Wipe Out Transphobia’s History
Our social media is our usual method of campaigning, as well as boosting petitions, and relevant news articles regarding Trans issues/stories around the world. This page, however, highlights key moments in Wipe Out Transphobia’s History, where we have been differently active. From our original founding, right up to our most recent campaigns.
18th April 2011
WOT Attended the First North Wales Mardi Gras
We attended the first ever Mardi Gras in North Wales in our first incarnation as a support forum called T-Form, where we held an information stand, working together with the Unique TG Network.
21st June 2011
Wipe Out Transphobia is Founded
Known back then as “Wipe Out Transphobia on FB”, our founder and managing director, Emma, began our journey by posting for the first time.
Photo Credit: Sophie Ball (Pride Angel)
June 2011
Jennifer Pellinen’s Flag
The flag that WOT uses today, has been used since the very beginning of the organisation. Designed by Jennifer Pellinen, it uses a wide range of colours with an aim to include a wider range of gender identities. For WOT, it signified inclusion of non-binary people in our campaigning as well, especially as not all trans campaigns did.
7th November 2011
Anglesey (Ynys Môn) Council Raise Trans Flag for TDOR
We spent lots of time writing and lobbying councils across Wales, to have them to raise the Transgender Flag for Transgender Day of Rememberance (TDOR). This day is when it was announced that they would raise one in front of their head offices on the beautiful Isle of Anglesey, North Wales (Ynys Môn, Gogledd Cymru), and they continued to do this for many years afterwards.
13th November 2012
Letter Campaign to More Councils Across Wales, UK
After the success of having a local council agree to raise a flag for TDOR, we decided to reach out to other councils in North Wales, hoping we could have them to do the same, making sure to include our very own flag in the letter/package for them (helping to reduce the chance of rejection).
19th February 2012
“I am who/what I am” 2012 Campaign Launched
The first ever campaign that WOT launched was designed to show that Trans people existed, and how diverse, and normal we are. It was very successful, with hundreds of people taking part, all proudly showing the world that we don’t need to fit into society. We are society!
View the Full Gallery Here!
19th July 2012
Started WOT Myth Buster
Using our member’s suggestions, mostly from their own experiences, we decided that busting some popular myths about the Transgender community would benefit our fight back against transphobia and hate crime. Trans people are not the stereotypes the media would have you believe, and we were successful in dispelling many of the popular myths that surround our small minority.
Our Myth Buster was also written about by Lexie Cannes.
Click Here to Read More.
11th September 2012
“Love is Love” Campaign Lauched
We wanted to show that Trans people were in happy, loving relationships, just like everyone else, so we launched our second campaign to do just that. Using the slogan Love is Love, we had hundreds of happy couples show off just how loved they are.
View the Full Gallery Here!
13th September 2012
30,000 Supporters!
Our first milestone graphic. It had occured to us, that this amount of people would fit into real world large spaces, and it was fascinating. 30,000 people for instance, would eaily fill a stadium, or large city center area.
25th September 2012
“I am an Ally” 2012 Campaign Launched
It’s important that our community knows we’re not alone, and that we’re not fighting for our rights in isolation, so we decided to launch the “I am an Ally” campaign, and we were pleased to see how many people contributed. It was a beautiful and much-needed display of solidarity. We cannot do this alone, after all.
View The Full Gallery Here!
5/6/7th October 2012
Attended North Wales’ First Ever Pride Event
We had an information stand at the first ever Pride Event held in North Wales (Gogledd Cymru), at the beautiful Hendre Hall. It was a truly wonderful weekend, full of fabulous people, many of whom joined in with our active campaigns.
12th October 2012
40,000 Members!
Still growing, 40,000 members was a great big milestone, that while still at stadium levels of people, it was heading up to the larger football stadiums of the world in terms of size. A truly incredible prospect. We always said thank you.
20th October 2012
“I am an Ally” Campaign in Newspaper in Ontario, Canada
Something that definitely put a smile on our faces was seeing our campains gain attention across the world. Here is a newspaper clipping from Ontario, Canada, where they gathered a large group of people to declare they were allies. Remarkable!
3rd November 2012
60,000 Supporters
Getting on to be very much larger in terms of numbers on our Facebook page, 60,000 people would, by modern estimations, fill the Colosseum in Rome.
18th November 2012
“WOT Worldwide Awareness” Campaign Launched
A few of our supporters began sending images of themselves simply holding signs saying “Wipe Out Transphobia”, and we loved the idea! We jumped on board with our community’s creativity, and this campaign was the result.
