Sall Grover On The Appeal Ruling Of The 'Giggle Vs Tickle' Case

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]I tuned in at 4:00 on Friday, could not believe my ears.

[00:00:04]But the Australian Federal Court has upheld a landmark decision that found a woman-only social media app and its founder unlawfully discriminated against Roxy Tickle, a man in a dress, after he was denied access to the platform. In their judgment, Justices Melissa Perry, Wendy Abraham, and Geoffrey Kennett affirmed an August 2024 finding that Tickle was discriminated against on the basis of his gender identity. And also sided with Tickle's cross-appeal, claiming he experienced two instances of direct discrimination by the Giggle for Girls app and its founder, Sall Grover.

[00:00:44]The app and Sall had challenged Justice Robert Bromwich's milestone decision, which found they had indirectly discriminated against Tickle when he was barred from the platform because Sall saw he was a man.

[00:00:57]As well as upholding Bromwich's decision, the court awarded Tickle a damages of 20,000, double the amount initially awarded, and ordered Giggle and Sall to pay his costs of up to 100,000. And Sall Grover joins me now.

[00:01:12]Sall, how lovely to see you.

[00:01:14]Thanks so much for having me. It's lovely to see you, too. Now, my love, how are you feeling today after the weekend has washed over you?

[00:01:23]Huh. [laughter] Well, I think yesterday the answer to that would have been hung over. Um but I'm feeling fresh as a daisy Um you know, actually, just while I was waiting to come talk to you, I was actually sitting out on my balcony, which was where I sat almost to the day 4 years ago, when this first started like in the Australian Human Rights Commission. I'd had the complaint put against me. The Australian Human Rights Commission Human Rights Commission was completely against me. It was very, very clear. And you know, I was refusing to basically um heed to their demands, which was to let him on the app, let all men who claim to be women on the app, go to sex and gender education, pay $20,000. So, he's got that. But, um publicly apologize and um moderate all content so that men who claim to be women weren't offended by anything that actual women were saying. That was what I was up against then, and I I was at this time at that point I was hugely pregnant. I was um less than 2 months away from my daughter.

[00:02:20]And I sat there thinking, you know, if I just give in to this, how on earth am I ever going to teach her to stand up for herself, even if it seems impossible, even if it just seems like the so hard? But, you know, these are the times when you becomes more important to. So, I felt just beyond the obvious um issue of women's rights and freedom of speech and all citizens' rights and ideology versus reality and freedom of speech, all of these things, on a really personal level for me, it was that I wanted to have an example to my daughter that I have that you to stand up for yourself. Yeah. And so, I was just sitting up there before and I was like, if you knew now [laughter] And the answer to be to be honest is yes.

[00:03:05]Um I don't regret standing up for myself. I don't regret standing up for women. I'll do it every single day of the week. So, I've always thought because the premise of this case is so ridiculous and the premise of gender ideology in general is so ridiculous, I reasoned that I was never going to be the one that came out of this looking like an idiot. Mhm.

[00:03:24]>> [clears throat] >> Yeah.

[00:03:25]So, I still quite confident in that.

[00:03:27]Yeah, so like it was reported on that that you were very emotional when you, you know, were listening to the the um justices.

[00:03:38]Uh and and when I was listening here, um as soon as I heard, you know, the pronouns and referred to Jason as her, she, I I kind of knew where it was going.

[00:03:52]Do you think when you picked up on that obviously very early?

[00:03:56]And for you for you for you to be breaking down is that was that just a combination of how much you've gone through and how how much this day meant?

[00:04:06]It's so funny. I mean I'm almost 42 years old and the first thing I did when I heard when the decision was being said I was like I just want my dad who was at the back of the courtroom. I was like I'll call my dad. So I was just like please like you know you just like just shut up just I get it I get it okay. You think he's a woman.

[00:04:23]Whatever just let me go and see my dad.

[00:04:26]Um I who incidentally was wearing a V-neck t-shirt in one of their arguments was being like >> [laughter] >> Because he was wearing a V-neck t-shirt.

[00:04:37]Yeah, so lots of conversations to have with dad about that. But um I knew when because that in their cross-appeal that the argument that had been that it was direct discrimination because he had shoulder-length hair and wearing a V-neck t-shirt. Like that is if you don't accept that that is a woman and that is direct discrimination and I honestly I honestly thought I know how crazy this ideology is I know how captured everything is but I was like this is too stupid to work surely. So then the Justice Perry was reading out like she sort of did the summary and then was just suddenly just said the cross-appeal is successful. I just had this moment of like You're kidding. Like I knew that meant everything else on my side had failed because I was like I just instantly the first thing that came into my head was a V-neck t-shirt has more rights in this country than I do.

[00:05:26]>> [laughter] >> Oh Sel, my gosh. It's got And that was how the law ended and that makes the law coherent. And it's like this is nonsense. Everyone knows this is nonsense and you they have proclaimed themselves insane in this I think. You know what blew me down when the court um Sel, you know, um it the because the previous decision in 2024 claimed Tickle wasn't direct indirectly discriminated against, but they doubled down saying he was directly discriminated against. And then doesn't that decision strengthen mean like Tickle Jason, who defends their rights more to be in female-only spaces?

[00:06:12]Um one of the I think the most chilling things that I saw on Friday was um it's just a clip I saw from outside the Federal Court, a representative of Equality Australia, which is one of the big LGBTQI+ organizations here. A little history on it, it actually was created to fight for same-sex marriage. They had to pivot after they won that, so now they're in court saying that sex is a spectrum and against lesbians. Um but a representative of Equality Australia was so gleeful about the direct discrimination um decision and said this will make it easier for trans people to make claims and win.