Melbourne Women Will Speak rally braces for transgender activists, neo Nazi gatecrashers
A heavy police presence will guard the Women Will Speak gathering at Parliament House and water barriers will be set up to separate the dualling groups.
A pack of neo Nazis have also threatened to gatecrash the rally.
Women Will Speak leader Jasmine Sussex, speaking with NewsWire on Saturday morning, slammed the prospect of Nazis embedding themselves into the day.
'You're not welcome. Stay away. We're not your women,' she said.
'We despise them and everything they stand for.'
More than 100 women are expected to gather about 11.30am and protest what they see as the erosion of women's rights before gender identity claims.
'We're not anti-trans, we're about women's rights,' Ms Sussex said.
'When you say gender ID is more important than sex in policy and law, it has catastrophic impacts for women and girls across society.
'It means things like men convicted of violent sexual crimes being put in women's prisons, which is happening now.'
Ms Sussex also singled out the passage of recent anti-vilification laws in Victoria, which she warns could land dissenting women in the courts.
'We first rallied in April this year in response to passing of some draconian anti-vilification and social cohesion laws, which will believe will be used by men who claim a gender ID as a weapon against women, because the threshold for vilification is very low,' she said.
'So if a man who believes he is a woman is offended by something … if we say, 'that's a man', that could be vilification.'
Some counter protesters with the Whistleblowers, Activists and Communities Alliance have threatened to front up and disrupt the rally, claiming the Women Will Speak event promotes 'bigoted transphobia'.
Some protesters have also threatened to disrupt media coverage of the event.
Victoria Police said they would set up water barriers to maintain order.
'Ahead of tomorrow's planned rally in the CBD, Victoria Police has become aware of online posts from one of the protests groups involved encouraging attendees to interfere with journalists covering the event,' the police said on Friday.
'This includes references to damaging the cameras of media outlets present.
'For safety reasons, police will also not be allowing media to set up beyond the water filled barriers that will be used to maintain the protest group tomorrow.'
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