‘Men can't be women' graffiti investigated as hate crime

Telegraph

18-07-2025

Police are treating graffiti stating that 'men can't be women' as a hate crime, The Telegraph understands.
Gloucestershire Constabulary are investigating after slogans were daubed around Stroud ahead of the town's annual Pride march.
Police said they were 'targeted towards transgender people' and the incident is being treated as a 'hate crime', but did not reveal what the slogans said.
The Telegraph understands that the slogans included statements such as 'men can't be women'. Others included 'you can't change sex', 'being female is not a costume', and 'transwomen are men', according to sources.
Such statements are made by gender-critical campaigners, who argue biological sex is immutable and that biological men should not have access to women's bathrooms.
This sex-realist view has been backed up by the Supreme Court in April, which ruled transwomen are not legally women for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010, and most famously championed by JK Rowling.
Stroud Pride has denounced these views, and The Telegraph previously revealed that the Pride event planned to ban performers with gender-critical opinions that organisers deemed 'harmful'.
In apparent protest against Stroud Pride's position, slogans were painted around the town ahead of the event on June 28.
On the morning of Pride, police said in an online statement that officers attended a park in Stroud following 'reports anti-transgender graffiti had been sprayed on tarmac walkways and paving stones'.
The incident drew the attention of hate crime coordinator, PC Steph Lawrence, who said: 'Hate crimes will not be tolerated and we will do all we can to ensure that people within our county feel safe in their day-to-day lives.'
He added that 'Gloucestershire is a tolerant county, which is rich in diversity'.
Concealed with pink hearts
The slogans were either cleaned off by Stroud Council or covered with painted 'pink love hearts'.
Photographs show that the slogan 'you can't change sex' was altered to say 'you can change sex' and left in place, along with new graffiti that stated 'trans rights'.
Tony Davey, the Mayor of Stroud, said the original gender-critical slogans were an attempt to sow 'hate and division' and to 'instil fear'.
The treatment of these slogans as a 'hate crime' comes amid increasing concern about the policing of 'hate', and the implications for free speech.
On Remembrance Sunday last year, Essex Police attend the home of Telegraph journalist Allison Pearson to investigate a potential hate crime.
It emerged she had been reported over a year-old and deleted social media post that police feared was stirring up racial hatred. The case was dropped after four days.
The incident added to the debate over the recording of non-crime hate incidents (NCHI) by police.
These are defined as an incident that is not criminal, but which is perceived to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards a person with a particular characteristic.
Police are only supposed to record them where there is a serious risk of significant harm that could escalate into criminality, and not just because someone feels offended.
Campaigners have warned that the recording of these hate incidents, which have been made for bizarre cases including a neighbour playing Bob Marley music, are having a chilling effect on free speech.