Unfortunately the "self-absorbed twaddle" appeared to go unrecognised as such by some female students. Bradley is performing at the Manchester SU Women's Campaign in the video above. Many of the male students with non-binary/trans identities who gained influence in NUS did so via Women's platforms and presumably with the support of sufficient numbers of female students.
April 2018 thread discussing a workshop at NUS Women's 18, 'How to Deal With Terfs' led by Rowan Davis and Eden Ladley precipitated awareness of the incident with Emma Healey (former Mumsnet intern/ data breach).
From the workshop's powerpoint 'Recommended reading' described by Davis and Ladley as 'a really good guide that outlines common TERF arguments": theterfs.com
(extract)
"TIP: In the same way anti-gay groups claim to be “Christian” (WBC), TERFs attempt to spread anti-trans animus by passing it off as a brand of feminism, usually “Radical Feminism” or so-called “Gender Critical Feminism.”
TIP: Like anti-gay groups, TERFs often assert that they don’t “hate” trans people.
In the 1980s, TERFs substantively supported the effort to bring an end to trans health care access. One TERF operative wrote a government report which led the the revocation of public and private insurance converge of trans medical care. According to the State of California, such policies lead to the death of trans people.
For decades, TERFs have sought to legislate trans people out of existence. Moreover, they work to oppose trans equality measures, infiltrate trans-inclusive feminist spaces, work with anti-gay groups to target trans kids and collaborate with anti-trans extremists who advocate bombing US targets.
Much like their far right-wing counterparts, TERFs do not support trans people using the restroom. In fact, the TERF community was the first to use this as a political issue way back in 1973.
Much like their extremist counterparts, TERFs generally do not recognize the transitioned status of trans people and instead assert that trans people are the sex they were assigned at birth.
The TERF movement is particularly effective in their campaign against trans people and trans equality as they consistently couch their actions as political/feminist/lesbian/radical/womanist critiques of gender and are therefore welcomed in spaces that would normally reject the same rhetoric from right wing people and organizations. From consistently targeting trans healthcare to supporting reparative therapy for trans children, the TERF movement – while historically seen as both ridiculous and irrelevant – has managed to inflict more suffering upon the trans community than any other anti-trans equality movement in the history of the United States."
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3222263-Slide-show-on-How-to-Deal-with-TERFs?pg=1#prettyPhoto[gallery77202844]/0/
Both Ladley and Davis were NUS Women's Officers.
relevant thread includes the 'Borderforce incident' : www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3474518-NUS-Trans-Conference