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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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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So much ardor, so little thought.

As a writer, I don't worry about being canceled. I worry about publishing something ignorant, betraying my audience, and accidentally using my platform to perpetuate hurtful ideas and societal structures. I worry about failing to be a responsible and curious author and citizen.

— ella dawson (@brosandprose) March 22, 2022

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

It is horrifying to come to terms with your own ignorance, especially when you consider yourself an informed and progressive person. But when readers tell you that your work is flawed, you have to listen. Sulk in private, sure, but don't make your hurt

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Labour MP.

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

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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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

Jolly is taking the war to the phobes again.

'Black people are a danger to white women. I don't think they should get public services I take for granted. And how dare they call me out as a racist – don't they know I have free speech rights?'

— Jo Maugham (@JolyonMaugham) March 20, 2022

Maybe you think trans women shouldn't compete in women's sport. Or trans women are a danger to cis women. Or being trans is a mental illness requiring therapy. There's no link of logic between those views. If you hold all three it's a racing certainty you're a transphobe. Own it.

— Jo Maugham (@JolyonMaugham) March 20, 2022

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

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

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

I'm insensed! pic.twitter.com/J7gAxfJUBL

— Modradical (@_gone_too_far) March 21, 2022

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

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

"Part of the problem is concentrating on these individual examples"

Natalie Washington discusses confirmation bias and how it's often used to attack trans women in sports, like the image of swimmer Lia Thomas alongside competitors.@Transsomething | @theJeremyVine | #JeremyVine pic.twitter.com/JROCxj9sDh

— Jeremy Vine On 5 (@JeremyVineOn5) March 21, 2022

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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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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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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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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

I don’t know what’s going on here but…you know…soldiers are soldiers, not commanders. Maybe they just didn’t want to mow down a bunch of civilians and so backed away.

‘GO HOME’: Powerful video shows Russian military vehicles turning around and leaving as Ukrainian protesters confront them on a street in Kherson, Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/nQ8X0nrXf0

— Fox News (@FoxNews) March 20, 2022

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Naomi Cunningham replying to a comment at Legal Feminist last September:

So it’s ok for the diversity training to emphasise that staff mustn’t harass trans colleagues or discriminate against them. It’s very far from ok for the diversity training to assert, for example, that “trans women are women”: that’s a highly contentious claim that many people reject. Similarly, it’s ok for diversity training to emphasise that staff mustn’t harass Christian colleagues or discriminate against them. It’s not ok for training to assert that Jesus is the Risen Lord.

I will add that if diversity training does emphasize that staff mustn’t harass Christian colleagues, it should also emphasize that Christian staff mustn’t harass atheist or secularist colleagues. It should cut both … Read the rest

Russia still fighting dirty:

Ukrainian authorities have said Moscow’s forces bombed an art school in Mariupol where more than 400 people had taken shelter, amid further reports that civilians from the devastated southern city were being forcibly transported to Russia.

Days after Russian shells struck a theatre in the city also being used as a shelter, local authorities said Mariupol’s G12 art school had been destroyed while women, children and elderly people were inside. There was no immediate word on casualties.

A theater and an art school. Both full of non-combatants taking shelter. Meanwhile Russia is kidnapping Ukrainians.

As Moscow claimed on Sunday it had fired a hypersonic missile against Ukraine for the second time, the country’s human rights

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I would post the tweet itself but he’s deleted it.

https://twitter.com/coachblade/status/1505023302535897089

The fucking nerve of that guy. THEY aren’t going to be haunted by that photo. THEY aren’t the ones who showed horrendous sportsmanship. The one who should be haunted by the photo is Lia Thomas, fraud and cheat, but he probably won’t be.

Of course it makes sense for Rhys McKinnon aka Veronica Ivy to take this view, given his photo gallery.

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So now they’re closing down actual training because “transphobia.”

Great Ormond Street Hospital has been forced to cancel a top trainee doctors conference after trans activists protested that speakers would make Zoom attendees feel “unsafe”, The Telegraph can disclose.

Note the “Zoom attendees” bit – how can you feel “unsafe” at a Zoom conference?

All trainee child psychiatrist finalists from across London were due to attend the day-long video conference on March 16 on how they can support gender-questioning young people.

High-profile speakers from across the trans debate were invited by a group of trainees at the hospital to speak on panels, including major trans charities, academics and gender-critical groups.

But the programme quickly descended into chaos as trans

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There’s a blog post dated March 10 on the National Women’s Law Center website, titled Women in Sports: The Good, The Bad, The Sexist. It starts with The Good.

Women coaches have had a moment, too. Iconic coaches like Dawn Staley and Kim Mulkey are leading incredible women’s programs and breaking records left and right. Coaches like Katie Sowers and Jennifer King broke barriers and paved the way for the NFL to have the most female coaches in their history last year. Becky Hammon left the San Antonio Spurs to be the head coach of the WNBA Las Vegas Aces, but there were still seven women on NBA coaching staffs this season!

And so on. No complaints. But … Read the rest