{"id":30785,"date":"2026-05-17T13:09:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T17:09:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=30785"},"modified":"2026-05-17T13:09:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T17:09:28","slug":"australia-court-doubles-payout-for-trans-woman-in-landmark-discrimination-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/05\/17\/australia-court-doubles-payout-for-trans-woman-in-landmark-discrimination-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia court doubles payout for trans woman in landmark discrimination case"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-oyhass-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><b class=\"ssrcss-1xjjfut-BoldText e5tfeyi3\">A Sydney court has doubled the discrimination payout for an Australian trans woman who was kicked off a female-only app.<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It comes almost two years after Roxanne Tickle successfully sued Sall Grover, founder of the Giggle for Girls app, for blocking her account on the grounds of gender identity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Grover lodged an appeal against that verdict, but on Friday, the Federal Court dismissed it and further found that Tickle was directly &#8211; rather than indirectly &#8211; discriminated against by Grover.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Tickle, a biological male who identifies as a woman, was also awarded compensation of AU$20,000 ($14,000; \u00a311,000), double the original amount.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-oyhass-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Giggle&#8217;s legal team argued throughout the original case that sex is a biological concept. They freely conceded that Tickle was discriminated against, but on the grounds of sex, rather than gender identity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Known as &#8220;Tickle vs Giggle&#8221;, the years-long dispute is the first time a case of alleged gender identity discrimination has been heard by the Federal Court in Australia.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">During the original case, the court heard that Grover had removed Tickle from the app after spotting &#8220;male facial features&#8221; on Tickle&#8217;s profile photo.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Grover told the court that when she looked at Tickle&#8217;s profile picture, she decided Tickle was not a woman and removed the account, saying that the process was &#8220;the same as removing all males&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I would have seen the photo and just gone, &#8216;male&#8217;, and blocked,&#8221; Grover told the court during the initial hearing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Under the country&#8217;s Sex Discrimination Act, it is illegal for providers of goods or services to discriminate against another person on the ground of a person&#8217;s gender identity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In Friday&#8217;s Federal Court judgement, the full court found that Grover had engaged in unlawful direct discrimination, saying she had treated Tickle &#8220;who is a transgender woman, less favourably than a person designated female at birth seeking access to the Giggle App&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The three judges also found that the original judge had erred by not deeming Tickle&#8217;s removal from the app based on Grover&#8217;s &#8220;first visual review&#8221; of the profile picture as direct discrimination.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The earlier ruling found that Grover had indirectly discriminated against Tickle.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Tickle downloaded the app in 2021 and passed the registration process which included a selfie, and used the app for about half a year before being blocked.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Grover founded the Giggle for Girls app in 2020 in response to online abuse by men during her time as a screenwriter in Hollywood.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I wanted to create a safe, women-only space in the palm of your hand,&#8221; she said earlier.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Shortly after Friday&#8217;s ruling, Grover said she intended to appeal the decision in the High Court.<\/p>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cdjpzgppr7mo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">bbc.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\">A Sydney court has doubled the discrimination payout for an Australian trans woman who was kicked off a female-only app. It comes almost two years after Roxanne Tickle successfully sued Sall Grover, founder of the <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/05\/17\/australia-court-doubles-payout-for-trans-woman-in-landmark-discrimination-case\/\" title=\"Australia court doubles payout for trans woman in landmark discrimination case\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30786,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[350,15,109,2,6],"tags":[819,12526,7005,10853,12528,9886,3862,9126,12527],"class_list":{"0":"post-30785","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"category-human-rights","9":"category-headline","10":"category-news","11":"category-world","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-australia-sex-discrimination-act","14":"tag-federal-court-of-australia","15":"tag-gender-identity","16":"tag-giggle-for-girls","17":"tag-high-court-of-australia","18":"tag-sydney","19":"tag-transgender-people","20":"tag-unlawful-direct-discrimination","21":"pmpro-has-access"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30785"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30787,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30785\/revisions\/30787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}