This one is in an area where I’ve actually been, so that’s new.

An Amazon employee in Seattle has tested positive for the coronavirus, according to an internal message sent on Tuesday afternoon.

…

All other employees who came in close contact with the individual have been notified, according to the message. The employee worked out of the Brazil building, which is located blocks away from the Amazon Spheres, the company’s giant greenhouse domes in downtown Seattle. The company said it defined close contact as “closer than 6ft/2 meters over a prolonged period of time”.

The Brazil building is in South Lake Union, which has a pleasant park along Lake Union so I go there sometimes. Not that I’m … Read the rest

Another “conflict”:

A bitter conflict is escalating in the Scottish literary scene with the Scottish Poetry Library (SPL) standing accused of “institutional transphobia” after it said that it would not support “bullying and calls for no-platforming of writers”.

But first we need to know what “transphobia” is, because people and institutions “stand accused” of it all too often not because they have shouted their hatred of trans people but because they have, for instance, said that women should not be persecuted for not ticking every box on the trans list of boxes to tick.

The issue was raised in the Scottish parliament on Tuesday, where the SNP’s Joan McAlpine said it was “worrying that women such as feminist poets

Warren is out, so we have to choose between Biden and Sanders to get the sack of shit out of office. I’m disgusted.

The sack of shit thinks his random thoughts are more authoritative than the informed thoughts of people with relevant education.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday night spun a web of theories minimizing the coronavirus’ threat to Americans, accusing the World Health Organization of dispensing inaccurate facts about the outbreak, and suggesting that those with the disease could be safe going to work.

During expansive remarks on Fox News host Sean Hannity’s program, the president continued to break with public health officials’ more dire messaging regarding the international crisis and forcefully contradicted the WHO, which earlier in the

Oh please.

We agree with the Presiding Officer that debate should be without insult or abuse.

Cisgender is used by academics worldwide to mean not transgender. Like any word, it could, but should not, be used in an insulting context.

We often use “non-trans”.

— Equality Network (@LGBTIScotland) March 4, 2020

Academics? Why academics? That makes it sound as if it’s a technical term, and a product of expertise and research. It’s not. It’s a political label, and a very silly one. It puts a modifier on sex to make pretend-sex seem more legitimate and science-based and…you know…real. It puts it there to make it seem as if “trans woman” and “cis woman” are just two kinds of woman, when … Read the rest

Vaishnavi Sundar finds out what it’s like to be canceled:

I am a filmmaker, writer and a women’s rights activist. I spend my time advocating for equal opportunities, contraceptive rights, education and the empowerment of women and girls. I centre women in all my work. When I started screening my film on workplace sexual harassment across India, I was hoping to raise public consciousness. But What Was She Wearing? was India’s first feature-length documentary on the subject.

However, I encountered strong resistance to the film from liberal feminist gatekeepers. Women who would send me private messages asking for professional favours and contacts, and congratulate me on the film, refused to acknowledge my presence on their public timelines or retweet

Lisa Nandy did an interview with the Guardian the other day. She sounds quite good in many ways. But…

We are meeting a couple of days after Harvey Weinstein received his guilty verdict in a New York courtroom. Nandy says she is appalled that there are women in the Labour party whose sexual harassment cases have still not been resolved years after they made complaints. “We’ve failed a lot of women over recent years,” she says. “It’s very reminiscent of what happened with antisemitism where there are a number of cases which quite simply haven’t been dealt with. It gives the green light to people who harass women to believe they can find a home in the Labour party.” She

Labour MP Keir Starmer calls out the media for the ‘vilification’ of trans people pic.twitter.com/dHRy7zRWML

— PinkNews (@PinkNews) March 2, 2020

Keir Starmer talks a lot of crap and makes a lot of false analogies, as Allison Bailey points out.

1/ @Keir_Starmer, no, trans extremism has nothing to do with section 28. You were a white, heterosexual male at Oxford during s.28. I was a 17 year old black girl from Cowley, who realised I was a lesbian at a time when LGB youth were vilified & abandoned. https://t.co/QVUikRPhkD

— Allison Bailey (@BluskyeAllison) March 3, 2020

Cowley is an car-factory town just outside Oxford. The juxtaposition is rather like Columbia/Harlem or Yale/New Haven or Berkeley/Oakland.

3/ You could have

There’s something missing in this story…I can’t quite put my finger on it…

BBC reports:

A transgender man who has given birth to a child has begun an appeal to be legally registered as the “father” or “parent”, rather than the “mother”.

Freddy McConnell is fighting a decision made by a High Court judge last year that a person who carries and gives birth to a baby is legally a mother.

Mr McConnell, a single parent from Kent, lives as a man following surgery, having been assigned female at birth.

What is it, what is it…what is being left out…oh yes, I get it!

This shithead is suing to ensure that her child will have no mother.

Not “no … Read the rest

Iain Macwhirter at The Herald Scotland:

WHEN I started writing about the trans self-identification issue nearly two years ago it was with the utmost trepidation. Questioning, or even discussing, the proposal that men should be able legally to become women merely by making a declaration of such, was regarded as transphobia, homophobia, bigotry.

…

Cultural and health bodies, and even the Scottish Government, were ceasing to use the very word “woman” in case it offended male-bodied transwomen. Bizarre substitutes like “womxn”, “menstruators” and “ciswomen” were being deployed in the cause of inclusivity.

Which – to belabor the obvious – is a very warped way to use the word “inclusivity.” The word should mean not excluding people from public events … Read the rest

Now you want to know what damn fool or set of fools was doing a Womxn’s Day Speaker Series, right? Well it was the Gates Foundation, blast their eyes.

