have their gender. uh,
slash sex legally recognized, uh, in law. So
the first step to this was a consultation. And
that was the first time that we saw organized
opposition coming together. So you had your,
you know, Christian groups that you would expect,
but we also started to see in kind of like radical
feminist groups or groups that right now we like,
you know, now we would call gender critical,
but sort of like kind of putting trans rights
in opposition to women's rights. So this group
also started to emerge and to converge, and I
think Open Democracy reported on this that their
views were basically the same, so that's quite
interesting. So even though the public response
to this consultation was in favor of reforming,
at the end this reform was shelved because of
the opposition and also then having you know,
government was interested. Another issue that
we've had ongoing is around the use and access
to puberty blocker. So I can't go into detail
on all that has happened since 2018, 2020, but
know that they've been banned for use for gender
dysphoria permanently at the end of 2024. And
then we got to April 2025 with the Supreme Court
judgment. I'm sure people have heard about this,
but this was a judgment, an appeal of a case
brought by a gender critical group against the
Scottish government. And the case itself started
in 2018. So the court ruled that the words sex,
woman, and man must be understood as biological,
by which they mean basically the sex marker that
you have on your birth certificate. for the purposes
of the Equality Act which is our equalities legislation.
So this is a complete departure from how the
law was understood for the past 20 years and
Amnesty UK we intervened as a third party in
the court and we made clear that you know legal
gender recognition is a human rights and the
legislation derives from European court case
law. So from our perspective now with this judgment,
the scope of legal gender recognition has reduced
massively and we consider that we are in a sort
of like pre -legal gender recognition situation.
So the implementation of the judgment is still
unclear, but the exclusion of trans people has
already started on top of rising hate crime and
vilification over the past seven years or so.
So you have big organizations like the Football
Association, for example, they decided, I think
this was in the summer, to exclude the trans
people. And recently we've had important women's
organizations like the Guiding Women's Institute
also decided to exclude trans women. And there
is evidence that in all these cases, legal threat
played a role in this organization making this
decision. So all of this said, why we decided
to do this research? I guess the starting point
is that we find ourselves on the back foot. We've
been firefighting for years and resources for
human rights work are what they are. Definitely
way less than what the anti -rights movement
has. So we know that the opposition exists and
is active, but we don't know exactly who they
are, what they're up to, where do they come from.
We also know that there's money coming in from
the US. This happened during the first Trump
term and is happening now as well. In 2022, I'm
sure people are aware, Roe v. Wade was reversed
in the US and this really galvanized the anti
-abortion movement globally, including in the
UK. And also across the movement, there is little
understanding of how issues of bodily autonomy
really are intersectional. So you have you know,
abortion, reproductive rights, trans rights,
these are all issues that are under the umbrella
of bodily autonomy. So I wanted to look at like
how the anti -rights movement targets these issues
and how we can be better, you know, working together
and fighting back. And another reason was that
small organic face backlash and the action of
anti -rights actors like directly, but they don't
have the resources to do this kind of work. So
we wanted to support the wider movement. So this
was the first time really that amnesty, usually
our research uses other kinds of methodology.
So I work with Claire Provo who is an investigative
journalist so you might know her. She has a lot
of experience in this area. So how did we go
about it? We had two phases of the research.
The first was mapping and the second one was
a follow the money exercise. So in terms of the
mapping, we used a snowball methodology. So we
looked at information available publicly, so
websites, social media, responses to government
consultations. And then we also had interviews
with key actors in the movement that have been
directly affected by these organizations. And
then for the follow the money piece, we looked
at accounts. We consider the expenditure and
not income. This too was to avoid counting assets
and reserves. It's a bit more straightforward.
Other analysts use income, so there's a different
way of going about it. We use expenditure. Looking
at the accounts, the levels of detail was very
variable. There isn't like one requirement to
break down accounts in a specific way, which
again is an issue per se. And levels of detail
vary. So for example, Alliance Defending Freedom,
which I'm going to talk about in a little bit,
just has a lump sum for expenditure and for donations
for income. And I have to say that the findings
were limited to the capacity and budget that
we had. So we certainly didn't cover everything.
