Last week, the UK Labour Party convened in the seaside city of Brighton for its annual conference. The gathering again showed the leadership preoccupied with long-standing controversies, with the resignation of a member of Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet and continuing efforts to force out the Left of the party.

Since the last conference in fall 2019 — shortly before the general election defeat that December — the post–Jeremy Corbyn left has found itself in a totally new environment. Now dealing with a hostile leadership and Parliamentary Labour Party, socialists are being targeted for everything from anti-imperialism to their support for the Green New Deal.

But as last week’s conference showed, transphobia has become a core feature of the conflict within Labour ranks — with party top brass refusing to stand up to the abusers. Instead, trans-exclusionary radical-feminist (TERF) talking points have become central to the war on the “communist” “loony left” waged by blue-checkmark liberals and Blairite hacks.