Oxford split over Kathleen Stock's invite to Union debate

A radical of Oxford University academics person signed a missive supporting the close of transgender students to talk retired against Kathleen Stock, a salient gender-critical figure.

Prof Stock is owed to code an Oxford Union lawsuit connected Tuesday.

But the caller missive said it was not a free-speech contented arsenic revoking an invitation "is not preventing them from speaking".

Oxford academics archetypal wrote to the Daily Telegraph, condemning the attack of those who opposed Prof Stock's views.

The unfastened missive shared connected Saturday by the university's LGBTQI+ society, signed by 100 academics and seen by the BBC, said: "We judge that trans students should not beryllium made to statement their existence.

"We besides refute that this is simply a escaped code contented - disinviting idiosyncratic is not preventing them from speaking.

"Freedom of code matters, but we shouldn't hide the close to protest… statement is indispensable for a vibrant ideology and we champion it."

In effect to the letter, Prof Stock said cipher was debating the beingness of trans students.

"We are discussing however the demands of a extremist radical of trans activists - galore of whom are not trans - impact different people. That is not the aforesaid thing. I americium precise wide that trans radical merit afloat extortion nether the law," she said.

The Oxford Union has said attendees volition person an "opportunity to respectfully prosecute and challenge" Prof Stock's views astatine the lawsuit connected 30 May, arsenic good arsenic being capable to inquire questions anonymously.

The Union is simply a backstage members' nine that University of Oxford students and others wage to join. It is autarkic of the assemblage and the pupil union.

There had been speculation that a caller determination by the pupil national to divided with the Oxford Union debating nine was owed to the invitation.

But the Oxford University Student Union said the determination was unrelated.

The Oxford Union is celebrating its bicentennial twelvemonth successful 2023, and has a past of welcoming immoderate of the world's astir high-profile figures.

Its debating enclosure has antecedently heard from a big of American presidents, and figures similar Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking.

It has besides drawn controversy, having extended invites to WikiLeaks laminitis Julian Assange, Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness and French far-right erstwhile person Marion Marechal-LePen.