And also, ideally, this is an exercise that should
be done on an ongoing basis. Yeah, just keep
ourselves up to date with what the opposition
is up to. So in terms of the findings, in terms
of the mapping, we mapped 65 organisations, three
quarters of which are charities and registered
companies, which I found really shocking. When
you're a charity, you can ask for institutional
funding. So we found evidence that a few of the
crisis pregnancy centres that we found received
the government and national lottery funding,
which shows that there is really either a misunderstanding
or a complete ignorance of what these organizations
actually are. I don't know if people know what
crisis pregnancy centers are, but essentially
they are either like clinics, like kind of brick
and mortar like centers you can go into or helplines.
that kind of market themselves as being neutral
and providing advice, but actually they're run
by anti -choice organizations and they want to
dissuade women and pregnant people from having
an abortion. So we divided the 65 in categories,
but they must be understood as an ecosystem.
So the categories are not watertight. So for
example, anti -abortion groups and what we call
ultra -conservative Christian groups often overlap.
and they share strategies, they share tactics,
they share staff or lawyers. So moving to the
Follow the Money, we looked at five financial
years, so 2019 to 2023, and we were able to look
at the accounts of 32 organizations where there
were accounts available that we could have a
look at. And I'm sure other people with this
methodology know that, of course, we're always
kind of like one financial year behind, right?
So it's always kind of like a retrospective look
at the situation. So this 32 spent 106 million
pounds in those five financial years and the
expenditure grew by over a third. All categories
have increased expenditure considerably. So,
for example, the anti -abortion group by 34%.
the UK branches of US organizations by 46%. And
I just wanted to highlight organizations promoting
so -called conversion therapy, which are 12 in
the mapping, but only four in the follow the
money exercise. So they account for only two
million pounds out of the 160. So it's a very,
very small share, but their expenditure has gone
up by 167%. So this is important because We have
been waiting for legislation to ban conversion
therapy the first time it was announced in 2018.
So successive governments have kept announcing
that this was going to come. We're still waiting.
And in the meantime, it appears that these organizations
are thriving really. So the biggest spender in
terms of the groups that spent more money are
these UK branches of US organizations. So I'm
going to talk about Alliance Defending Freedom,
which I think people have heard of. So they are
an American organization that was established
in the mid 1990s and they're, I guess, infamous
or most famous because they contributed to the
overturn of Roe v Wade, as well as like many
other different cases that are now perhaps that
high profile. So they established in the UK in
2015 as a company, and then they registered as
a charity in 2017. So their expenditure since
2015 has grown by 187%, sorry, since 2019. So
they are investing in the UK more and more. So
far, their main activity has been defending individuals
that have been charged with breaching safe access
zones around abortion clinics. And last summer,
JD Vance commented on one of these cases, making
it an example of how we don't have freedom of
speech anymore in the UK, apparently. So quite
like really extraordinary that a US vice president
comments on like one legal case of one individual
in the UK. So they are very close to the Trump
administration. And recently, I don't know if
people have seen, but the New York Times reported
that ADF has also facilitated Nigel Farage going
to the U .S. Congress to testify again around
freedom of speech, apparently. So why freedom
of speech? The UK context is different for what
concerns abortion, how it is regulated. Here
is parliament that decides. So it's not through
the courts like in the US that you can make changes.
So this organization needed another entry point
and they have converged on freedom of speech.
Another entry point where ADS is not as active
so far, but others are. is France healthcare,
especially for young people. So since 2020, we
have seen a prominent anti -abortion solicitor
by the name of Paul Conray taking, I think, at
least five cases, five legal cases to try to
meet the capacity of under 16 to consent to medical
treatment. This is called the Gillick Principle
in law. You know, if this was restricted, these
outcomes would impact everyone. So not only trans
youth, but also young people wanting to access
abortion and contraception. And this is a wedge
for this movement to get to abortion and contraception.
So they have adopted this strategy, kind of using
a wedge issue rather than going straight for
abortion and contraception, given how different
the political climate is in the UK compared to
the US. The thing I find really frustrating is
that these dots are basically never joined in
mainstream coverage of these issues. So you see,
for example, coverage of these trans health care
cases with named, this solicitor is named, but
nobody kind of joins the dots saying actually
this person is being active trying to reduce
access to abortion as well. And I think that
The same, like lack of joining the dots, unfortunately,
is also part of our movement. The sectors are
very siloed. For example, the reproductive rights
sector and the LGBTI sector in civil society
are very siloed. And there is still disagreement
on trans inclusion. So of course that doesn't
help us fighting back. So I want to move on to
another kind of key actor. a key player in anti
-rights when it comes to the UK. So in the UK,
many anti -rights organizations also called gender
critical are women led. And this provides a really
good kind of cover for legitimacy where you can
say that, you know, this is about women's rights
and protecting women and women and trans people's
rights are incompatible. Of course, we also have
the JK Rowling factor. I'm not going to go into
that. I'm sure everyone is aware of her level
of influence. We've seen this growing exponentially
when we had the general election campaign last
summer. And from looking at these issues for
a few years now, I can say that in this case,
it's the UK gender critical movement that has
influenced the US rather than the other way around.
