The BBC is getting mauled these days.

That the BBC had been “captured” by activists promoting a “pro-trans” agenda to the detriment of women’s rights is one of the criticisms in the memo that helped precipitate the resignations of [Tim] Davie and his chief executive of news, Deborah Turness.

In this document, sent to the BBC board last month, Michael Prescott, a former journalist, claimed that the specialist “LGBT and identity” desk had effectively censored stories that “raised difficult questions about the trans debate”. He accused the desk of “a constant drip feed of one-sided stories … celebrating the trans experience without adequate balance or objectivity”.

Or without any balance or objectivity.

I don’t subscribe to the view that journalism has to provide balance on all subjects, like for instance settled science, but if ever there has been a non-settled still-disputed subject, trans doctrine is one of them. Trans doctrine is not just contested but also deranged. The pro-doctrine side ought to have admitted defeat long ago, but unfortunately there are a lot of gullible onlookers who have been stiffening its spine for years. Its popularity with goons far exceeds its ability to make sense.

In this document, sent to the BBC board last month, Michael Prescott, a former journalist, claimed that the specialist “LGBT and identity” desk had effectively censored stories that “raised difficult questions about the trans debate”. He accused the desk of “a constant drip feed of one-sided stories … celebrating the trans experience without adequate balance or objectivity”.

Women within the BBC have been making that case for several years. More than a dozen emails dating back to 2020, seen by The Sunday Times, show that female staff raised a catalogue of complaints with executives, including Jonathan Munro, now acting head of news, Richard Burgess, the director of news, and Stuart Millar, digital news ­editor, but felt they were rebuffed or ignored.

Man, man, man. All trained from birth to ignore female people.

Their objections ranged from stories that referred to transgender sex offenders as women despite their being biologically male, to articles that avoided using the words “girls” and “women” when discussing menstruation and birth control.

What a coincidence. I’ve been talking about the same stories and articles all this time.

Samantha Smith, a former editor of the southwest edition of Inside Out, spoke up about reporting on the case of Karen White, a prisoner who was a biological male but identified as transgender and sexually assaulted two inmates at a women’s prison.

Smith, who left the BBC in 2020, felt that the broadcaster should have reported that White was a man, but when she raised this in a meeting of senior managers, was told: “Trans women are women.” She felt the “undercurrent” of this statement was that she was a “bigot” who needed to be “re-educated”. She said: “The conversation was shut down, which is a bit of a metaphor for everything that’s happened.”

How dare women say that men who assault women are men. How dare women object when they are called harsh names for calling rapey men “men”. How dare women say anything at all?

One persistent flashpoint is the BBC’s style guide, which still instructs journalists to use an individual’s preferred pronouns — in effect accepting self-identification — meaning the broadcaster uses “she” for convicted male rapists who identify as women.

Cath Leng, a former chief writer who said she felt forced out of the corporation in 2023 for her gender-critical views, said: “I think the problem isn’t solved while they still have self-ID in the style guide — that is the definition of institutional bias because it means that even if journalists want to say ‘he’ [about a sexual predator], they can’t.”

Yes this is another thing I’ve been saying all along. Of course giving in to the “preferred pronouns” crap is just another short road to entrenching trans ideology. Of course calling a man “she” deludes onlookers into thinking the man is a woman – that’s the whole point of it.

Nick Wallis, a former BBC journalist known for his work on the Post Office scandal, recently turned his attention to covering transgender issues. “I think the reason that women in the BBC were ignored is just rank misogyny,” he said. “It shows how easy it is for powerful men to brush aside serious and valid concerns because they are coming out of the mouths of women.”

Yes it does. Always has and still does.