View the Full Gallery Here!
18th November 2012
Swansea Sparkle and TiW Support WOT
The group Transgender in Wales (TiW), supported Wipe Out Transphobia’s campaigns by creating a wondeful book to take to their events, which asked people to sign and use one of the campaign slogans.
View the Full Gallery Here!
20th November 2012
Trans Flag Raising Successful in Flitshire Council, Wales
Some of the letters we had sent out to councils in the UK a couple of months earlier started to get results. Flitshire Council showed their support by raising the flag we sent them for TDOR.
20th November 2012
Trans Flag Raising Successful in Gwynedd Council, Wales
Gwynedd Council in North Wales also responded to our letter positively by raising the Trans flag in front of their main offices, in Caernarfon, Gogledd Cymru.
23rd November 2012
Sussex University Contribute to “WOT Awareness Campaign”
As part of their ‘trans day of remembrance’ awareness event, Sussex Uni in England, UK, ran a photo campaign where they invited students, lecturers and any other people on campus to have their photograph taken holding a ‘Wipe Out Transphobia’ sign, to show their support for the cause.
View the Full Gallery Here!
23rd December 2012
“Stand up to Bullies” Campaign Launched
This campaign was unfortunately inspired by so many people sending us stories about how badly they got bullied for simply being themselves. Usually by friends and family members. So we decided to take a stand. Alongside the usual photo campaign idea, we followed up with articles, information, resources and press releases, in an effort to stand up against bullies everywhere.
30th December 2012
80,000 Supporters Reached!
Growing steadily, WOT had now reached 80,000 people on our Facebook page. This, is enough people to fill the Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor, or a small city.
17th January 2013
Grant from Football v Homophobia
We were awarded a small grant from the Football v Homopbobia campaign to to produce “A poster campaign tackling transphobia in sport & making trans people visible in sport.”
31st January 2013
“I am an Ally” 2013 Campaign Launched
While the campaign was misunderstood, the previous year, with us being accused by a few of “giving allies an unneeded pat on the back for doing the bare minimum”, we re-explained the purpose of the campaign and re-launched it for 2013.
Exerpt from our FB page at the time; “This is about showing our transgender youth/adults there is hope out there and that not everyone will reject them.
It’s about bringing down the attempted suicide rate, giving people a boost and a smile, and about showing the rest of the world that the trans community does not exist in isolation.”
View the Full Gallery Here!
2nd February 2013
“I am who/what I am” 2013 Campaign Launched
Due to the success of the campaign the previous year, we couldn’t help ourselves in relaunching it for another year. So many more beautiful people contributed. It was really wonderful to see.
View the Full Gallery Here!
13th June 2013
Reached 160,000 Supporters!
160,000 is a huge number of people, and we were so pleased that our message of hope, logic and reason was reaching so many people across the world. We have no examples of this sort of crowd size yet, but it’s as big, as the biggest stadiums you can imagine for things like Nascar.
21st June 2013
Sarah Savage Becomes Our First Patron!
We welcomed our first patron, Sarah Savage!
“I’m proud to support and be a patron of Wipe Out Transphobia as it is an issue that is close to my heart and educating and supporting people around these issues is important.
Raising awareness about transphobia is something that benefits not only trans* folk, but also their families, friends, partners and children and the work that Wipe Out Transphobia do is invaluable.” – Sarah
21st June 2013
Celebrated Our 2nd Birthday!
We had done a lot by our second birthday. We had multiple team members, had grown our following on multiple social media platforms, and we were having success with our campaings both, on, and offline.
More importantly, a lot of our work was supporting individuals with hate crime and transphobia across the world. because of this we had a large collection of letters and notes thanking us for the work we had been doing. They still make us smile.
26th/27th July 2013
WOT Attended North Wales Pride Event 2013
For the second year in row, we attended North Wales Pride. We had our own Information stand, and met so many wonderful people throughout the day, making outreach a a really enjoable experience..
6th August 2013
“To Russia, With Love” Campaign Launched
With all of the hate going on in Russia towards LGBTQI+ people at the time, WOT, paired with Wipe Out Homophobia, Wipe Out Suicide, and Adam & Steve, lauched this campaign in solidarity. We wanted them to know that their discrimination, pain, and violence wasn’t going unnoticed, and that they weren’t alone.
View the Full Gallery Here!
24th August 2013
WOT Represented at Galway Pride
Friends of WOT representing our aim of wiping out transphobia at Galway Community Pride, 2013.