And the key difference is that, as I said, here
is women led organization, sometimes LGB people
led organization, or, you know, that's what they
say. So that provides more legitimacy, right,
than being like, you know, your evangelical organizations
that you might expect. So this is the key difference
that their policies are the same, but they present
themselves or they are different. So for example,
one of the main gender critical organizations,
Sex Matters, praised Trump's first executive
order on biological truth. I can't remember exactly
what it was called. And this is never kind of
raised as a question that why an organization
that says they support women are actually in
agreement with Trump. So Sex Matters is the main
gender critical charity. They registered in April
2024. So we're still waiting for them to file
their accounts for the first time. They have
a year's time because they're a new charity plus
10 months as like a grace period. So we're still
waiting. It would be really interesting to see
what they look like and also to see the level
of detail that they go to in their accounts.
And sex matters also recently intervened in two
cases around, again, freedom of speech, around
issues of LGBT rights, where Christian Concern,
which is a ultra conservative Christian organization,
represented defendants. So from their perspective,
because it's about freedom of speech, it really
allows them to work with actors where it could
raise questions why they work with these actors.
But the freedom of speech framework really allows
different actors to converge and work together.
They also submitted just last week, I think,
an amicus to the US Supreme Court on this case
on trans inclusion in sports. So they are extremely,
extremely active, even though there are, I think,
three people who are spokespeople for these organizations.
So I'm running a bit out of time, but I just
wanted to conclude by saying that what we see
that is coming up is a constituency of committed
anti -abortion MPs or former MPs convening inside
the reform. So you have people like Dan Hooger
who defected from the Tories or people like Maria
Caulfield who is an anti -choice former MP. She
also joined the reform. And we also have this
Professor James Orr. I didn't know about him.
I haven't heard about him until this summer.
I'm curious to see if people have heard. of him
before, but he's a professor of divinity at Cambridge,
very close to JD Vance. He's against abortion
in any circumstance, and he's now a top advisor
to reform. And it's been interesting to see Farage,
how he positions himself around abortion. So
he has been saying that he's pro -choice, but
the abortion limits are ludicrous, so they should
be lowered. Then a few months ago, he brought
up the Child Benefit Cap, which is a restriction
to social protection, which is responsible for
keeping a lot of families and children in poverty.
So he said, you know, we should lift this cap
so that families can have more children. Of course,
you know, he means white families. This is like
an ethno -nationalist framing. But then two weeks
ago, he said that we should reinstate the cap.
so that we can use the money to provide subsidies
for pubs. So there isn't a coherent ideology
around these issues yet, but of course we're
keeping an eye on what's going on. So I think
I'm going to stop here and I'm looking forward
to the questions. I'll give it back to you, Charlie.
Thank you. Thank you, Chiara. We've already got
a bunch of questions coming in. But I wanted
to ask a question first and foremost, just to
understand the research a little bit better.
How does your team define an organisation as
part of this movement? What kind of characteristics
are important to kind of class an organisation
as part of the anti -rights movement in the UK?
Yeah, that's a really good question. Thank you.
Yes, so by anti -rights actor we mean organizations,
individuals, political parties or member states.
When I mean member states, I mean at the UN level
who actively advocate for the restriction of
human rights. These ones that I've talked about
are often called anti -gender. We call them anti
-rights because they are really against the architecture
of human rights and human rights are universal.
So when you you know, you start clamping down
on bodily autonomy that of course affects rights
across the board. So that's how we define them.
Brilliant. Thank you. We've got a few questions
across the board that I'll ask Icares first.
