Imagine being so hateful that you feel the need to put your transphobia in a published Sex Education review. That is precisely what happened with an article published by The Guardian reviewing the show’s fourth season, which dropped on Netflix on September 21, 2023. Throughout four seasons, Sex Education has earned high praise for its handling of mature themes and for striving to change how viewers think about sexuality. It has tackled everything from LGBTQ+ relationships to teen pregnancy to sexual assault in a nuanced, honest, and often humor-laced manner that more people should use when talking about the realities of sex.
Meanwhile, season 4 was especially strong as it featured more transgender representation. Sex Education added two transgender actors, Anthony Lexa and Felix Mufti, to its season 4 cast to portray the trans characters, Abbi and Roman, respectively. It also focuses on a compelling storyline revolving around Cal (Dua Saleh) and the difficulties they experience while transitioning. The show poignantly captures the importance of gender-affirming surgery while capturing the impact it can have on mental health when there are long waiting times and other obstacles to gender affirmation.
Even though Sex Education has always been pretty progressive, the increased emphasis on transgender representation raised the possibility for some transphobes and TERFs to come out of the woodwork with their hateful ideologies. We just didn’t expect someone would feel the need to put their transphobic views in a review for The Guardian.
Sex Education review features explicit transphobia
Users on X, formerly Twitter, drew attention to a Sex Education season 4 review by Lucy Mangan published by The Guardian. User @ParkerMolloy shared a screenshot of the excerpt in question. In the section, Mangan criticizes Sex Education, claiming that it should have questioned if Cal’s body-affirming surgery was “a cure for anything” and lamenting that there’s only “absolute affirmation.”
It’s quite disgusting that this woman felt the need to put her transphobic views into a review about a TV show. The majority of her “review” was really just a means to express her ideology, as she gave the series a three-star rating seemingly solely because she was disgruntled that the show tried to diversify its cast this season. She hardly touched on the storyline or any actual elements of the series, merely expressing anger that the show included a deaf character and characters for “gender identity representation.” Griping about perceiving a show as “woke” hardly seems like a quality review. Meanwhile, your hateful opinion that transgender or nonbinary individuals shouldn’t receive gender-affirming surgery does not belong anywhere on the internet, especially not in what should’ve been a light, interesting review for fans of the series to enjoy.
The Guardian has since changed the article slightly. The same sentiment remains, but the explicit comment about gender-affirming surgery has been cut. Additionally, the article now comes with a note reading, “This article was amended on 21 September 2023 to clarify a reference to Sex Education’s early radical roots.” Describing the update as a minor amendment instead of condemning the article’s explicit transphobia is very unsatisfactory.
Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that The Guardian has been accused of creating a platform for transphobia. The outlet has been accused of publishing transphobic articles in the past. The most egregious example was an article from The Guardian that somehow used the Sarah Everard case to claim that transgender women are a danger to cis women, even though a cis male police officer carried out the crime in question. In another instance, The Guardian was caught censoring Judith Butler’s criticism against transphobes.
Members of the LGBTQ+ community have encouraged boycotts of The Guardian over its repeated offenses. This latest example of transphobia seeping onto their platform now in the form of TV reviews suggests that withdrawing support from the outlet may be a good course of action.
(featured image: Netflix)
