Piers Morgan Had A Go At Benjamin Law For… Correctly Identifying Someone’s Gender
Piers Morgan in being-a-massive-dickhead shock.
British TV personality Piers Morgan picked a fight with our very own Benjamin Law over the weekend — and it didn’t work out well for Piers.
Here’s how it all began: Law sent out a nice, wholesome, lovely tweet about the Victorian Premier’s literary awards.
Late to it, but so bloody pleased about this year's Victorian premier’s literary awards winners. All women – amongst them, many women of colour and queer writers. https://t.co/udPD8ZUxuK (by @stephharmon) pic.twitter.com/xNZ9TNAj1c
— Benjamin Law 羅旭能 ? (@mrbenjaminlaw) February 3, 2018
It turns out that not all of the winners were women — Alison Evans, author of the young adult novel Ida, is non-binary. And when this was brought to Law’s attention, he quickly apologised and amended his mistake.
It was quite nice to see such a constructive interaction on Twitter. Really good. Now surely we all move on and… enter Piers Morgan.
The British morning show host, best known for winning Celebrity Apprentice and being told to “fuck off” on live TV, sent out this tweet last night:
This is where we've got to, ladies, gentlemen & non-binaries.
Jeez…..what a farce. ? pic.twitter.com/xAIrRoeBoi— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) February 4, 2018
Thankfully, Twitter fired back with some ripper responses:
I know. A journalist apologising for making an error. How farcical.
— Chris Cox (@Coxy4Queensland) February 4, 2018
Context: this guy doesn't know who the Victorian premier is or where Victoria is on the map (Googling is cheating).
— John Hardy (@jhlagado) February 4, 2018
We don't have to imagine it. It's what happened literally for generations. Over and over and over again, even into this past decade. This is a first, and is upsetting a longstanding bias. Hence the desire to recognise it. But sure, call it hypocrisy.
— Nicole Hayes ? ? ? (@nichmelbourne) February 4, 2018
Did you read any of the books @piersmorgan?
Did you attempt to engage in any way other than small minded bigotry?— Andrew Pople (@rightzblock) February 4, 2018
What Morgan probably doesn’t know is that the winner of the Victorian premier’s literary award was a memoir on the extraordinary life of transgender woman Sandra Pankhurst. The author, Sarah Krasnostein, claimed a cool $100,000 for her book, titledThe Trauma Cleaner: One Woman’s Extraordinary Life in Death, Decay & Disaster.
Alison Evans also got top honours — despite Morgan having a go at them for being non-binary, Evans won the people’s choice award.
And remarkably, this was the second year in a row that no man won a major category at the awards. Women of colour also won big: Melanie Cheng, Michele Lee and Bella Li won across the short story, drama and poetry categories.
Law wrapped up the Twitter feud by highlighting an excerpt from his recent Quarterly Essay, which sums up why viewing gender as a spectrum isn’t so radical.
Lots of anxious souls in my mentions tonight, freaking out about a recent tweet where I acknowledged someone as non-binary.
It's not scary. You might just need to get out more. Here's quick extract from my recent Quarterly Essay. Happy Sunday reading. ?https://t.co/ejZbYjsFe0 pic.twitter.com/kPDBAbpigf
— Benjamin Law 羅旭能 ? (@mrbenjaminlaw) February 4, 2018
Meanwhile, Alison Evans is copping a bit of abuse since Morgan’s tweet. Luckily, you can help them out here:
Hello! Award winning non-binary Australian author Alison Evans is being attacked by transphobic trolls today, thanks to a tweet from 6-million-follower-bigot Piers Morgan. If you can, please go and order their book right now to show your support! #LoveOzYA https://t.co/8fUek4f05N pic.twitter.com/dhf8fDYUsU
— Jessica Walton (@JessHealyWalton) February 4, 2018