Hadley Freeman

I am COMPLETELY shocked: the Wall Street Journal has named Good Girls one of its top 10 books of the year! Thank you so much to the WSJ editors and to @slsatel for the original brilliant review. You have honestly made my year wsj.com/arts-culture/b…

Well said. Well argued. Opinion | Hatred of Israel and the Degradation of the West - The New York Times nytimes.com/2026/05/20/opi…

Oh how sad about Barney Frank. A great politician, a great mensch and author of my favourite ever line to end an argument youtube.com/watch?v=Xtlqh2…

BBC report on the plight of poor Afghan fathers forced to sell their children to survive. Except you have to read some way into the article - which is around 2,500 words long - before it becomes clear they are specifically selling their daughters into child marriage and domestic slavery. “If I sell one daughter, I could feed the rest of my children for at least four years,” says one father. Another father, pictured in the article, sold his five-year-old little girl. The framing is extraordinary. Not only because the fact only female children are being sold is presented as unremarkable. But also because the fathers making the decision are presented as the victims - rather than the girls who will actually live with the consequences of it. The fathers’ desperation is real and tragic. But so is the reality that these girls are being treated as commodities.

The Maudsley psychiatric hospital is well-known within gender-critical circles for having a rabid LGBT staff network, intransigent on the supremacy of gender identity over sex, and quick to call out "transphobia". Quotes from Maudsley webpages (still up): - On gender identity. "For some people, treatment may just involve acceptance and affirmation or confirmation of their identity." slam.nhs.uk/gender-dysphor… On the importance of Pride: it is "the right to be seen and accepted as the person you truly are." slam.nhs.uk/blog/why-do-we… In 2024, I wrote in an Unherd investigation on the capture of the NHS by gender ideology: "one Pride post on the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust  website  ... talks about “the fight for LGBT rights” as something “to be won against your family or your neighbours or whoever is directly around you”.' unherd.com/2024/04/the-li… That is the fantasy. You, a staff member, are a freedom fighter. You are a hero, saving vulnerable people from the urgent threat of misgendering or being put in sex-appropriate facilities. I'm sure it made staff feel very noble at the time. The reality: today we learn that in 2022, a 5ft 3 female who said/believed she was a man was put on male psychiatric ward, and raped within hours. Inmates chanted "No adam's apple". A man with a history of sex offending was in there, and he stood lookout. It was then covered up by staff. thetimes.com/uk/crime/artic…

@HelenWebberley Of course you'd rather date a trans woman than a lesbian. Because you are a straight woman and you date men

I think I would prefer to date a kind trans lesbian woman than a selfish cis lesbian woman.

@mrianleslie Were you there last night?? Wasn’t it amazing?!

One of the greatest shows I've ever seen. What a master.

About to see Paul Simon, my second favourite Paul, play the Palladium

The Nova exhibition in London is absolutely incredible and everyone should see it, whatever your politics or religion. Immersive and unforgettable, tragedy narrated with devastating clarity

I'm a middle eastern historian. My own family were made refugees. And this is my honest view of the Nakba (“catastrophe”) - the displacement of around 700,000 Palestinian Arabs during the 1947–49 war surrounding the creation of Israel. A thread. 🧵

@maggiegeewriter @thetimes Thank you so much!

@HadleyFreeman @thetimes Just to say, I always like your column, human, honest & thoughtful, but this one made me laugh aloud before 7 am. Loved the way you tucked the best bit away, too. Thanks & chapeau 😊❤️

Today’s @thetimes column: The Southampton Spy? C’est moi Southampton’s ‘spygate’ row reminds me of my own explosive error thetimes.com/article/8f0f52…

@RobBurl @unherd @Chattysalerton Anyone with an ounce of news sense knows that @Chattysalerton is one of THE absolute best editors in the business

Gosh, @unherd are brave and brilliant. Editor @Chattysalerton let me write what I and just made it better. Times Radio is highest quality and I’m proud to work there. And it takes quite some chutzpah to make snide points about ownership when you are an actual Man City fan.

@davidyelland @anyabike @soniasodha @SoniaRGallego @RobBurl Since when is “compassion” a news organisation’s responsibility over journalism? And compassion to whom? And finally, do you think the BBC was the only organisation that prioritised activists over journalism here? Because allow me to introduce you to *every other liberal media*

@anyabike @soniasodha @SoniaRGallego @RobBurl That's fair. My point is the B BBC's motivation was laudable, to seek balance on a new societal issue, to have compassion. It all went dreadfully wrong but no other media bosses even bothered to try.

Essential reading from @RobBurl. As I've said before, no one who denies the BBC's long history of bias on trans issues can call themselves its friend. Rooting it out is key to its survival. It must be a priority for Matt Brittin. unherd.com/2026/05/inside…

@Tuurtuur @thetimes Thank you!

@HadleyFreeman @thetimes epic. possibly your best piece ever - a high bar.

@glosswitch @davidyelland @GBNEWS youtu.be/nB49mky_C4s?si…

@HadleyFreeman @davidyelland @GBNEWS You're only meant to use the organisations that won't let you write about the issue to write about them not letting you write about the issue

The article in Unherd is all very well, but somebody needs to point out that Unherd is owned by the same guy who owns @GBNews and the writer has a slot on Lachlan Murdoch’s Times Radio. Frankly, the BBC needs to get better at pointing these things out. This is not to say there is not merit in the piece nor is it to question Rob’s journalism, especially on the tortured trans issue which caused pain to many media orgs as they learned how to navigate it with compassion, a characteristic lacking almost everywhere else.

Five-star story on How To Do Journalism from @HadleyFreeman in her Sunday Times column today. Trebles all round.

So brilliant by @Gabriel_Pogrund

Anyone who was working at a liberal media organisation between 2016 - 2022 and claims not to recognise everything in this is lying. Fantastic and important piece by @RobBurl with receipts and on the record interviews

It’s out!! Thank you so much to @nickwallis and the @DailyMail team ❤️ dailymail.com/lifestyle/arti…