Another friendship broken over the endlessly escalating demands of trans ideology:

A schism has erupted in environmental politics after the Scottish Greens voted to cut ties with the UK party over claims of “trans abuse”.

Meaning abuse that identifies as abuse but is actually just a non-conforming opinion?

Members overwhelmingly backed a motion to suspend “formal association” with the Green Party in England and Wales on the second day of their Scottish party’s conference in Dundee.

Terfs in the sugar bowl was it?

The Rainbow Greens, a group representing LGBTQ+ members of the Scottish Greens, submitted the motion, accusing the Greens of “transphobic bigotry”, “homophobic bigotry” and disrespecting the devolution settlement.

I’m beginning to wonder of Scottish trans ideologues are a little bit too zealous even for other trans ideologues.

Guy Ingerson, who is vice co-convenor for Aberdeen Greens, proposed the motion as a temporary “tool” to demonstrate the Scottish Greens’ “intolerance of intolerance”.

Or their fanatical enforcement of a lunatic ideology.

The Scottish Greens’ accusations of transphobia follow co-leader Patrick Harvie’s call this year for the expulsion of Shahrar Ali from the party after the candidate for the deputy leadership of the Greens, who came third in the election, was compared to Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin on the issue of trans rights.

In other words trans fanatics called Shahrar Ali names.

In February the Scottish Greens criticised the opinion of Emma Bateman, the co-chair of Green Party Women, who was suspended in February for her opinion that “humans can’t change sex”.

What hope is there for a political party that kicks people out for stating obvious impersonal facts?

The party claimed that her signature on the Women’s Declaration International, which aims to make rights “sex-based”, amounted to “asking [for] the removal of all rights trans people currently have under the European Convention on Human Rights”.

In other words fanciful new rights bestowed on trans people are incompatible with women’s rights, and the Scottish greens think women just have to take it and shut up.

Likewise the former MSP Andy Wightman resigned over a disagreement with the Scottish Greens about an amendment allowing victims of sexual crimes to choose the sex, rather than the gender, of the person who examined them.

The New Scientist last week:

New Scientist today:

Willful, determined stupidity from David Futrelle:

Does J.K. Rowling believe that trans people — or at least trans women — don’t deserve the presumption of innocence? That seems to be the clear implication of an op-ed she wrote for the Times (UK) today. But she is cagey enough in her wording that she can and probably will figure out a way to say, my goodness, I wasn’t saying anything of the kind.

Or to put it another way, she’s precise enough in her wording that she is in fact not saying anything of the kind.

Before we get to her wording – presumption of innocence isn’t a magic talisman that applies to everyone on all occasions in all contexts. It’s a legal term – defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty. That doesn’t translate to some magic formula that applies to everyone everywhere.

Here’s the relevant quote in context. She is — in the midst of a longer attack on First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon – insinuating that men routinely pretend to be trans women in order to get easier access to women to abuse:

No she’s not. What an idiotic thing for Futrelle to claim. What she does say:

The third argument Sturgeon uses is that it’s transphobic to suggest any man would fraudulently claim a female identity. This claim is extraordinary. Nobody but the very naive can fail to be aware that predatory men are capable of going to great lengths to gain easy access to victims, and have often sought out professions or special status that offer camouflage for their activities. Sex offenders have historically been found among social workers, teachers, priests, doctors, babysitters, school caretakers, celebrities and charity fundraisers, yet no matter how often the scandals break, the lesson appears never to be learned: it is dangerous to assert that any category of people deserves a blanket presumption of innocence.

She’s comparing trans people to priests, social workers, doctors – and the point is not that they’re not entitled to the presumption of innocence in court, the point is that they’re not entitled to it in advance in situations that would be a honey pot for predators. It’s extremely sad and infuriating that it’s necessary to take precautions against predators, but it’s true all the same. This is not an insult to all priests or doctors or social workers, nor is it a call to remove their right to a fair trial: it’s a reminder of why we can’t just assume that no predatory male would ever pretend to be a trans woman for greater ease of predation.

Futrelle’s distortion of this is appalling.

Jennifer Rubin says don’t go thinking forced birthism isn’t part of Trumpism:

Pundits and politicians tend to observe a bright distinction between the Donald Trump MAGA movement’s assault on democracy and the right-wing evisceration of women’s reproductive rights.

