‘Single sex spaces matter’: Victorian woman Mel Jefferies slams trans rights activist

A trans rights activist who has tried to take legal action against media outlets has had her latest complaint thrown out of court and been slammed by a Victorian woman who detransitioned after a decade spent identifying as a man.

Mel Jefferies spent a decade of her life identifying as a man before detransitioning. She is now fighting for women-only spaces. Picture: Mark Stewart

A transgender rights activist who has repeatedly tried to launch legal action against Australian media outlets has had her latest complaint thrown out of court.

Claire Southey, director of Rainbow Rights Watch, lodged her failed complaint about an article published by the Herald Sun that reported on a petition by female inmates at a women’s prison demanding the removal of a transgender inmate who had a history of ­violent sexual offending.

Victorian woman Mel Jefferies, who spent 10 years identifying as a man ­before detransitioning in 2021, slammed the lobby group after the failed vilification claim.

The claim related to a 2022 article that outlined pleas by prisoners at Dame Phyllis Frost Correctional Centre to relocate the inmate on safety grounds.

The request was not based on concern about transgender people, but the individual’s ­history of violent sexual ­offending against females.

The trans prisoner had pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a woman in a Richmond street in 2011, and also spent time in a European jail for a child-sex offence.

Mel Jefferies says ‘fair and reasonable objections’ to the trans rights movement should not be hauled in front of courts. Picture: Mark Stewart

Ms Southey’s complaint argued the article uncritically repeated claims that the person’s trans status caused other inmates to feel “unsafe”, “threatened” and “traumatised”.

But the tribunal dismissed Ms Southey’s claim, finding the article did not vilify transgender people or link gender identity with criminal behaviour.

“In our view the article did not either state or imply that transgender persons as a class or subclass engaged in general or regularly or significantly in serious criminalist conduct and constituted a ‘threat’ to people who are not transgender,” the tribunal said.

It also found the article did not “incite hatred towards, ­serious contempt for, or severe ridicule of this applicant”.

In May last year, Ms Southey lost a legal battle against the Australian Press Council over the publication of stories she claimed “perpetuate discrimination” against trans people.

Ms Jefferies told the Herald Sun she was tired of seeing the legal system used to punish those with fair objections.

The fierce campaigner has been pushing back against trans healthcare, particularly the gender affirmation model, after having her breasts surgically removed in 2017 under the advice of medical experts.

“Single-sex spaces matter,” she said.

“I was sexually ­assaulted in a mixed-sex psych ward.

“When I see efforts to disenfranchise women who have suffered deeply at the hands of abusive men, who speak up and try to raise alarm about injustice, it hardens my resolve to oppose these ideas and the people who push them.”

Ms Jefferies pointed to a widely distributed document by lobby group the Trans Justice Project urging people to make complaints about “anti-trans media”.

“They’re trying to silence critics of the movement,” she said.

Institute of Public Affairs deputy executive director Daniel Wild said issues about gender and identity were “critical matters” and media should not be restricted from publishing factual stories on the topic.

Ms Southey was contacted for comment.