Katie Roche's Blog

The Truth about the Transgender Murder Epidemic

20th November was Transgender Day of Remembrance. Across social media, people commemorated those who sadly lost their lives to anti-transgender violence. Everyone from politicians and influencers to the ordinary person. It wasn’t just social media where Transgender Day of Remembrance was observed. Vigils were held in large cities too. And, some buildings, including the University of Oxford, flew the transgender flag. We heard all about the terrible epidemic of violence against transgender people, motivated by transphobic attitudes. So, now is the perfect time to learn more about all those who tragically died this year in the UK. Here are their names:

Where’s the list, you ask? Surely, if there is an epidemic of violence against transgender people, there must be a long list of names. Well, you might be surprised to hear that no trans people were murdered in the UK this year. Nor were there the year before. In fact, the last murder of a transgender person in the UK was in 2018. Isn’t that great news? Oddly, the opposite seems to be true. It’s not a cause for celebration but a source of disappointment. Last year, I posted a graphic on Instagram with this fact. In my comments, I got an angry activist telling me my post was “fake facts”. So, why does the myth of the transgender murder epidemic endure?

There are some shocking stats out there about transgender murder rates. For instance, there’s a long-circulating claim that 1 in 12 transwomen are murdered, rising to one in 8 for black and other ethnic minority transwomen. This comes from an estimate by Kay Brown in the 1990s. Brown is a transwoman and activist who was giving a lecture at the Harvey Milk Institute when she came up with this figure. The first problem with British activists citing this figure is that Brown is from the USA. She explains her methodology here Her estimates are based on the US population. So, it’s inaccurate to apply it to the UK. But many do so anyway.

Furthermore, her methodology is heavily flawed. Brown estimated that there were 11,600 transwomen in the USA. She based this estimate on data from the Netherlands that put the rate of Gender Dysphoria at 1 in 11,200 male births. Brown also estimated that one trans person was murdered each month. To get the one in 12 number, she multiplied 12 by 80. 80 years being the approximate average life expectancy in the USA at the time. 12 × 80 = 960. And 960 ÷ 11600=0.08. This is equivalent to 8%, or 1 in 12. So, in 80 years, 960 out of 11,600 trans people would be murdered.

If we had 11,660 counters in a bowl and took 1 out every month for 80 years, we would have removed 960 counters. But unlike with the bowl of counters, people newly identify as trans. People die for other reasons too. They might also move to or out of the country. Brown’s calculations don’t consider these things. In 1993, which Brown’s estimate is based on, 4 million babies were born in the USA. Based on that, 200 new trans-identifying males would be born in that year. Furthermore, on average, 1% of the population dies per year. If we go back to the bowl analogy, in the first year, we’d remove 128 counters (representing the 12 who were murdered and the 1% who would die for other reasons) and put in 200 new counters to represent new births. I don’t know how to work out the lifetime chances of being murdered. But I do know that normally, criminologists work out crime rates as incidence out of 100,000. Brown’s figures give a murder rate of 103.4 per 100,000. Does the data support that?

The answer: no. Channel 4 Fact Check estimates that one trans person is killed per year on average in the UK. Based on that, they estimate the murder rate for transgender people is 0.5 in 100,000. However, the murder rate for the general population is 1 per 100,000. That would mean the transgender people are actually less likely to be murdered than the general population.

But is the situation different in the USA, where Brown is from? In 2020, 44 trans people were murdered according to Human Rights Campaign, a US-based LGBT pressure group. That’s almost 4 times more than Brown’s estimate. But unlike Brown’s estimate, this list includes cross-dressers and people who identify as nonbinary.

Although not everyone on the list may have been murdered. For instance, Rayanna Pardo had been harassed while walking. She ran in to traffic to escape when she was hit by a drunk driver. https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2021/03/22/trans-woman-rayanna-pardo-killed-car-crash-los-angeles-california-transphobia/ Had she not been harassed, she wouldn't have ran into the road. And if the driver had been sober, they may have stopped. But it was an unfortunate combination of circumstances rather than murder.

Next, to work out the murder rate, we need to know how many people are transgender. The Williams Institute estimates that 1.4 million American adults are transgender. That estimate was from 2016. https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/trans-adults-united-states/ That works out as a murder rate of 3.1 in 100,000. How does that compare to the general population? In total, 21,570 people in the USA were murdered in the same year. The US population was approximately 331 million. That puts the murder rate for the general population at 6.5 in 100,000. So, like in the UK, the transgender murder rate is lower than the general population murder rate. Even when the Human Rights Campaign’s liberal approach to identifying transgender murders is taken.

Admittedly, underreporting might be an issue when calculating transgender murder rates. It’s difficult to count how many transgender people there are. There is considerable disagreement over who is transgender. Are cross-dressers trans? Even if they don’t cross-dress in public? What about people who identify as nonbinary? In the UK, it appears that nobody with an official gender recognition certificate has been murdered since 2003, when the Gender Recognition Act came in. So, we rely on family and friends of the deceased to say if they were transgender. But family and friends might not have known, especially in cases where the victim cross-dressed in private or only identified as transgender online.