View Gossip Galway Here;
www.gossipgalway.com/
14th November 2013
165,000 Supporters!
By this point in our growth on Facebook, we were blown away by the support we were finding amongst communities of the world. Trans people and allies alike, were taking part in campaigns, and educating those around them about the nuances of gender diversity.
16th November 2013
WOT Attended Swansea Sparkle 2013
Some of our team members were down in Swansea for Swansea Sparkle 2014. The event is a transgender and public integration day to help eliminate barriers between members of the public, and the transgender community.
26th May 2014
Celebrities Supporting WOT on Twitter
A gallery of screenshots was collected together of celebrities showing their support for Wipe Out Transphobia. Some of those celebrities being, Chaz Bono, Miley Cyrus, Laverne Cox, Fallon Fox, and Pete Burns.
View the Full Gallery Here!
29th May 2014
“#RuPaul We Won’t Be Silenced” Campaign Started
After some innapropriate and hateful speech from the popular drag queen started surfacing, which was then made worse by him trying to silence the Trans comminunity that was trying to call him out for it, we decided that we needed to make some noise. While it wasn’t our biggest campaign, it was (as all of our campaigns are), still very important.
21st June 2014
WOT Celebrates 3rd Birthday!
Exerpt from our FB post at the time; “Three years ago today we started a very small FB page, which has now grown to well over 170,000 likes. We have 2,200 on twitter, and a website.
We print literature, deliver training, attend events, raise awareness, hold vigils and lobby to raise flags for TDOR, we highlight gender diverse people and the issues they face and we fight transphobia and hate crime. We have consulted with local governments, and we remain as visible as possible.
Thank you for all of your support!”
5th July 2014
WOT Attends North Wales Pride Event!
For the 3rd year in a row, WOT held a stall at North Wales’ Annual Pride Event. We always have such a fun time meeting, talking, and interacting with people from all walks of life, celebrating who we are at the same time.
28th August 2014
Gossip Galway at Galway Pride!
For the second year in row, Gossip Galway represented WOT and supported our goal with wiping out transphobia at Galway Community Pride!
30th August 2014
WOT Attends First Ever Consultation with Stonewall UK
Stonewall UK had historically excluded the Transgender community from their campaigns, despite the combined history of the Sonewall riots, and how they began. They were regularly protested against, to include the trans community in their efforts, which we were involved in.
Two of our team attended, with multiple other Trans campaigners from across the UK, a meeting/workshop facilitated by Stonewall UK to discuss how they might begin to include Trans people in their future campaigns. They announced their first campaign that included Trans people on the 16th February 2015, and have included the Trans Community ever since.
4th October 2014
WOT at Chester Pride 2014
In 2014, we were Chester Pride’s official campaign, and were included in booklets at the time. We marched in the parade around historic Chester, and held an information stand in one of their tents.
View the Full Gallery Here!
11th October 2014
WOT at the Quadrant Shopping Centre, Swansea
To help raise awareness for Hate Crime Awareness Week, our director at the time, Andrew Davies, took to the Quadrant Shopping Centre in Swansea, Wales, along with Unity Group Wales, and the South Wales Police, to hand out information to the public.
4th November 2014
The Wipe Out Transphobia Collection by NailNation 3000
As a bit of fun, NailNation 3000 created eight nail polishes, a collection specifically with WOT in mind, in an aim to bringing awareness to the struggle for gender diverse rights and a pervasive problem with changing/using certain names on Facebook at the time. Another thing we helped to protest against.
23rd November 2014
Attending Swansea Sparkle in South Wales
Two of our team members were down in Swansea for Swansea Sparkle 2014. The event is a trans and public integration event, to help to eliminate barriers and prejudice between members of the public and the transgender community.
13th February 2015
LGBT History Month
Our team member Andrew Davies, took part in LGBT History Month, by promoting Wipe Out Transphobia, alongside Unity group Wales, in South Wales.
24th March 2015
Galactic Knights Show Their Support
The cosplay group The Galactic Knights showed their support for wiping out transphobia by partaking in our Worlwide Awareness Campaign. They sent us a bunch of amazing photos of a wide range of characters holding up signs of our logo.
31st March 2015
Our Director Kate on what TDOV Means to her
“I believe that being Trans, out and visible is important beause it helps to change attitudes and spreads awareness by showing pride in who you are.
It helps to break stereotypes seen in the media and to show that we are people with the same hopes, dreams and ambitions as everyone else.” – Kate, Training Director.
