Point hiss
They’ve found another witch.
Edinburgh Labour Students strongly condemns the recent behaviour of our University Rector, Labour NEC Equalities Chair and NEC candidate Ann Henderson. There is evidence that Ann attended a Woman’s Place UK meeting two weeks ago, whereby she made a comment implying that the party rulebook should require members to state their birth/legal sex for official party records. Such a comment implies opposition to self-identification as a principle; yet, self-identification is a principle that the Labour Party officially supports.
In August 2018, we reached out to Ann as she failed to comment or respond to concerns from a Labour Party member as to why she followed Woman’s Place UK on twitter. From our statement back in 2018, Woman’s Place: ‘… is a group that has referred to trans youth as mutilated/sexual predators, encouraged educators to treat trans youth as mentally ill and repeatedly referred to trans women as violent men, ‘parasites’ and rapists.’ As well as historically sharing material described as transphobic, Ann’s recent behaviour actively demonstrates a continuation of transphobic behaviour.
Transphobia has no place in the Labour Party. We will continue to do all that we can so that the trans community are not prejudiced against by those in positions of power. As Ann continues to engage in such behaviour, we wish to reiterate that we unequivocally do not support Ann holding office at our University, The University of Edinburgh, nor the Labour Party.
We have reached out to Ann to confirm her attendance and comments during this meeting, and we urge Labour Party members not to vote for Ann in the upcoming NEC elections if we want a Labour Party welcoming of, and inclusive of, the trans community.
Bullying is the new socialism.
At a guess, she failed to respond because she’s too polite to have said “It’s none of your fucking business”. I certainly would not have had the same self-control.
Also, am I the only one sick of all the ‘reaching out’ going on these days? They don’t reach out, they contact or write to or ask. Reaching out where it’s not welcome is liable to end with a slapped hand.
Statements like this are horrifying. “You went to the wrong meeting”. Am I the only one who has images of HUAC? The idea that she went to a meeting!
Shame on her! Oh, such shame! No, sorry, I don’t agree with shame on her at all. It’s a common sensical statement. And what’s with “whereby”? Someone is trying to make their writing sound educated and high-falutin’, but I think it sounds weird. Whereby means by which; I suspect they mean simply “where”,. but didn’t want to sound…ordinary. They wanted to sound official.
A woman has dared to think for herself, and not fall in line behind dogma. She must be burned, of course.
I bet there was context, nuance, and argument here.
And if I choose to identify as a SIG (self-identified giraffe) what support can I expect from the Edinburgh Labour Students? To ask the question is to answer it. Absolutely none.
The whole lot of them should self-identify as the Edinburgh Labour Hypocrites.
I have to agree with Acolyte of Sagan over the increasing use of ‘reached out’ as the boilerplate jargon of choice. Presumably it’s because it sounds much more reasonable than ‘demanded recantation’ or ‘told them to shut up and do as we say’ which are more accurate descriptions of their communications.
Exactly right, James. It casts the reachers-out as reasonable and compassionate and the enreached as unreasonable, bigoted and unenlightened. When the truth is usually the reverse.
Sastra@3:
Heh. I was just thinking how differently my brain unpacks that statement from how they intended. I have no doubt that it’s all true… with barely an entire mountain of context removed and the cracks smeared closed with bullshit.
[…] Point hiss […]
What I find baffling in all this is the apparent death wish that the Labour Party has. Do they really want Britain to be run by the likes of Boris Johnson for the foreseeable future? It seems to me that sane Labour voters will decide not to vote at all at the next election if they don’t come to their senses.
Athel,
I was lamenting just this morning that as things stand I’d be unable to vote for Labour should the need arise. Just couldn’t do it. I’m not alone.
I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of sanity before, though. I’ll take it.
Puts me in mind of one of these woke Bros I heard lamenting left-wing infighting. My thoughts: “What you really mean is why won’t these other liberals do as I wish them to?”
‘cuz when you’re cackling over no more Harry Potter movies being made it’s pretty rich complaining about the circular firing squad.
[…] These bullies of Edinburgh Labour Students are now whining because their point-hiss at a disobedient woman wasn’t 100% well received. […]