Trans person launches £100k GoFundMe to “spite” Graham Linehan

A TRANSGENDER person has launched a £100,000 GoFundme campaign to “spite” comedy writer Graham Linehan following the latter’s similar plea for funds to aid in a court battle.

Linehan is famous for writing legendary comedy shows like Father Ted and The IT Crowd, but has more recently attracted controversy for his stance in the transgender debate.

He has been the subject of criticism by many in the transgender community for his alleged anti-trans rights stance, having shown concern for issues surrounding self-identification.

Currently, the writer is being sued by actor David Paisley who claims that he was the subject of alleged libel and harassment from Linehan.

Linehan has since launched a £100,000 Crowdfunder to help him pay for the legal costs involved in defending himself against the actor.

The writer wrote in his post: “Of course, I am going to fight this case, not only because of the principle involved, but to prevent him from doing this to anybody else.”

Currently, he has managed to raise over £44,000 towards his cause.

In response to this, transgender person Felix Fern launched a GoFundMe campaign last Thursday aimed to “annoy Graham Linehan”.

The campaign is titled “Help me raise £100k to annoy Graham Linehan”, and the description reads: “Hello everyone. I’m not Graham Linehan, the comedy writer and director.

“In fairness, he’s not a comedy writer or director anymore either.

“I am someone that Graham Linehan once claimed is disabled because I took testosterone, thus causing me to have to use mobility aids.

“Graham Linehan is, at the time of me writing this, trying to raise £100,000 in order to defend himself from someone taking him to court due to, in his own words: ‘… [having] written about David Paisley and his attacks on gender critical women, gay men and LGB organisations.’

“In fact, if you search the name ‘Paisley’ on Mr. Linehan’s Substack, there are no less than 40 articles he has published about the man.

“David Paisley is a gay cisgender man who supports transgender people, and has been a proud and vocal ally to the trans community for many years, as well as someone who has spoken in support of women and victims of domestic abuse.

“So, why am I raising £100,000? If I raised £23,000 I could pay off the rest of the money that my beautiful Muslim trans fem friend needs to get life-changing gender affirmative surgery.

“If I raised £73,000 total I could probably afford to buy a small cheap house up north and never have to worry about homelessness again. Or pay off more people’s surgeries.

“If I raised £100,000 I could give £27,000 to David Paisley to help with his legal costs, or give it to grass roots trans and intersectional charities, or never have to worry again about having to raise money to cover the costs for British Sign Language interpreters at trans rights protests.

“All I know is that if I raise any money, it will go towards something far more worthwhile than Graham Linehan’s fundraiser.”

Felix, 34, shared their campaign to Twitter last Thursday with the caption: “I am raising £100,000 purely to piss off Graham Linehan.

“So if you know any bored, white, able-bodied, cisgender people who have more money than sense, that also dislike Graham Linehan, please do send them my way.

“I will spend the money on far more worthwhile things.”

The post has been liked by over 500 people and has received a flurry of replies.

One Twitter user wrote: “I only barely have more money than sense, which admittedly doesn’t say much about my sense, but I’m happy to pay the cis-tax!”

Another commented: “I love a good spite project.”

A third said: “I love how hated he is. This is the kind of reaffirming content I need in my life.”

Another wrote: “This is so petty I love it.”

Speaking today Felix from Norfolk said: “Graham Linehan has been down a catastrophically anti-trans path for years now, to the extent that his wife divorced him and his career has essentially ended.

“This includes bullying anyone that stands up against him and stands up for trans people online, which appears to be why he is currently trying to raise £100k via CrowdJustice to defend himself against a gay man who he has published no less than 40 articles about on his Substack.

“To my knowledge the only crime that David Paisley has committed in Linehan’s eyes is being an ally to the trans community, which he seems to believe gives him full permission to libel him.

“But that is of course only an outsider perspective, I can’t legitimately comment on the case, which I don’t think has been shared publicly outside of what Linehan is claiming on Twitter, Substack and in his CrowdJustice fundraiser.

“I am one of many trans people that have been on the receiving end of Linehan’s bigotry.

“Because I am part of an activism group, he once made defamatory comments about me on his Substack.”

Linehan once replied to a series of comments made about Felix saying: “Felix has also poisoned herself so much with testosterone that she now has male pattern baldness and needs a walker.

“She also dresses like a toddler while wearing badges that say ‘slut.’

“Great advert for transitioning.”

Felix claims these comments came after a far right activist shared pictures of them wearing colourful dungarees at a protest, and claimed they were an “adult baby”.

Felix continued: “£100k is a shockingly life-changing amount of money, and he is raising it to defend himself because he cannot accept the consequences of his actions.

“So I am raising £100k and specifically only asking those privileged enough to afford it to donate, to show what legitimately helpful things money like that can do, instead of pissing it into the wind via Linehan’s fundraiser.

“My main goal is to be able to raise funds to add to my good friend’s surgery fund, as she still needs to raise a lot of money in order to have gender affirming surgery.

“That money would change her life, and frankly I love the idea of annoying Linehan by using the publicity of his fundraiser to raise money for legitimately beneficial causes such as making trans people happy, the one thing he has dedicated years to doing the opposite of.”

GoFundMe later contacted Felix as they were moved by their campaign and requested if they can share it with their media contacts to help increase donations.

Currently, Felix’s campaign has only amassed £1,801 of its £100,000 target.