David French explains why Hutchinson’s testimony makes the case for prosecuting Trump stronger:

I confess that I’ve been skeptical that the January 6 committee would produce evidence that Donald Trump was directly criminally responsible for the attack on the Capitol. Certainly he was morally and politically responsible. There’s no credible argument that a mob would have stormed the Capitol if he had the basic decency to concede a race he clearly lost. 

At the same time, it’s legally quite difficult to hold a politician responsible for the violence of his followers.

It’s very difficult for non-lawyers to keep that distinction in mind – at least it’s very difficult for me and I doubt I’m special that way. It feels as if the two ought to be the same, so we balk at accepting that they’re not. Times a million in Trump’s case.

That was yesterday’s analysis. Today’s is different. Because of a courageous woman named Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Mark Meadows. 

…

Hutchinson claims she overheard Trump say about the crowd, “You know, I don’t effing care that they have weapons. They’re not here to hurt me. Take the effing mags away. Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here. Let the people in. Take the effing mags away.”

As Jake Tapper noted, the “mags” refer to magnetometers deployed to keep armed individuals away from the president. 

Trump has denied Hutchinson’s testimony in a series of “truths” (equivalent to a tweet) on his website, Truth Social. Moreover, it is important to attempt to corroborate Hutchinson’s sworn testimony by interviewing others who may have heard Trump’s words. But Hutchinson’s sworn testimony closes a gap in the criminal case against Trump, and Trump is closer to a credible prosecution than ever before.

I hope she has very good security.

Aw yeah, fun times.

A lot of cops were seriously injured thanks to these guys an hour or two after this snap was taken. Nice to see them feeling so perky.

Let’s hope so.

Stupidity or malice or both?

But we’re not “debating the legitimacy of trans rights.” We don’t for a second disagree that people who call themselves trans should have human rights. What we’re doing is seeking clarity on what “trans rights” are. Are they human rights that trans people, like all people, should have? Or are they special, custom, bespoke rights that only trans people should have? If the former, there’s no disagreement; if the latter, we definitely want to know what those rights are and how they conflict with other people’s rights. So would Fern Riddell if she had the sense of a pile of wet pasta.

Of course people who call themselves trans exist. Why does their “right to exist” need protection more than anyone else’s?

Not that I’m expecting a reply.

Greg Sargent notes that the Trump headlines in the wake of yesterday’s hearing are brutal.

Yet Trump’s propagandists have found an answer. They are claiming Hutchinson’s appearance was a flop, based on the fact that a single anecdote about Trump — one barely related to the central allegations against him — is now being questioned by a handful of bit players in this saga who aren’t even offering this pushback publicly, let alone under oath.

…

Trump’s spinners have seized on Trump’s episode with the Secret Service. Hutchinson testified to the Jan. 6 select committee on Tuesday that Tony Ornato, then-White House deputy chief of staff, told her Trump erupted in fury as his detail refused to take him to the Capitol to join the mob, cursing and lunging for the steering wheel.

The Secret Service now says it will offer a response. A source close to the agency leaked word that Robert Engel, the agent in charge of Trump’s detail that day — along with the vehicle’s driver — are prepared to say under oath that Trump never lunged for the wheel.

What good would that even do the Trumpies? Hutchinson didn’t even claim Trump lunged at the wheel, she said Ornato told her he did.

The leaks in Trump’s favor don’t address this point. They simply say Engel and the driver will dispute that Trump lunged for the wheel. Ornato can deny ever recounting this episode to Hutchinson. He hasn’t.

Which brings us to the more fundamental point. If Ornato wants to respond under oath to Hutchinson’s testimony, guess what: There are many other things he can be asked about as well.

For instance, Ornato was the person who informed Meadows that Trump supporters attempting to enter the rally were armed at a meeting on the morning of Jan. 6, according to Hutchinson’s testimony.

