Sorry! Internet was down this morning and I ran away from home for several hours. Normal service to resume.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
A little sand tumbling down the cliff
Aug 12th, 2024 5:50 pm | By Ophelia BensonWelp. The end may be in sight at last.
The main justification for “gender-affirming care” for minors in the United States has been that “all major U.S. medical associations” support it. Critics of this supposed consensus have argued that it is not grounded in high-quality research or decades of honest and robust deliberation among clinicians with different viewpoints and experiences. Instead, it is the result of a small number of ideologically driven doctor-association members in LGBT-focused committees, who exploit their colleagues’ trust. Physicians presenting different viewpoints are silenced or kept away from decision-making circles, ensuring the appearance of unanimity.
So doctors get the same kind of bullying and silencing we civilians do. How interesting (and horrifying).
… Read the restAs the U.K.’s
Husks of students
Aug 12th, 2024 10:51 am | By Ophelia BensonNo listen they can explain. It’s totally feminist and free speechy to attack and lie about a feminist speaker in an attempt to get her forcibly silenced.
The University of Sydney Philosophy Department has listed Holly Lawford-Smith, Associate Professor in Political Philosophy at the University of Melbourne, as one of its speakers in its Semester 2 seminar series. The casual seminar format is open to all, and features interstate and international academics on a weekly basis.
Lawford-Smith, who labels herself a “gender critical feminist”, also known as trans-exclusionary radical feminism (TERFism), has been previously called out for her transphobic views and posts on social media.
“Called out” by whom you may wonder, but that’s none of your business, because … Read the rest
Izza Bigot and the Bigoteens
Aug 12th, 2024 10:21 am | By Ophelia BensonSilence the woman! Silence her we say!!
https://twitter.com/aytchellesse/status/1822898437354119648 Note the smuggled in “attacking sex workers” – with no shred of explanation or example, let alone evidence.… Read the restSurely it was unconscionable?
Aug 12th, 2024 9:26 am | By Ophelia BensonMore from Oliver Brown on the raging trash fire of the Olympics:
The very notion of these fighters competing in Paris as women seemed indefensible. Not least when footage from 2022 surfaced of one of them, Algeria’s Imane Khelif, hitting a Mexican opponent so hard that the beaten Brianda Tamara reflected: “I don’t think I had ever felt like that in my 13 years as a boxer, nor in my sparring with men.” Surely the IOC would intervene before the first scheduled bouts for Khelif and Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting? Surely it was unconscionable to permit boxers deemed ineligible for last year’s world championship due to tests revealing XY chromosomes, the male pattern, into combat with women?
Because this … Read the rest
The flap stoked discord
Aug 11th, 2024 5:32 pm | By Ophelia BensonCowardly inadequate women-abandoning reporting by the NY Times:
A lawyer for Algerian boxer Imane Khelif says the gold medal-winning boxer has asked prosecutors in Paris to look into online harassment she faced during the Olympics about her gender and presence at the Games.
And they’re gonna do what? Arrest us all? Fine us? Yell at us?
… Read the restThe lawyer, Nabil Boudi, said in a statement on Instagram that his firm had filed a complaint with the online hate unit of the Paris prosecutor’s office. It was not immediately clear where the complaint would lead. The Associated Press reported Sunday that under French law, it would be up to prosecutors to decide if an investigation is merited and who might be
Bizarrely storming
Aug 11th, 2024 11:46 am | By Ophelia BensonA team Trump insult a few days ago:
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung rushed to defend JD Vance for bizarrely storming Air Force 2 to unsuccessfully confront Kamala Harris Wednesday evening with an unsavory comment regarding the smell of the plane.
Unclear. Vance weirdly tried to confront Harris; Cheung made the unsavory comment.
Make sure AF2 is deep cleaned because Lord only knows what @KamalaHarris and her team have done on there. The smell alone on that plane must be crazy. https://t.co/0Kr0K3QXYR
— Steven Cheung (@TheStevenCheung) August 7, 2024
He hasn’t taken it down; it’s still proudly sitting there, alongside a lot of other trash.
