[Un]Captured: a new chapter

You may have noticed that this Substack has a new name.

Courageous by Janet Murray has become [Un]Captured by Janet Murray.

I’ve been mulling this over for a while. Courageous was the name of the digital marketing business I spent more than eight years building - a business that began to fall apart after I publicly stated, in April 2025, that I disliked the phrase “pregnant people”.

One opinion that imploded my life in so many ways.

A breast cancer diagnosis followed shortly afterwards. Then, in January 2026, I returned to my previous career in journalism.

While I’m glad I did, I didn’t have many other options. Once you’ve spoken publicly about gender ideology, you can become pretty unemployable.

I learned the hard way just how captured many of our institutions have become - not only by gender ideology, but by other contested ideas that people are increasingly afraid to question.

In many ways, this reflects the journalism I’m already doing.

Much of my reporting focuses on sex and gender, women’s rights and the consequences of institutional policies for women and girls. That will remain central to my work.

But there are other areas I’d like to explore - particularly what happens when public and private institutions become so committed to an ideology or political position that they lose sight of their core purpose and the people they exist to serve.

That will be the focus of this Substack blog:

Investigating institutional capture - and the route back to purpose, impartiality and public trust.

If you were already subscribed, you don’t need to do anything. You’re simply coming with me into this next chapter - and I hope you’ll find it worth reading.

I’m still courageous (I hope). But I now feel ready to leave the old business brand behind and begin something new.

Thank you for supporting my work so far. It really does mean a lot.