The acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs:

Pregnant women. The word for those people is women. Stop erasing us.… Read the rest

“All you Karens” and “panties in a bunch” right out of the gate. Top class doctoring.

… Read the rest

Areas with more people vaccinated are found to have lower rates of infection. I’m tempted to add “You don’t say!” but the Post reports that in fact that wasn’t true until now.

As recently as 10 days ago, vaccination rates did not predict a difference in coronavirus cases, but immunization rates have diverged, and case counts in the highly vaccinated states are dropping quickly.

…

But experts worry that unvaccinated people are falling into a false sense of security as more transmissible variants can rapidly spread in areas with a high concentration of unvaccinated people who have abandoned masking and social distancing.

…

Local public health officials fear the public is tuning out the danger as they see news reports

Historian Heather Cox Richardson writes:

The idea that will and money could create success was at the heart of the Reagan Revolution. Its adherents championed the idea that any individual could prosper in America, so long as the government stayed out of his (it was almost always his) business.

Critical Race Theory challenges this individualist ideology. CRT emerged in the late 1970s in legal scholarship written by people who recognized that legal protections for individuals did not, in fact, level the playing field in America. They noted that racial biases are embedded in our legal system. From that, other scholars noted that racial, ethnic, gender, class, and other biases are embedded in the other systems that make up our

Course description for Law 266 – Critical Race Theory at UCLA Law.

General Course Description:

Throughout American history, race has profoundly affected the lives of individuals, the growth of social institutions, the substance of culture, and the workings of our political economy. Not surprisingly, this impact has been substantially mediated through the law and legal institutions. To understand the deep interconnections between race and law, and particularly the ways in which race and law are mutually constitutive, is an extraordinary intellectual challenge. That is precisely the project of Critical Race Theory (CRT). This course will pursue this project by exploring emerging themes within CRT. Contrary to the traditional notion that racial subordination represents a deviation from the liberal legal ideal,

From today, the NHS Scotland Pride Badge will be worn by health care staff who have taken the pledge to show their support for LGBT+ communities. #NHSScotlandPride pic.twitter.com/AfJWwC24xZ

— Scot Gov Health (@scotgovhealth) June 14, 2021

Has there ever been an NHS badge signifying a pledge to show support for women?

Some NHS staff won’t want to take that pledge because of the way the T bullies and coerces and threatens women. What will happen to them if they refuse? Will they be reported and punished? Will they be fired?

Staff and patients alike should be free to be their true selves, safe in the knowledge that they will be listened to and not judged.#NHSScotlandPridehttps://t.co/aKeqRk2bNu

— Scot Gov

Continuing the effort to pin down what Critical Race Theory actually is, I find an explainer from the American Bar Association (which I figure is establishment enough that it won’t be accused of Marxist postmodernism or modern postMarxism).

CRT is not a diversity and inclusion “training” but a practice of interrogating the role of race and racism in society that emerged in the legal academy and spread to other fields of scholarship. [ Kimberlé ] Crenshaw—who coined the term “CRT”—notes that CRT is not a noun, but a verb. It cannot be confined to a static and narrow definition but is considered to be an evolving and malleable practice.

Yeah that’s not a good start. It is a noun; … Read the rest

Fair questions.

Open question to those who are afraid of “critical race theory” (which isn’t being taught in K-12 schools; it’s a course offering in law schools, but you clearly are conflating it with the #1619Project.) What do you WANT taught about U.S. slavery and racism? Nothing? Or what?

— Nope. (@JoyAnnReid) June 11, 2021

Is this about continuing to teach Confederate Race Theory? And continuing to omit things like the founders owning slaves, or the facts about the mass extermination of the indigenous? Are you insisting that those things continue to be omitted? If so, why?

— Nope. (@JoyAnnReid) June 11, 2021

Or, she concludes, “is it about adding more empty praise to the teaching of history and … Read the rest

Open Democracy erases women from a discussion of abortion rights. Much democracy, very open.

“Mum!” “Murderer!” “Give your baby a present – a birthday!” For close to 25 years, pregnant people were harassed by anti-choice protesters as they made their way into the MSI Reproductive Choices clinic in Ealing, west London.

No, not pregnant people, pregnant women. However butch any of them may have been, they were still women. If you can’t say the word “women” you can’t defend women’s rights.

Thanks to successful campaigning by Sister Supporter – a group of grassroots activists that I am part of – this is no longer the case. Our activism has also spread nationally, protecting women from anti-choice harassment outside

Another pebble added to the pile, or piece of scaffolding removed [standard note that the source is the Daily Mail]:

Kate Grimes, a former chief executive of Kingston Hospital in South-West London, has joined a growing chorus calling on organisations to withdraw from the Stonewall scheme.

…

Ms Grimes accused Stonewall of ‘undermining’ the NHS’s ability to keep patients safe, ‘stifling’ free speech and creating a ‘culture of fear’ among some NHS staff.

And she warned [that] some advice risked ‘opening up NHS organisations to litigation and reputational damage’.

Ms Grimes recalled how she received offensive messages when she came out as a lesbian in the late 1980s, her pride at running one of the country’s leading HIV/AIDS services,

Utopia at last: free binders and packers for the people.

Trans students in Edinburgh are being offered free prosthetic breasts and “packers” that help give the appearance of having a penis.

Edinburgh University’s students’ association (EUSA) is paying for “gender-empowering” items that also include breast-binders and compression underwear to hide male genitalia.