Do they? I hadn’t noticed. I don’t. I suppose if asked I would say I think any opposition to abortion Trump claims is basically opportunistic, but then that’s true of nearly everything Trump says. I’m sure he’s quite happy to stick it to the bitches along with sticking it to the feminists and lefties and Democrats and yadda yadda, but I doubt he has a systematic worked-out plan as opposed to a determination to do whatever he feels like doing in the moment.

The attack on women’s self-determination and autonomy is as much a part of MAGA’s fascistic affinities as is the cult’s fondness for violence and white Christian nationalism.

Oh yes. Of course it is. People who love violence naturally love attacking women because it’s so easy.

One need only look at right-wing regimes present and past to see that they invariably include appeals to hyper-masculinity and demands for women to be limited to their roles as women and mothers. Modern authoritarian regimes — such as Viktor Orban’s Hungary or President Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil — and European fascists of the 1930s alike have sought to compel motherhood and limit women’s participation in society.

Fascism is about violence and force, so naturally it’s about hyper-masculinity, so naturally it considers women worthless apart from whelping more men and vessels to whelp more men.

The xenophobic right-wing movement in the United States today is obsessed with “replacement theory,” regarding women in the dominant group as essential to the preservation of white supremacy. 

Mainstream media coverage has no problem recognizing the link between the MAGA anti-democratic movement and racism/white nationalism. One need only look at the Confederate flags carried through the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, or listen to right-wing fearmongering about immigrants to understand racism is intrinsic to the MAGA movement. However, when it comes to women’s rights, we see little acknowledgment in mainstream reporting and commentary that misogyny and deprivation of women’s rights are central to a movement playing largely on White male hysteria.

I think I know why that is. I think it’s the same old reason we keep seeing: because women don’t matter that much. That’s why racism always precedes misogyny in news stories: because women don’t matter that much. It’s still considered fluff to talk about women’s rights and the hatred of women. It’s still an afterthought to talk about rape and domestic violence. It’s still considered dubious to talk about women’s rights in the same breath as real people’s rights. Lots of women are Karens, you know – probably most of them. The woman who complained to her husband about Emmett Till is far more to blame for his murder than her husband and brother-in-law who tortured him to death. Women are sly and sneaky and devilish, and also trivial and stupid and boring. Let’s put them at the bottom of the list every time.

We must not keep males out of women’s sports unless a male actually smashes a girl to the ground leaving her concussed.

“A wise legislature does not go out looking for social issues to tap,” said [North Carolina] Republican House leader Tim Moore when he declined to put the Save Women’s Sports Act up for a vote last year. Moore said the House would not consider legislation prohibiting biological males from competing against girls in school sports without examples.

Now the House has its example (but it said examples – how many does it need?).

During a girls’ tournament last month, a Highlands High volleyball player pelted a Hiwassee Dam High player in the forehead with the ball during a return.

I think “bashed” is the word rather than “pelted.”

The Hiwassee Dam player, a biological girl, suffered severe head and neck injuries, resulting in long-term concussion symptoms, including vision problems. The girl has still not yet been cleared to play again by her primary care physician or a neurologist.

Never mind. The validation of the boy is more important than the health of the girl.

When the cops are criminalish themselves:

Metropolitan [London] police officers suspected of serious criminal offences including sexual assault and domestic abuse have been allowed to escape justice, a damning review has found, with the force’s leader admitting that hundreds of racist, women-hating and corrupt officers have been left in the ranks.

Not really what you want in a police force. Cops who hate women aren’t the ideal people to call if you’re a woman reporting a rape.

Massive failings in how Britain’s biggest force roots out wrongdoing were exposed in a report by Louise Casey, which found “systemic” racism in the Met, and misogyny.

One officer faced 11 claims including sexual assault, harassment and domestic abuse, but remains in the force, the report found.

It’s interesting that the Guardian keeps naming racism first, as if it’s automatically and obviously more important than misogyny, even while citing a cop accused of sexual assault, harassment and domestic abuse. It’s as if misogyny is kind of a mild, lifestyle thing, while racism is the real deal.

Lady Casey was commissioned by the Met in the wake of the kidnap, rape and murder of Sarah Everard by a serving officer. This was her interim report purely focusing on the Met discipline system, and complaints from officers and staff about their colleagues.

