Trump won himself a gag order the other day.

The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s civil fraud trial issued a gag order Tuesday barring Trump from making comments about court staff after the former president posted a social media attack on the judge’s principal law clerk that included her photo.

“This morning one of the defendants posted to his social media account a disparaging, untrue and personally identifying post about a member of my staff,” said Justice Arthur Engoron, addressing Trump as he sat in the courtroom, about 15 feet from the clerk, Allison Greenfield.

“Personal attacks on members of my court staff are unacceptable, inappropriate and I will not tolerate them in any circumstances,” Engoron continued.

The judge said he

You mean…this isn’t satire? Really?

This is how Canadian universities are now evaluating PhD candidates https://t.co/QjweHXD3g1

— Jonathan Kay (@jonkay) October 4, 2023

… Read the rest

Oh no oh no, says Philip Ball: government is messing with science!

The science secretary, Michelle Donelan, told the Conservative party conference this week that the Tories are “depoliticising science”. Or as a Conservative party announcement later put it, in case you didn’t get the culture-war reference, they are “kicking woke ideology out of science”, thereby “safeguarding scientific research from the denial of biology and the steady creep of political correctness”.

I wish we could skip the stale “political correctness” bit along with the stale “woke” bit, but denial of biology is not something to laugh off as if it were imaginary.

What exactly does Donelan think science needs protecting from? What is this woke threat? At

Willoughby bullying women as usual.

Take a moment to acknowledge the vileness of this man…specifically the way he says Baroness as Barren-Ness. Its a word used to demean a womans value if she's not given birth.

He is grotesque. We see see the misogyny that seeps out of his every pore. https://t.co/I2dbHYOG8U

— Ms H (@Ms_H_Survivor) October 4, 2023

Note: He hasn’t given birth himself, because he couldn’t, because he’s a man. Barren yerself boyo.… Read the rest

Gee I wonder why.

What’s stopping them? The fact that they won’t win, of course. The whole point of invading women’s sports was the guaranteed win. William Thomas was a middle of the pack swimmer; Lia Thomas won first prize. It really is that simple.… Read the rest

Why we can’t have nice climate:

On Friday, Dr Gianluca Grimalda, an environmental campaigner who refuses to fly on principle, was told by his employer, Germany’s Kiel Institute for World Economy, that if he was not at his desk on Monday he would no longer have a job to return to.

Trouble is he’s 14 thousand miles away.

Instead this week he was still waiting in Buka Town, Bougainville, to embark on a cargo ship to begin his journey back to Europe, after six months studying the impact of climate change and globalisation on communities in Papua New Guinea.

Grimalda said he intends to make the 22,000km (14,000-mile) return trip to Europe entirely without flying, instead travelling on cargo

Oxford vice-chancellor gives her annual speech, which includes thoughts on the free kind.

Free speech has been centre stage this year. I have been clear about our role in the university sector to protect free speech: it is core to how we teach subjects and expose students to different views; and it also goes hand in hand with our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion. I have publicly acknowledged that this means some legal free speech will be hard for some individuals to hear. However, I am also disturbed by what I witness as an amplification of discourteous, intolerant and hateful rhetoric on social media platforms under the guise of free speech. I was deeply saddened to learn of

Oh golly gee now who could have seen that coming?

Men Overran a Job Fair for Women in Tech

IT WAS MEANT to be a week for women in tech—but this year’s Grace Hopper Celebration was swamped by men who gate-crashed the event in search of lucrative tech jobs.

The annual conference and career fair aimed at women and non-binary tech workers, which takes its name from a pioneering computer scientist, took place last week in Orlando, Florida. 

Wait. Why women and non-binary? Why not just women? Include women who call themselves non-binary and there you go, the conference is still for women. But if you say women and non-binary you’re going to get men who call themselves non-binary…which, of … Read the rest

Originally a comment by Mike Haubrich on Desk job.

It does put us Democrats in a quandary the way that the party has embraced gender ideology. I see on Twitter how many Democrats plan to vote Republican even though they’ve always been Democrats; over gender and the roles that men like Richard Levine and the guy here in Minnesota who said that detransitioners should be dismissed because they are very low in number, Leigh Finke. But in the meantime:

1. The Republicans voted to oust their leader in the House because he refused to let the government shutdown, after previously refusing to let the country default on its loans.

2. The Republicans cut heating assistance for those unable to … Read the rest

Broadcaster Michael Crick actually says, starting at 52 seconds in, that one rape in a hospital is probably not too many.

PROFESSOR Stephen Whittle wants to make sure women don’t get to have women-only wards in NHS hospitals.

One consolation – almost all nurses & doctors would refuse to play such a cruel fascistic game as placing trans women on a men’s hospital ward – so i hope Steve Barclay has lots of side rooms lined up. And that he is willing to be taken to court by me.

