Daily Wire host Michael Knowles moved from attacking trans rights to feminism in less than a week
Right-wing commentator. Michael Knowles said conservatives should not identify as feminists, saying it’s the “origin of the gender debate”. (Photo by Jason Davis/Getty Images)
First right-wing news host Michael Knowles has launched a bitter attack on feminism just days after calling for “transgenderism” to be “eradicated”.
Speaking at an event at the University of Buffalo on 9 March, The Daily Wire host said feminism “sits at the origin of the gender debate” (his speech was titled: How femism gave us transgenderism).
Conservatives should not consider themselves feminists and the rise of the feminist movement “weakened the family as the fundamental political institution”, he said.
“Feminism has made everybody miserable – especially women.”
Before he started his speech, and not long after taking to the stage, he was met by protesters in the crowd chanting “trans lives matter”.
Knowles chuckled at them and jokingly asked if they had anything else to say.
Video of the event shows Michael Knowles telling a woman in the crowd: “That’s not a word fit for a lady, that’s not the way ladies should speak.” What she said is in audible in the video.
Eventually, he talked about the “transgender argument”, claiming that it is simply referring to a person’s soul and body being in opposition to each other, which, he went on to say, cannot happen because the soul and body “are inextricable”.
Knowles added that “the complexity of human nature” meant people could not “chop up [their] genitals to assuage a spiritual confusion or mental illness”.
People responded on social media with shock at hearing such comments in 2023.
One person said: “1950 called and wants it’s thoughts back”, another, referring to dystopian novel and TV show, The Handmaid’s Tale, said: “Gilead is calling”, while someone else tweeted: “A man criticising feminism [eye roll emoji]”.
On 4 March, Michael Knowles spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where he said “for the good of society… transgenderism” should be eradicated from public life.
“There can be no middle way in dealing with transgenderism. It is all or nothing,” he said.