It reveals Met officers and staff trying to fight toxic colleagues were betrayed by the force’s discipline system, and fear an “anything goes” culture.

The findings are among the worst faced by any police force and Rowley said he felt shame and anger reading the report, and conversations with female and ethnic minority staff about their experiences had left him in tears. He added the report showed the Met had been “too weak” facing down wrongdoing in the ranks.

Oh well, it’s not as if it’s a big important city.

Originally a comment by Sastra on It’s a war on multiple fronts.

The identity theft of an entire sex (both of them) could never have been pulled off without guilt: guilt over the way we for so long refused to accept homosexuality as a perfectly normal and natural orientation; guilt over the way we for so long put women and men into restrictive “boxes” of attitude and behavior; and guilt over the way we for so long allowed children to be mercilessly bullied on the supposition that it made them “toughen up.” By “we,” I mean modern Western society. We ought to have known better. We should have been heroes.

And so we — some of us, that is — overcorrect by experiencing a social justice version of pareidolia, seeing Faces in the Clouds of fuzzy concepts running up against an incoherent concept propelled by soppy thinking. Trans people “know who they are” in a secret inside way. Don’t they look like gay people? Trans identities defy traditional ideas of men and women. Doesn’t this appear to be sexual nonconformity? Trans folks are fearfully dependent on being accepted by their peers. Isn’t this resembling fragile youngsters trying to navigate a schoolyard filled with popular kids gatekeeping who’s in and mean kids intimidating who they can? Look at the shapes. No way that’s a coincidence.

And, for the rainbow coming out of the clouds, we have the same group responsible for our wicked past re gay people, sexist roles, and bullying now coming out against trans identities: the conservative religious right. It’s like the voice of God telling us “Yes, that’s totally a face in the clouds.” Hero time. This is how we’re going to get it right.

Pareiodolia is an evolved instinct. I think it’s not really a mystery why people see a resemblance between solid social justice issues and the nebulous, undefinable, innate sense of transgender self billowing itself around their shapes. The interesting thing is how we are able to second guess ourselves, look closer, and accurately see nothing.

Leicester Police issue a Statement on a previous Statement (or collection of tweets) about Hate Crime:

Temporary Chief Constable Rob Nixon said: “Over the past week, a number of social media posts were issued on our Leicestershire Police Stay Safe account aiming to raise awareness of hate crime. This was as part of National Hate Crime Awareness Week.”

Twitter, that is. He means “our Leicestershire Police Stay Safe Twitter account” but forgot to say so. “Social media” isn’t just another word for Twitter. It includes Twitter but it isn’t limited to Twitter.

“While we recognise that people have strong and often conflicting views regarding this issue, we should not forget the seriousness of hate crime and the devastating crimes that as a country we have seen in the past which have happened as a result of hate crime.”

As a result of hate, he means. Not crimes that have happened as a result of hate crime, but crimes that have happened as a result of hate. If you’re going to issue statements at least make them clear.

“Hate crimes are acts of violence or hostility directed at people because of who they are. Hate crime law in England and Wales have developed in various phases over the past two decades and the law recognises five protected characteristics; race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity.”

But not sex. Trans women are protected, but women are not. Lesbians are protected, but women as a whole are not. Women are not protected as women though some can be included under one of the protected characteristics. It’s old news, but that doesn’t make it ordinary or acceptable news. Misogyny is pervasive, yet somehow sex is not a protected characteristic.

Originally a comment by Your Name’s not Bruce? on It’s about an innate sense of self.

You may ask how anyone can assess the authenticity of somebody else’s “innate sense of self”. I haven’t a clue.

No one has a clue, because it’s inherently meaningless and impossible. Trans ideology is wholly dependent on the worship of a magical Self, but only for some people. Feminist women don’t get to claim any kind of magical self; we’re just a kind of donkey, or system of pulleys.

