Amy Hamm: ‘Ask a Trans Person Anything’ hosts barred me from asking anything at all

Fae Johnstone, executive director of Momentum. Photo by TONY CALDWELL/Postmedia

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Last week, I was barred from entering a public event hosted at St. Andrew’s Wesley United Church in Vancouver.

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The event, “Ask a Trans Person Anything,” was advertised as a “no-questions-off-limits Q&A” hosted by Momentum (also known as the Society of Queer Momentum). It was one of several in a cross-country series. The description lauded its hosts Fae Johnstone and Victoria Bucholtz, who both identify as transwomen, as “two of Canada’s leading trans activists.”

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The organizers have suggested that their goal is to change hearts and minds: “We have more in common than we think — but when complicated issues become political, it’s hard to find those connections,” read the description of the event series.

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“We want to hear your worries and share our side of the story.… This is your chance to get your questions answered — yes, even the tough ones. We won’t cancel you. Instead, we’ll give you our honest takes….” With the exception of “threats and personal attacks,” all questions were supposedly welcome.

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Notwithstanding these promises, I was turned away at the door. As I approached the venue, pulling up the electronic ticket on my phone (which I had booked a month prior), I realized that it had been rescinded a few hours earlier.

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At the same time, I heard someone ask, from up the block: “Is that Amy Hamm?” Looking up, I saw Johnstone and Bucholtz outside of the venue, staring towards me. A third person, who I learned was hired security, began to walk towards the door in what appeared to be an effort to block my entrance to the church. It was at this point that I turned on my phone camera to record whatever interaction was about to occur.

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Sure enough, after showing identification to the guard, I was informed that I was blacklisted.

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“Your friends are more than welcome but you are not,” said the guard. “I was informed by the organizers with a list of people who wouldn’t be coming with the right intentions.”

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Some naive part of me thought that perhaps I’d observe the event and report on the hosts as having been genuine in their attempts to face ideological scrutiny. However, Johnstone’s history suggests this was unlikely: in a now-deleted X post from 2021, Johnstone wrote, “I actually do want a political environment in which TERFs are so vilified they don’t dare speak their views publicly, let alone act on them. Shut. Them. Down.” (“TERF” is a slur used against gender-critical people and stands for “trans exclusionary radical feminist.”)

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Similarly, Bucholtz attracted international scorn in 2024 after berating Alberta MLA Jennifer Johnson for refusing to state, during a recorded video session, that trans women are literal women.

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From where I stand, these two want open dialogue like an agoraphobe wants a free trip to Disneyland.