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Substack Is Not a Neutral Platform

The newsletter platform is the latest tech company to turn a blind eye to anti-trans arguments

Jude Ellison S. Doyle
GEN

Photo: Andrew Brookes/Getty Images

Last weekend, I announced my intent to abandon Substack. I surprised myself a little with the decision. I like my newsletter. I had content scheduled for two or three months in advance. I had been on the platform since early 2018, when I was recruited by co-founder Hamish McKenzie, who promised me that Toast founders Daniel Lavery and Nicole Cliffe were satisfied users. Yet, over the past several months, I had watched as the platform morphed into a haven for online transphobia, and when I hit my limit, I hit it hard.

The names on Substack now — Glenn Greenwald, Andrew Sullivan, Bari Weiss, Katie Herzog, Jesse Singal, Graham Linehan, Freddie de Boer — are a world away from the ones McKenzie used to sell me on the service, and, though their politics differ, they are seemingly united in their contempt for “identity politics,” “wokeness,” and “cancel culture,” terms which often translate as “trans people talking back to cis people.” Herzog, Singal and Linehan in particular are dedicated to spreading transphobic rhetoric through their work, and Singal and Linehan use their platforms in a such a way as to operate as “harassment influencers,” naming individual trans people who then get swarmed by their…

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Responses (19)

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This is wildly dishonest:
"There are no two sides, there is no argument; there are trans people, who exist, and the bigots, who think we shouldn’t."
What actually exist are a bunch of unsolved and difficult questions about gender, development, mental…

Only one of those groups is right. Only one of them has any points worth hearing.

This is the problem with cults. They don’t listen to anyone, even their own numbers.
There are many transsexual journalists and activists who say the same things as the numerous Substack journalists you misrepresented. And I know you misrepresented…

Oh a tech company isn’t censoring dissenting opinions?
This is such wonderful news!
Im so tired of not being able to have an open discussion about transgender issues, even being trans myself!
We need more platforms that allow open discussion about the…