Seeking: a person

Oct 28th, 2022 3:27 am | By

Mysterious person does mysterious persony things, police seek help finding mysterious person.

https://twitter.com/BTPBerks/status/1585579312081666052

Were the two teenagers girls by any chance? Or did mysterious person select teenage boys as “their” victim?

This is the police. This is the police seeking a man sexually abusing girls in a public toilet, and those police are carefully not being specific about what they’re looking for, because it’s more important to honor and protect the idenniny of the creepy dangerous man in the wig and skirt than it is to protect any teenage girls he might decide to terrorize.



Amazing but not in a good way

Oct 28th, 2022 1:46 am | By
https://twitter.com/KirstySNP/status/1585733173287170048

It is an amazing speech, but not in the sense Kirsty Blackman seems to mean.

But it’s not about the right “to simply be who they are.” That’s the whole point. They’re claiming a right to be recognized, treated as, embraced as, who they are not. There are two lies in this formula, not just one. The first lie is that it’s about who they are when in fact it’s about who they are not, and the second lie is that it’s just about them, doing their thing, when in fact it’s about forcing everyone else to endorse and support and help with their personal fantasy. That is not a right. Compelling all other people to “validate” your personal private fantasy is not a right.

“…fighting other women just because their experience looks different to your own gets you nowhere.”

Maybe so, but that’s not what this is. They’re not other women, we’re not fighting them, our refusal to obey their orders is not because their “experience looks different” from ours.

I’m so fed up with all this baby talk from legislators.



What kind of bodies?

Oct 27th, 2022 6:08 pm | By

The Faculty of Nursing at the University of Calgary wants to provide period products for…well that’s where it gets tricky.

One of our NURS 289 clinical groups is partnering with The Moss Bag Project to provide period products for the houseless and vulnerable in Calgary! Mulitple donation boxes are in various locations on campus: Professional Faculties Building at the PPE station, Wellness Centre, UofC Bookstore, and TFDL. Donations are accepted from now until November 15th

Useful, helpful. But…

Bleeding bodies.



To spread accurate information

Oct 27th, 2022 3:46 pm | By

The trans wars seep into everything.

https://twitter.com/DawnButlerBrent/status/1585605353013657600

Only, as onlookers have pointed out, Badenoch didn’t spread misinformation about Mr. Cohen.

I won’t hold my breath while waiting for that apology.



Your consent violated

Oct 27th, 2022 11:37 am | By

Reverse victim and offender. Can do! says “Katy” Montgomerie.

https://twitter.com/KatyMontgomerie/status/1585665142708207619

No. That’s a reversal. No you’re the man pretending to be a woman; no you are; no you; etc. Reality blows the whistle hard: only women are women; men are not women; women only are women.



Making up the numbers

Oct 27th, 2022 11:06 am | By

Six people on the panel, one of whom was a woman and one of whom was…Eddie Izzard.

Shortly before the Brexit referendum, I was invited to appear on Question Time. Knowing how much of a cage-fight such occasions can be, I asked the producer if there would be another woman on the panel. I didn’t want to be the only one. “Yes, of course, don’t worry,” came the reply. 

In retrospect, I was being a bit feeble; I was a big girl and I could hold my own. It was just that, in the past, I had always much preferred shows when there was another member of my sex taking part. A dash of oestrogen dilutes the gamey testosterone with which our political class is so richly imbued. Besides, it was hardly controversial to expect half the human race to occupy a third of one current affairs panel. 

Welllll not to you maybe, but to the fans of gamey testosterone…

Anyway, I got to Brighton and was sitting in the green room where all that night’s guests were assembling. Nigel Farage was there in a natty velvet-collared check coat, comedian Eddie Izzard sported a pink beret and there was a Tory Transport minister among the rest. But no female guest. Where was she? 

She asked the producer. He said they stopped looking after Eddie said yes.

I was dumbfounded. Did a pink beret and matching lippy really qualify Eddie Izzard to be a female panellist? Did anyone seriously think that someone who lacked all of the key milestones and experiences of a woman’s life (not to mention the matching female genitalia) was qualified to take one of only two places reserved for a woman? Astonishingly, the answer was, clearly, yes. In the eyes of the BBC, at least, although not in mine and not, you can bet, in the minds of the majority of viewers who were about to tune in. 

But we’re considered demonic for seeing through those eyes.



Playground bully

Oct 27th, 2022 10:32 am | By

The Guardian is so upset it can hardly breathe.

