The Queer Stickers That Terrified ‘Gender Critical’ Feminists

I keep thinking about a child.

They’re in a school library in Glasgow. Maybe they’re ten, maybe twelve. They’re quiet. The kind of quiet that makes adults proud and teachers overlook. Maybe they’ve already figured out they’re not like the others. Maybe they don’t have the words yet. Maybe they just know they feel different, like they’re living slightly out of focus.

And then they see it a sticker on the wall.

A little rainbow. A soft, kind font. It says, “Queer Joy is for Everyone.”

It doesn’t shout. It doesn’t instruct. It just waits there, like a whisper meant only for them.

And for the first time in weeks, maybe months, maybe ever, they feel seen.

That’s all it takes. Not a pamphlet. Not a speech. Just a tiny gesture that says: you are not alone.

But now, someone wants to tear it down.

The Sticker That Sparked a Storm

In Scotland, a ‘gender critical’ feminist group called For Women Scotland has criticised the stickers. Their claim? That these messages about joy, belonging, and identity are a form of “grooming, " that they are “propaganda," and that they are dangerous for children.

Let that sink in.

Not because the stickers teach sex. Not because they’re graphic. But because they acknowledge that LGBTQ+ people, young and old exist. And that they might deserve happiness, too.

This isn’t a debate about curriculum or parental rights. This is about the right to be visible.

And it hurts more than usual, because the attack is coming from within a movement that was supposed to stand for freedom.

When Feminism Becomes a Gatekeeper

I was raised to believe that feminism was about liberation. It was about undoing all the quiet violence the world does to people based on how they look, love, or live.

The right to vote. The right to speak. The right to dream bigger than the box someone put you in.

But some corners of modern feminism have turned rigid. They’ve replaced patriarchy’s cage with one of their own. If your body doesn’t match their definition of womanhood, you’re a threat. If your joy doesn’t look like theirs, it’s suspect.

The cruelty doesn’t always wear a mask. Sometimes it wears a slogan.

And what gets lost in all of this, in the shouting, the theory, the fear, is the child in the library. The teenager is figuring themselves out. The adult who never had the words, and is only just starting to find them.

The Old Lies, Dressed Up New

We’ve seen this before.

In the 1950s, gay people in America were fired and blacklisted under the claim that they were predators. In the UK, Section 28 banned any acknowledgment of homosexuality in schools. Russia, Hungary, and other countries still call LGBTQ+ lives “dangerous” under the guise of protecting children.

It’s always the same lie: that queerness is something you catch. That’s something planted in innocent minds. That it doesn’t already live quietly, tenderly, within some children, who are just waiting to feel like they’re not broken.

The “groomer” accusation isn’t new. But hearing it echoed by people who call themselves feminists cuts differently. Because it means that even the language of liberation can be turned into a weapon, if we’re not careful.

What Children Need

Children don’t need to be shielded from queerness. They need to be shielded from shame.

They need to know that whoever they are or may grow to be, they are not alone. That being different isn’t something to hide or fix. That their joy is not dangerous.

They need more stickers. More rainbows. More stories where someone like them gets a happy ending.

And maybe, the rest of us need those things too.

The Hard Question Feminism Has to Ask

If your feminism excludes trans people, it isn’t feminism.

If it treats queer happiness as a threat, it isn’t feminism.

If it erases the experiences of those already pushed to the margins, it’s just another form of control

One that speaks the language of liberation, but forgets the meaning.

The future of feminism isn’t about who gets to be called a woman.

It’s about who gets to feel free.

Joy Is Not the Enemy

I think about that child in the library again. Maybe someone does take the sticker down. Maybe they overhear a parent say it was “dangerous.” Maybe they learn, too early, that their joy makes people uncomfortable.

Or maybe not.

Maybe a teacher puts another sticker up the next day. Maybe someone hands them a book where a character just like them falls in love and doesn’t die at the end. Maybe they grow up to believe in a version of the world that isn’t afraid of color, or softness, or change.

Maybe they even become a writer.

And they remember the first time a sticker told them they were okay.