Russell T Davies says he has gender critical friends - drama ensues

[fromorbit]

RTD's new drama Tip Toe is about to start. A Guardian article on it has seen online drama.

‘How often I’m called a paedophile online is shocking’: inside Russell T Davies’s horrifying drama about rising hatred
The creator of It’s a Sin is back – and he’s furious. His new series, Tip Toe, explores the rise of homophobia through a feud between two Manchester neighbours. He and stars Alan Cumming and David Morrissey talk death, fear and ‘joy as a form of protest’...

Trying to get in as well rounded a view of the issues at stake here is a deliberate choice by Davies. Spit & Polish’s employees are mostly a younger generation of LGBTQ+ people. He sought advice from the writer Juno Dawson, with whom he worked on Doctor Who, about how to portray the trans characters in the show, including the charming and endearing employee Zee (Iz Hesketh). Stephanie (Elizabeth Berrington), Leo’s close friend whom we see throughout the series, is gender-critical – believing that biological sex cannot be changed from birth.

“I wanted all sorts of voices in there,” says Davies. “I’ve got friends who are gender-critical. It’s only online you end up screaming and shouting and being attacked by them. In real life, you have a chat, and we all kind of sigh and put up with each other. That’s how the world works. It’s actually how the world is ceasing to work.” As terrifying violence looms towards the end of the series, Stephanie and Zee end up on the same side.
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/may/29/inside-russell-t-davies-tip-top-drama-alan-cumming-david-morrissey

It is now over for RTD he can't have friends who think like that according to the TAs. That makes him "intolerant". On Bluesky there is massive push back. RTD has aroused the hatred of Windy!!! Someone else has threatened to kill RTD over this.

Details and screenshots from James Dreyfus.

James Dreyfus

Russell T Davies says, in an interview, that he has “gender-critical friends”. Bear in mind, that he is extremely vocal in support of the LGBTQIA+, especially the QT. (Although, curiously there were NO trans or non-binary characters in “Queer As Folk”…an odd oversight, considering they apparently “fought for our rights” & were ‘ubiquitous’ in 1999…🤔) Anyway, apparently his support is not meeting the skyscraper-high threshold for their purity test & he’s now being attacked for his choice of friends by the very people he champions. Which seems to me to be a trifle harsh, irrational & certainly predictable.

This outcome probably demonstrates that it’s perhaps unwise to engage in genial horseplay with your pet rattlesnake, unless you’ve a fridge packed with anti venom & are handy with a needle…

James Dreyfus
16h
Re: my earlier post.

It’s odd to be in a position where my instinct is to defend Russell T Davies, when I’m pretty sure the favour wouldn’t be returned, but to see the outpouring of venom directed at him today for daring to have ‘ GC friends’ patently shows how ANY deviation from the approved narrative is as dangerously precarious as stroll across a barbed-wire tightrope…

These reactions are just insane.

https://nitter.net/DreyfusJames/status/2060768949059674466#m

So will RTD experience this backlash and see things from a different point of view?

The other big question is will the Terfy character in the series suddenly convert to thinking biology is not a thing at some point. Presumably a man is going to do some violence at some point. If this prompts any women character to go - "oh no men are being violent - IT MUST BE MY FAULT! Why did I have opinions!" It will be very very dumb.

If on the other hand you have a trans type and a gender crit being jointly horrified by male violence and managing to unite to condemn it you might have something you don't see in any drama so far, but happens IRL a lot. Because men being violent is kind of a thing.

We all kind of sigh and put up with each other.....

yes, I already know who will get to do the sighing and putting up. And I'll bet she won't be allowed a character with any really explored or considered reasons for not wanting to have to validate a man with her body, in case the audience sympathises with her.

Edited to add.... just visualising this while muttering fucksake...

A woman has to sigh and put up with getting her kit off with a man (and I bet he won't be a character with any reality or unsympathetic aspects and definitely not hint of AGP) and submit to him. A man merely has to sigh and put up with the woman grumping a bit about her enforced submission and humiliation.

Reddit are furious, I've been chuckling at them all morning.

Yes, on Reddit, eg re RTD:
Easy to remain friends with bigots when they're not baying for YOUR blood.

But they love It's a Sin. Which is odd, because IIRC there are no trans people in that, despite the fact that historically they were all there fighting in the vanguard during the struggle for gay rights...

I did a bit of sighing myself when I heard about this series, but I was planning to watch when I heard there was a gender critical character involved. I am not at all hopeful that she will be written thoughtfully or with any kind of nuance, but I'll give it a go for one episode at least

As for Russell and the backlash - oh dear, how sad, never mind

I've asked that question many times, also about all the AIDs films/documentaries etc, all lacking in trans people...