Tory MP under fire for transphobic comments about Eddie Izzard

Define “transphobic.”

Don’t be silly; of course they’re not going to define it.

A Conservative MP has been criticised for making transphobic comments that questioned whether female representation in parliament would “increase or decrease” if Eddie Izzard was elected as an MP.

How is that “transphobic”? It is a real issue that pretending men can be women will skew statistics and representation and the like. It’s not phobic to say so. It’s a tad misogynist to pretend it is.

Lee Anderson, MP for Ashfield in Nottinghamshire, told Talk TV he “would not follow him into the toilets” if she came to parliament, and even said Keir Starmer “is not sure what he’s all about”.

Anderson told the show: “… I think Labour have got 51% of their MPs now, in parliament, are females. Now, if Eddie Izzard gets elected, I don’t know whether that increases or decreases the percentage.

“Because I’m not sure what he’s all about, Keir Starmer’s not sure what he’s all about. And you know what, the old traditional working-class Labour voters will take a look at Eddie Izzard and think, y’know, really?

Working class???? Good lord, what does Labour have to do with the working class?

Labour MP Chris Bryant told the Guardian: “Eddie is more than capable of defending herself and has run more marathons for charity than this chap could ever manage, but what I don’t understand is why playground bullies always think they are God’s gift to humanity and that LGBT folk are just waiting to pounce on them in the loo.”

Why playground bully though? Eddie Izzard is a rich and successful man, not a spindly child in glasses. Izzard is a narcissist making his personal feelings a matter of public interest while trying to appropriate womaning from actual women. Is he the victim of playground bullies or is he a playground bully himself?

Next we get a few paragraphs of background in which the Guardian refers to Izzard with “she” and “her” no fewer than nine times.



A torrent of abuse

Oct 27th, 2022 10:07 am | By

Oh gee, how nice of him.

Eddie Izzard rules out appearing on all-women Labour MP shortlists

Izzard, 60, who became famous as a cross-dressing comedian and now identifies as a gender-fluid trans woman, has made the longlist of the open contest to become Labour’s candidate for the safe seat of Sheffield Central in the next general election.

In a short telephone interview with the Guardian on Thursday, Izzard said she had suffered a “torrent of transphobic abuse” since announcing her candidacy, including being photographed by a gender-critical feminist using the women’s toilet.

Oh poor darling. How dare those bitches talk back to him just because he’s trying to shove them aside.

Though Izzard announced two years ago that she preferred to be addressed with female pronouns and wanted to be “based in girl mode from now on”, she said “I don’t mind he/him”.

Anything as long as we’re all talking about Eddie Izzard. The key thing here is to keep TALKING ABOUT EDDIE IZZARD.

Rosie Duffield, the Labour MP for Canterbury, suggested recently that she would rather be arrested than refer to Izzard as “she”.

When asked about the possibility of misgendering someone becoming a hate crime, Duffield said: “Is that a serious thing? Is that coming to parliament anytime soon? I hope not because you might as well arrest me now. I’m not calling Eddie Izzard a woman.”

Imagine arresting people for saying Rachel Dolezal is not black. Now imagine arresting women for not saying Eddie Izzard is a woman. The first is absurd, the second is commonplace. Shut up, women, you don’t matter.

Asked for her message to Duffield, Izzard said: “She has got to join the 21st century. She’s got to catch up with the rest of us. The vast majority of the world is now moving forwards … The millennium has happened and we’re 22 years into it. So come and join us in the 21st century.”

Fuck you, Ed. We haven’t “got to” do anything at your command.

On the pronoun question, Izzard said: “I am not telling anyone else to do anything. I prefer she/her. Don’t mind he/him. Changing my pronouns after a number of years being out just seemed to align more with how I was living my life. And am I not allowed to do that?”

Depends. If you’re doing it inside your head, sure. If you’re doing it outside your head and ordering the rest of the world to play along, not necessarily.



He would show compash

Oct 27th, 2022 8:52 am | By

But…

https://twitter.com/LabourRichard/status/1585541819747680256

But sir. But sir, why does a system that puts compassion at its heart=taking rights away from women and giving them to men who call themselves women? Why are trans women, aka men who call themselves women, deserving of compassion at the expense of women? Why are women not deserving of compassion?

Not that we want “compassion” of course. We just want our fucking rights. We just want men like you to stop cheerfully giving our rights away and ignoring us when we object and calling that “compassion.”