Others claim that the police refuse to investigate murders of transgender people. The police are far from perfect. But it would be awful to think they could just decide not to bother investigating a murder case because of who the victim was. But is that likely? Wouldn’t friends, family and colleagues want to know what happened? If there were a body, would the coroner not find signs of murder? They’d have to report this.

And, is everyone such huge bigots, that they are fine with trans people being murdered and not recorded? That we’re happy for murderers to carry on living their lives with impunity? That’s a chilling thought. But thankfully, there is no evidence to support that. Even if transgender murders are under-reported, there is nothing to suggest transgender people are more likely to be murdered than the general population.

Now that we’ve seen the stats don’t back up the claim that there’s a trans murder epidemic. Why do we still have Transgender Day of Remembrance? We don’t have memorial days for any other groups of murder victims. The only other memorial days that are observed in the UK are Armistice Day and Holocaust Memorial Day. These days both commemorate people who couldn’t otherwise be commemorated.

In the case of Armistice Day, after world War I, the bodies of soldiers weren’t returned home. They were buried in France or other cemeteries near battlefields. In some cases, it might not be clear when the person died. There are many unmarked graves where the soldier’s body couldn’t be identified. In the Holocaust, most victims were either buried in unmarked graves or cremated without a funeral. Therefore, family and friends needed a way of remembering their loved ones in the absence of a body, funeral or exact date of death. As well, both of these events commemorate the victims of government actions. Whether that be going to war needlessly or genocide. They serve as a reminder to both individuals and politicians to never let these atrocities be repeated.

These things aren’t true for trans people though. The bodies of murdered transgender people aren't routinely disposed of without giving loved ones the opportunity to say goodbye. And I am not aware of any state-sanctioned programmes to kill all transgender people either. Perhaps the true purpose of Transgender Day of Remembrance is to draw parallels with atrocities such as war and genocide.

It’s about guilt. By not wholeheartedly embracing transgender ideology, you are creating an environment where murder is acceptable. You might not have pulled the gun’s trigger or plunged the knife in the body, but you may as well have done. You are equally culpable. It’s a form of emotional blackmail on the part of trans activists (I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again- “trans activists” isn’t the same as “trans people”. The most vocal trans activists aren’t trans themselves).

Why is emotional blackmail such a big part of trans movement? The truth is that trans activism has little else going for it. It’s not backed up by solid facts or logic. They turn to emotional blackmail in absence of reasoned argument. People’s questions are silenced by accusing them of being complicit with murder, amongst other tactics. One example of how murder rates are used as emotional blackmail is access to female spaces- for trans-identifying males. Murder rate is cited as proof that male-only spaces are too dangerous for trans-identifying males. And it works. I know because I used to be one of them. I put aside my questions and concerns, because supposedly, this group was so hated by society and by questioning them, I was part of the problem. Finding the truth is part of what made me gender critical. I felt a sense of betrayal. I had been lied to for support.

This phony epidemic of violence can’t be good for transgender people’s mental health either. If someone told me I had a 1 in 12 chance of being murdered, I’d be anxious. Who wouldn’t be? To think all the time that today could be the days your life ends in a brutal fashion. But making a political point is more important than actually helping those the transgender community is supposed to support.

The murder myth is also rooted in misogyny. The notion that gender feminism leads to murder is way of holding women responsible for men’s actions. A man kills a trans person, but those evil TERFs got him all wound up. This is an insult to both sexes. It implies that men can’t control themselves and that women are conniving. I’ve never heard of a GC feminist killing a trans person, but somehow, GC feminists get the blame for transgender murders.

A further issue: globally, many murders of trans were sex workers. This is a problem for all sex workers, regardless of their biological sex or gender identity. Indeed, gender critical feminists oppose sex work because it’s dangerous. Sex workers have a much higher murder rate than general population. Ironically, many pro-transgender activists favour relaxing regulations on sex work. They claim that trans people are forced into sex work by workplace discrimination and lack of financial support from family. I don’t think that’s the full story. Not in the UK, at least. The UK has strict anti-discrimination legislation. It's not perfect. I have no doubt that discrimination does take place. But transgender people can still find work. The UK also has a good social security system, but it has been weakened in recent years. Indeed, there might be circumstances where benefits don’t cover living costs and a person finds it necessary to engage in sex work. However, unlike the USA, a person can survive with no job or other source of financial support.

I suspect the fetish for “she-males” explains why there are so many trans sex workers. This demand arises from the buyer’s repressed homosexuality. Men go to prostitutes to fulfil sexual desires that can’t be met in a loving, respectful relationship. For closeted gay men, sex with a trans prostitute enables a buyer to keep up the pretence of being straight. This pretence is for themselves as much as anyone else. Meanwhile, they can fulfil their desire for gay sex.

If trans activists and politicians were serious about saving trans lives, they would take action against sex work. The key to stopping sex worker deaths is to stop sex work. And the main solution to that is poverty reduction. Countries must provide either income-replacement benefits to all who need them, for as long as needed. Healthcare and housing must be available for all too. That way, nobody would be forced to sell their body. And sex workers of both sexes would be safer.

Every murder is a tragedy. A life cut short needlessly. But in the UK and USA, we should be rejoicing that trans people are safe. Not reinforcing the false notion of the transgender murder epidemic.

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