Repeated attempts to convert an LGBTQI person will be banned in Sweden on July 1, as part of a new law on psychological violence.
Agnes Wold, professor of clinical bacteriology and a radio personality at Swedish Radio, has been a vocal critic in the debate about transgender care in recent years.
When the new law was discussed in the web program "
", she said that she is prepared to defy it if her grandson were to express gender dysphoria, writes ETC."If my grandson came and said, 'I was born in the wrong body,' I would do everything, everything, everything in my power to reverse it," she says in the program.
In an interview with ETC, she maintains her position, which has been met with criticism.
But there are no plans to end her assignment as an expert in the SR program "Ask Agnes Wold," says program commissioner Mark Malmström.
"I find her remorseful, and we know that she is active in the trans debate, which is why we don't bring it up in the program. But what she said is not something Sveriges Radio stands for," he tells SVT.
"Mosquito off"
Christopher Garplind, a program host on both SR and SVT, has been furious with the statement.
"I'm ashamed to be paid by the same company that pays that fool," he wrote on Instagram.
But now he says he doesn't want Wold to be fired.
"I was just annoyed with her, because she is always out there criticizing transgender people, who are an extremely vulnerable group in society," he says in "Afternoon in P3".
The host David Sundin also harshly criticized her, writing on the Threads platform that she should be "shunned."
Wold herself said in a statement that she does not believe anyone should be offended.
"I have never misbehaved with any transgender person and I never will."
Backed by Busch
Wold receives support from KD leader Ebba Busch, whose party voted against the new gender identity law. Busch believes Wold has been subjected to a form of "cancel culture".
"I think wanting to silence someone with comments like 'Mosquito off the old woman' is going too far for anyone, even a public service employee," she writes to the magazine Kvartal.
However, Minister for Equality Nina Larsson (L) does not agree with Tidö colleague Busch.
"Agnes Wold's attacks on vulnerable people are not worthy of an open and free society. We need more respect and love - not more hate and threats," she writes on X.