They said, I know your study is mainly descriptive,
but would you say the motive of these anti -rights
groups is mainly ideological or are there economic,
political motives behind these efforts? Yeah,
this is an excellent question because there are
mixed motivations. So when I talked about the
anti -abortion cool status inside reform, that's
extremely concerning because you have people
who are ideologically committed and then you
have people who are trying to grab power. So
that cocktail is pretty dangerous. So, you know,
in many, for example, trans rights that become
such a political football and been taken up by,
you know, the issues being taken up by politicians
who never said anything about LGBT rights. So
that is clearly a wedge issue. It's something
that they think is going to work with the public
in terms of, you know, quote unquote culture
wars. Instead for others is really they're ideologically
committed on clamping down on LGBT rights. So
there's mixed motivation. There's also, I didn't
have time, but I think a very fascinating aspect
of all of these is individuals. and how they
monetize this kind of activity. So influencers
who have cases of, for example, a couple of people
who have become like, yeah, not famous, but let's
say known in the public sphere because they took
up cases where they argued that they were discriminated
against because of their views. Out of that jumping
point, now they have, you know, huge Twitter
following, they go on GB News, they have their
own blogs, their own podcasts. So this is a very
interesting aspect of anti -rights grifters,
I call them, that I hope to investigate more
in the future. Seeing the same kind of patterns
of those individuals also within the US. As we're
talking about organisations though, Will D601
ask an interesting question, does the legal structure
within the UK compared to the US restrict what
kind of advocacy these groups can perform, i
.e. if they're a charity versus a private company
and tax deductible, deductibility questions for
donors? Is there any difference between the UK
and the US funding that kind of restricts some
of the advocacy that they can do in the UK? I
think in terms, okay, I can't say that I can
answer this in full. I can say how it looks like
in the UK, which is there are different vehicles
for influencing parliamentarians, for example.
So as a charity, you can influence. We are also,
you know, a charity and we try to influence.
There are mechanisms like all party parliamentary
groups with a sort of like interest groups of
MPs. For example, there is a right -life one.
which was chaired by an anti -choice organization.
So that's a good vehicle to kind of like, you
know, get into parliament and start talking to
MPs. I think perhaps, and I'm no expert in this,
but I think perhaps like a big difference is
the level of like electoral funding and how parties
can raise funds ahead of elections. I think the
UK is stricter, but is also kind of seeing more
and more money coming in. So just to give you
an example, there is a donor to LGBT Alliance,
which is an anti -trans LGBT organization, who
is also a top donor to reform. And they provided,
you know, it's not a big sum, it's like 20 ,000
pounds to LGBT Alliance to run their, they have
a helpline. to run the helpline. So it's not
that much money, but you see them kind of coming
together and the sort of, as I said, kind of
like dynamic where you have ideologically committed
people and people were just trying to get in
power. Consider that we have elections in 2029,
but the current government is not doing very
well, so they could happen even sooner. So it's
really prime time to influence right now. Yeah,
and reform do appear to be gaining traction as
well in the UK at the moment. As we're on funding,
actually one of the first questions we got was
you mentioned to follow the money exercise. How
did you conduct that particular exercise? Is
it just a series of web searches or are there
specific tools that you use to look into the
finances? I know you mentioned a few in the talk.
Yeah, so this was essentially going through the
accounts that were available. So that was Charity
Commission and Companies House. So we just used
what was available. As I said, we had limited
capacity. So it was a lot of working with spreadsheets
and tracking the expenditure over five years,
as well as like, you know, increasing percentage.
So it was really with publicly available information
that you find on Charity. Commission website
and Companies House website. We've spoken before
in a stage talk about the nightmare that is Companies
House in terms of finding information on there
and how there's differing reporting on there
and all sorts of things. If anybody fancies taking
some time out to build a fantastic tool to use
Companies House better for open source researchers,
I'm sure that would be very well received. Bellingcat
actually a couple of years ago built a tool for
looking into US corporate data, which is also
difficult to navigate. And I've just posted a
link to that in the chat. So many more questions
coming your way. Can I just add something on
this? So as I said, we looked at 32 out of 65.
three quarters of those mapped were registered
charities or companies. So a lot of them are
micro companies. So they're either completely
exempt from accounts or they just have to file
micro accounts. But I think it's interesting
that you don't need that much money to be very,
very influential. I'll give you an example. There
is a registered company called The Lesbian Project,
and this is to anti -trans. yeah, lesbian activists
and they, you know, yeah, they don't appear to
have a lot of money, but of course they have
their own podcasts, you know, their own columns,
et cetera. But they intervene also in the Supreme
Court case, which is a very, very, you know,
is a very big piece of influence that you can
exercise. So sometimes, yeah, sometimes it's
like particular individuals have a lot of influence,
whether they have gained that recently or they
have it because previously they were already
journalists or lawyers. So I think the money
is a really, really important aspect of it, but
there is also the wider ecosystem of social media.