… Read the restHarris is the first vice president of Indian and Black heritage, and has gained
His campaign denies it
Aug 11th, 2024 10:45 am | By Ophelia BensonIn the least surprising news of all time, the AP hints that Trump calls Harris a bitch in private. You don’t say! I’m pretty confident he calls her worse than that.
Former President Donald Trump reportedly has used a slur often targeted at women to describe Vice President Kamala Harris during at least two private conversations. His campaign denies it.
The New York Times cited two people who, on different occasions, heard Trump call Harris a “b——.” The people were granted anonymity to describe private discussions.
In response, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said, “That is not language President Trump has used to describe Kamala and it’s not how the campaign would characterize her.”
Check it out. He is “President … Read the rest
“for justice, dignity and honour”
Aug 11th, 2024 10:03 am | By Ophelia BensonAnother ratchet. Now he’s trying to sue people for noticing that he’s not a woman.
Imane Khelif claiming a digital lynching is the worst gaslighting in a long time.
“Sniff out those bitch witches with their words online” pic.twitter.com/tJiY1rIgju
— Iseult (@iseult) August 11, 2024
From a very great height
Aug 11th, 2024 9:08 am | By Ophelia BensonWho is this idiot and how does she get anyone to publish her idiotic drivel?
[Imane] Khelif’s crime – in the eyes and relentless social media feeds of the “let us tell you how women should look, act, reproduce, breathe and exist on this earth” brigade – lies in choosing not to portray herself as an aspirational Sports Illustrated swimsuit model when her job as a professional athlete is, literally, to punch other people in the face.
Could not be more wrong.
The reality is that it’s Imane Khelif and his enablers who are shitting on every single female athlete at the Olympics. Yes, Khelif is a boxer, and his job at the Olympics is to box, but it’s … Read the rest
The starkest illustration
Aug 10th, 2024 10:39 am | By Ophelia BensonOliver Brown doesn’t mince words:
The smouldering scandal of these Paris Games has reached the most explosive possible conclusion, with a biologically male boxer winning an Olympic gold medal as a female. Imane Khelif, the 25-year-old Algerian whose DNA tests have shown the male pattern of XY chromosomes, has swept all the way to the women’s welterweight title after dismantling four successive opponents in four utterly one-sided contests. The outcome of which the International Olympic Committee had for so long been warned – that an overwhelming focus on inclusion could remove fair sport for women – has finally come to pass.
And it’s not even “inclusion” given that women are excluded from winning in their own damn sport.
… Read the restIt
Third and final Brown
Aug 10th, 2024 9:47 am | By Ophelia Benson“Oh right it was that other black guy. You know, the other one.”
World’s only other Black guy steps up:
Former Los Angeles city councilman and California state Sen. Nate Holden said Friday that he was with former President Donald Trump in the helicopter ride that made an emergency landing, despite Trump saying it was former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown.
“Willie is the short Black guy living in San Francisco,” Holden said in an interview with Politico late Friday. “I’m a tall Black guy living in Los Angeles.”
It’s a damn good thing there are only three Black guys to keep track of, because more would be just impossible.
… Read the restTrump told reporters gathered at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida
Epic bus journey
Aug 10th, 2024 6:55 am | By Ophelia Benson
Hey, a public transportation nerd! I’m a public transportation nerd too!
The headline is misleading.
This man travelled from Canada to Mexico on only public transport
It’s misleading because duh, millions of people do that every week. It turns out they meant local public transportation, i.e. city buses and the like.
… Read the restWilliam Hui has been fascinated with public transportation for as long as he can remember. So it only made sense that the 40-year-old systems engineer would challenge himself to travel from his hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia, to Tijuana, Mexico, solely on public buses and trains.
On 24 June, Mr Hui set out to do just that, taking a nine-day journey along the US Pacific coast. Mr Hui told
What about their dignity and honor?