Nobody has direct, unmediated access to what is going on inside anyone’s head. There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical about people’s self image and self understanding. People suffering from anorexia. Rachel Dolezal. Donald Trump. To take them at their word, to accept their claims about themselves can lead to harm to those individuals, the people believing the claim, or both. Yet with “gender identity,” we are told that these claims are true, honest, and real. More than that, we are told that we must accept these claims without qualm or question. Failure to do so allegedly results (somehow) in harm to the individual claiming the professed “identity,” through self-harm, or through “marginalization” or “violence” by others. The online participation of a single gender skeptic will render zoom meetings “unsafe” for trans folk and their allies. A single gender critical professor can turn an entire university campus into a potential death-trap for trans people. Doubt=trans genocide. This isn’t even posited as a “slippery slope”, but as a sheer cliff off of which “vulnerable” trans people will topple if we misgender them or deadname them. This extreme “danger” of potential “harm” is supposed to justify the sacking, banishment, and de-platforming of such critics and skeptics. While the alleged “harm” to gender snowflakes is hypothetical transperbole, failure to submit and comply is harmful to those who question and resist. That’s okay, though: they deserve it.

Why is it the case that if I were to claim that I was Bill Gates, had surgery to make myself look like him, and dressed like him, I would be thrown into prison if I were to repeatedly demand access to his home, his private plane, or his bank account? What if I claimed I was better at being Bill Gates than Bill Gates 1.0? Why would nobody come to my aid if I said that the failure of anyone to acknowledge my Gates-hood was oppressive and discriminatory? Would I achieve greater success if I said that if anyone were to tell me I was not Bill Gates, or if they called me by the name bestowed upon me at birth, I would kill myself? No. I would be institutionalized, not lionized. Would I have governments, corporations and other authorities and institutions backing me up and paving the way for my claims of Gatesness? Would I have the police making threats to arrest anyone who questioned my claim, or who wrote a critical limerick against it? Would Bill Gates would be told to “be kind” and accept my claim? Would I be granted the access to his stuff that I demanded, with its denial penalized and punished? Again, no. Unless I had done something truly rash or violent, nobody would have paid me the slightest heed, because I would have been taken away and put into the mental health system, for my own good and the good of everyone else. Obviously. Unremarkably. All because my claims and actions were based entirely on stuff going on inside my head. My claims were unable to supervene on reality. I was unable to recruit support for these claims from anyone else because they were outlandish, unbelievable, and not in agreement with reality.

Using Bill Gates as my “target identity” is an admittedly extreme example intended to help me make my point. But my point would be as valid if the identity I claimed stole was of nobody rich, famous, or powerful. The crime of identity theft is not contingent upon the celebrity or privilege of the person whose identity is being appropriated (though someone rich and powerful is likely to have such issues resolved more quickly because of their influence). It is considered harmful and wrong regardless. It is a violation of the person, and an abuse of the institutions that rely upon open, plain dealing, and good faith claims of identity. If you aren’t who you say you are, then all bets are off. You are not to be trusted. You must have something to hide. Access and use of property, resources, positions, and facilities under the falsely claimed identity can be assumed to be for no good or honest purpose. This is bad enough in individual cases. A data breach within a company or government that exposes the information of millions is a scandalous disaster that is seen with a great deal of alarm, and rightly so. It can lead to identity theft on a huge scale. The intent of those causing the breach, or taking advantage of it, is unlikely to be benign. Fraud and confidence scams are built upon false claims of identity. They depend upon the acceptance of hidden untruths that victimize one party to the advantage and benefit of the deceiver. They are corrosive of the basic trust upon which societies rely, and are rightly punished.

So how is it that genderists have been able to pull off the identity theft of an entire sex with the blessing and vigourous assistance of governments and other organizations? How is it that men claiming to be women have been given access to women’s spaces, resources, facilities and positions without the bat of an eye of those so willingly handing it over? Why can we not assume, as we would with any other identity theft, that those so eager to lift or breach women’s boundaries are doing so for no good purpose? Women are already held responsible for their own assaults. “What were you wearing? Why were you alone? How much did you have to drink?” And here are some of the very same people and institutions removing the remaining barriers women have left to be safe from men. And just to crank up the gaslighting even more, women are told that they are supposed to trust these individuals because of the claims they make, based on stuff going on inside their heads. Accept the fraud. Play along with the con. There are five lights. Be complicit in your own victimization, or else. They’ll further punish any woman who dares question this, or who is rude enough to call these magically harmless individuals by their true sex. It’s the only instance I can think of of the deliberate, calculated erasure of men. Not for inclusion, but for camouflage. For invasion. It’s a war on multiple fronts. Rape shelters; sports; classrooms; awards and positions. Things are so fucked up that women aren’t even safe from men in a goddamn PRISON. It’s all mind over matter: men don’t mind, women don’t matter.

