Legal action against Eventbrite for unlawful discrimination

[Spero]

On Oct 27 2022, Eventbrite pulled my book launch event for 'Transpositions - personal journeys into gender criticism'. This was a collection of stories from men and women about how they got involved in issues around sex and gender. Some of you may have contributed.

They told me that I was promoting 'violent and dangerous' content. I asked them to explain themselves. They haven't. So I am taking them to court for unlawful discrimination against my gender critical belief.

I wrote about it in the Critic here thecritic.co.uk/why-is-eventbrite-obstructing-my-book-launch/

I am hoping that some people may feel able to do a spot of gardening. I know its dark and miserable and not the best weather for gardening, but I think this could be quite an important piece of digging. There are some really important questions to ask about how private companies, based overseas are allowed to dictate what we think or say.

It becomes clearer. If Linehan was speaking, they have a much stronger reason to refuse to supply tickets for the event than the contents of the book, because it's very hard to argue that his publicly stated views aren't disparaging and discriminatory against transgender people.

Utter nonsense. Disagreeing with someone is not disparaging them. There is no right not to be offended. They have prejudged what he is going to say - if he does no more than express the protected belief that sex is binary and immutable and gender is a social construct. Who is being disparaged? Do Eventbrite get to police free speech in Britain? Is that the power you want to hand to a US corporation that they can decide whether or not someone is allowed to express a protected belief?

How is Glinner being 'discriminatory' ? What detriment have TW or any of the rest suffered due to Glinner's views? It may be shocking to some to hear other opinions but not to us in the real world.

Give it a rest, @DadJoke .

I can't find it. Is it not up yet or is there a link for a clip please?

Do Eventbrite get to police free speech in Britain? Is that the power you want to hand to a US corporation that they can decide whether or not someone is allowed to express a protected belief?. No Eventbrite doesn’t obviously, and cancelling a services contract to sell tickets to an event isn’t technically policing free speech so much as exercising their right to support or not support certain expressions of free speech. The OP had it spot on in that Eventbrites actions are an obstruction to free speech. The question is whether their action was illegally discriminatory due to her protected belief (as that’s what it’s been categorised as by the EAT ruling)

But equally, does a U.K. Eventbrite user get to over-ride Eventbrite US’s right to refuse service in accordance with US & CA law? When the express T&Cs agreed on by both parties plainly stated the applicable laws were US & CA law? Does a user’s local law take precedence, and if so, why?

There’s a conflict of laws here that the court will have to resolve in terms of was their refusal of services discriminatory. Under our EqA it was, but under US law it was not (as far as I can tell from a tiny bit of research). An added wrinkle is that a U.K. court can choose to apply US & CA law if they think it more applicable to the circumstances. Just filing a case here is no guarantee of a ruling in her favour using our laws.

That’s why the argument put forth (as stated above by Maggie) as to place of performance of the ticket selling services being in the U.K. matters so much. A case has to be built pushing for our EqA to be applied, not the US Civil Rights Act & the CA Unruh Civil Rights Statute. And one recognised method to successfully argue that is the centre of gravity approach.

This isn’t an easy fight, and luckily the OP has more resources at her disposal to fight this than the vast majority of women would ever have for access to justice.

I certainly wouldn’t ever be able to get on TV or have a pro bono solicitor if I were in her shoes. Any attempt of me vs megacorp in Silicon Valley would be doomed to fail.

I agree with OP too from her interview that her case would set an important precedent and that it’s much bigger than her freedom of speech, it affects everyone in the U.K. of all nonreligious beliefs.

Oh no was someone disparaged?

Quick call the cops.

First, I am not considering the location of the corporation, I've assumed that this will be dealt with under English law.

Linehan was suspended from Twitter for hateful conduct. There was no legal challenge to an American corporation banning him for what was obviously hateful conduct. I'd say a lot of what he says is straightforwardly hateful, but deadnaming people and using the wrong pronouns is disparaging, sufficiently disparaging that it's not generally permitted even in this hotbed of the gender critical. As for his comparison with NHS doctors and Nazis, the UK Holocaust Memorial Foundation suggested he was "trivialising the Holocaust."

Eventbrite has no obligation to provide services to such people, even if their speech is legal - and racism, homophobia and transphobia are not per se illegal. You do not have an absolute right to express your views on a commercial platform. Gender critical beliefs are protected in the sense that they aren't literally illegal.

And yes, I am absolutely happy with sites American or not, having posting policies, and that includes Mumsnet.

Linehan was banned for life from Twitter for stating 'men aren't women though'.

So hateful eh?

@DadJoke I got suspended from Twitter for talking about a ferret. Violent conduct apparently.

