A former breastfeeding counsellor was back before a Brisbane tribunal on Wednesday  – not for a final hearing, but for a procedural step in a case that has now been running for years.

Jasmine Sussex is defending a vilification complaint brought by a transgender-identifying man after she publicly criticised men who claim they can breastfeed. The complaint, lodged in the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal, alleges she incited hatred, serious contempt, or severe ridicule.

We last covered Jasmine’s case in November, when it was confirmed the matter would proceed to the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal. HRLA Principal Lawyer John Steenhof put the question at the heart of the case plainly: “It’s not going to be a case that’s going to come to a definitive position on what is right and wrong … but whether we’re allowed to speak about them.”

Wednesday's hearing was about evidence before the tribunal. The complainant claims to have induced lactation under medical supervision. Jasmine’s legal team sought an order that the complainant provide medical evidence relating to that claim. A single-member panel of the tribunal ruled earlier this year that the complainant need not produce the evidence, and that it was irrelevant to whether Jasmine’s criticism amounted vilification.

Jasmine, who is represented by HRLA and Anthony Morris KC, is appealing that ruling.

The dispute is narrow but it matters. And as Mr Morris argued, the nature of this evidence raises a question of public interest – whether induced lactation in men is a safe substitute for mother’s milk, or healthy for an infant at all.

Whichever way the appeal falls, the decision will shape what any eventual hearing can consider.

This is how these cases grind on – each procedural question argued, reserved, and appealed while the years accumulate, and still without any finding of vilification. In many ways, the process is the punishment.

Queensland has, in the past year, taken modest steps toward restoring common sense to gender policy – reinstating a freeze on puberty blockers for minors, and a cabinet minister acknowledging that a woman is an adult human female. But in the same state Jasmine has been hauled before a tribunal for saying something nearly all Queenslanders would accept as common sense.

The question is not whether Jasmine’s views are contested. It is whether contested views on biological sex, infant welfare, and women’s rights can be expressed at all without attracting years of legal proceedings.

When they cannot, the cost falls on ordinary Australians – not on those with the resources to absorb it.

HRLA awaits the tribunal’s decision, which will determine how Jasmine’s case proceeds.