Okay, I was wrong. Turns out the crime of identity theft is contingent upon the identity that is being appropriated. You’re good to go if you’re a man pretending to be a woman.

You’re a woman? Great! Here’s your all-access pass. Don’t bother shaving; no-one will say a thing. Enjoy your self!

Originally a comment by Cluecat on Six out of ten.

As is mentioned in the other posts, this is a huge problem with industrial livestock raising all over the world.

There are a few antibiotic agents designated as the absolute “last line of defence” – to only ever be used in human treatment when literally nothing else has had any effect, and to never ever be routinely prescribed because of that critical designation.

These medications treat bugs that are resistant to every other antibiotic on the market, infections that cause horrible, drawn-out death. These meds are the reason we no longer have Sepsis Wards in healthcare settings in Western countries – although it looks like we might be heading back that way…

These are treatments that can save lives in extremis. They must be handled as the critical interventions that they are.

What happens instead? These critical medications are routinely added to animal feed, thrown around like candy in industrial farming settings, because using them means more efficient animal growth/less disease burden in atrocious conditions. This is once more focusing on profit at the expense of welfare – and a complete disregard for the wider consequences.

Areas in the Indian Subcontinent, certain countries in Africa, have been warning the rest of the world for decades. Multi-Drug Resistant TB has been an issue for many years. We are heading back to a time when a tiny scratch in the skin could be someone’s death warrant, as has been the case for most of human history. Sure, some of it is stupid people not completing the full course of antibiotics, or demanding them unnecessarily, but a huge amount of the problem is industrial farming methods. Profit uber alles.

All the Pharma companies have little interest in developing new anti-microbial agents because there’s no instant pay-off for their shareholders. Companies refuse to put new drugs through testing because it costs money, and that isn’t coming back to shareholders. Companies hang on to patents and refuse to make drugs availible for the same reasons.

Without firm support from governments and international health authorities, and a willingness to recognise this issue, it’s only going to get worse. Humans are stupid, and greedy. The people who are going to suffer are the same ones who always end up suffering, and only when the incredibly entitled and wealthy idiots driving the profit cycle find out that no amount of money will stop a lethal infection will there be a serious attempt to fix the issue. By then, it’ll be too late. Just like everything else.

Originally a comment by iknklast on They’re gone.

I remember even as recently as 15 years ago my husband and I would sit on the porch watching fireflies. They were abundant. Bullfrogs croaking in the distance, and crickets chirping somewhere unseen…and we live in the city. A small city, to be sure, but a city. Now what I see is squirrels, domesticated pets, and the roar of automobiles.

I’ve been talking about this a long time. People want to focus solely on global warming, and I’ve had this argument – what good is a world where we’ve solved global warming and there are no animals left? We need to focus on the big picture, but we are not good at that. All of them are part of the same interlocked problem. The biggest losses of species are caused by loss of habitat. That loss of habitat comes with increased emissions, plus the urban heat island effect.

The species that are still abundant seem to be those that like living with humans…and other than a few domesticated animals, most of those we don’t like. Dandelions, rats, racoons, and other species that can feed off our detritus.

OJ has a gotcha.

He’s literally a man running for public office while claiming to be a woman. That’s it. That “it” is not nothing. Imagine a white man running against Raphael Warnock while claiming to be black – imagine how well that would go over. Consider why that would not go over well. Now apply that to a man running for public office while claiming to be a woman. That’s it, and that’s all you need.

Say goodbye to wetlands?

On Oct. 3 — the first day of its new term — the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency, a case that could dramatically reduce the number of wetlands and other waters across the United States that are protected under the landmark Clean Water Act.

And the court being what it is, it seems very likely to be team Sackett and not the EPA that wins.

The Sacketts started their dispute with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2007, after purchasing a parcel of land that was subject to Clean Water Act protections. The parcel — which included sensitive wetlands a stone’s throw from Priest Lake, one of the largest lakes in Idaho — required a wetlands permit before being developed.

Instead of following EPA’s processes to get a permit to fill sensitive wetlands to build a lake house, the Sacketts sued. This 14-year legal battle now has them before the Supreme Court, for the second time. (The Sacketts first appeared before the justices in 2012, securing the right to bring a court challenge against an EPA compliance order.)  