For example, a lot of these individuals go on
GB News, which as far as I understand, these
are paid appearances. Again, money might not
be that much, but it might be enough to be very,
very influential. That's a really important point.
Thank you for adding that. In terms of funding,
as we're talking about it, Das Wickermann asked
earlier, are there similarities between the overall
structure of funding for these organizations,
especially at the grassroots level, and far -right
extremist groups? Has your organization ever
looked into the comparisons there? We haven't
looked into that. There is an organization in
the UK called the Hope Not Hate and they track
the far right. That's their main job. They have
observed over the past few years that transphobia
has become like a top talking point for the far
right as well. And in their, they keep like Yeah,
just like an index of individuals that they observe.
And one of them is this campaigner called Posey
Parker. That's not her real name, but that's
how she's known. And she's a gender critical
anti -rights activist who has been kind of like
hanging out with what we would call sub -right
more than the other ones who are more of like
a sort of respectable kind of, yeah, veneer,
I would say. But in terms of the funding, I wouldn't
be able to say, but I recommend that you check
out Hope Not Hate. Thanks for sharing that. Moonlight
earlier asked, has Amway appeared anywhere when
following the money? And also have any neurodivergent
related E .G. autism or ADHD ableist organizations
also appeared in your research? I think this
is a question about the crossovers basically.
Sorry, what was the first thing you mentioned?
Amway. A -M -W -A -Y. Amway. And if you've not
heard of them, then I'm guessing they haven't
come across in your research. Okay. No, I haven't
heard of them. In terms of, yeah, I mean, there
are crossovers. It's a complex one because a
lot of the anti -abortion organisations, one
of their points is that basically abortion is
detrimental to the rights of people with disabilities.
This is absolutely not the case and has been
said repeatedly by all human rights bodies. So
I think in that sense, there is an instrumentalization
of people with disabilities. But again, I think
that one of the points here that is like an interesting
angle to look at this from is the sort of economic
policies that not necessarily these people that
I've tracked, but others in this ecosystem promote,
which are essentially small state. And small
spending, of course, this is very detrimental
to people, to disabled people. So, yeah, I wouldn't
say that I found that more than as I just explained,
but it's really interesting. And I just saw in
the chapter that what Anwui is, and I didn't
know, so I had to keep an eye on that. Yes, just
for listeners at home, it means it's a multi
-level marketing company. I think it's called
American Way. But yeah, it's a multi -level marketing
company. It would be interesting to know kind
of, as mentioned, the marketing strands that
come out of maybe some of the investments that
these organizations or these individuals are
taking. We've got quite a few questions to get
through those. So in the interest of time, I'd
like to... Move on. Somebody asked earlier, I
was wondering if you come across any evidence
of British groups operating in Ireland and any
other links between the same? We've spoken a
lot about the crossover between America and the
UK, but is there any crossover closer overseas
between the UK and Ireland? Yeah, that's a really
interesting question. So I assume you're talking
Republic of Ireland rather than Northern Ireland.
So this is not as recent as a few years ago,
but some gender critical British campaigners
tried to organise a tour in Ireland and there
was a very strong and united response from the
feminist movement there. that was basically saying,
you know, set home and don't come here. And it
was framed in, you know, from a decolonial perspective
as well. So the, yeah, the Irish feminist movement
is definitely trans inclusive, but in Northern
Ireland as well is more trans inclusive than
the rest of the country. Really Scotland is...
Yeah, I'm in Scotland and England, but especially
Scotland is where we've seen like a lot of the
big legal cases happening, including the one
that then led to the Supreme Court judgment that
was brought initially by a group called Four
Women Scotland. That's really interesting to
note. Somebody said, it's a pretty horrendous
situation and we currently sat in the back of
the bus as we are being driven off a cliff. My
question is how do we get on the front foot?