31st March 2015
Raising Awareness for TDOV in Swansea
Wipe Out Transphobia and Unity Group Wales went out in South Wales with the South Wales Police, NUS Wales LGBT+ Campaign and TSD Swansea LGBT+ Society, raising awareness and celebrating visibility on TDOV2015.
27th April 2015
Hate Crime Posters Launched
We launched our own set of bilingual anti-hate crime posters for Wales. Supported by Unity Bangor, The Citizens Advice, Unity Project, and all four Police Forces in Wales. They went everywhere, and got loads of attention worldwide, getting posted in PinkNews, and even getting the Westboro Baptist Church to directly protest us for being ‘deviants’.
28th April 2015
Gwent Police Posts Poster Campaign
Announcing their support for our poster campaign to all of their social media sites and their website, Gwent Police Force in Wales, also had them up in their offices and Police Stations.
29th April 2015
South Wales Police Announce Support for Poster Campaign
Releasing an article on their website and showing support on their FB and Twitter accounts, South Wales Police announed how pleased they were to support us with our campiagn.
29th April 2015
WOT Hate Crime Poster Campaign in Pink News
Our Hate Crime awareness campaign was written about in Pink News, a notable LGBT+ news source in Europe.
Calling the posters themselves “powerful”, and bringing attention to the campaign itself and WOT as a whole.
Quoting our founder Emma, from the article itself, “The posters are aimed at demonstrating that individuals with the same passions, hobbies, hopes and dreams as everyone else, do not deserve to be the recipients of hate crime just for being trans.”
7th May 2015
Anmesty UK Tweets about our Poster Campaign
Retweeting the Pink News article, Amnesty UK showed their support for our campaign on Twitter.
2015
Gained the Attention of the Westboro Baptist Church
While we cannot find the original song, or even the specific date of when it was sent to us, we do know that the Pink News Article garnered the attention of the ever friendly Westboro Baptist Church. The song was a parody of Lady Gaga, if we remember correctly, and made everyone here at WOT giggle.
We viewed this positively. If the Westboro Baptist Church were protesting us, we must be doing something right.
21st June 2015
WOT Celebrates 4th Birthday
WOT reached our fourth birthday in 2015, and by that time had helped a large amount of people with various hate crime problems across the world. From prison services, the UNHCR, and places like Iraq, Turkey and Australia, we were able to effect positive change for many different people.
23rd June 2015
Channel 4 News Covers Story on Unity Group Wales
Andrew, our team member, and the founder of our partner organiastion, Unity Group Wales, was shown on Channel 4 News, detailing some hate crime he had personally had to deal with, and the reason it was important to fight against it.
Watch here;
https://www.facebook.com/Channel4News/videos/10153026877701939
26th July 2015
4th Year at North Wales Pride
This was the fourth year in a row that we held a stand at North Wales Pride. As always, it was a lovely venue, and we and all of our lovely volunteers/team had a brilliant time.
29th August 2015
Marching at Chester Pride
For the second year in a row, we attended Chester Pride. We marched in the parade, and we got the chance to get many wonderful people take photos in front of our banner (see photo above), to show their support. It was a wonderful event.
27th February 2016
Trans Punks Benefit Gig
A superb event, put on by the group Trans Punks in Ipswitch in aid of Wipe Out Transphobia. The gig was a superb success.
View the Full Gallery Here!
31st March 2016
WOT Giving Talks at National Resources Wales
Two members of our team were with National Resources Wales in the UK on TDOV. Kate gave a talk to an engaged room of people, while busting trans myths.
1st December 2016
WOT in the House of Commons
One of our team, Kate, who also worked with LGBT education charity Schools OUT UK, took part in the prelim Launch event for LGBT History month 2017, at the speakers chambers in the House of Commons.
4th July 2017
Free Talk on Trans Representation and Gender Expression in Rock Music
Held at the Welsh Assembly in Cardiff, one of our directors, Kate gave an extended version of the talk she gave at various venues across the country, for LGBT history month.
28th April 2025
WOT Signs Open Letter Regarding Pride Events
We signed an open letter organised by the Trans Safety Network, asking the organisers of Pride Events across the UK to stand with Transgender people across the country, against the Anti-Trans political parties that are trying to take Trans people’s rights away.
No support for trans people, no photo opportunities waving sparkling flags at Pride. We’re looking at you, Prime Minister Starmer.
Photo Credit: Trans Safety Network
Click Here to Read More