Glinners not hateful towards trans people, he just hates the ideology that does so much damage.
Don't blame him. I was reading the New York Times piece on puberty blockers today. More sunlight.

No, he wasn't - that was the final straw in a pattern of behaviour. It was "repeated violations of our rules against hateful conduct and platform manipulation"

And the fact that posters here don't think any of Linehan's are disparaging isn't really evdence that they aren't disparaging. Misgendering people is considered disparaging in most cases even here.

If you find yourself defending someone on the wrong side of the Holocaust Memorial Foundation as not "disparaging" you might at least consider that your judgment is biased.

Finally, if you think it wasn't disparaging, and he was banned in any case without successful appeal, it rather supports my view that the platform gets to decide its conditions.

Finally, if you think it wasn't disparaging, and he was banned in any case without successful appeal, it rather supports my view that the platform gets to decide its conditions.

And that's where the issue of not adhering to gender ideology nonsense ends up - full circle.

The point of the thread is no, platforms don't get to decide their own conditions, if they violate the laws of the land.

As far as I rember it isn't illegal to be disparaging is it?

Twitter isn't a court of law either is it?

I was once banned for posting someones own tweet at them. It is a fucking mental place.

Yes, it is. And they still have to abide by the law.

Misgendering people is considered disparaging in most cases even here.

Interesting. I consider the unilateral redefinition of "woman" to benefit the needs/preferences of a small group of males, thereby redefining the basis on which almost all female people understand themselves as women and imposing upon them a "womanhood" which is mental instead of physiological regardless of what they themselves may think about the matter and regardless of whether they do in fact identify in that way, as an act of "misgendering" which is breathtaking in its arrogance and scope, so far beyond the use of pronouns that are not to one's taste that they are barely in the same frame of reference.

Hopefully you agree and will add your voice in support of the increasing numbers of female people who are saying no to this identity being imposed upon them.

That sums up exactly how I feel. Great post.
Every day that a biological male attempts to redefine what it means to be a woman to suit their own purposes completely ignoring my lived experience is a misgendering and deeply misogynist.

And you know what - I still don't think they should have events cancelled as long as they stay within the law

Fantastic post.

Yes. Don't whine about bloody pronouns when you're totally redefining my existence.

Where will the book be available when it releases OP? Hope this isn’t too off-topic but I would very much like to buy a hardcopy when it’s out.

Brilliantly put.

I hope the book is out in time for Christmas. There's a thread on here about GC Christmas presents and this book could be one.

I dunno, platforming a misogynist who has admitted to sending dick pics to people on this forum seems a step too far, even for gender critical devotees.

No one is imposing an identity on anyone else, any more than marriage equality redefined anyone else's marriage. The argument is almost identical.

It's entirely possible to hold beliefs which are hateful and directed against people with protected characteristics and yet legal. Some religious people think gay people will go to hell. That doesn't mean a supplier can't refuse to platform them if they think it disparages gay people. The same applies to gender critical beliefs.

If you change the meaning of woman away from adult human female you are absolutely imposing an identity on me that I don’t want or recognise.
If you call me cis you are absolutely imposing an identity on me I don’t want or recognise.

It is deeply offensive that a small subset of males have taken it upon themselves to try to redefine my identity to suit themselves.

It is a grotesque and inexcusable misgendering.

BTW marriage is something you do. Being a woman is something I am. Not remotely comparable.

@DadJoke do you believe all spaces should be mixed sex? Why do you believe women are not entitled to single sex spaces for privacy, dignity and safety? Why do you believe transwomen are women but women are not allowed to be referred to as such without obnoxious prefixes?

Chaz you really do have a way with words, pithy and concise, filleting your thoughts and ideas as though with a very sharp knife. [hearteyes]

No one is imposing an identity on anyone else, any more than marriage equality redefined anyone else's marriage. The argument is almost identical.

That is not true.

When the word Woman is changed from a type of physical body to a mental attribute, it labels not just trans women but all people who are called women. It cannot be any other way, because without a shared definition of womanhood that encompasses both sexes, trans women are not women.

It is impossible to define trans women as part of shared womanhood without imposing an identity on all women.

It leaves those of us who are female since birth and do not feel any dysphoria about our bodies, but do not experience womanhood as a mental attribute, with the choice to accept an identity imposed upon us by others to benefit a small group of males, or to be pushed out of womanhood.

And with that, we are pushed out of the support structures that were themselves created specifically to enable female bodied people in male-dominated society, not through any change or new understanding of ourselves, but simply because someone else fancied our name and redefined it without our consent to suit their own purposes.

It is an act of breathtaking arrogance and entitlement.