Ornato also told Meadows he informed Trump of this, per Hutchinson. She went on to recount that Trump angrily demanded that armed supporters be let in, after which he directed the mob to the Capitol to intimidate his vice president into completing his coup attempt.

The Trumpies want that in the headlines all over again? Go for it.

Peter Wehner in The Atlantic:

This new account of what Trump did leading up to, on, and after January 6 was shocking, yet not surprising. His behavior did not amount to an abrupt about-face by an otherwise honorable man, but was the last link in an almost unfathomably long chain of events—vicious, merciless words and unscrupulous, unethical acts that were said and done, many in public view, in ways that were impossible to deny. All of the signs of Trump’s corruption and disordered personality were obvious for years.

And yet he was able to become the president. Without the popular vote.

Perhaps the case against Trump presented by the January 6 committee and previous Trump loyalists—by now so overwhelming as to be unquestionable—will cause some members of Congress, academics, and “public intellectuals” in the right-wing infrastructure to distance themselves from Trump. Of course, until now Trump has crossed no ethical line, has shattered no norm that caused them to say “Enough!” Instead we’ve heard whataboutism and strained-to-the-breaking-point excuses.

…

Massive cognitive dissonance—in this case individuals and a political party that have historically championed law and order, “traditional values,” high ethical ideals, moral leadership in political leaders, and a healthy civic and political culture defending at every turn a person who was indecent, cruel, vindictive, demagogic, unstable, and ultimately deranged—can produce some very creative justifications.

I’m not convinced about the high ethical ideals and the moral leadership. When’s the last time the Republican party championed those things?

Hutchinson’s testimony was a withering indictment of America’s 45th president. But it was also, if less directly, an indictment of his party, his supporters, his acolytes, those who went silent and those who spoke up on his behalf. He and they are ever twinned.

Well, yes, and have been all along.

LP is trying to sound intelligent again. This never goes well.

I wonder what she thinks she means by “a word like woman.” Like woman how? What other words are like the word woman? Man, girl, boy, I suppose. Will those do? Is that what she’s saying? The four words that name people of the female and male sex?

If so why do those words, in particular, need to be subject to change of meaning more than others?

I would think it’s the opposite – we need those words to be particularly stable and clear in their meaning.

The fakery about thinking it’s languagephobic and anti-freedom of expression to continue knowing what “woman” means is laughable. Laurie Penny doesn’t love language, she loves her image of herself as hip and enlightened.

CNN underlines some points from yesterday’s January 6 hearing:

The reality of Trump’s intentions became clear to national security officials in real time as they learned the Secret Service was scrambling to find a way for the former President to travel to the Capitol while he was on stage urging his followers to march, according to National Security Council chat logs from that day that were revealed for the first time during Tuesday’s hearing.

The NSC chat logs provide a minute-by-minute accounting of how the situation evolved from the perspective of top White House national security officials on January 6 and, along with witness testimony delivered on Tuesday, contradict an account by Meadows in his book where he says Trump never intended to march to the Capitol.

“MOGUL’s going to the Capital … they are clearing a route now,” a message sent to the chat log at 12:29 p.m. ET on January 6 reads — referring to the former President’s secret service code name.

“MilAide has confirmed that he wants to walk,” a 12:32 p.m. message reads. “They are begging him to reconsider.”

Meanwhile the committee is finding that Trump has been tampering with witnesses. (Quel surprise.)

The committee has secured testimony from some major witnesses members of Trump’s inner circle, even members of his family. But Cheney suggested during the hearing that there might be a Trump-imposed blockade of sorts, and that the panel has evidence of witness tampering.

She said one witness — whom the committee did not identify — testified that: “What they said to me is, as long as I continue to be a team player, they know that I’m on the team, I’m doing the right thing, I’m protecting who I need to protect, you know, I’ll continue to stay in good graces in Trump world.”

Another unidentified witness said they were told by someone in Trump’s orbit that Trump was “thinking about you” and that “he knows you’re loyal” and hopes that “you’re going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition.”