Aug 10th, 2024 4:51 am | By Ophelia BensonThe BBC gloats over a man’s gloating over stealing a gold medal from a woman.
Imane Khelif said “attacks” over
hergender eligibility gavehervictory a “special taste” aftershewon Olympic women’s boxing gold a year after being disqualified from the World Championships.The Algerian was banned and reported to have failed gender eligibility tests but, having been allowed to compete in Paris, beat Chinese world champion Yang Liu by unanimous decision over five rounds to win welterweight gold.
While the men roared with laughter.
… Read the restKhelif said
shehad sent a “single message” withhergold – thather“dignity and honour is above everything else”.“My message to the whole world is that they should to commit
Emanation from the sewer
Aug 10th, 2024 3:35 am | By Ophelia BensonWords fail me.
https://twitter.com/zarahsultana/status/1822021699878989999… Read the restX is someone who identifies as X
Aug 9th, 2024 5:21 pm | By Ophelia BensonHunnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnh.
Play the clip.
#ProfCircularDefinition Same vibes: pic.twitter.com/7P4OUQ9xP5
— Amanda (@Amanda2010___) August 9, 2024
And then a dragon ate the pilot
Aug 9th, 2024 12:22 pm | By Ophelia BensonTrump stacks the lies one on top of another.
San Francisco’s former mayor Willie Brown has dismissed as “fiction” Donald Trump’s story that they once endured a scary helicopter trip together. The former president said on Thursday that he and Mr Brown “went down” in a helicopter together and Mr Brown was “a little concerned”.
That’s so Trump. He wasn’t concerned, but Mr Brown was. Geddit??????
… Read the rest“We thought maybe this was the end,” Trump said. “We were in a helicopter… and there was an emergency landing. This was not a pleasant landing.” Mr Brown, 90, told US media he had never shared a helicopter with Trump, adding: “I don’t think I’d want to ride on the same helicopter with
Dude Rights Watch
Aug 9th, 2024 11:00 am | By Ophelia BensonHuman Rights Watch has nothing but contempt for women’s rights. I guess to them “human” just means “male.”
The outpouring of vitriol against Lin Yu-ting and Imane Khelif in the Paris Olympics boxing competition shows the immense harms “sex testing” policies cause. The International Olympic Committee is right to stand against sex testing.
https://t.co/OtygB2k6K6 pic.twitter.com/SUb9GjBNao— Human Rights Watch (@hrw) August 9, 2024
Let men punch women and take all their prizes, eh? Women don’t matter.… Read the rest
Nominees will have to pick a side
Aug 9th, 2024 10:53 am | By Ophelia BensonAdults tell twerps we’re not going to invent new categories of sex/gender idenniny just for twerps:
BAFTA has dealt a blow to nonbinary performers, deciding – after spending two years debating the thorny question of ‘gendered’ acting categories – that awards nominees will have to pick a side and choose whether they want to compete as ‘actors’ or ‘actresses‘.
There are no “nonbinary performers”; there are only twerps who call themselves “nonbinary.”
The announcement places non-binary performers – like Emma Corrin, Emma D’Arcy and Bella Ramsey – in a tricky position.
If they’re so non-binary why are they called Emma and Emma and Bella? Also why can’t the Mail decide whether there’s a hyphen in non-binary or not?
Check … Read the rest
The duty of care has been thrown out the window
Aug 9th, 2024 10:25 am | By Ophelia BensonSharron Davies raised fears of a woman Olympian being killed as she joined fairness for sport campaigners in demanding sex tests for all competitors. The former silver-medallist swimmer said the “insane” gender row engulfing boxing at these Games amounts to “genuine neglect” by the IOC.
Genuine, knowing, calculated, brutal, murderous neglect. A man’s feelings somehow matter more than a woman’s physical safety.
… Read the restDavies and Fiona McAnena, of the group Sex Matters, appealed for sport not to get sidetracked by doubts over the credibility of the International Boxing Association, which carried out gender eligibility tests on Khelif and Lin in 2022 and 2023.
“In boxing, it is insane to put a male in a ring with a