The Guardian reports, or gloats:

A university has apologised to transgender and non-binary staff and students over a review that suggested it had unlawfully no-platformed two female academics whom some had accused of transphobia.

You’d think it was the two female academics who were owed apologies, wouldn’t you.

The vice-chancellor of Essex University has written to staff and students to say sorry for the timing of the highly critical report, which was released shortly before exams and Pride month, and for the stress under which it had placed staff and students.

Blah blah blah blah, and meanwhile the stress on the two invited academics, and anyone who wanted to hear them, who respected them, who had a hand … Read the rest

A fine rant by an anonymous someone on Facebook which is apparently open for sharing:

When Antifa and other anti fascist groups started, they were about defending communities from racist & fascist violence and attacks. It is sometimes necessary & reasonable to use violence to defend yourself or others from physical attack. In the 70’s-90’s fascists were graffitiing & firebombing the homes of black people, firebombing left-wing & anarchist bookshops, physically attacking black people in the street, attacking trade unionists & anti racists, gay bashing & so on. The police did nothing to stop those attacks and in fact regularly colluded with the racists / fascists. In those circumstances there was little alternative but for people to join together to

… Read the rest

But but but my freedom to refuse to get vaccinated! My precious freedom I tell you!! Mine mine mine mine!!!

Unvaccinated people do more than merely risk their own health. They’re also a risk to everyone if they become infected with coronavirus, infectious disease specialists say.

That’s because the only source of new coronavirus variants is the body of an infected person.

“Unvaccinated people are potential variant factories,” Dr. William Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told CNN Friday. “The more unvaccinated people there are, the more opportunities for the virus to multiply,” Schaffner said.

Yes but freedom. Freedom freedom.

The current vaccines protect well against all the variants so far, but

… Read the rest

I used to be on the same blog network as this guy. I had no idea he was like this.

https://twitter.com/ZJemptv/status/1411511290518986757

No, tell people not to display their “junk” around 9-year-old strangers, no maybe about it.… Read the rest

This guy…

https://twitter.com/KatyMontgomerie/status/1411654920479068164

That is, 60% of men who call themselves trans women are, according to another man who calls himself a trans woman, raped or sexually assaulted by other men in men’s prisons. Men assault other men in prison. Yes that’s a bad thing, and it shouldn’t happen. The solution, however, is not to put the men who call themselves trans women into the women’s prisons, because that just shifts the risk onto women, who are physically far more vulnerable. But Montgomerie thinks that is the solution. (Notice his breezy “most of which are non-violent.”)

https://twitter.com/KatyMontgomerie/status/1411683946174324741

I’m not replying with that, I’m replying with “don’t shift the violence onto women.” Montgomerie of course is expressing his indifference to women … Read the rest

So progressive.

After that she was chased out and drove away.

She was shoved by a man as she was trying to get in her car. #Antifa then threw water at her car as she leftpic.twitter.com/eZ3RlgpGTk

— AntifaWatch (@AntifaWatch2) July 3, 2021

… Read the rest

CBS Los Angeles reports:

Unlawful Assembly Declared As Violence Erupts Over Trans Rights Outside Koreatown Spa

Ah yes, violence simply erupted, like a volcano. It wasn’t one set of protesters physically attacking another set, it was an eruption.

And the issue was trans rights. Not women’s rights and trans rights, or trans rights versus women’s rights, but just trans rights. Women’s rights don’t matter enough to mention. We’re bored with women and their pesky rights.

Violence broke out at dueling demonstrations over trans rights in front of a Koreatown spa Saturday, fueled by a viral video posted by a woman upset that a person with male genitalia who identified as female was allowed to disrobe in the spa’s women’s

… Read the rest

More on some “Antifa” people (weird that they don’t realize they ARE fa) perpetrating violence against women.

Word is it was Antifa counter-protesters who did that. I suppose there will be news coverage later.… Read the rest

Much as I dislike sharing anything from Andy Ngo…

https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1411391998649532418… Read the rest

A male ego so bloated it blocks out the sun women.

https://twitter.com/DavidPaisley/status/1411061779854204934

A woman says she doesn’t want a male gynecologist; a man (who is an actor) says “You know I played a male midwife, right?”

Oh sir, I’m so sorry sir, I said a thing without taking into account your expertise on the subject of women not wanting a man poking around between their legs. How could I have been so rude? Of course performing a scripted role as a midwife is exactly equivalent to training and work as a midwife, and how dare I say anything about it to you with your vastly greater experience and education.

But seriously – David Paisley isn’t 3. He’s more than old … Read the rest

A tweet of Maya’s alerted me to some more abject groveling.

Dear god man, this is absolutely pathetic .

Get off your knees.

Do your job. Make sure your institution complies with the Equality Act.

Protect the rights of all your staff and students.

Including your gender critical staffhttps://t.co/45N46hPjDP pic.twitter.com/rQ2gz8ICAZ

— Maya Forstater (@MForstater) July 3, 2021

Do you think the words “trans and non-binary” appear often enough in that short extract?

It’s Professor [and Vice-Chancellor] Anthony Forster on the University of Essex staff blog:

Our commitment to our trans and non-binary staff and students

That’s nice, but is there any commitment to your female students? Any at all?

I met with trans and non-binary students and staff

… Read the rest

Kurt Eichenwald says there are sharks underneath.

…in fact, if even the smallest bit of this case is true, I think the Trump Org could be dead. It's complicated, but it primarily pertains to the 12th count of the indictment.

Taking this a step at a time: Like most real estate companies, the Trump Org is horribly illiquid…2

— Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) July 1, 2021

…this means it cannot readily convert its assets into cash as needed.