Fists up for Eddie yeah?

Oct 27th, 2022 8:37 am | By

The bullying escalates some more.

https://twitter.com/LabourStudents/status/1585581346952462339

Those fists. Those fists used to stand for we won’t back down, for courage, for solidarity, for speaking truth to power. They stood for workers or women or people of color or lesbians and gays uniting to resist oppression. Here they just stand for we will punch you bitches.



Looking forward to the docs

Oct 26th, 2022 5:36 pm | By

Just to make sure everyone has all the facts –

Good

to

know.



They screamed and hit the door

Oct 26th, 2022 11:28 am | By

Helen Joyce’s talk at Gonville and Caius went ahead yesterday evening; the Telegraph has details:

Naï Zakharia, an attendee of the talk, said: “There were hundreds of protesters. They screamed and hit the door. It was hard to hear the speakers. In the middle of the talk a group of protesters got in to right behind the door of the auditorium.”

All because of a woman who doesn’t believe in magic gender.

On Tuesday night, organisers were expecting 75 masked protesters to assemble at the church.

Students rallied each other via other emails, seen by The Telegraph, to “bring pots and pans to make some noise” along with “banners, flags and signs”. Protest organisers added: “Facemasks are recommended for privacy reasons.”

Make noise in order to disrupt the talk, and wear masks to do it with impunity.

Prof Ahmed said: “Senior figures in the University have expressed regret that this debate is even going ahead. The only response to that is to arrange another, bigger event like it. That is what I intend to do.”

Helen reports:



Blunt?

Oct 26th, 2022 10:35 am | By

Why can’t India Willoughby be accurate?

Rowling doesn’t “view” trans women as men, she just knows that’s what they are, because it is what they are. Women are just called women; the modifier “trans” means “not literally.” The word “trans” points to fiction, pretending, fantasy, playacting, imagining.

Of course Rowling believes trans women should use “the right facilities.” It’s Willoughby who thinks trans women should intrude on women.

As for the clumsy “uses cases from around the world as proof to fear us” I suppose he means she cites examples of trans women assaulting women. Well? What’s the point here? That we should keep our bitchy mouths shut about men assaulting women? That’s not going to happen.



The heroic version

Oct 26th, 2022 8:41 am | By

Pink News rushes to compile a self-serving story on how Benjamin Cohen is without flaw and critics of Pink News are demonic:

Kemi Badenoch used her first appearance as equalities minister to attack PinkNews CEO Benjamin Cohen, while claiming she would work with “compassion”.

The new women and equalities minister made her comments when asked about a series of tweets posted by Cohen in response to her appointment in Rishi Sunak’s government.

What series of tweets?

https://twitter.com/benjamincohen/status/1584959197523116032

Then Benjamin Cohen, scourge of “transphobes” everywhere, calls someone a cunt.

You never have to work hard to uncover the misogyny.



Who should understand what

Oct 26th, 2022 8:15 am | By

Benjamin Cohen, CEO of Pink News, can dish it out but he can’t take it.

What he leaves out when he says “No we were not either sued, that’s a lie!!!” is that they weren’t sued because they backed down. True but incomplete, in short, so incomplete as to be misleading, which should not be the goal in journalism. Pink News purports to be journalism. It doesn’t call itself Pink Chatter or Pink Think, it calls itself Pink News, so it should do better than “We avoided being sued by withdrawing the assertion.”

But it’s not such a big difference morally or ethically or journalistically, and a news outlet CEO should understand this.



Shun the witch eh?

Oct 26th, 2022 7:43 am | By

Even Young Labour hates women.



Guest post: Claims of eliminationism

Oct 26th, 2022 6:34 am | By

Originally a comment by Eava on A world with.

I feel like this rhetoric runs in parallel to that of some disability rights activists, deaf activists who oppose cochlear implants as destroying deaf culture, autism advocates who oppose therapies to help reduce or eliminate autistic behaviors, that instead we need to embrace “neurodiversity” just like gender diversity/gender expansiveness, etc. There is research being done on treatments for children with Down Syndrome that can improve their cognitive abilities, it would not be a “cure” but it would help them live fuller, independent lives, but this leads to similar claims of, if not genocide, eliminationism. Which is so ironic because if there were treatments for Down Syndrome that could help those children become functionally independent, I would bet more women would opt to continue a pregnancy vs have an abortion if they got a prenantal diagnosis of Down Syndrome.