If only he could have been a mob boss instead. It would have harmed a lot of people, but not nearly as many as he did by being mob boss president.

The new evidence from the committee is consistent with a years-long pattern of behavior by Trump, who has repeatedly used private and public channels to pressure people who could testify against him. This happened with his former lawyer Michael Cohen and his 2016 campaign chairman Paul Manafort during the Russia investigation, and with a US ambassador during the 2019 impeachment hearings.

Trump has also retaliated against people who provided damaging public testimony against him, including a top White House national security official and his ambassador to the European Union, who both described his pressure campaign against Ukraine during House impeachment hearings in 2019.

A born mob boss.

How it started.

How it’s going.

Ruthless anything for a buck capitalism in action!

Originally a comment by Freemage on But which people, which Americans, whose bodies?

“Karen” didn’t originally mean “aggressive female racist”. It originally (as used by the male black comedian who coined the term) was mostly about class-privilege (in, of course, a gendered way), about upper-middle-class women who made life tough for front-line service industry workers by complaining incessantly and immediately demanding to ‘speak to the manager’. So not about feminists specifically, and mostly focused on class, but with that sexist tag-along.

It didn’t really have anything to do with race until the New York Central Park incident, where the white woman calling the cops on a black man as a threat was considered the ultimate form of ‘speaking to the manager’. So then it became about racism, too.

And then, it took about 60 seconds to transform into ‘any woman, anywhere, who does something I want to criticize, and imply that the behavior is because she’s a woman, specifically’. (The term “Mary Sue” did a similar transformation–it started out as a critique of a specific form of self-insert fanfiction character, then got applied to female characters who were protected by plot armor–with the occasional slightly more aware critic pointing out that this also applies to Batman, etc–and then finally, “any fictional female character who does something I don’t like”. It’s almost like these gendered epithets are meant to be ultimately expanded to apply to all women, or something.)

And, of course, the original coinage of the term is, in addition to being misogynistic in design, also dead wrong. The reason a lot of service people encounter a specific behavior coming from white, middle class women is simple–women still do most of the shopping, and upper-middle-class women (who are disproportionately white, since this country is racist as fuck), specifically, are the bulk of people who round out their shopping by going to a cafe or whatever. I work retail–but since it’s home improvement, we have a much more gender-balanced customer base. And the behavior originally attributed to “Karens”? Yeah, it’s pretty much universal, as a small percentage of any human sampling will include people who are overly entitled, and seeking an edge in some way or another at the expense of the hourly wageslave who is just trying to make it through the end of their shift. Most of the folks demanding to speak to my manger, frankly, are named either Sergei or Patel (the home improvement contractors in my store’s area are mostly either Indian or Eastern European men).

I point this out to people, and I usually get some form of “Well, men can be Karens, too.” My rejoinder is usually, “Well, then, why don’t we use the word ‘asshole’, instead? That’s nicely non-gendered and really would apply to everyone.”

The incident of the catsup in the nighttime.

Same transcript via NPR:

LIZ CHENEY: The physical altercation that Ms. Hutchinson described in the Presidential vehicle was not the first time that the President had become very angry about issues relating to the election. On December 1, 2020, Attorney General Barr said in an interview that the Department of Justice had not found evidence of widespread election fraud sufficient to change the outcome of the election.

Ms. Hutchinson, how did the President react to hearing that news?

CASSIDY HUTCHINSON: Around the time that I understand the AP article went live, I remember hearing noise coming from down the hallway. So I poked my head out of the office. I saw the valet walking towards our office. He had said, get the Chief down to the dining room. The President wants him. So Mark went down to the dining room, came back to the office a few minutes later.

After Mark had returned, I left the office and went down to the dining room and I noticed that the door was propped open and the valet was inside the dining room changing the tablecloth off of the dining room table. He motioned for me to come in and then pointed towards the front of the room near the fireplace mantel and the TV, where I first noticed there was catsup dripping down the wall and there was a shattered porcelain plate on the floor.