When you're thinking about counter strategies,
bearing in mind that we're both from non -partisan
organisations, what are effective long -term
strategies for human rights advocates to counteract
coordinated anti -rights efforts without amplifying
their messages? What would be your advice in
terms of trying to counteract the steps that
these movements are taking? Yeah, that's a million
-dollar question, right? I think that in terms
of strategic long -term picture, for me, the
key one is intersectionality. We're still very
much divided. The crossover between these issues
and, as I said, the demonization of certain groups
is plain to see. is still hard for organizations
kind of working, let's say, with different constituencies
to come together. So that is really, is really
key. I discuss about this a lot, you know, with
colleagues and other people, and this is perhaps
not, it's a more operational thing to do. But
it's kind of somebody talked about leveraging
bureaucracy. So kind of burying them in paperwork
and procedures and try to kind of like slow down
how much, how effective they are. And I thought
this was quite an interesting thing. They do
the same, but definitely to try and keep them
out of specific spaces that could be something
to think about. And then I think continuing to
do this work, monitoring, exposing. And also
I think in terms of the messaging, we still do
a lot of myth busting that doesn't work because
we are repeating their framing and their messaging,
just trying to basically explain why it's not
evidence -based. We really need our own narrative
and I don't think that we're doing as well as
we can right now. And I think really from Amnesty's
perspective, from a human rights perspective,
just making sure that people understand that
human rights are universal. So that means that
if one set of rights, the right to health is
taken away, then all your rights are jeopardized.
And if the rights of a minority are taken away,
then that has repercussions on everyone. So I
think it's challenging because people see, they
might not know a trans person in their life.
They see this as a very politicized marginal
issue to their lives. What many people don't
even think about it. That's the point. This is
like a whipped up moral panic. But yeah, just
trying to educate people on like why this matters
for us, for everyone, I think is also really
important. And then keep being in dialogue. You
know, I think also with COVID, we lost a lot
of like in -person convening. And of course it's
very convenient to have online convening, but
I think having spaces to strategize and think
together and like, you know, grow a relationship
and strengthen the movement is also really, really
important. That being said to the online community,
but absolutely very, very important. It's interesting
that you mentioned kind of the the difficulty
with that kind of fact checking, um, you know,
counter argument steps. So we actually had a
talk on that last two weeks ago, um, by Elliot
Higgins, spelling cat founder and Cornell University's
Dr. Claire Wardle about the rise backlash and
future of counter disinformation. If you missed
that talk, you can listen back to it. It's all
about kind of the decline in effectiveness of,
of kind of verification methods and that kind
of counter argument with facts and how that's
kind of becoming harder and harder as kind of
political views become more entrenched across
social media. A lot of people in the comments
have suggested on the question you just answered,
perhaps targeting the money, particularly from
overseas might be a way to do it. Somebody shared
a telegraph link that was about ministers cracking
down on foreign political donations. Is kind
of cutting off their supply of cash a route to
this? Is that why also that you decided to look
into the financial structures here? Yeah, absolutely.
And I think, again, the point I was trying to
make is that these issues of gender are still
seen as marginal, as niche issues, but they fit
in a bigger picture of, you know, a lot of money
in this case. Democracy for Sale has done a lot
of work on this looking at the foreign influence
on UK politics, including political parties.
So I think that measures that might appear to
be sort of like in broader terms or universal
measures around reducing the influence and the
amount of money that circulates in the system
would also be beneficial for this. So that's
why I'm saying we need to take an intersectional
and universal approach and not be siloed or siloed
ourselves. Sometimes I think unfortunately even
in human rights movements and social justice
movements, issues of gender and bodily autonomy
are considered marginal, but really they are
the canary in the coal mine. And you can see,
you know, in every, well, in the US, of course,
but in other contexts as well, where bodily autonomy
protection has been weakened, that then leads
to further weakening of protections. So definitely,
I think, you know, It's also important to kind
of like keep an eye on what's coming. I think
often we are on the back foot because we don't
necessarily understand what their strategies
are. So for example, in the UK with the anti
-trans gender critical movement, one thing that
they've done really successfully is to go through
employment tribunals. And this is not something
that Amnesty normally would look at. But in this
case, it will be looking at the money that goes
into those cases and how those cases are kind
of framed, how they are represented, how they
are won. That's really, really important. So
sometimes it's something maybe in your periphery,
but trying to kind of... Yeah, think outside
the box and have a look at what's happening that
you might not expect. And of course, following
the money in that is really important as well.
How much control do we have over our own kind
of political stances? Bone Blue Mast, some nations
require its military members to complete training
that is exclusively delivered in the UK, whose
facility policies may restrict transgender personnel's
equal access. Is anyone actively examining this
issue? Have you, on that single point, are you
aware of anybody looking into transgender representation
in the military and cross -border policies on
that? And also how much control do we have over
making sure that our laws and our policies are
followed within our country if the people influencing
them are from different cross -border organisations?