The Sacketts’ case against the EPA, however, is not about a parcel of land, let alone a lake house, but is a coordinated push by industry polluters that want to blow a hole in the Clean Water Act, bulldoze cherished wetlands, and contaminate the country’s streams with waste from mining, oil and gas, and agro-industrial operations as they see fit, just to maximize their profits.

And they’ll win, thanks to Trump and McConnell.

In 2015, based on a comprehensive scientific study, the EPA issued a regulation that defined “waters of the United States,” a term that determines which waters the Clean Water Act protects.

The Trump administration later attempted to replace that regulation with one that would have substantially narrowed the law’s protections. But a group of Tribes represented by Earthjustice were able to get that regulation overturned. The EPA is now working on an updated definition of the “waters of the United States” to reflect the latest scientific knowledge.

But the Supreme Court isn’t waiting for the EPA to finish that work.

Instead, it is stepping in to decide what waters and wetlands the Clean Water Act protects.

Profit is everything, the environment it and everything else depends on is nothing.

H/t Mike Haubrich

The transports continue.

The Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, plans to continue flying undocumented migrants to Democratic strongholds, his spokeswoman said on Saturday, a day after released records showed the state paid nearly $1m to arrange two sets of flights to Delaware and Illinois.

But worth every penny, to make a point and torment the migrants.

The flights would be a follow-up to 14 September flights from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, that carried 49 mostly Venezuelan migrants to the island where the former president Barack Obama owns a home. Local officials were not told in advance that the migrants were coming.

DeSantis claimed responsibility for the flights as part of a campaign to focus attention on what he has called the Biden administration’s failed border policies. He was joining the Republican Texas governor, Greg Abbott, in sending migrants to Democratic strongholds without advance warning.

More precision or less precision? It depends on who is talking.

A transgender science teacher has become the subject of criticism after a video of him insisting it was important to “clean up” language, like “women produce eggs” and “males are more likely to be colorblind,” in order to be more “accurate” and “precise,” resurfaced from a webinar series held earlier this year.

Sam Long, an activist for “gender-inclusive” policies and “trans/non-binary” educators, teaches science at Denver South High School, part of the Denver Public Schools (DPS) system. Long, along with other science teachers, has previously spent time establishing “gender-inclusive biology” curriculum resources, which he promotes to educators across the country.

Science teachers teaching magical nonsense.

During an April webinar series “to address hot topics that are on the top of educators’ minds,” hosted by the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), Long argued it wasn’t the most “accurate” or “precise” statement to say it’s “women who produce eggs.” Rather, Long argued, it was more “precise” to say, “it’s ovaries that produce eggs.”

And it’s only women, women only, who have ovaries.

“We’re acknowledging that not all women produce eggs and also not all egg producers are women,” Long says during the webinar. “We’re teaching students that language matters. We’re not just talking about imaginary people,” he continued.

Language does matter, and it’s a lie that not all egg producers are women. Yes all egg producers are women. Schools should not be teaching lies in science class. Literature class (should they have such a thing) are closely related to fiction, so truth and falsehood are not really relevant, but in science classes, this kind of deliberate bullshitting should be expelled.

Bill McKibben writes:

A vast new study finds there are 70 percent fewer wild animals sharing the earth with us than there were in 1970.

Ouch.

I notice a lot of missing wild animals even here in big city Seattle. It used to be commonplace to see mergansers and coots and buffleheads on lakes and ponds here, lots of them, and now I walk along Lake Washington and see none at all. None at all. Sometimes I see one or two, but not often. And swallows. Swallows used to come back in the spring, and you’d see a lot of them. Now? Zip. None. Very occasionally one lone pair, but that’s all. They’re just gone.

We must burn the house down to save it.

Eco-activists have doused UK supermarket aisles with milk – including Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and Waitrose, with Animal Rebellion spokesperson Robert Gordon telling LBC “we don’t have a choice”.

The co-ordinated protests from Animal Rebellion activists were staged across the UK, pouring milk down aisles and dousing displays in what they dubbed ‘Milk Pours’.

We must waste food in order to [something goes here].

Here they are in action. It’s quite unpleasant to watch, all that milk wasted, not to mention the mess they won’t be cleaning up.

John Lewis at the Edmund Pettis Bridge they’re not.

JKR on Nicola Sturgeon:

Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, believes the protesters outside parliament on October 6 have nothing to complain about. The woman who calls herself a “real feminist” said to the BBC that her proposed new Gender Recognition Act “doesn’t give any additional rights to trans people nor does it take any rights away from women”.

