TV Host Schools Trans Guest Who Insists on 'They/Them' Pronouns: 'You Don't Get to Require Me to Use Incorrect Grammar'
Tensions flared when a trans activist demanded that a host on Britain’s TalkTV use her preferred pronouns.
Shivani Dave, a self-described journalist, broadcaster and physicist who identifies as transgender, was invited on TalkTV to discuss a recent report on medical and social services for children who identify as transgender in England.
TalkTV host Julia Hartley-Brewer introduced Dave, a biological female, as “she.”
Dave took offense to this, immediately instructing Hartley-Brewer that “[her] pronouns are they/them.”
Hartley-Brewer was quick to fire back. “Thank you for telling me your pronouns. I use correct grammar,” she said.
She went on to call out Dave’s attempt at curtailing her speech.
“You don’t get to require me to use incorrect grammar,” Hartley-Brewer said. “You’re not a plural, you’re one person.”
When Dave said that she wanted people to “refer to her correctly,” Hartley-Brewer asked if it was “disrespectful to use factual correct grammar.”
Dave indicated Hartley-Brewer was out of line because Dave is “not a single woman. I’m a very special non-binary trans person.”
Dave was on to discuss the recently published report on transgender health services, referred to as the Cass Review, authored by English pediatrician Dr. Hilary Cass.
The 259-page report, commissioned by NHS England in 2020, sought to make recommendations on questions relating to the provision of services for children struggling with their gender identities.
Cass found that there is little long-term evidence that shows the benefit of medical interventions, particularly puberty blockers, for children under the age of 18 who identify as transgender. Cass also stated that there remains uncertainty about the overall impact that these interventions will have on young children.
Cass also noted that there are serious questions that remain as to the long-term effects of puberty blockers, and that such hormones should be further researched before they are given to children.
Dave suggested that Cass’s findings show that more research would be “massively beneficial” for the progress of transgender healthcare, and that some of Cass’s conclusions could help transgender children “if implemented correctly,” although she didn’t specify what she meant by this.
While the hostilities seemed to diffuse for a moment, the discussion heated back up when Hartley-Brewer stated she “[doesn’t] accept that there is any such thing as a trans child.”
Dave stated that it was “amazing” that someone with Hartley-Brewer’s opinion was not a doctor in charge of services for children who identify as transgender.
“You don’t have to be a doctor to know that no one is born in the wrong body,” Hartley-Brewer responded.
Dave and Hartley-Brewer continued to go back and forth for the remainder of the segment.
This exchange shows how people have had enough with trans activists trying to control the way people think and speak.
They bash others as being disrespectful bigots if they use what everyone accepted as proper grammar for much of history until just a few years ago.
No one is going to listen to people who demand respect when they are not being respectful themselves. As Hartley-Brewer pointed out, “respect works both ways.”
What this exchange really highlights is how Western culture has descended into a pit of relativism. Objective truths must now yield to the subjective ‘truths.’
In effect, this means that there is no such thing as truth anymore. Truth is whatever someone wants it to be on a given day.
In this instance, even when confronted with a study that found no evidence that puberty blockers and social transitioning help children struggling with their gender identities, Dave seemed to brush away any concerns.
If it doesn’t fit the narrative, then it doesn’t matter.
It’s hard to see how trans activists and others who hold this view don’t understand how this is detrimental to our society.
If everyone is free to make up their own truths, which cannot be challenged and must be respected, what hope can we have in the path our society is heading?
We desperately need to stand up for the actual truth, as Hartley-Brewer did here, and refuse to back down. It’s the only thing that is going to get our society back on track.
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