Yeah, on this first point, I'm not aware of anything
related to this in terms of an issue that the
anti -trans movement has taken up. I haven't
heard about this so far. In terms of the influence,
we do have influence in the UK, you know, MPs
are listening to their constituents. So critical
mass when it comes to lobbying your own MP is
really important. But I also think it's about,
you know, resistance and kind of strengthening
the fabric of our communities. It's quite interesting
that, you know, for example, on trans rights
issues, the UK Parliament, Westminster has not
voted on anything, you know, over the past seven
years. But the erosion of rights has happened
and trans people have become this political football.
So sometimes it's not in parliament that we have
to look, it's a community level, it's in our
workplaces where we need to have inclusion and
equality and respect. It's in our schools. The
anti -rights movement is really good at going
through these sort of like side and less kind
of maybe observed or monitored routes. So I think
that now putting all our influence on MPs is
really important. And I think here there is like
US tactics are coming in. For example, trying
to influence schools boards and school governance
has been something that we've seen. We amnesty
also has a big human rights education program,
we work with teachers and we have seen over the
past few years increase, not everywhere of course,
but noticeable increase of parents, parents kind
of contesting relationship and sex education,
contesting LGBTI inclusion in schools. So I think
the micro level of what surrounds you is really,
really important. And sometimes as campaigners
who are very concentrated on parliament. But
what is happening locally is really important
because before it goes to parliament, a lot has
happened already. So you need to start looking
very close to you and to your sphere of influence.
Absolutely. We often talk about the kind of the
legal landscape really defining what happens.
Yeah, it's a whole societal view that we need
to have to understand the wider scope of the
problem. Sonny asked, first of all, I want to
thank you for your work, Kiara. Here's my question.
Since this US -UK network is also very openly
influencing EU far -right groups, I wanted to
ask you if in your opinion, the EU is better
prepared to deal with this on an institutional
level. Thank you so much. Any thoughts on that?
That's a good question. I don't know if the rules
are stronger. I think the situation is different
in the European Parliament because you already
have far -right parties represented. I wouldn't
say that there is something that is so different
in the EU that it kind of insulates them more
than in the UK. But just to give you an example,
this is last week, the Parliamentary Committee
of the Council of Europe was voting on a resolution
around the conversion therapy and Sex Matters
basically emailed, I mean, like, have you seen
their newsletter? So they even support us to
say, we're opposing these and we're working with
this sister organization in the EU. Please contact
your MP, your representative. So there is collaboration
and that's why I think there should be also more
collaboration between MPs and NEPs and politicians
in different countries because it is really happening
across the board. Of course, it's very context
specific, but it's also global. So I think it's
about relationship. I wouldn't know exactly that
there is something that insulates the EU more
than the UK parliament, for example. Final few
questions as we're marking the 10 minutes to
go mark. How would you characterize public awareness
of this anti -rights movement? in general aware
of the fact that there is this kind of overreaching
movement called the anti -rights movement? Is
that broad understanding or is it still kind
of a niche concept when you've looked at reception,
for example, for your report or any campaigning
that you've done? Yeah, I would say it's still
quite niche, like one of the main goals with
the report was raising public awareness. So if
you go to the page, you will see that at the
top, we have done this video for social media
with Deborah Francis White, who is a comedian
and a podcaster, feminist podcaster. And the
whole story behind it was, you know, they're
trying to take us back to the 50s, as she stresses,
like 1950s housewives, they're trying to take
away our right to contraception, the fact that,
you know, women are protected from domestic violence,
et cetera. And when we shared these, we found
that the narrative of the U .S. is trying to
influence us and is trying to, you know, take
us back and remove our rights really resonated.
So I think people still think that the people
who are aware, which I would say is a minority,
but the understanding that people have is really
the US is coming here and they're trying to influence.
Of course, bans on abortions and the erosion
of LGBT rights are much more stark in the US
and also the US is so... ever -present in our
media and political discourse. So I think that
narrative really resonated. One of the things
that I try to do when I'm asked to speak about
this work with the media is to say that we really
need to be aware that this is also UK domestic.