The valet had articulated that the President was extremely angry at the Attorney General’s AP interview and had thrown his lunch against the wall, which was causing him to have to clean up. So I grabbed a towel and started wiping the catsup off of the wall to help the valet out. And he said something to the effect of, he’s really ticked off about this.

I would stay clear of him for right now. He’s really, really ticked off about this right now.

He was also 74 years old right then so you’d think he would have had time enough to learn to control his temper but apparently not.

LIZ CHENEY: And Ms. Hutchinson, was this the only instance that you are aware of where the President threw dishes?

CASSIDY HUTCHINSON: It’s not.

LIZ CHENEY: And are there other instances in the dining room that you recall where he expressed his anger?

CASSIDY HUTCHINSON: There were — there were several times throughout my tenure with the Chief of Staff that I was aware of him either throwing dishes or flipping the tablecloth to let all the contents of the table go onto the floor and likely break or go everywhere.

It’s a funny thing: I happened to find a copy of Pete Souza’s Shade in a Little Free Library yesterday. It’s funny in a wicked way. The hook is to quote Trump or a news item about him and then one of Souza’s photos showing Obama doing something in a parallel context. He’ll have to do an updated version with a photo of Obama not pulling the tablecloth off the White House dining table.

NPR has a transcript of today’s hearing on the January 6 [attempted coup].

Bennie Thompson: In the weeks ahead, the committee will hold additional hearings about how Donald Trump summoned a mob of his supporters to Washington, spurred them to march on the Capitol, and failed to take meaningful action to quell the violence as it was unfolding on January 6th. However, in recent days the Select Committee has obtained new information dealing with what was going on in the White House on January 6th and in the days prior, specific detailed information about what the former president and his top aides were doing and saying in those critical hours, firsthand details of what transpired in the office of the White House chief of staff just steps from the Oval Office as the threats of violence became clear, and indeed violence ultimately descended on the Capitol in the attack on American democracy.

It’s an important — it’s important that the American people hear that information immediately. That’s why, in consultation with the vice chair, I’ve recalled the committee for today’s hearing.

New information. New, hair-raising information. Worth recalling the committee.

LIZ CHENEY: On January 3rd, the Capitol Police issued a special event assessment. In that document, the Capitol Police noted that the Proud Boys and other groups planned to be in Washington, DC on January 6th and indicated that, quote, unlike previous post-election protests, the targets of the pro-Trump supporters are not necessarily the counter-protesters as they were previously, but rather Congress itself is the target on the 6th. Of course, we all know now that the Proud Boys showed up on January 6th, marched from the Washington Monument to the Capitol that day, and led the riotous mob to invade and occupy our Capitol.

In other words the Capitol Police warned them, and were proved all too right.

Then Cheyney moves on to the subject of weapons. The authorities were already aware of a flood of weapons on January 5.

LIZ CHENEY: Of course, the world now knows that the people who attacked the Capitol on January 6th had many different types of weapons. When a President speaks, the Secret Service typically requires those attending to pass through metal detectors known as magnetometers, or mags for short. The Select Committee has learned that people who willingly entered the enclosed area for President Trump’s speech were screened so they could attend the rally at the Ellipse.

They had weapons and other items that were confiscated: pepper spray, knives, brass knuckles, tasers, body armor, gas masks, batons, blunt weapons. And those were just from the people who chose to go through the security for the President’s event on the Ellipse, not the several thousand members of the crowd who refused to go through the mags and watched from the lawn near the Washington Monument.

Refused why? Because they were carrying weapons.

The police were calling in reports of people with weapons. Mark Meadows was informed about the weapons, and seemed thoroughly bored to hear it. Trump on the other hand was deeply concerned – not about the weapons, but about the crowd looking too small in the photographs.

