Barr says the militant atheists are gonna eat your religious freedom.

Attorney General William Barr warned New York’s Cardinal Timothy Dolan of “an organized, militant secular effort” to suppress religion in “the marketplace of ideas” in an interview Wednesday.

“The problem today is not that religious people are trying to impose their views on non-religious people,” Barr told Dolan on his SiriusXM radio show Conversation with Cardinal Dolan. “It’s the opposite — it’s that militant secularists are trying to impose their values on religious people, and they’re not accommodating the freedom of religion of people of faith.”

“Freedom” is another one of those words that get deployed as silencers when in fact it matters what kind of freedom … Read the rest

The projection defense:

It is Donald Trump’s habitual practice to accuse political opponents of misconduct he excels at, from self-dealing to the use of nasty language to telling lies.

At the impeachment trial Trump’s legal team has invented a twist on the projection tactic, taking the charges against the president and seeking to turn them back on the impeachment managers, using the precise language of the prosecution.

No you’re the corrupt lying cheating sacks of shit!

Thus Trump’s lawyers have accused the House of Representatives of abusing its power by pursuing impeachment and of obstructing justice by running the impeachment process in a way the White House objects to.

Which is just stupid, but no doubt it will work … Read the rest

From last week: Trump and his goons changed the definition of domestic violence so that there will be less of it to do anything about.

The Trump administration quietly changed the definition of both domestic violence and sexual assault back in April but the move has only just surfaced.

The change could have significant repercussions for millions of victims of gender-based violence.

That is, victims of violence against women. The “gender” in question is female.

The Trump Justice Department’s definition only considers physical harm that constitutes a felony or misdemeanour to be domestic violence – meaning other forms of domestic violence such as psychological abuse, coercive control and manipulation no longer fall under the department’s definition. 

Lisa Page, anyone? DoJ … Read the rest

Khadija Khan writes:

A recent independent review into child grooming and abuse in Manchester in the mid-2000s has revealed horrific details of how the victims were denied protection, and turned away by British police officers and social workers. The victims had been deliberately hooked on drugs, groomed, and sexually abused for years by grooming gangs predominantly comprised of Pakistani men, while the authorities involved looked the other way. These revelations of institutionalized criminal negligence were soon followed by denials, accusations, regrets, and excuses.

Apparently, the neglect of the sexual exploitation of women and girls at least partly arose to avoid creating racial tensions in the area. Some still believe that discussion of paedophile gangs of Asian men grooming

Kathleen Stock explains the power and influence of Stonewall in many UK institutions:

The main protagonist in this war on free speech in the UK is Stonewall, a campaigning charity that was founded to promote the rights of the same-sex attracted, but which in recent years has switched its focus to an unconditional defence of (what it views as) transgender equality. Its website declares that “Trans women are women and trans men are men”, and—somewhat surprisingly to many gay people, given the charity’s original mission—that “of course” a lesbian can have “a trans woman as a lesbian partner” or “a gay man be with a trans man”.

And by “can” they mean “had better not refuse to.”

A central

Argument creep: don’t do it.

Jings. This is a standard bubble marginal comment for me: "Well, if it could be argued, then argue it. Give your reasons for thinking that this claim is true. It could be argued that the moon is made of green cheese." FFS. https://t.co/Qt4LpjalNk

— Jon Pike (@runthinkwrite) January 29, 2020

So: "It could be argued that the moon is made of green cheese … " through "If we accept that the moon is made of green cheese…" to "We should deal with the moon's being made of green cheese as follows…

Philosophy students! Don't do this!

— Jon Pike (@runthinkwrite) January 29, 2020

Also everyone else! Don’t do this!… Read the rest

I missed this one back in October:

“…surrounded by enemies and spies catching and perverting every word that falls from my lips or flows from my pen, and inventing where facts fail them.” -Thomas Jefferson’s reflections on Washington, D.C. in a letter to his daughter Martha.
Some things never change, dad!

— Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) October 31, 2019

Ironically, or aptly, what Jefferson was complaining of there was not an invention.

It's interesting Ivanka picked this example because the thing Jefferson's enemies were accusing him of — fathering a child with a slave — was absolutely something he did. 6 times as a matter of fact. Jefferson was bemoaning being called out for something he actually did. https://t.co/ZnvjPLrkjY

— Rachel

Metro UK reports:

A transgender police community support officer was left feeling ‘upset and embarrassed’ after a teen yelled out:’ Is it a boy or is it a girl?’

Declan Armstrong, 19, saw PSCO Connor Freel when he was on duty in Mold, North Wales on October 16 last year.

When the officer looked over at him, he repeated the comment ‘very loudly’, Rhian Jackson, prosecuting, said.

Ms Jackson said: ‘Due to his transgender, when Connor heard Declan say what he said, it left him feeling upset and embarrassed.’

Armstrong was given a curfew requirement and ordered to pay £590 at Mold Magistrates’ Court today after he was found guilty of making the comments to PCSO Connor Freel following

Another man who “identifies as” a woman says this is all fine and poses no harm to women.

