All entries by this author

Be sure to omit the core of the issue

Mar 23rd, 2022 11:05 am | By
Be sure to omit the core of the issue

The Guardian frowns on Ron DeSantis for saying that men shouldn’t compete in women’s races.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis has issued a proclamation that a resident of his state is the “rightful” holder of the NCAA 500m freestyle title won by trans swimmer Lia Thomas last week.

Trans swimmer? So Thomas isn’t a real swimmer but just identifies as one?

Also, we can do the scare quotes thing too. DeSantis said a resident of his state is the rightful holder of the NCAA 500m freestyle title “won” by trans swimmer “Lia” Thomas last week. Thomas didn’t actually legitimately win that title, because it was a women’s race and he has a male body.

The Guardian does the careful wording thing … Read the rest



A cavalier attitude

Mar 23rd, 2022 10:26 am | By

Bozo is saying how much better he would handle it.

“I listened to him constantly using the N-word, that’s the N-word, and he’s constantly using it: the nuclear word,” Trump told Fox Business on Monday.

“We say, ‘Oh, he’s a nuclear power,’” Trump said. “But we’re a greater nuclear power. We have the greatest submarines in the world, the most powerful machines ever built …”

Idiot. It doesn’t matter whether we’re “greater” or not because a nuclear exchange with Russia would mean millions of people dead, whole cities destroyed, survivors if any poisoned and helpless.

“You should say, ‘Look, if you mention that word one more time, we’re going to send them over and we’ll be coasting back

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All he said was

Mar 23rd, 2022 9:24 am | By

I would share the originating tweet but he’s locked his account and I don’t follow him so I can’t.

He’s not some petulant and barely literate Young Person, he’s an adult academic at Oxford ffs. Yet he too considers it appropriate and useful to say publicly that Rowling is “spreading hatred” and far to the right of Marine Le Pen.

Updating to add:

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Surprise surprise

Mar 23rd, 2022 5:41 am | By

Oh gee golly guess what the Taliban have gone back on their promise to re-open high schools for girls. I thought they were sincere!

The Taliban on Wednesday abruptly reversed their decision to allow girls’ high schools to reopen this week, saying that they would remain closed until officials draw up a plan for them to reopen in accordance with Islamic law.

Well what’s the holdup? They’ve had months, in fact they’ve had centuries.

Tsss. We know what the holdup is. They have no intention of doing any such thing, and never did.

The keeping women in the dirt part is not some frill on the edge of their theocracy, it’s the whole point. It’s crucial. It’s central. It’s … Read the rest



Guest post: Now that the words have been taken away

Mar 22nd, 2022 5:26 pm | By

Originally a comment by Artymorty on Culture wars in a blender.

There’s something about all this ostentatious word-swapping that gives up the game, that exposes the distinction between the reality which transactivists can see just as clearly as we can, and the performance that they put on. The words are so jumbled at this point: if the words “transgender female” are just as likely to refer to someone like Eliot Page (a female who identifies as a man) as they are to Eddie Izzard (a male who, at least some of the time, identifies as a woman), the activists end up having to fall back on their senses to make out which is which: they look at an image … Read the rest



A freezing hellscape

Mar 22nd, 2022 12:00 pm | By

Human Rights Watch on the situation in Mariupol:

Thirty-two civilians who managed to escape southeastern Ukraine’s besieged city of Mariupol last week told Human Rights Watch how they struggled to survive in below-freezing temperatures as Russian forces relentlessly attacked the city. They described men, women, and children sheltering in basements with little to no access to running water, power, heating, medical care, or mobile phone service since the siege began on March 2, 2022.

Russian forces laying siege to Mariupol should immediately ensure that civilians in Mariupol are not being denied access to items essential for their survival such as water, food, and medicine, and should facilitate safe passage to areas under control of Ukrainian forces for civilians who

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Culture wars in a blender

Mar 22nd, 2022 11:11 am | By

It’s only girls.

The governor of Indiana governor on Monday vetoed a bill banning transgender females from girls school sports.

The ACLU called it hateful. I guess girls don’t have a civil liberty to have their own sports.

Republican sponsors of the bill said it was needed to protect the integrity of female sports and opportunities for girls to gain college athletic scholarship but pointed out no instances in the state of girls being outperformed by transgender athletes.

Well, good that it hasn’t happened yet, but what if it does?

The law would prohibit K-12 students born male but who identify as female from participating in a sport or on an athletic team designated for women or girls. It

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But what about trans women in Ukraine?

Mar 22nd, 2022 10:11 am | By

Yes yes yes apartment blocks and art museums and theaters full of people sheltering from the bombs are being smashed but let’s wring our hands about the trans women who aren’t being allowed to leave Ukraine.

As strange hands searched her body and pulled back her hair to check if it was a wig, Judis looked at the faces of the Ukrainian border guards and felt fear and despair.

Judis is a transgender woman whose birth certificate defines her as female.

Legally, there is no reason why she should not be allowed to pass with the thousands of women who are crossing Ukrainian borders to safety every day.

Yet, on 12 March at about 4am, after a long

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Cis authors

Mar 22nd, 2022 9:19 am | By

So much ardor, so little thought.

Hm. What she needs to worry about is being a boring writer and thinker whose brain is full of clichés.

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His incredible achievement?

