‘Transphobe finder’ list targets women to be reported, removed from Twitter

People who are on the "Transphobe" list include journalist and author Julie Bindel, Linda Blade, a Canadian coach and advocate for women's sports, biologist and writer Colin Wright, podcaster Sydney Watson, Chris Elston, or Billboard Chris, who travels the US and Canada to engage in discussion about gender transition of children, along with thousands of others.

The list of some 4,000 was revealed on Twitter by Christie Grace, and in addition to the list of names, it runs a tally of how many women and men have been identified as "transphobes," and how many of those accounts have been sanctioned or suspended form Twitter.

On that first "Transphobe finder" page, the project is described as "A way to easily find rule-breaking transphobic tweets to report to Twitter." It says that it's not a "blocklist," and not designed as a means for users of the list to find people to argue with.

Instead, it reads that "Arguing with bigots is exhausting and demoralizing," and if they are "breaking rules there are more effective 'consequences' available." Also, practically, it notes that "If they block you then you can't report their tweets," and "If they report you then you might get banned."

The idea is that users should "Anonymously tell us if you think there's someone who shouldn't be here, or ask to be removed from the list."

"It's okay to share a link to this spreadsheet with other people," it reads.

Instructions on how to use the list are broken down into several steps. The first step is to adjust Twitter settings, and the second is to "click the random transphobe search generator link." The idea is to go searching for "transphobic" things to report.

"Search for tweets by a particular person found tweeting transphobic things, plus a vague search term such as 'trans' to help narrow it down," it reads. "Search for tweets containing a word or phrase commonly used in transphobic tweets."

What users should look for, the guide suggests, are misgendering, giving the example "mutilating your chest doesn't make you a man." Slurs about trans people, or insults about the group at large, as well as "transphobic memes."

Instructions are then shown for how to best report the tweet, and how to bring the tweet to the attention of the "transphobe finder" list.

The final tab in the sheet gives details on what qualifies as reportable by Twitter rules, and states that "evidence of harm" can be that the user reported the tweet at all.