Magdalen Berns

Magdalen Berns. Born May 1983. A lesbian, radical feminist, and critic of gender identity ideology. She helped to co-found the campaigning organisation For Women Scotland. Born in London, Berns attended Hampstead School in Camden, London. After leaving Hampstead School, Berns worked as a sound engineer until attending the University of Edinburgh in her thirties. She initially studied engineering, receiving a Doris Gray Scholarship — an award for underprivileged women studying engineering in Scotland — from the Women's Engineering Society. Berns was active in Scottish amateur boxing. From 2009 to 2011, she was a member of the Edinburgh-based Leith Victoria amateur boxing club.

In 2015, Berns expressed opposition to the Edinburgh University Students' Association "LGBT Liberation" group, issuing a statement of support for the decision to exclude drag acts from participating in that year's Pride Glasgow event. In 2016, Berns was banned from the University of Edinburgh's Feminist Society for opposing the decriminalisation of prostitution . She died from a brain tumour in 2019.