Northumbria Police are facing mockery on social media after making an open appeal for information regarding “transphobic” graffiti spotted throughout the community of Tyneside. The “hateful” vandalism states that human cannot change sex.
On September 5, Northumbria Police utilized their official X (formerly Twitter) account to announce an appeal for information regarding the graffiti. They further shared that the “transphobic” vandalism has also been left on various bus stops in the Gateshead area, namely High West Street and Durham road.
According to images shared on X, the graffiti that that had been reported as “hateful” included “U can’t change sex,” and “woke R fascists in disguise.”
In a four-post thread on the matter, the police force deemed the graffiti a “hate crime” and assured users that a “thorough investigation” was in progress.
“Hate crime of any kind is never acceptable and a thorough investigation is underway to find those responsible,” the force wrote. “We are working with our partners to address this issue and ensure any graffiti such as this is quickly removed.”
According to the police, other graffiti had already been cleaned up, only for these “new offensive slogans to be left in their place.”
The appeal posed by Northumbria Police was met with ample mockery from X users, who quickly piled into the comments of the thread to respond with jokes and questions.
One user asked what crime had specifically been committed, reminding the force that a “hate crime” designation required an underlying charge and did not constitute a charge in and of itself.
In a humorous yet concerned response, another user wrote: “Have you investigated all the misogynistic and homophobic graffiti, too? Or just the factually correct graffiti?”
Popular UK-based X user @ripx4nutmeg posted about the Northumbria Police’s appeal on September 8 and added that that they “…have not appealed for witnesses for any of the other graffiti that the same bridge is covered in.”
This is not the first time a police force in the United Kingdom has invited backlash for using resources to combat so-called transphobic “hate crimes.”
In August, pro-woman outlet Reduxx reported that a senior woman was visited by West Yorkshire Police after being caught taking a photograph of a sticker critical of gender ideology. The woman was questioned at her home for over 30 minutes by uniformed officers on her intentions, and “lectured” on social justice.
Similarly, Leicestershire Police were forced to retract an X post after they uploaded a graphic suggesting that using an incorrect name for a trans-identified individual could be reported as a “hate crime.”
