JENI O’DOWD: Giggle v Tickle legal dispute settled, but gender identity debate roars on

If you really want to start an argument at the pub, forget Trump or house prices. Bring up gender identity and women-only spaces.

The conversation goes downhill from there. One person starts talking about fairness, someone else discrimination, and suddenly the whole table is debating biology, women’s rights and who should be allowed into what spaces.

Last Friday’s Federal Court decision on Giggle v Tickle may have settled one legal dispute, but it certainly opened something much bigger — a political, cultural and fundraising movement around how Australia legally defines sex and gender.

The court upheld a ruling that transgender woman Roxanne Tickle was unlawfully discriminated against after being removed from the women-only Giggle app, increasing damages against the platform and its founder, Sall Grover, to $20,000.

The judges found that the app’s exclusion amounted to unlawful gender identity discrimination under the Sex Discrimination Act.

But the reaction surrounding the case shows this debate is now much bigger than the courtroom, with Giggle’s crowdfunding campaign making that crystal clear.

It is not framed as simply defending one app founder or paying legal bills. Instead, supporters are being urged to “join this landmark fight to reclaim sex based rights and protections for all women and girls”, while the case itself is now branded online as the “what is a woman case”.

The campaign warns the ruling risks “eroding the ability of women to lawfully maintain spaces and organisations based on sex”.

I don’t think the ruling was legally wrong when you examine existing Sex Discrimination legislation and previous court decisions in Australia.

And although Grover has vowed to take the matter to the High Court, legally, the chances of the ruling being overturned are slim under the current wording of the Act.

But whether the broader social outcome sits comfortably with many Australians is an entirely different matter.

On Saturday, Liberal leader Angus Taylor posted a statement to Facebook claiming it would be his “first-term priority” to change existing sex discrimination laws.

“Yesterday the Full Federal Court confirmed that Australian law does not properly protect single sex spaces for women and girls,” he wrote.

“Most Australians would find that hard to believe… (a Coalition government) will amend the Sex Discrimination Act to ensure that women and girls (and men and boys) have protections based on biological sex.

“We will define biological sex in the act. Male or female. The sex you are born. And we will protect single-sex spaces across Australian life.”

That was the moment the case moved from online outrage to possible future law reform.

And politically, Mr Taylor is looking increasingly sharp, jumping onto issues that everyday Australians are talking about. No wonder his popularity is rising in the latest polls.

The court may have followed the law as it currently stands, but socially and politically, Australians are still trying to work out where the boundaries should sit.

I’m no law expert, but here’s an interesting question: if transgender-only support groups, online communities, counselling services and dating spaces already exist, why is it considered discriminatory for biological women to want spaces exclusively for women born female too?

Most Australians would probably say transgender-only spaces are perfectly fine. But when it comes to biological women-only spaces, things start getting messy.

A lot of women do not see these spaces as hatred towards transgender people; it is more about privacy, boundaries, shared experience and trauma.

And for some, the sticking point is not somebody transitioning young. It is when someone has lived most of their life as a man and transitions later on. Fair or unfair, that is where many people become uncomfortable.

In this case, Ms Tickle has lived as a woman since about 2017.

After years of public pressure, the law already recognises exemptions in some areas, including transgender participation in elite female sport, certain religious organisations and some women’s services such as refuges.

So where does the line actually sit?

ABS figures show transgender and gender diverse Australians make up a tiny share of the population. Yet this debate is everywhere — the courts, politics, women’s sport, schools, even pub conversations.

Which is why the Giggle v Tickle case has exploded far beyond a single app.

For most people, this debate is not about hostility towards transgender people. It is about where female-only spaces still fit in modern Australia, and whether women are still allowed to ask that question without immediately being labelled discriminatory.

The courts may have settled this case legally. The country, however, is nowhere near settled on the bigger question underneath it.