No Laughing Matter: Can the Tickle v. Giggle Case Save Women’s Spaces in Australia?

What is a woman?

That simple, yet profound, question has come to define an entire generation of discourse surrounding women’s rights, despite most people knowing very well what makes someone a woman.

Things have gotten so out of hand that legal cases throughout the world are being fought just to protect the very notion of womanhood.

While these cases are being litigated in different countries and in different contexts, what they have in common is the impact that a bad decision can have on women and the legal protections created specifically for them.

One of these groundbreaking cases from Australia, Tickle v. Giggle, has put the definition of womanhood itself on trial—and the consequences for women could not be more serious. The case has raised global concerns about truth, safety, and freedom.

A man demands access to women’s space

In 2022, a biological male identifying as a woman filed a discrimination lawsuit against Giggle for Girls—a networking app created exclusively for women founded by Sall Grover—after being denied access. “Roxanne Tickle” sued on the basis that, being “legally permitted to identify as female” and having had his birth certificate amended, he should be permitted into spaces reserved for women.

Giggle for Girls, meanwhile, argued that women have a right to single-sex spaces, both offline and online. ADF International supported Giggle’s defense in line with the protections for women enshrined in international human rights law and on the basis that Australian law must uphold the truth of biological reality.

Sadly, the Federal Court of Australia ruled that Roxanne Tickle had suffered from “indirect discrimination.” As a result, the court ordered Giggle to pay $10,000 AUD (approximately $6,500 USD) in compensation and cover Tickle’s legal expenses.

The court dismissed Giggle’s defense, asserting that “…sex is not confined to being a biological concept referring to whether a person at birth had male or female physical traits, nor confined to being a binary concept, limited to the male or female sex…”

In other words, this ruling effectively redefines “sex” and “woman,” with implications for women and girls across Australia and beyond. That ruling was subsequently appealed, with a hearing before the Full Court in December 2025, and on May 15, 2026, the Full Court delivered its verdict. It was not the one women’s rights advocates had hoped for.

The Full Court not only dismissed Grover’s appeal but allowed Tickle’s counter-appeal — upgrading the original finding from indirect discrimination to direct discrimination, and doubling the damages owed by Giggle from $10,000 AUD to $20,000 AUD, plus legal costs capped at $100,000 AUD. A law written to protect women had now been used twice to punish a woman for creating a space for women.

Sall is appealing this unjust ruling to Australia’s highest court.

“I am absolutely devastated,” Sall said after the ruling. “Men who claim to be women have more rights than actual women in Australia. It is women who are being discriminated against, not the men who claim to be us. But in a sense, nothing has changed: we will all wake up tomorrow & men will still not be women.” While this case is happening in Australia, it’s clear that this ideology has leaked into the U.S. as well.

There’s perhaps no clearer example of this than the numerous cases that ADF has taken that uphold the fact that men and women are equal and yet different:

• In January 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for State of West Virginia v. B.P.J., where ADF helped defend West Virginia’s “Save Women’s Sports” law. B.P.J. is a boy who identifies as a girl, and courts have allowed him to compete on girls’ teams and share private spaces with them—including ADF client Adaleia Cross, whose story illustrates exactly what is at stake in this case.
• In September 2025, ADF secured a victory in Mid Vermont Christian School v. Saunders after the Vermont Principals’ Association banned Mid Vermont from participating in state-sponsored events because the school adhered to its religious belief that God creates us male and female. The VPA later agreed to pay $566,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees to settle its portion of Mid Vermont’s lawsuit.

ADF recognizes how important this struggle for private spaces is for women.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of many ideologically-driven governing bodies, which seem intent on muddying a simple biological truth.

Court ruling undermines international law and women’s rights

The two Australian court rulings contradict international treaties like the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which protect women’s rights based on biological sex. Redefining “woman” to include biological males erodes these protections and violates fundamental principles.

In ruling that Tickle, a biological male, was a victim of discrimination when prevented from joining a women’s app, the court delivered an egregiously flawed judgment that undermines protections for women.

That flawed judgment was appealed—and the Full Court’s May 2026 ruling has only compounded the damage. The upgraded finding of direct discrimination and the doubling of damages against Grover set a precedent that is difficult to overstate. It is a decision that not only undermines single-sex spaces online but sends a chilling message to any woman, anywhere in Australia, who dares to create or maintain a space reserved for her own sex: do so at your legal and financial peril.

Think about it. A law written to protect women has been used to punish a woman for creating a space for women—twice. If the courts won’t recognize the farcical nature of these rulings, then the Australian Parliament must.

As Sall said after the most recent ruling, no matter what the courts say, men will wake up tomorrow as men, and women as women. That biology hasn’t changed. And thankfully, neither has Sall’s resolve.

Learn more about this case at ADF International.