That just shows she has her whole fists stuck in her ears, aka she’s not listening.

If Sturgeon’s new act passes into law, a person will be able to change their legal gender as long as they’ve lived in their acquired gender for three months, and made a statutory declaration that they intend to keep doing so. Remarkably, nobody seems able to explain what living in an acquired gender actually means, so how those granting certificates can judge whether the criteria [have] been met is anyone’s guess.

Under the current act, those who wish to change their gender need a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, ie, persistent distress and discomfort with their natal sex. However, all medical gatekeeping has been removed from Sturgeon’s revised bill. I presume this is in response to the strong push from the trans activist lobby to “depathologise” trans identities. The argument is that trans people aren’t mentally ill: being trans is as natural as being gay. As Rachel Cohen, campaigns director of Stonewall wrote in 2017: “Being trans is not about ‘sex changes’ or clothes, it’s about an innate sense of self.” You may ask how anyone can assess the authenticity of somebody else’s “innate sense of self”. I haven’t a clue.

No one has a clue, because it’s inherently meaningless and impossible. Trans ideology is wholly dependent on the worship of a magical Self, but only for some people. Feminist women don’t get to claim any kind of magical self; we’re just a kind of donkey, or system of pulleys.

In 2019, The Sunday Times made a freedom of information request to the Ministry of Justice that revealed almost 90 per cent of sexual offences committed in changing rooms happened in those that are unisex. Nevertheless, Sturgeon loftily dismisses anyone who fears her new legislation could be wide open to abuse. “It is men who attack women [feminists should worry about] and we need to focus on that, not on further stigmatising and discriminating against a tiny group in our society that is already one of the most stigmatised.”

Yes it is men who attack women we should worry about, and some of them call themselves trans women, and we’re being systematically disabled from avoiding or resisting them.

The third argument Sturgeon uses is that it’s transphobic to suggest any man would fraudulently claim a female identity. This claim is extraordinary. Nobody but the very naive can fail to be aware that predatory men are capable of going to great lengths to gain easy access to victims, and have often sought out professions or special status that offer camouflage for their activities. Sex offenders have historically been found among social workers, teachers, priests, doctors, babysitters, school caretakers, celebrities and charity fundraisers, yet no matter how often the scandals break, the lesson appears never to be learned: it is dangerous to assert that any category of people deserves a blanket presumption of innocence.

This is what the worship of a magical Self does: it causes people to forget everything they know about male aggression toward women, and instead decide that trans women are holy beings with immaculate souls and we should all be overjoyed to have them moving among us.

BBC India correspondent Soutik Biswas reports:

At the 1,000-bed not-for-profit Kasturba Hospital in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, doctors are grappling with a rash of antibiotic-resistant “superbug infections”.

This happens when bacteria change over time and become resistant to drugs that are supposed to defeat them and cure the infections they cause.

To be a little more precise, it happens when natural selection does what it does: selects the bacteria that because of a favorable mutation are able to resist the antibiotic. The more the antibiotic is used, the more of those bacteria there are.

Such resistance directly caused 1.27 million deaths worldwide in 2019, according to The Lancet, a medical journal. Antibiotics – which are considered to be the first line of defence against severe infections – did not work on most of these cases.

This is why antibiotics should not just be thrown around like popcorn.

India is one of the countries worst hit by what doctors call “antimicrobial resistance” – antibiotic-resistant neonatal infections alone are responsible for the deaths of nearly 60,000 newborns each year. A new government report paints a startling picture of how things are getting worse.

…

Saswati Sinha, a critical care specialist in AMRI Hospital in the eastern city of Kolkata, says things are so bad that “six out of 10” patients in her ICU have drug-resistant infections. “The situation is truly alarming. We have come to a stage where you are not left with too many options to treat some of these patients.”

Meanwhile an ignorant “Health Secretary” in the UK hands out antibiotics as if they were aspirin.

A widespread lack of knowledge about antibiotics means that most patients – rural and urban – are not aware of antibiotic resistance. Even the rich and educated take antibiotics if they fall ill or pressure doctors to prescribe antibiotics.

And not just in India.

Nothing can be for women any more. Nothing nothing nothing. Every single thing has to be taken away and made for men too.