Recently, a new “Women’s Society” has been established at Cambridge University, aiming to bring together “gender-critical” women to fight against what they call “gender ideology”. 

Update (28.11.25): The Cambridge Student Union has officially registered the society. This means the society can access university funding and status as an official society at the University of Cambridge.

The SU have directly violated their own policies, which state under Section 2: Clause 2 that:

“Registered Cambridge SU Clubs and Societies shall not; (1) engage in, allow, or encourage their members to engage in, behaviour that is abusive, offensive, violent or criminal; (2) publish or otherwise distribute material that is grossly inaccurate, defamatory, deliberately misleading, harmful, or menacing.”

The CUSW has repeatedly violated these rules within only its first few weeks. It has declared that the Varsity headline, which reads, “Students launch women's society excluding trans women” should instead say “Students launch women's society excluding men”. This is inaccurate, misleading, and harmful. 

The exclusion of trans women from the society’s events on the basis of their gender identity further violates Section 7 of the Equality Act 2010, which protects against discrimination based on gender reassignment. The CUSW therefore discriminates against trans women on the basis of their gender reassignment, which is a criminal offence.

On trans people, the society has further declared:

“We aim to challenge: “the predominant narratives surrounding sex and gender at our university. We want to represent and discuss how the idea of biological sex being changeable, arbitrary, exclusionary or ‘falsely assigned’ is regressive and directly erodes women’s sex-based rights.”

“Newnham College is a transition pipeline. The majority of lesbians who arrive as freshers (a large cohort at a women’s college like ours) will be some flavour of trans or non-binary within a year, if they aren’t already. I find this in particular to be incredibly depressing. I’ve seen so many interesting, quirky, hopeful young women just deteriorate during their time here.“

“University staff should be more open in their support for students with gender critical views. She hopes the CUSW “will shake up some of the complacent academics who we know privately agree with us, but have so far been too cowardly to speak up. If we as young students can be brave enough to say publicly that men shouldn’t be in women’s spaces, perhaps the tenured professors at this university could consider standing with us.”

“I want women who think they’re men to join this society because I’m a firm believer the words female and woman includes females who do not conform to traditional stereotypes and females who wish they were not female. I don’t think they actually wish they were men. I think it’s actually because they wish they weren’t women.”

We must fight back against transphobia. The SU must remove the registration of the CUSW as an official society at the university, and societies which endanger the safety and rights of trans people at Cambridge must be banned. The SU must declare that transphobia will not be tolerated at our university, and any further attempts to form so-called “gender-critical” societies will not be accepted.

Sign this petition to make our stance clear. We need to put pressure on the University of Cambridge to show them that we will not accept transphobia with open arms. Trans people belong at Cambridge, should be safe and loved at Cambridge, and our university’s feminist movements must always be trans-inclusive and intersectional. Stand up for trans rights now!