“Gender-empowering”? What does that even mean?

For Women Scotland, the women’s rights group, said it was “horrified” to learn about the programme.

It said: “Breast-binding is a dangerous and regressive practice that destroys healthy tissue and causes breathing problems and damage to the ribcage. It restricts young women’s capacity to participate in normal activities and if done for long periods will cause permanent damage.”

But in exchange … Read the rest

How interesting – Katy Montgomerie doesn’t want men in his spaces.

He doesn’t want men in his spaces, but he does want to be in women’s spaces.… Read the rest

It wears the badge or it gets the hose.

A campaign encouraging Scottish NHS staff to sign a pledge and wear a badge supporting gay, lesbian and transgender people has been criticised after it emerged participation in the scheme will be monitored.

Have Scottish NHS staff ever been encouraged to wear a badge supporting women?

The NHS Pride pledge, devised by Scotland’s health service and the SNP government, with input from the charity Stonewall, launches tomorrow as part of Pride month.

There’s your problem right there. Reject “input” from Stonewall.

The campaign has rankled some doctors and nurses, however, amid leaked guidance from civil servants that health boards should record uptake among staff. A Scottish government briefing passed to

Politifact has an explainer on Critical Race Theory.

The grandfather of the movement was Harvard Law School professor Derrick Bell, who in the mid-1970s voiced frustration at the limited impact of landmark civil rights laws and U.S. Supreme Court rulings of the previous decade. While those changes aimed to broaden access to high-quality education, jobs and housing, they fell short, he said. Laws remained embedded in a set of values and practices that discriminated against people of color, Bell said.

You know, it was the same way with feminism – revived feminism, aka second wave. It was about vastly more than laws – it was about a set of values and practices that discriminated against women. Better laws are … Read the rest

How to do politics that is serious and honest:

I think the anti-trans movement is dangerous. It’s leaders – Glinner, Stanisland, Stock – are conspiracy theorists, demagogues, reckless people with no political background playing at politics.

— Simon Cox (@SimonFRCox) June 12, 2021

Starting with honest – it’s not honest to say “the anti-trans movement” when he’s talking about Maya and the ruling. It’s not “anti-trans” to defend women’s rights, even when we are defending them in the face of actions and policies promoted by some trans activists.

Also, yes it is about trying to humiliate a person, when he singles Maya out for abuse and lies – when he calls her names and claims she’s doing things she’s not … Read the rest

Yes he’s a barrister but he’s not the only barrister, and other legal peeps are saying he’s violating all kinds of rules.

These tweets –

Forstater is a figurehead in a campaign that trans people & allies are trying to destroy women’s rights. Read the replies to my tweets.

The campaign deliberately uses lies, exaggerations & menacing language to make people terrified and angry – at trans people & their allies. +

— Simon Cox (@SimonFRCox) June 12, 2021

Anti-abortionists use the same tactics. Then some of them bomb clinics. Gay haters use the same tactics. Then some of them bomb a gay pub or club.

If someone bombs Stonewall, they’ll say they did it for “gender criticism”.

—

I’d forgotten about Simon Cox. It’s good to forget him; remembering him is not pleasant.

Maya, you belittle the abuse directed at me to help legitimise abuse of others.

They may not be an old white male barrister who needn’t fear for his livelihood, but young women without that.

You’re contemptible.

Gender crit lionising of you speaks to the thuggery of your cult

— Simon Cox (@SimonFRCox) November 29, 2020

He’s back at it today.

Forstater campaigns against (“anti”) the rights and interests of trans people. As the judgment recognised. She’s anti-trans. I realise you want to pretend she / you aren’t. But pretending doesn’t make it true.

— Simon Cox (@SimonFRCox) June 12, 2021

Maya does no such … Read the rest

For some completely mystifying unfathomable reason, there are not many lesbian bars any more.

Rachel and Sheila Smallman spent the summer of 2016 traveling the Gulf Coast, trying to find the best place to open a lesbian bar.

There were queer bars along the coast, but they largely catered to cisgender gay men. The Smallmans visited at least five cities in four states.

Why does PBS say “cisgender”? Can we not just take that as read now? Wouldn’t “gay men” have done the job perfectly well? Would any reader be wondering if they meant trans men too?

On one night, the Smallmans met a friend at a New Orleans gay bar. They were there for about three minutes before

Florida has passed a law governing the teaching of history in public schools. What next, a law on what brand of shoes the students must buy?

The Florida State Board of Education unanimously voted to ban teaching ideas related to critical race theory Thursday, making it one of the largest public school systems to fall in line with conservative efforts across the country to regulate certain classroom instruction of American history.

What’s the betting that they even have much idea what it is?

The rule says in part: “Instruction on the required topics must be factual and objective and may not suppress or distort significant historical events, such as the Holocaust, and may not define American history as something

Mississippi being Mississippi:

At first, it seemed a joyous occasion. There was an audible gasp in the room, then boisterous cheering and applause when the announcement was made: Ikeria Washington and Layla Temple had been named 2021 valedictorian and salutatorian for West Point High School.

The president of the local N.A.A.C.P. in West Point, Miss., Anner Cunningham, smiled as the two young women, both standout students, were photographed. “It was a beautiful and proud moment to witness two young, Black ladies standing side by side given such honors,” Ms. Cunningham said.

And moment is what it was, because it couldn’t be allowed.

But almost immediately parents of other students near the top of the rankings raised questions about who