Child Commissioner warns against symbolizing 8-year-old trans author

The Children’s Commissioner has warned against turning eight-year-old transgender author Willa Naylor into a “symbol” for LGBT+ rights.

“Excessive media exposure risks children getting idolized and demonized from certain sectors of the public,” Pauline Miceli said in a statement. “It also risks hindering her chances of re-discovering her original gender later on in life; such cases have happened before.”

Willa Naylor yesterday presented a copy of her autobiographical book ‘Truly Willa’ to ministers Helena Dalli and Evarist Bartolo. In comments to the press afterwards, she said that she hopes her book can help spark courage in other children uncertain about their gender identity.

However, her mother Bex Naylor later expressed her “heartbreak” at nasty online comments targeted at her family in the wake of her daughter’s comments.

“We are human and I wish the commenters knew the paid they have drove us through today on a day that should have been filled with pride and happiness,” she said. “We are still proud of her but we are only human and those comments really hurt. How people can say things that insinuate we have made our child this way without knowing the reality of loving and supporting a trans child and all of the struggle, fear, sense of mourning and stress that we went through at the start…I will never know.”

Pauline Miceli congratulated Bex Naylor and her husband James for their support to their daughter, and said that Willa’s activism in favour of transgender children is “admirable”.

“The personal stories of transgender boys and girls help raise positive public awareness about such an important and topical issue,” she said. “However, the children should not be turned into symbols.”