Extremist Online Forum Connected to Anti-Trans Hit Lists Shutters

Ovarit and its precursor, r/GenderCritical on Reddit, “make the internet another dangerous place for trans women through doxing and harassment,” The Atlantic reported in 2020.

Ovarit, a website for Reddit refugees fleeing the social media site’s hate speech bans, died quietly on Sunday, surrounded by J.K. Rowling fan posts and heinous vitriol towards trans women.

After nearly five years of serving as a breeding ground for anti-trans hate, the current webmaster announced they are “burned out.”

“Ovarit.com will be permanently shutting down on April 27, 2025,” Ovarit administrator girl_undone wrote in late March. “It's often boring, difficult, draining, or stressful, and it's uncompensated.”

Ovarit members have historically called trans people “pedophiles,” threatened to commit acts of violence against them, and called trans women “rapey incels.” Meanwhile, one recent post was titled, “I bet I'm the only person here whose ‘transphobia’ has been mentioned in a suicide note.”

Few Ovarit affiliates have gone public, but Mary Kate Fain—who was an Ovarit developer—denied that it was a hateful community.

Ovarit also spent a great deal of time fawning over J.K. Rowling, who, last week, celebrated with cigars aboard a yacht after successfully leading a campaign to strip trans women of their rights in Britain.

One user claimed that they had even asked Rowling to fund the Ovarit venture, but that Rowling’s office had replied in the negative. “JK Rowling is not just a random woman in this case,” user AngrySloth wrote. “She's a key player [...] she's using both her money and her platform to stop the gender madness.”

April 16, 2025 — J.K. Rowling enjoying a cigar after the British Supreme Court issued a devastating anti-trans ruling. She posted this photo to Twitter with the caption: “I love it when a plan comes together. #SupremeCourt #WomensRights. (Credit: @jk_rowling via Twitter)

Who was behind Ovarit?

After the 2020 George Floyd uprising, many companies sought to reckon with issues of diversity, inclusion and bias in their ranks. Reddit cracked down on hate speech, including the anti-trans subreddit r/GenderCritical—the preferred name for a particular kind of anti-trans zealotry. This coincided with the mass bans of subreddits dedicated to other forms of hate as well, such as racism or antisemitism.

Ovarit was a private, invite-only community, but its cult following was potent and prolific among “gender critical” advocates, who are also often known as “TERFs.”

“TERF” means a “trans-exclusionary radical feminist”. The Cambridge Dictionary defines a “TERF” as someone who believes “that feminism should not include supporting the rights of transgender people.” Some TERFs embrace the term, and others regard it as a slur.

Ovarit and its precursor, r/GenderCritical, “make the internet another dangerous place for trans women through doxing and harassment,” The Atlantic reported in 2020.

While the real identities of most r/GenderCritical and Ovarit administrators do not appear to be public information, there is some carryover in leadership. Now, many Ovarit users are saying they will flee to smaller websites—Cekni, Saidit, Spinster—which are either TERF-owned or TERF-friendly.

It is not immediately clear how many Ovarit users were active at the time of its demise, but in 2020, Ovarit self-reported “2,500 registered users,” and at least one occasion where, over the course of a day, they “hosted over 7,000 unique visitors, almost 100 new posts and 1,200 comments.”

What is Ovarit’s legacy?

As outlined in a report published last week, Erin in the Morning’s investigation found that the Ovarit community helped shepherd fringe internet ideas into mainstream thought and consequential action. Two websites with ties to the Ovarit community, HeCheated and SheWon, have cumulatively compiled a centralized list of hundreds, if not thousands, of presumed-trans women and girl athletes.

These lists surveil competitions ranging from the Olympic level down to local children’s leagues. They include triathlons and powerlifting as well as sports like darts and poker. They also feature a section for non-athletic events too, targeting presumed-trans prom queens and hot dog eating contest winners. And they grew directly from Ovarit’s forums.

Like Ovarit, SheWon and HeCheated are anonymously-run. They also appear inaccurate. Their inclusion of decidedly non-trans athletes, such as boxer Imane Khelif, further demonstrates how the trans moral panic harms people of all genders and sexes.

John Oliver’s “Last Week Tonight” and Erin in the Morning’s own separate investigations of the registries showed they were misleading at best and flat out false at worst. Nonetheless, these public lists, which often include the full names, schools and links to photos of student athletes, have been weaponized by lawmakers and pundits across the country, fueling the far-right campaigns of Alabama’s Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville, anti-trans activist Riley Gaines, and more.

A representative for HeCheated, who declined to reveal their identity, told Erin in the Morning that an individual can be removed from the list only after providing the anonymous group with proof that they have ovaries.

Ovarit’s final days might come as a welcome albeit small victory. But make no mistake: Extremist “gender critical” ideology and TERFdom are not going away. On the contrary, it may be in part that they don’t need cloak-and-dagger, back-alley forums for their hate anymore.

On April 3, YouTube quietly removed “gender identity” from hate speech policy. Last week, the oversight board for Meta—which owns Facebook and Instagram—told content moderators they should no longer remove many types of anti-trans posts. And Tiktok, like most all of the social networks, has reportedly been using an algorithm that pushes far-right, anti-LGBT content. Even the New York Times platformed the numbers from the anonymous, debunked HeCheated list. What was once on the fringes of hate is now out in the open.

In a tearful farewell post, user grrrandma said they felt Ovarit had played a pivotal role in the landscape of anti-trans politics today. “It’s a different world now than it was four or so years ago when this site was founded,” they said. “So many more people now understand the harms of transgenderism, and it’s much more acceptable to TERF out on main. Ovarit helped make that change happen and I’m proud of what we accomplished here.”