Worse, because of the incredible incompetence and business idiocy of Trump, cash on hand (and access rapid loans through what is known as the commercial paper market) is small. So, the company survives on loans against assets.

Trump originally depended on bank loans,

… Read the rest

SexMatters on that ruling:

The judgment, and the Ministry of Justice policy, use phrases like “transgender women” and “non-transgender women”; the “gender with which they identify”; and the “biological sex assigned to them at birth”.

This language obscures what is really happening. Male prisoners, including rapists, are being housed in women’s prisons, and female prisoners and prison officers are forced to pretend that these male people are women.

The language always obscures what is really happening. That’s what it’s for.

When the judges talk about “transgender women”, these are some of the people they are talking about:

https://transcrimeuk.com (from 2021/2020 convictions) 

That’s one of the three rows. Look at them all.

Currently, under the Gender Recognition Act 2004, being

… Read the rest

Now on to James Kirkup in the Spectator:

For context, the court heard that a significant number of transwomen in jail are there for sexual offences. In March/April 2019, there were 163 transgender prisoners, of whom 81 had been convicted of one or more sexual offences. 129 of those prisoners were allocated to the male estate, 34 to the female estate.

Many of them are there for sexual offences but hey let’s put them in with the women anyway, and then watch and laugh.

The judge acknowledged the risk, as we’ve seen. He acknowledged lots of things, all of which should have point to Nope Nope Nope.

The judge also found that female prison[er]s, who are disproportionately likely to

… Read the rest

So it is. Well spotted.

https://twitter.com/Docstockk/status/1411054443446116352

And even the “feelings” of said chattering classes aren’t that important. The feelings are seven or eight times removed. It’s not really any skin off the ass of the chattering classes if men in prison don’t get to pretend to be women in order to be housed in the women’s prison. It’s a political “feeling” of sorts, but not the kind we should feel either compassion for or solidarity with. It’s a feeling of fabricated and exaggerated “caring” about men who identify as women coupled with a brutal indifference to women. It’s not like the feeling of compassion for and solidarity with starving refugees fleeing violence in Nigeria or El Salvador, or for workers … Read the rest

The worst-case scenarios didn’t predict a Lytton. That’s scary all by itself. That tells us it’s going to be worse, faster, than the knowledgeable people thought.

The US president, Joe Biden, and Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, have warned worried populations to brace for more. Shocked climate scientists are wondering how even worst-case scenarios failed to predict such furnace-like conditions so far north.

Johan Rockström, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said the recent extreme weather anomalies were not represented in global computer models that are used to project how the world might change with more emissions. The fear is that weather systems might be more frequently blocked as a result of human emissions.

… Read the rest

David Paisely is trying to understand (or claims he is).

https://twitter.com/DavidPaisley/status/1410951390499946496

I wonder what it was that made him decide to be gender uncritical. I wonder if there was a particular thing that drove him towards that mode of thinking.

(I don’t really. I think he’s just dumb and conformist, and there’s nothing more interesting than that about it.)

https://twitter.com/DavidPaisley/status/1411015501485068295

Hm. So it’s not believing in magic swappable gender that’s like god-belief. Interesting.

And how do we “seek to harm” trans people? By our wicked failure to “validate” them? By declining to take their absurd reality-denying claims at face value? Are we really classifying that as seeking to harm people now? Just, not believing other people’s fictions and fantasies?

https://twitter.com/DavidPaisley/status/1411019311163097100… Read the rest

Women just don’t matter at all.

It is lawful for transgender women to be housed in female jails in England and Wales, the High Court has ruled.

A female prisoner, known as FDJ, had challenged the Ministry of Justice over aspects of the policy.

She claimed she had been sexually assaulted by a trans prisoner but the MoJ did not say whether it accepted this alleged incident had taken place.

The judge ruled barring all trans women from female prisons would ignore their right to live as their chosen gender.

But what about women’s right to live away from male violence?

Why isn’t that right vastly more important than some fanciful made-up “right” to live as a “chosen” i.e. … Read the rest

So…it looks as if this phenomenon could set whole continents on fire.

Storm-producing fire clouds threw out hundreds of thousands of lightning strikes over wildfire-stricken British Columbia and northwestern Alberta provinces in Canada Wednesday and Thursday, bewildering meteorologists. https://t.co/QnyZ9yPq7G

— SFGATE (@SFGate) July 1, 2021

Lightning strikes cause fires. The horrific fire season in California last year was partly caused by thousands of lightning strikes.

"This is a literal firestorm, producing *thousands* of lightning strikes and almost certainly countless new fires."

Read more: https://t.co/R7mUV6aglI pic.twitter.com/QwlAMRcIg0

— SFGATE (@SFGate) July 1, 2021

Fire clouds spark 710,117 lightning strikes in western Canada in 15 hours: The numbers shared by @COweatherman from a lightning siege in western Canada are mind blowing. https://t.co/hHUAd2OIxf via

… Read the rest

You got the science wrong no you got the science wrong.

https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700553668239360 https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700558755827714 https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700562597883908 https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700570520850445

I think he has an extra “not” in that last sentence.

https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700574358654977

Why yes, it does. I thought so at the time, especially since he was so pissy to me during the DJ Grothe/TAM brouhaha. Allyship with Grothe and TAM then, and allyship with Our Trans Siblings now. Never allyship with feminists, because I guess that would just be too boring.

https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410700579022774276 https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410730408673615874 https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1410732371121373185

Why, what could go wrong? Apart from self-mutilation and whatnot.… Read the rest