Why? The ticklish question

Andrew L. Urban

Among all the uproar over the Federal Court’s stunning backhander to women in the Tickle v Giggle case, one question to which I have not found an answer is: why? Why would the Tickle person want to be the sole biological male among biological women in an online space, an app, for women? And why would rejection lead to an ugly legal confrontation? Why was Tickle tickled pink at the court’s decision, without a word of sympathy, empathy or just plain human regard, for the women who were clearly distraught. It’s all one question, though. WHY? 

 “I brought my case to show trans people that you can be brave and that you can stand up for yourself,” Tickle said. Well, sorta; she didn’t fund her own case, we the taxpayers did … unwillingly. (Bravery funded by the government v private funding for Giggle, of course.) In any case, is this the way to do that? I would have thought this is the way to bring disrepute to the trans cohort.

So what is old Tickle going to do as a member of Giggle for Girls? Who will befriend Tickle?

It would be naive to think this was a selfless act of civil duty as old Tickle claims, praising her own bravery. The problem with this view, apart from its conflict with biological reality, is the assumption that by suppressing the rights of women it elevates the rights of male-to-female transsexuals. Society doesn’t (shouldn’t) have to take rights from one cohort to give rights to another.

The blame seems to lie with Julia Gillard’s decision to remove the definition of women from the sex discrimination act. The current sex discrimination commissioner, in supporting the Tickle argument, is likewise guilty of this miscarriage of justice. Oh but wait…it is now the law.

The Tickle person claimed victory on behalf of trans women, lesbian women, indigenous women, Asian women … but didn’t mention women with a penis.

Wisdom of the ages: A system that forces people to embrace absurd beliefs causes damage to their processes of rational thought. These impaired people are more likely to act illogically and destructively. With encouragement they may act barbarously.

NB: The Supreme Court in England ruled in April 2025 that “women”, under the sex discrimination act, applies to biology, and not the “feelings” or gender identity of people.

Received just before deadline:

The Giggle Gulag: Welcome, Ladies (and One Very Special Lad)

Posted on May 20, 2026 by a sympathetic ghost

Ah, the Tickle verdict. What a delicate triumph. One biological male, armed with the full might of the Federal Court and the Australian taxpayer’s unwilling wallet, has finally cracked the sacred code of the women’s app. Giggle for Girls now stands corrected: of course the most authentic expression of womanhood requires at least one Y chromosome swinging in the breeze like a participation trophy. Diversity achieved. Equity restored. Someone fetch the smelling salts for the biologicals.

But let’s be brutally honest about the why, since the court was too polite (or ideologically lobotomised) to ask. Why does a man need to plant his flag in the last remaining digital treehouse marked “No Boys Allowed”? Is it the sparkling conversation about periods and pelvic floors? The shared trauma of underwire bras? Or is it the delicious, forbidden thrill of being the only one in the chat who can write “I’m feeling bloated” without anyone daring to reply, “Mate, that’s just your balls.”

Tickle, brave pioneer funded by the public purse (how very working class hero), claims this was all about courage. Courage! The sort of courage that requires a legal team, government-backed human rights apparatus, and zero risk of ever being told “no” by people who still remember what a woman is. Private funding for the defence, of course. That’s how you know who’s really oppressed.

Picture the scene on Giggle now. A new notification pings: “@Tickle has joined your safe space.” The women, once there to escape precisely this sort of thing, now face a Sophie’s Choice between being labelled bigots or quietly deleting the app their taxes helped make possible. Some will stay and perform the mandatory allyship—heart emojis under selfies featuring five o’clock shadow, enthusiastic comments about “bravery” while privately wondering if they’re having a stroke. Others will migrate to darker corners of the internet where biology is still, tragically, legal.

And what will Tickle actually do there? Offer unsolicited advice on how to tuck properly?

Mansplain (womansplain? persunsplain?) the female experience from the comfort of never having had one? Perhaps the endgame is simpler: to turn every female-only space into a panopticon where the mere presence of the sacred penis enforces ideological compliance.

Nothing says “inclusivity” like knowing that at any moment, your trauma support group might include someone who could, in a different timeline, have caused the trauma.

This is the new normal, courtesy of Julia Gillard’s surgical removal of the word “woman” from the Sex Discrimination Act. A legislative own-goal so spectacular it makes you wonder if the author was, herself, feeling a little ticklish that day. The Sex Discrimination Commissioner, naturally, cheered it on. Of course she did. When your job depends on pretending the emperor has a beautifully constructed lady garden, intellectual honesty becomes a hate crime.

The darker joke writes itself. We are training an entire generation to override their own eyes, their own evolutionary wiring, their own lying instincts that scream “this is a man” every time reality intrudes. Force people to applaud the absurd long enough and you don’t get tolerance. You get a society of malfunctioning pattern-recognisers who will believe—or at least pretend to believe—anything the regime demands next. Climate cults. Economic fantasies. The idea that men can breastfeed. All of it becomes equally plausible once you’ve signed the loyalty oath to Tickle’s Giggle.

Wisdom of the ages, updated for 2026: A civilisation that insists you call a man a woman, then punishes you for noticing the bulge, is not liberating anyone. It is running a psychological stress test on the population to see how much self-betrayal it can extract before something breaks. So far, the results are fascinating.

Tickle may have won the court case. But somewhere in the comments section of Giggle for Girls, a woman is closing the app, opening a new one with better verification, and muttering the quiet part out loud: “This isn’t inclusion. This is colonisation with extra steps.”

And somewhere, the ghost of actual feminism is laughing so hard it’s crying. Or perhaps it’s just crying. At this point, who can tell the difference?