Will Gender Self Declaration Undermine Women's Rights and Lead to an Increase in Harm? out now in the Modern Law Review (11/1/20) I believe it is the first peer-reviewed article to address these issues. It argues the answer is No. https://t.co/bZfyI9Kgb4

— Alex Sharpe (@AlexSharpe64) January 28, 2020

Alex Sharpe is “a social and legal theorist, legal historian and gender, sexuality and law scholar and activist”; source Garden Court Chambers. Sharpe is also a trans woman.

The article is pay-walled, and very expensively so – $42 for a single article! – but we can read the abstract.

This article considers

Trump’s buddy Eddie Gallagher has publicly outed the SEALS who reported him.

Former Navy SEAL and accused war criminal Eddie Gallagher put service members in jeopardy with a new video attack launched from his social media accounts on Monday. Gallagher’s video revealed sensitive information about the Navy SEALS who testified against him in his war crimes trial, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

In the three-minute-long video posted to his Facebook and Instagram pages, Gallagher identified his accusers by posting their names, photographs, duty status, and the units they serve in — which experts said jeopardizes those Navy SEALS’ safety.

The identities of SEALS are always kept secret, from everyone, by everyone. It’s a rule.

“As a matter of

He speaks!

But not well. Not well at all. What he says is rather breathtaking.

Jared Kushner, senior adviser to the President, says the White House's Middle East plan is "a great deal" and if Palestinians reject it, “they’re going to screw up another opportunity, like they’ve screwed up every other opportunity that they’ve ever had in their existence.” pic.twitter.com/ABAI3gKjig

— CNN (@CNN) January 28, 2020

He does say that, and before he says that, he says, starting at 2:29:

…when we talk about random individuals who don’t have a lot of say or maybe knowledge or who have tried and failed –

Yes, really, Jared Kushner, real estate hustler, called other people random individuals who don’t have a lot … Read the rest

A little excitement.

Earlier today, I passed a black woman in the store; we briefly made eye contact and smiled at one another before carrying on with our shopping. Nothing else happened.

Intersectionality insists that there were racial and gendered power dynamics that needed interrogating here.

— James Lindsay, full varsity (@ConceptualJames) January 28, 2020

I don’t know what “intersectionality” insists or thinks or says, because I don’t think it’s a person, but I do think it’s pretty weird to tell Twitter “I passed a black woman in the store today!!”… Read the rest

Oh look, a new way to torment women, and starve their babies while you’re at it.

Men drinking their partners’ breast milk is not uncommon in some areas of Uganda, and in parts of Tanzania and Kenya. It is now being linked to gender violence and coercive behaviour and there are concerns over the impact on babies’ nutrition. Little was known about the practice until Uganda’s minister of state for health, Sarah Opendi, broke the silence in parliament in 2018 and warned against “a growing culture of men demanding to suckle, which was becoming a problem for some breastfeeding mothers and their babies”.

Or, you know, all breastfeeding mothers and their babies.

The preliminary research suggested that men

They don’t have the votes.

Senator Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) on Tuesday said he doesn’t have the votes to block a resolution to allow witnesses in the Senate impeachment trial, according to multiple reports.

McConnell made the admission in talks with Senate Republicans after President Trump’s defense team concluded its arguments.

If the Senate votes to summon witnesses, Democrats will likely attempt to call on former White House national security adviser John Bolton to give testimony in the trial…

Republicans may react to a subpoena of Bolton by summoning Hunter Biden and the government whistleblower, whose complaint sparked the impeachment inquiry, to testify.

Why yes, likely they will.

I still imagine a scenario in which several of them … Read the rest

First there was this:

The arrogance, the dismissiveness, the smug cackling, the accents.

If Donald Trump wins re-election this year, I’ll remember this brief CNN segment late one Saturday night in January as the perfect encapsulation for why it happened. pic.twitter.com/8kQ6zN9AZV

— Steve Krakauer (@SteveKrak) January 28, 2020

Steve Krakauer is (or, rather, pretends to be) disgusted at the “elitism” and “arrogance” of three guys (two of whom are black, you might notice) mocking the ignorance of Trump and the evil of Pompeo, as if that’s more shocking and reprehensible than Trump’s ignorance and malevolence and Pompeo’s bullying and evil.

Then there was Act Two, when Princess Ivanka seconded the fake outrage of Steve Krakauer.

The president’s daughter said:

A good job on her.

Pres. Trump to Sec. of State Mike Pompeo: "That reporter couldn't have done too good a job on you yesterday, huh? I think you did a good job on her, actually." https://t.co/GJHB6Sx4Dt pic.twitter.com/eyxHU30j0M

— Evan McMurry (@evanmcmurry) January 28, 2020

… Read the rest

This is nuts. The Guardian:

Anyone who films a partner during sex without their consent is committing the criminal offence of voyeurism, the court of appeal has ruled in a case that may affect the Crown Prosecution Service’s apparent reluctance to bring charges.

In other words the CPS thinks filming a partner during sex without their consent is and should be legal legal legal.

The ruling by three judges came at the end of an unsuccessful appeal by a man convicted of filming himself having sex with prostitutes. His lawyers argued that the voyeurism law allowed him to do so since even a bedroom is not a private place if he was there legitimately.

And he was totally there … Read the rest