We’re celebrating International Womxn’s Day by hosting the United Way’s Emerging Leaders 365 Speaker Series here at the Discovery Center, featuring a panel of powerhouse womxn who are entrepreneurs and doing incredible work to give back to our community. Moderator: Mika Yamamoto with Panelists including Laura Clise – Founder & CEO of The Intentionalist, Nourah Yonous – Founder and Executive Director at African Women Business Alliance, and Sage Ke’alohilani Quiamno – Co Founder of Future For Us. Admission is a suggested donation of $10 to United Way’s Emerging Leaders 365.

You can’t escape it even when it’s not the topic. I’m reading a piece from NBC on how the virus is affecting Seattle, and then thud.

Down a normally crowded hallway, Market Magic & Novelty Shop also remained quiet. A family bought a small keepsake and then walked out. No one came in after.

“We’re rethinking our business model, that’s for sure,” owner Sheila Lyon said. “People are scared. They don’t want to be in public spaces.”

…

Lyon and her husband make up a little money on the weekends, but every day seems to bring fewer and fewer customers. As a result, Lyon, who has owned her business for 47 years, is turning to social media to entice

This person didn’t like Suzanne Moore’s piece at all.

What’s next after what threat? There was no threat. There was a woman saying that Selina Todd should not have been told not to give her talk and that Woman’s Place UK clearly isn’t a hate group and that female is a biological classification that applies to all living species. None of that is any kind of threat, or anything like a threat, and women do have a right to organize and campaign as women without being screamed at and accused of terrorizing helpless male employees who identify as women. Jess was never in any danger from Suzanne Moore.

So today…

You know that person who had said Suzanne Moore’s

All about…her?

*bangs head repeatedly on desk*
Of my many many objections to this piece, the most personal is that I was trying to have a rare day off and am now digging out a proper actual response.

— Laurie Penny (@PennyRed) March 2, 2020

So many people telling her to take as many days off as she likes.

Jane on the other hand has some tips.

Notes for Laurie.

1. No emotional blackmail
2. No hyperbolic statistics or claims
3. No blaming women for male violence against trans people
4. No amorphous manipulative claims about safety
5. No bullshit analogies comparing women who want to maintain their rights to racists,

— Dr. Jane Clare Jones (@janeclarejones) March 3, 2020

Even in Missouri?

It’s “Women’s HERstory Month” at Missouri State so…

The Office of Multicultural Programs and the Department of Gender Studies are excited to announce the return of the annual Womxn of Distinction Awards.

I assume the Office of Erasing Women and the Department of Centering Men were involved too.

A yearly part of Women’s HERstory Month, the Womxn of Distinction Awards honor women and femme identified individuals who have excelled academically, contributed to the success of the Missouri State and Springfield communities, and demonstrated commitment to positively influencing the lives of others.

Women and “femme identified” people…because women can’t have anything that’s just for women any more. We have to share everything with men who claim to be … Read the rest

Suzanne Moore says some things in the wake of the disinviting of Selina Todd:

The radical insight of feminism is that gender is a social construct – that girls and women are not fated to be feminine, that boys and men don’t have to be masculine. But we have gone through the looking-glass and are being told that sex is a construct. It is said that sex is merely assigned at birth, rather than being a material fact – actually, though, sex is recognisable in the womb (which is what enables foetal sex selection). Sex is not a feeling. Female is a biological classification that applies to all living species. If you produce large immobile gametes, you are female. Even

Thick as ten short planks.

President Donald Trump held a Cabinet Room meeting with pharmaceutical executives Monday, pressing them to deliver a vaccine for coronavirus as the epidemic spreads across the U.S.

Helpful. I’m sure they’re just being lazy, and if he presses them they’ll sigh and say “Oh all right” and come up with the vaccine by this afternoon.

At one point, Trump asked whether the normal flu vaccine could be used to prevent the spread of the current COVID-19 strain of coronavirus that is causing global disruption. “You take a solid flu vaccine,” Trump said, “you don’t think that would have an impact, or much of an impact, on corona?”

“No,” came the response. Tony Fauci, the

Oh god.

It’s a little unfortunate that the dumbest guy in the UNIVERSE has that job right now.… Read the rest

Hey, remember when liberals pinned their hopes on Ivanka Trump?

No, neither do I.

Maggie Haberman says they did though.

Three years after liberals pinned their hopes on her as a bridge within the Trump White House, Ivanka Trump has registered as a Republican, defends her father over impeachment and goes on Hannity’s show. https://t.co/g8ikc8tGo0

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) March 2, 2020

The only "liberals" who pinned their hopes on Ivanka were extremely wealthy New Yorkers. https://t.co/OwSvTfzGCB

— Clara Jeffery (@ClaraJeffery) March 3, 2020

Something I didn't realize before I read Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs" is that Ivanka Trump donated $130k to Republicans in 2012 and said she didn't want to see Obama reelected. https://t.co/nxyXep83YH

— Michelle Goldberg (@michelleinbklyn) March

See the man. See the man say words. See the man say words that don’t mean anything. See the man make remarks. See the man flap his lips while an epidemic takes hold and he has no clue what to do.

“A lot of things are happening, a lot of very exciting things are happening and they’re happening very rapidly” pic.twitter.com/4opyUDi0Ey

— Acyn (@Acyn) March 2, 2020

… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Claire on It doesn’t.

This is actually dangerously incorrect information. Yes, for the most part endometriosis doesn’t kill (although it does slightly increase the risk of ovarian cancer). But it is a terrible condition nonetheless.

But if you say 1 in 10 people, you’ve now screwed up the statistic. It’s not 1 in 10, because almost half the population is not at risk at all. And they can’t say 1 in 10 people with a uterus because it is possible to get the disorder without one in places such as the fallopian tubes, pelvic cavity, and even the bowel.

Now imagine if we were talking about something that does kill people but has differential … Read the rest