We are deluding ourselves if we just think this
is a US influence. Of course, the US influence
is there and it's huge. It's money and organization
registered in the UK. But there is an ecosystem
that is, you know, was already there. So I think
that, yeah, it's interesting because the US narrative
can be used to raise awareness, but at the same
time, you want people to understand that this
is not just something that is happening, is coming
from the US, and this is not something that is
new. So, yeah, so I think that there is still
work to do. But I think, you know, putting information
out there is really important I've seen the graphs
and our social media being shared. They were
some of the best performing we had last year.
And I think it's because people really want evidence.
They have this feeling that, you know, this is
happening and our rights are being reduced, etc.
It's true. We have this feeling, but really it's
true. And this is the evidence. So I think that
is a powerful tool for people to have, even when
they have conversations with their families or
colleagues, et cetera. Maybe linking to that
point then, you're speaking to a room of researchers
and journalists. What would be the key gaps in
research that you think should be focused on?
Where would you put? the people in this audience's
eyes, for example, over the next five years.
What are the danger zones that we're under reporting?
What should we be looking at? Yeah, thank you
for this question. So one of the things I wanted
to flag is crisis pregnancy centers. So these
are across the country. There's been a BBC Panorama
episode in 2023 where the journalists went undercover.
to expose the centers. But since then, I haven't
seen anything. And according to our analysis,
their expenditure has been growing substantially.
So they have more funds. So definitely, please
look into that. There's also other research done
that I really recommend that people have a look
at, done by the European Parliamentary Forum
on Section Reproductive Rights. And they've been
tracking these movements more in Europe rather
than the UK for a while. And one of the interesting
things they highlighted in their latest report
was that in addition to strategic litigation
and lobbying, which are kind of like the long
-term strategies that these groups have, the
provision of services has increased. So what
they call anti -gender services. So for example,
crisis pregnancy centers as others are. you know,
for example, well, yeah, like third party organizations
that are going to school to explain, to promote
abstinence education rather than, you know, fact
-based sex education. So I think that, yeah,
that is an interesting thing to look at. Some
of these are charities. So we found evidence
that they got some money from National Lottery.
and from the government, especially from a COVID
fund that was supposed to help organizations
kind of keep the doors open during the pandemic.
There are small amounts of money, but they shouldn't
be able to get money. And also we have seen one
of them being contracted by a women's prison.
to provide the services there. So this is also
really concerning. So yeah, definitely look into
that. I think if anyone is able to track the
money on an ongoing basis, also look at income.
That is also always really important. And I think
now that, let's say big, big in the sense of
very influential, not in size. anti -trans charities
are going to start having accounts. I think really
looking into those is really, really critical.
I'm just, you know, we're waiting. I think everyone
is waiting to see this sex matters account. Amazing.
Thank you so much for those tips. really important
and really clear things to look into for the
next few years. If you're interested in some
of these topics within the Discord server, we
do have spaces called anti -LGBTQ plus monitoring,
which is looking at a lot of the anti -trans
movements. We also have obviously a space dedicated
to the EU and the UK as well where you can share
news. And we have a space for far right monitoring
and also disinformation and propaganda, which
are slightly out of the remit of this talk, but
may still be interesting to those who've attended
it. Do check those spaces out. Oh, I also forgot.
We also have a space that covers ableist monitoring
as well, which I can't find at the minute, but
I will link in the chat in a second. Thank you
so much, Kiara, for your time today. We are coming
to time, so I want to make sure that we finish
on the hour. If people want to get in touch with
you, perhaps they want to follow up on your research
or have more questions that they didn't manage
to ask today. What's the best way of getting
in touch with you or your team? Yeah, thank you.
I'm just going to pop my email in the chat. Please
feel free to get in touch. There's also some
information that I'm happy to share that is not
on the website. So if there's anything you want
to know, you have further questions, please get
in touch. I just popped my email in the chat
right now. Amazing. And for those listening back
to the podcast, I'll make sure to include that
as well. All right, thank you everybody who has
joined today. We'll be back in two weeks time
with another stage talk. But for now, thank you
so much, Chiara, for your time and for your amazing
research. Can't wait to dig into it a little
bit more in my own time. And yeah, thank you
everybody for joining. Thank you so much. It
was a pleasure to be with you. Bye, everyone.
Thank you for listening to the stage talk. If
you'd like to catch a stage tour live where you
can ask the guest questions, join the Bellingcat
Discord server by visiting www .discord .gg slash
Bellingcat. The music you've heard is titled
Dawn by Newer Self and is courtesy of Artlist.