I loved one comment, calling him a "pick me cis boy" - it's like Mumsnet but through the looking glass.

RTD faces a new threat, he has upset the Fox Basher!! Screenshot in a great thread from FWS.

For Women Scotland
@ForWomenScot
21h
Russell T Davis is about to discover that nothing will ever be good enough. Having a GC woman in his latest drama who ends up on the same "side" as a trans-id man (does she learn the error of her ways?) is causing upset over on Bluesky.

In other news the Gender crit mates of RTD are coming clean on X.

Avocado 🥑 of THE LAW LEAVES NO SCOPE Wrath #KPSS
@WrathQueenof
I think we should have a confessions line:

My name is Doris & Im a #GCFriend of #RussellTDavies.

Twice a week we share a pot of Terfy Tea & a Tunnocks tea cakes & he pours his little heart out about how Juno Dawson’s just a dull bloke with tits but it’s for the ratings innit?

Own up. I am sure someone here is friends with him and is keeping quiet because they are ashamed they couldn't persuade him to write recent Dr Who a bit better.

Bless James Dreyfus. He is so brave and sane.

I was surprised to learn that that RTD is so supportive of the trans lobby. I always thought the teen who identified as a cat in Years and Years and then outgrew that phase was a metaphor for teen trans-fixation. At the time, I thought it was clever and subtle of him to allude to the problem in this way.

Maybe the vitriol will make him see how unbalanced the transactivists are, how much of a kick they get from trying to control and bully others and their glee at any opportunity to unleash their aggression towards anyone who doesn't conform to their rigid worldview.

Will the TRA's do a John Boyne type hatchet job on him and turn him full terf?

you just know the GC character will exist entirely to enable all the Trans characters to gently and sadly explain all the reasons why she's wrong and she'll end up being utterly converted to the TRA cause 🙄

as for the telling off he's getting on social media from the TRA - meh, he'll put his propaganda piece out on national tv so I couldn't give a toss

The comments Dreyfus reposted are chilling. I wonder if they will help RTD to understand why women half his size and strength don't want these unhinged gleefully violent men to have free access to safe spaces.

No gender critical person I have ever met wants to kill or eradicate trans people. But the threats pour out in the other direction.

He's a pompous twit who has been fawned over so much that he thinks he's invincible.

This is something that if you're a public figure who chooses to support trans rights you doggedly stick to it as to be in support of trans rights means you're siding with delusions.
Did Davies not realise that they allow no subtlety? No criticism. They're like Daleks. Scrap that: Daleks are like wet liberals in comparison.

Well he's about to find out.

'Exterminate, Russell T. Davies. He is an enemy of the Trans!!'

Not relevant but I've never liked his writing: fecker ruined Dr Who by making it too touchy-feely.

Edited for clarity, not to change fundamental message.

It would be quite difficult to go through life without having friends who are gender critical because most people are gender critical, even if they don't use the term.

Why do I get the feeling RTD has suddenly acquired some GC friends, any publicity is good publicity, especially for a writer who likes to think he's edgy.
It would be nice to think he might spare a thought for the women who have suffered far worse for far longer from his 'community' but I'm not holding my breath.
I also won't be watching his latest whatever, I rather watch paint dry.

Nobody is baying for blood. Apart from TRA’s.
I wish they’d take a breath.

There was an awful little bit of me that wanted to say "I don't..".

It probably is what he thinks about JD really!

Don’t defame my Dalek hoards. I’ll wear my inflatable Dalek outfit to Australia house next time

Yes, exactly.

doesn't dawson collect Brat dolls? I mean, for fuck's sake

"I’ve got friends who are gender-critical. It’s only online you end up screaming and shouting and being attacked by them. In real life, you have a chat, and we all kind of sigh and put up with each other."
He's portraying gender critical people as screaming, shouting and attacking people? Who then sigh and put up with things?! He doesn't know any gender critical people does he?!

According to Dawson, all gay men are just wannabe “trans women”, after all…

Verbally eviscerated for not being the right sort of ally? I'm sure his GC friends tried to warn him, but he wouldn't listen.

I’ve got friends who are gender-critical. It’s only online you end up screaming and shouting and being attacked by them. In real life, you have a chat, and we all kind of sigh and put up with each other.

That’s nice for you Russell. Cos in real life, the gender critical women are screamed and shouted at and attacked by the TRAs. There are no chats and sighs to be had.

Is he called a paedophile because he’s gay or because he has a very young looking partner? (Not condoning either to be clear.)

oh yes, I'd forgotten that one. Do you think Dawson went over this gem when RTD sought advice from him?