- In short: Transgender woman Roxanne Tickle is suing social media platform Giggle for Girls after she was excluded from the women-only app.
- She is alleging unlawful discrimination on the basis of gender identity while the app’s founder has denied she is a woman.
- What’s next? The hearing is expected to run for four days.
A transgender woman who was excluded from a women-only social media app should be awarded damages because the app’s founder has persistently denied she is a woman, a Sydney court has heard.
In February 2021, Roxanne Tickle downloaded the Giggle for Girls social networking app, which was marketed as a platform exclusively for women to share experiences and speak freely.
Users needed to provide a selfie, which was assessed by artificial intelligence software to determine if they were a woman or man.
Ms Tickle’s photograph was determined to be a woman and she used the app’s full features until September that year, when the account became restricted because the AI decision was manually overridden.
Maybe because everything about the space still caters to women’s concerns, and the presumption for a random-ass social media app should be that your appearance doesn’t determine your intent? If somebody’s daily life is being a woman, then why the fuck should it matter which parts they have? Are you also going to exclude gay women, or women who cut their hair short, or women who choose not to have kids? After all, they’re not having all the same issues that long-haired cis-het mothers have.
Not to mention it’s a technologically stupid gate to keep. In what fucking world does it deter anyone who is willing to be dishonest?