‘It’s a red card’: Premier League blasted for promoting LGBT Pride

The Premier League is facing heavy criticism for promoting transgender ideology through its ‘Premier League with Pride’ campaign.

Linzi Smith, who successfully challenged the Football Association’s association with Stonewall’s Rainbow Laces campaign last year, intends to bring a legal case against the Football Association (FA) for continuing to promote the “highly political LGBTQ+ agenda”.

‘Premier League with Pride’, a new annual event for ‘LGBTQ+ history month’, decorates stadiums with rainbow flags and provides inclusion training for all players, including children’s teams. The campaign also covers the Primary Stars school programme, which includes pushing children as young as five to “demonstrate active allyship to the LGBTQ+ community by creating rainbow flags”.

‘Hypocrisy’

Smith, who is a Newcastle United fan, said: “Given that The FA backed off on rainbow laces, I was shocked to find they’d approved this new ‘Premier League with Pride’ initiative. With its Pride symbols and politically charged language, it’s essentially a rebranding of the rainbow laces campaign.”

“The rules governing The FA specifically state that for any players and staff under its jurisdiction, religious and political messaging is off-limits. The frustration is they don’t seem to think these rules apply to them: they continue to promote the highly political LGBTQ+ agenda.

“When I see players, on the one hand, threatened with sanctions for expressing their religious beliefs, and on the other, being pressured – for the sake of a political agenda – into wearing Pride clothing that conflicts with their faith, all I can see is hypocrisy and double standards. And I refuse to ignore it. In my view, it’s a red card.”

Impartiality

Conrathe Gardner, Smith’s legal representatives, explained that Pride is political because it has social policy objectives such as allowing people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate solely by “professing another gender identity”.

The firm stated: “The FA is required to ensure political as well as religious neutrality in the game; this is essential to ensure that everyone can enjoy football without being subjected to political messaging they disagree with.

“Our client is of the view that, just as it would be wrong for the LED messages beamed around the stadium to promote messages such as, ‘Vote Labour’ or ‘Vote Reform’, so it is also wrong for Premier League stadiums to be filled with symbolism for the controversial political movement which believes biological sex is wrong.”

Victory

Last year, Newcastle United acknowledged that Smith’s gender-critical views are legally protected.

The football club had revoked her membership and banned her from matches until 2026 for publicly defending the reality of biological sex.

She also won a case against Northumbria Police after the force investigated her social media posts for “malicious communications”, one of which stated simply “trans women are men”. The High Court ruled that the force’s participation in Pride marches breached its duty of impartiality.