Mar 22nd, 2022 8:37 am | By

Labour MP.

https://twitter.com/charlotte2153/status/1505130262778236933… Read the rest


Episode

Mar 21st, 2022 5:25 pm | By

Ok this is scary. Antarctica is hot:

The coldest location on the planet has experienced an episode of warm weather this week unlike any ever observed, with temperatures over the eastern Antarctic ice sheet soaring 50 to 90 degrees above normal. The warmth has smashed records and shocked scientists.

That’s no good. It’s bad in itself, and scientists weren’t expecting it, so what else could happen that scientists aren’t expecting and that could cook us like so many eggs in a pot? You don’t want temperatures soaring 90 degrees. That=being cooked.

Parts of eastern Antarctica have seen temperatures hover 70 degrees (40 Celsius) above normal for three days and counting, Wille said. Helikened the event to the June heat

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Immersion

Mar 21st, 2022 4:03 pm | By

Kathleen Stock explains to us about immersive fiction:

Getting immersed in fiction is a familiar state for most of us. Nearly all of us do it, and some of us do it several times a day. When you dip into a novel, binge on a box-set, or even just daydream furiously about succeeding romantically or seeing your enemies fail, you’re doing it.

I did it in all my spare time (time not at school, not around grownups or for that matter children, time not doing homework) as a child. I was always “being” someone out of a book or a tv show. My way of playing was basically just to roam the countryside while “being” Mary Lennox or whoever … Read the rest



In a fashion hostile

Mar 21st, 2022 1:03 pm | By

Jolly is taking the war to the phobes again.

That’s a very peculiar argument, or attempt at … Read the rest



Loomy McLoomface

Mar 21st, 2022 11:21 am | By

“Natalie” Washington’s claim that Lia Thomas is only 5’8″ is not holding up very well.

https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1505966528533041156

Who ya gonna believe, your lyin’ eyes or “Natalie”?… Read the rest



Do you like beer

Mar 21st, 2022 10:40 am | By

The Guardian Live is reporting from the Supreme Court hearing.

Senator Ted Cruz, a Republican from Texas and a presidential aspirant, is speaking now in remarks peppered with conservative talking points and grievances.

Cruz began by recounting the history of Supreme Court nominations and lamented how contentious they have become, though he notably left out the controversial and unprecedented decision by then-majority leader McConnell to deny Obama the opportunity to fill a supreme court vacancy, which infuriated Democrats and poisoned the already-poisoned well…

Echoing his Republican colleagues, he said the hearings would be different [from] the Kavanaugh hearings. “No one is going to inquire into your teenage dating habits. No one is going to ask you with mock severity,

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Let’s ask a Natalie

Mar 21st, 2022 10:03 am | By

Yes I definitely want to listen to this guy explaining how it’s fine for Lia Thomas to steal women’s prizes.

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On the feet

Mar 21st, 2022 9:01 am | By

Heels, again.

Women have long bemoaned the unfair and sexist norms that require many of us to wear heels at the office – from the physical discomfort of having to work in stilettos for hours, to the misogynistic tropes that get projected on to women who wear high heels, especially in male-dominated spaces.

Finally, though, there’s new research to validate those experiences. To find out how heels really affect women’s careers, University of North Carolina professor Sreedhari Desai and her team conducted a series of studies looking at how people evaluated women in a variety of work settings. These scenarios included leading a class, giving a presentation, interviewing for a job, and taking part in a negotiation, with the

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Oh no we’re aggressively promoting our agenda

Mar 20th, 2022 5:09 pm | By

Trans woman says why can’t women be more ladylike god damn it?

I was sad that, yet again, JK Rowling is using her fame to campaign against trans women (“JK Rowling rounds on Starmer”, News, last week). As a trans woman myself I am angry and frustrated that the media debate has deteriorated into an argument about whether I can use a ladies’ lavatory. The argument that a public lavatory can be classed as a “safe space” is frankly bizarre.

Not if you’re a woman it isn’t, not if its comparative safety is being taken away from you.

High-profile women should stop using megaphone tactics to whip up transphobia: using words like “scared, angry and disillusioned” creates a

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Ironically, during Women’s History Month

Mar 20th, 2022 4:24 pm | By

Parents have written a new letter on the Lia Thomas question.

As parents of Ivy League swimmers, from men’s and women’s teams across the league, we have witnessed firsthand the utter abandonment of women and girls this year.

Ironically, during Women’s History Month, the subjugation of our daughters continues at the Women’s NCAA Swimming Championships when Lia Thomas, a biological male, took a lane and a podium from a deserving female swimmer on Thursday. Lia has now broken female legacy records across pools and in the Ivy League. 

We are furious and most everyone in our community is furious as well. Parents, coaches, swimmers, and rational, logical people know this is grossly unfair. Female swimmers have not consented

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But when they do

Mar 20th, 2022 10:37 am | By

A lot of people think this way? And that’s supposed to be a bad thing?

https://twitter.com/adamdavidson/status/1505560862316273676

It’s self-evidently shameful to say that men don’t belong in women’s sports?

https://twitter.com/adamdavidson/status/1505563406375526400

One, we don’t want to say “trans people aren’t real.” Two, we are not the equivalent of or allied with Fox News-style racists. What a horrible man.… Read the rest