One of the most dangerous myths in Irish politics right now is the idea that the far right only exists in obvious forms. People are often horrified to find themselves associated with what Ammi Burke once described outside Mountjoy Prison as the “unwelcome rabble” surrounding support campaigns for Enoch Burke, comprising of overt fascists, screaming racists, or online conspiracy cranks. But modern reactionary politics rarely presents itself that way anymore. Increasingly, it arrives wrapped in the language of common sense, women’s safety, health, wellness, concerned parents, and traditional values.
South Dublin County Councillor Linda de Courcy represents exactly that political shift. Elected in 2024 for Independent Ireland in Clondalkin, de Courcy publicly brands herself as a wellness professional, nutritional therapist, and community advocate. Her public image leans heavily on health culture, local activism, and practical concerns about government accountability.
But beneath that branding sits a deeply reactionary political project rooted in anti-trans agitation, anti-immigration rhetoric, and imported culture war politics from Britain and the United States.
Again and again, de Courcy has politically constructed trans people as threats to women, children, education, and public life itself. “Why are women’s spaces not being protected by the government? There is a violent sexual predator in Limerick women’s prison putting the safety of both prisoners and prison guards at risk every day. Women deserve better than this.”
This is now a standard anti-trans political tactic internationally. Individual criminal cases are weaponised to construct an image of trans people collectively as dangerous predators The strategy is familiar internationally. Isolated criminal cases become political propaganda used to portray an entire minority as dangerous (US Trans Shooter) – complex issues around prison violence, trauma, addiction, institutional safeguarding, and systemic failure disappear entirely. Instead, trans existence itself becomes framed as the problem.
De Courcy’s rhetoric escalated further following the 2026 UK Supreme Court flawed ruling on biological sex, which was celebrated across anti-trans networks as a major ideological victory. Publicly aligning herself with Cork politician Ken O’Flynn, she praised the ruling as a return to “truth and common sense”, insisting there are only two sexes, and describing trans ideology as inherently damaging to women and girls.
These are imported culture war talking points lifted directly from British anti-trans campaigning and wider far-right political ecosystems. “Gender ideology”, “biological truth”, “protecting women and children”, “common sense”, “defending reality”.. these phrases now function as political dog whistles within a broader international movement targeting trans people as symbolic enemies of social order.
Following the UK ruling, de Courcy publicly demanded that trans pride flags be removed from South Dublin County Council buildings. Pride flags are not laws. They are not binding policy instruments. They are acknowledgements that trans people exist within public life and deserve dignity and safety within their communities.
Yet even symbolic visibility appears intolerable to this political movement. That is because contemporary anti-trans politics increasingly operates through attempted erasure. Visibility itself becomes framed as provocation. Inclusion becomes described as indoctrination. The existence of trans people in schools, sports, healthcare systems, public institutions, or civic spaces becomes treated as evidence of societal collapse.
The same pattern appears clearly in de Courcy’s attacks on Ireland’s new wellbeing curriculum for primary schools. Publicly reacting to curriculum language discussing sexual orientation and gender, she accused the Department of Education of spreading gender ideology and lying to children.
This is a broader reactionary project seeking to delegitimise LGBTQ existence within education altogether. The phrase “gender ideology” itself originated in the Vatican and comes directly from international anti-LGBTQ political movements, particularly American evangelical conservatism and European far-right organising. It is deliberately vague because its purpose is to collapse together feminism, queer visibility, trans rights, inclusive education, and bodily autonomy into a single imagined threat against children.
What de Courcy calls ideology, is simply social reality. Queer people exist. Trans people exist. Intersex people exist. Children already grow up in diverse families and communities regardless of whether reactionary politicians approve.
As an intersex person, I recognise this immediately because intersex people have historically been erased in precisely the same way. Educational systems almost entirely exclude discussion of biological variation because our existence complicates simplistic binary narratives about sex. Many intersex adults grow up without language to describe our own bodies because institutions decided our realities were too politically inconvenient to acknowledge openly.
De Courcy’s politics also increasingly overlap with anti-immigration agitation and wider nationalist grievance politics. She has publicly claimed Irish citizens are becoming second class citizens in our own land, rhetoric that closely mirrors replacement narratives common across European far-right movements. She has repeatedly invoked fear-based language about migrant men, women’s safety, and community decline while aligning herself politically with figures and movements built around anti-immigration resentment.
At one stage, she campaigned alongside Glen Moore, a figure associated with hard-right political agitation and anti-immigration activism. That association further demonstrates that de Courcy’s politics cannot simply be dismissed as isolated concerns about policy wording or safeguarding. They exist within a broader ecosystem increasingly linking anti-trans politics, anti-immigration rhetoric, nationalism, and culture war grievance into a unified political identity.
The anti-trans movement in Ireland is becoming one of its central organising forces.Trans people are useful political targets because they are a small minority that can be endlessly discussed while larger structural crises remain unaddressed. Housing collapse, healthcare failures, poverty, precarious work, violence against women, childcare costs, and crumbling public infrastructure all disappear behind endless manufactured outrage about pronouns, pride flags, schoolbooks, and sports participation.
As an intersex feminist, I recognise the deeper historical pattern beneath all this. Reactionary politics has always depended on controlling bodies that disrupt rigid social hierarchies. Intersex people, trans people, migrants, queer communities, disabled people, racialised minorities, and feminists all become framed as threats because our existence destabilises simplistic ideas about who society is supposed to belong to.
What Linda de Courcy represents is not simply disagreement over policy. It is the normalisation of reactionary politics within Irish local government through the softer language of women’s safety, and concerned communities.
Recently, de Courcy criticised gender quotas for women in public life and industry, falling back on deeply traditional patriarchal assumptions about gender roles. Like many anti-feminist commentators before her, she relied on the tired and easily dismantled “bin men and road workers” argument to dismiss structural inequality affecting women.
What Linda de Courcy represents is the real danger. It is the mainstreaming of reactionary politics through the softer language of wellness culture.
We should be paying closer attention to how quickly that politics is embedding itself inside local government, schools, media discourse, and public life.
Because history shows us exactly where these movements go once they stop being challenged.
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