— Prof. Stephen Whittle OBE, PhD, DLaws, FAcSS, (@stephenwhittle) October 3, 2023

Weird that Whittle sees it as cruel and “fascistic” to put men in men’s wards but sweet and angelic to put men in women’s wards. Last I heard men were more of a danger to women than women are to … Read the rest

Of course they did.

Males took over a women in tech career conference by registering as non-binary. pic.twitter.com/CcGByMt4H1

— Ren (@rottengirl) October 3, 2023

Non-binary male of course, which is TOTALLY VALID.… Read the rest

Inside Higher Ed reports:

The head women’s lacrosse coach at Oberlin College in Ohio was removed from her position this week, more than a year and a half after she posted her personal views on social media criticizing the participation of transgender athletes in women’s sports.

The news of Kim Russell’s reassignment to a different position in the athletics department follows her release late last month of a mini-documentary explaining her side of the story, through the Independent Women’s Forum, or IWF, a national conservative organization.

The documentary includes audio clips of lacrosse players and university officials, which were recorded by Russell during what she called “disciplinary meetings” following her social media post. An Oberlin spokesperson says the other

In late August the Independent Women’s Forum reported:

In Kim Russell’s memory, the room had dark energy. Chairs were set up in a circle, and she was at the epicenter. For nearly two hours, Russell, who has been Oberlin College’s head women’s lacrosse coach for five years, recalled feeling critiqued, crushed, and degraded by the condescending and censorious voices of colleagues, players, and friends.

So you know instantly what the circle was addressing.

This was one of a series of disciplinary meetings Oberlin College staff subjected Russell to after a post she shared on her personal Instagram account upset students and staff. The post congratulated Emma Weyant, now an Olympian swimmer, who had her first-place podium spot at the

The Guardian:

The FBI has interviewed several individuals who have alleged they were abused by members of the People of Praise (PoP), a secretive Christian sect that counts conservative supreme court justice Amy Coney Barrett as a lifelong member, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The individuals were contacted following a years-long effort by a group called PoP Survivors, who have called for the South Bend-based sect to be investigated for leaders’ handling of sexual abuse allegations. The body, which has 54 members, has alleged that abuse claims were routinely mishandled or covered up for decades in order to protect the close-knit faith group.

What’s a Christian sect doing being secretive? What’s the secret? Isn’t the whole point … Read the rest

How men just causally kill women for sport.

The short CCTV video of two Indian girls riding bicycles starts off quite innocuously. Dressed in their school uniform – tunics, salwar bottoms and scarves – the teenagers are riding side by side on a near-empty road. But within seconds, the calm of the scene is shattered.

Two men on a motorbike overtake them and one of them pulls away the scarf of one of the girls. Immediately she loses her balance and her cycle moves right and collides with a second motorbike coming from behind. As she and the riders fall on the road, the 17-year-old is run over by a third motorbike coming from the opposite direction.

And she’s … Read the rest

One becomes stupider by reading this sludge:

A bold and daring new play from one of Australia’s leading trans voices.

Bold? Daring? It’s a hit piece on JK Rowling. About as daring in Melbourne as wearing shoes.

Anna Piper Scott stars in a controversial new work that asks, “How did one of the world’s most celebrated authors become one of the most hated?”

She didn’t. The fact that some ignorant self-involved “activists” hate her doesn’t make her one of the world’s most hated authors. Trump has his name on books. Thousands of fervently hated people have written books. Rowling is way down that list.

In this rare and exclusive literary event, join world-renowned children’s author JK (as played by

Because of a deeply irritating “They should just get over it already” in the comments I’m going to share a little history lesson from the Library of Congress:

The Convict Leasing System: Slavery in its Worst Aspects, by Lynn Weinstein.

“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” Article XIII, February 1,1865

Emphasis added. That “except as punishment” clause was resisted by the radical Republicans, and they were right. That clause was death to a lot of former slaves and their descendants.

While many believe that the 13th Amendment ended slavery, there was an

Exactly.

Imagine a case hinging on whether astrology is fraudulent, and the judge starts by asking counsel their star signs https://t.co/7JCrpoZMhG

— Sonya Douglas (@SonyaDouglas) October 2, 2023

… Read the rest

Another example of how ludicrous and interrupting and contrary it is to try to talk about women or lesbians (or indeed men or gay men) by invoking the alphabet soup.

October is Women’s History Month in Canada. The government tells us:

October is Women’s History Month in Canada, a time to celebrate the women and girls from our past, and our present, who are contributing to a better, more inclusive Canada.

In 1992, the Government of Canada designated October as Women’s History Month, marking the beginning of an annual celebration of the outstanding achievements of women and girls throughout Canada’s history. 

Ok. So far so good.

This year’s theme, Through Her Lens: Celebrating the Diversity of Women, emphasizes