Susan's Place Transgender Resources

Founder of 'women-only' app loses appeal after landmark trans discrimination ruling

https://www.thepinknews.com/2026/05/15/giggle-for-girls-women-only-app-trans-discrimination/

Poppy-Jay St. Palmer (15 May 2026)

In January 2022, Giggle for Girls, marketed as a female-only space that allows women to find roommates, engage in freelance work, find friendship groups and more, came under fire for excluding trans women with its use of artificial intelligence.

A court ruling in August 2024 found that Australian businesswoman and founder of Sall Grover and her app had unlawfully discriminated against trans woman Roxanne Tickle when her membership was withdrawn.

Grover, whose Wikipedia page describes her as a "self-identified trans-exclusionary radical feminist", filed the notice of appeal the following October, challenging justice Robert Bromwich's decision.

The court found that Tickle had been unlawfully indirectly discriminated against after she was barred from using the app in 2021 "because she did not look sufficiently female".

During the appeal on 15 May, Justice Melissa Perry upheld the previous ruling and told the court that both Giggle and Grover had excluded Tickle from the app on the basis of her gender-related appearance.

She told the court: "This amounted to direct discrimination by reference to a characteristic that pertains to people of Ms Tickle's gender identity."

The judges also ruled to reassess the damages originally awarded to Tickle and increased the amount to 20,000 AUD (£10,700).

There are a lot of efforts to exclude us.  I can see why some CIS females may not want to have a MTF roommate but many of us just would like to be in women's book reading groups or some other social activities like that, so we can be with other women of like interests.

This is a particularly satisfying outcome for us Aussies as it means the untested Sex Discrimination Act has now passed legal challenge, so it will be less likely to be challenged again. Also, Ms Grovers initial court case was said to be backed by the UK's JK Rowling but failed, then her appeal case was backed by the US Alliance Defending Freedom, and it also failed. This sends a strong message to overseas anti trans groups that Australia holds transgender as a protected asset under the Act, and legal attacks are more likely to fail here.

We have strong laws, and do not welcome foreign pressure!

Hugs,

Allie

Today, in reaction to the Tickle v Giggle case, all of our conservative parties and anti trans groups have gone crazy on social media. They are calling for the Sex Discrimination Act trans protections to be cut, but they simply don't have the numbers politically to do anything. I suspect the sabre rattling is really a dog whistle to the people who don't understand trans people to get active with the hate groups and parties. While I expect the heat to go out of it in the next few weeks, our next election is over a year and a half away, and I would imagine it will be a low priority by then.

Hugs,

Allie

I hope I'm not the only one who immediately googled Tickle v Giggle. 🤣

Quote from: Devlyn on May 16, 2026, 05:43:54 AMI hope I'm not the only one who immediately googled Tickle v Giggle. 🤣

I giggled at Tickle v Google.

Dyslexia is a horrible thing.

🤣

Unfortunately the backlash from conservatives has intensified with the major conservative parties vowing to remove trans rights from the Discrimination Act. Worse, Chris Minns, a progressive state Premier, has opposed his parties policies and sided with the conservatives to call for changes to the Discrimination Act. This has intensified the right wing groups attacks on trans people on social media.

I guess with every win there is a down side, we need to endure and stick to our efforts to educate and fight to preserve our rights.

Hugs,

Allie