In 1792, the philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft argued for women’s rights not on the grounds of equality, but on the basis of reason. Setting aside the notion that men and women were equal, Wollstonecraft claimed instead that reason itself was consistent, and that it applied to all people.
“If the abstract rights of man can stand discussion and explanation,” she wrote, “those of woman—by a parity of reasoning—won’t shrink from the same test.”
Centuries after the Enlightenment, the attempt to anchor women’s rights in something fact-based and inarguable is far from over. In the ancient university town of Cambridge in the U.K., a 22-year-old graduate student named Maeve Halligan is still trying. Along with two other students, Halligan recently founded the Cambridge University Society of Women, an association for female students at the university, “providing a place for free speech, discussion, and association among women.”
The catch? CUSW’s founders believe that biological sex is real and immutable. In other words, men who call themselves trans cannot become women. And therefore cannot join the Cambridge University Society of Women.
Within 48 hours of the CUSW’s founding, more than 30 other societies at Cambridge had signed a statement denouncing it. Their statement didn’t mention CUSW by name, but decried “Feminism without intersectionality” as “not effective, considerate, or productive” and reiterated that the undersigned organizations “are safe spaces for transgender and gender-queer students.” Soon after, a petition circulated to ban the society.
None of this surprised Halligan. She’d studied as an undergraduate at Bristol University, where, unless you supported what she called “the Omnicause,” of progressive dogma, you were in the intellectual minority. “Claiming sex-based rights and pointing to sex-based oppression by extension, that was such a bad view to hold,” says Halligan, speaking of her experience at Bristol.
Still, when Halligan arrived in Cambridge this autumn, she felt emboldened to act on her sex-based understanding of feminism by creating an association where women could come together for lectures, discussions, and events and find community and common ground away from the punitive orthodoxy of other student spaces she’d experienced. “The reason I started it is because I wanted to be in it,” Halligan says. “There have been some windfall moments in law, in society, and in culture. This is the time, zeitgeist-wise.”
In April 2024, NHS England published the Cass Review, an independent review of the science behind gender-affirming treatments for minors who say they’re transgender. Exposing a lack of medical evidence for the safe use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones in children and teens, the Cass Review led to the closing down of the Tavistock Centre, the main gender and identity clinic in the country, and the creation of different regional services that deliver more holistic care, with a renewed focus on mental health.
A year later in April 2025, the U.K. Supreme Court ruled that within the Equality Act of 2010, the words “woman” and “sex” refer to biological women and biological sex. This clarified that it is lawful to exclude all biological males, even those in possession of a Gender Recognition Certificate (a minority of the people who self-identify as transgender) from female-only spaces such as women’s changing rooms, shelters, and prisons.
When Halligan joined up with Thea Sewell and Serena Worley to found the Society of Women, she was confident that the law was behind her. But many students in Cambridge have not been: Opponents have often described CUSW as “transphobic.” The Cambridge University Labour Club has claimed that the society peddles “transphobic rhetoric under the guise of ‘free speech’” and stated, “We reject this hatred in the strongest possible terms.” The founders of the society have been told to “choke on your hatred” and that they are a “disappointment to women.” And because CUSW uses the word “men” to describe “trans women,” the petition to ban the society claimed that its language was “inaccurate, misleading and harmful.
Language is one of the frontlines in the battle between intersectional feminism—which includes trans-identified males—and sex-based feminism, which does not. Halligan is a linguist herself; she lived in Russia as a child and speaks Russian and French, having studied both languages for her undergraduate degree.
Among Halligan’s concerns about the trans movement is its strident effort to police language. One of the tenets of the political Omnicause, she says, is that “Man is woman, and you need to say that.” Halligan is unwilling to do this: For her, this is merely the practice of preserving meaning and clarity in language. But some, it is impolite: Why not call others what they want to be called, out of respect? For others still, it is hate speech.
The society, according to Halligan, is determined to be consistent with its own use of concept and language. As such, “trans-identified women”—that is, biological women who don’t identify as female—are welcome to join. So far, the society hasn’t had any takers. On an average journey across Cambridge by foot, Halligan says she gets stopped at least once, sometimes by people wanting to insult her, but slightly more often by people who whisper that they want to join the society, but are scared.
In this sense, Halligan is reacting to an illiberal instinct—“use this language, or else”—with a liberal one: “Come have free discussion and debate.” But because the discourse has been refashioned as a Manichean battle between “ignorance” and “hate” vs. “inclusion” and “love,” she is classed as a villain.
“I’m keen for the society to be full of women who aren’t massive fans of the society,” she says. “Membership to CUSW is different from memberships to other things: membership isn’t necessarily endorsement. It’s just the opportunity to attend stuff where you can share your views civilly.”
Whether the society will help to engender the spirit of open debate remains to be seen. It has 30 members so far, as well as a large network of supportive alumni and a group of affiliated professionals and academics. It has hosted two events: a discussion with author Jo Bartosch, co-author of the book Pornocracy, and another with Nimco Ali, the CEO of the Five Foundation, which combats female genital mutilation.
These events seem harmless. But detractors don’t seem to like any bit of it: The University of Cambridge Left Society declared that the CUSW was part of the “oppression of the Queer community and the persistence of transphobia in our society, [which] is a direct consequence of power structures which spew divisive hate and intolerance, in the name of perpetuating capitalistic oppression” and that it must be “rejected at every turn.”
Other dissenting voices are more measured. A spokesperson for the trans-focused charity Gendered Intelligence said that “the creation of these groups that are very openly exclusionary” reflects a wider “hostility towards transgender people.” But the spokesperson added that the society’s creation is not “particularly damaging or particularly significant, ultimately. Transgender people weren’t looking to join societies that don’t want to have them in the first place, and the vast majority of feminist groups do continue to include trans people.”
Halligan wears both the extreme and the moderate critiques lightly. Of her generation, she says, “Many of us are just confused and disillusioned with the state of free speech and political thought. The loud minority is just that: loud. These people like to shout us down, but the society is a small, and hopefully powerful voice, speaking back. I believe that you can get through to people.”
Of her invitation to skeptics, Halligan remains hopeful.
“Do I really think they’ll join? I don’t know. But the door is more than open.”
