Why should my student paper report on an anti-trans documentary?

Journalists and editors make decisions every day about what stories to report and what to skip. That’s not just because there isn’t enough time, or enough staff, to report on everything. They also prioritise what they, or their publication, believe is most important, or interesting, to their readers. This is especially true for publications with a specific audience, like Edinburgh University’s Student newspaper, where I am editor.

My decision not to report on Adult Human Female, a documentary due to be shown at my university by campaigners and academics who might call themselves ‘gender critical’, sparked something of a backlash. I was labelled a fascist, an enemy of free speech, ‘the Taliban but worse’ – primarily by people with ‘Adult Human Female’, and ‘my pronouns are non/existent’ in their Twitter bios.

Some professional journalists also denounced me. I would never make it in the real world, they said.