The Broadcasting Standards Authority has issued new guidance for complainants and broadcasters in response to proliferating complaints about TV and radio coverage of gender identity issues.

Based on recent BSA decisions, the new guidance acknowledges the right to freedom of speech as well as the need to balance this against the right of vulnerable communities such as gender minorities to be free from discrimination.

“As a media regulator tasked with reflecting community standards, we acknowledge the free and frank exchange of opinions is a key element of freedom of expression, and is fundamental to our democratic society,” BSA Acting Chief Executive Helen Cruse said.

“However, the right to freedom of expression is not unlimited and our role in this context is to consider where limits may be justified in light of harm potentially caused to already vulnerable communities.

“We issue our new guidance in a context where gender identity issues are generating considerable discussion and media coverage. It highlights key matters recognised and determined in recent BSA decisions which may assist broadcasters and members of the public considering these issues,” Cruse said.

Key elements of the new guidance include:

Trans people protected against discrimination and denigration

The BSA has found trans people are a recognised ‘section of the community’ protected by the discrimination and denigration standard, in line with a similar provision in the Human Rights Act.

Misgendering and deadnaming

Consistent with Human Rights Commission and United Nations guidance, the BSA acknowledges trans and non-binary people are vulnerable to harm by being referred to with a name or pronoun that does not accurately reflect their gender. Broadcasters are encouraged to stay alert to changing audience expectations around such language. Harm can be caused regardless of the speaker’s intentions, though this must be found to meet a sufficient threshold to justify limiting freedom of expression.

Inclusive language

Inclusive language is unlikely to breach broadcasting standards, particularly when reporting on harm to underrepresented communities or groups adversely affected by a particular practice. For example, in an item on trans men and non-binary people missing out on cervical screenings, the BSA found the term ‘people with cervixes’ was accurate and did not denigrate women.

Complaints relying on transphobic tropes

Complaints referring to, or relying on, transphobic stereotypes are unlikely to succeed and the BSA may decline to determine them. It acknowledges the evidence behind a number of tropes cited in complaints is ‘strongly disputed’ and reliance on these is ‘capable of embedding long-standing prejudice’. Most commonly, these have involved a variation of the trope that gender identity is a mechanism to exploit women.

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