The idea that we’re all perfect how we are born gets twisted by TRAs and disability rights advocates to make any attempts to cure or repair disabilities “genocidal”. Of course, the irony is overwhelming where a surgery to restore a child’s ability to hear is verboten, but surgeries to remove or create body parts, leading to sterility and lack of sexual function, is “life saving health care”.

I think the other big sleight of hand at work here is equating being trans with being gender nonconforming. This rhetorical tactic is trying to say Gender Critical feminists not only want to eliminate trans people, but they want to eliminate people who don’t conform to the societal stereotypes for their sex. It completely misses the point that GC feminists don’t believe we have a “gender identity” and nothing about how we dress, how we behave, or who we sleep with changes that.

I want a world where no one feels they have to physically alter their bodies to be happy, where a gay boy and lesbian girl are free of the homophobia that makes them feel the only way they can live the life they want is to alter their bodies and claim to be the opposite sex. Where a heterosexual girl does not feel targeted, devalued, and unsafe in her female body, so worthless because of misogyny (familial or societal) that the only way out she sees is to make her body appear male and claim a male identity. And a society where pubescent boys can find treatment for AGP behaviors before it becomes their identity and way of life.

I do think there will be people who can’t get to the point where they make peace with their body and natal sex. There are people for whom no treatment, psychological, medical, etc. helps them achieve peace. I believe we can make space in society for people who can’t find relief any other way than transition. But that number is incredibly small and doesn’t require rewriting laws and language to accommodate them.



For the distress caused

Oct 25th, 2022 4:53 pm | By

Here’s the whole letter sent to all Cambridge sociology students by the big boss of sociology:

Image

In the first sentence Desai takes for granted that “distress was caused to” the students by the fact that Helen Joyce was giving a talk at Cambridge – as if she were a proponent of genocide or something equally horrifying.

In the next sentence she takes it for granted that Helen Joyce’s lecture is “potentially harmful” – as if she were a proponent of genocide or something equally horrifying. It’s pretty evil, this kind of thing. If someone were giving talks at universities advocating slavery for lesser races, or literal non-metaphorical LITERAL genocide, or the right of men to murder their female relatives, I would consider that harmful, but after all these years I still don’t consider it harmful to point out that humans can’t change sex.

In the next sentence Desai says with regret that “we” (the good people?) can’t tell independent colleges to disinvite speakers “we” disapprove of. She doesn’t, of course, go to the trouble of saying why “we” disapprove – she treats it as self-evident.

In the next sentence Desai gloats that the University’s alphabet groups have written to the guilty independent college to “express dismay.” Hooray for universities and students and the right and need to think carefully about things!

In the next two sentences Desai says grovel grovel grovel grovel please don’t hit me.

In the final sentence Desai says there’s a “welfare event” and a “gathering” in the evening – I guess so that the stricken prostrated students can get medication and prayer and mugs of Horlicks.

What a pathetic display.



Meet outside the church with torches lit

Oct 25th, 2022 4:34 pm | By

Inclusion crime klaxon:

Dear Students:

PANIC!!!!!!

PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC

love,

Head of Sociology at Ancient University



Damen und Herren

Oct 25th, 2022 12:11 pm | By

Cambridge is what now?

It aimed to encourage students to speak more “inclusively” and not fall foul of those who may be offended by sex- specific pronouns. But the University of Cambridge’s decision to say Auf Wiedersehen to teaching gendered German has prompted warnings from linguists that students risk making a fool of themselves when talking with native speakers.

[There’s also singular and plural. …students risk making fools of themselves, not a fool of themselves. Subject-object agreement.]

The students have been urged to

use “inclusive language” and “to use gender- and non-binary-inclusive language when we address or refer to students and colleagues, both in writing and in speech in English and in German”.

Language can’t be “inclusive” in that way without ceasing to do the job language is there to do.

Course managers said they encouraged students and staff to choose newer forms with plural nouns.

When writing, they may render feminine nouns unisex by inserting an asterisk before the suffix — a nonstandard usage known as the “gender star”.

Funny that there’s no mention of making masculine nouns unisex. Funny how it’s always women who have to be disappeared, and never men. Ha ha.

A spokesman for the University of Cambridge said: “As it clearly states on the faculty of modern and medieval languages and linguistics website, ‘students are free to choose for themselves how to engage with inclusive language when speaking and writing in German’. To suggest otherwise is entirely wrong.”

But by calling it “inclusive” language they’re implying that the alternative is the enemy of “inclusivity.”