Hutchinson:

But when we were in the offstage announce tent, I was part of a conversation — I was in — I was in the vicinity of a conversation where I overheard the President say something to the effect of, you know, I – – I don’t effing care that they have weapons.

They’re not here to hurt me. Take that effing mags away. Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here. Let the people in. Take the effing mags away.

In other words fuck security, what matters is the photos and their numbers when they attack the Capitol.

LIZ CHENEY: Let’s reflect on that for a moment. President Trump was aware that a number of the individuals in the crowd had weapons and were wearing body armor.

And here’s what President Trump instructed the crowd to do. [Begin Videotape]

DONALD TRUMP: We’re going to walk down, and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down — [Applause] — We’re going to walk down any one you want. But I think right here. We’re going to walk down to the Capitol. [Applause] [End Videotape]

He knew they had weapons – lots and lots and lots of weapons.

And there’s the bit where Trump tried to attack an agent.

Tony proceeded to tell me that when the president got in the beast, he was under the impression from Mr. Meadows that the off the record movement to the Capitol was still possible and likely to happen, but that Bobby had more information.

So, once the president had gotten into the vehicle with Bobby, he thought that they were going up to the Capitol. And when Bobby had relayed to him we’re not, we don’t have the assets to do it, it’s not secure, we’re going back to the West Wing, the president had a very strong, a very angry response to that.

Tony described him as being irate. The president said something to the effect of I’m the f’ing president, take me up to the Capitol now, to which Bobby responded, sir, we have to go back to the West Wing. The president reached up towards the front of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel. Mr. Engel grabbed his arm, said, sir, you need to take your hand off the steering wheel.

We’re going back to the West Wing. We’re not going to the Capitol. Mr. Trump then used his free hand to lunge towards Bobby Engel. And Mr. — when Mr. Ornato had recounted this story to me, he had motioned towards his clavicles.

A very stable [____________].

End of part one.

And one more thing. (This day of the hearing is proving to be startling.) NYT reporter Carl Hulse:

Murmurs through the hearing room as Mike Flynn refuses to answer whether he believes in the peaceful transfer of power and whether the Jan. 6 violence was justified, citing his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.

NYT reporter Peter Alexander:

To see a retired four-star general who swore an oath to defend the country and the Constitution plead the Fifth when asked if he believed in the peaceful transfer of power in America is another stunning moment today.

This country is in deep trouble.

Some observers are saying Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony indicates a seditious conspiracy.

Doing what? It seems the people attending the rally on the lawn were checked for weapons first, so a lot of them were shut out, because of ALL THOSE GUNS. So then apparently the White House or Trump ordered the magnetometers removed…so that heavily armed people could attend the rally and then head for the Capitol, heavily armed.

It’s…yikes.

They really have to. He has to be stopped, because if he’s not, he’ll be back. That must not happen.

So. According to new testimony from a Trump White House aide, Trump got violent when he was told he wasn’t going to the Capitol after the January 6 rally.

“I’m the fucking President,” he said. “Take me up to the Capitol.”

It’s a preview of the not at all distant future, too.

The number of people migrating globally has steadily risen in the past two decades as poverty, climate change and violence have led people to flee their homelands.

Climate change is only going to get worse, much worse and very fast, so poverty and violence will get worse too, and migrations are going to accelerate, and resistance to migrations will accelerate too. People roasted to death in the backs of trucks will be an everyday occurrence.

The bodies of more than 40 people who appeared to have crossed into the United States illegally were found on Monday in one of the worst episodes of migrant deaths on the southern border in recent years. The journey north for migrants crossing into the U.S. from Mexico is typically dangerous, and sometimes fatal. Smugglers often transport large numbers in trailers, vans or S.U.V.s through remote areas in sweltering weather.

Desperation is a powerful force.

Erase erase erase erase.

Menopause is for everyone.

The NHS has ditched the terms ‘women’ and ‘woman’ from its menopause guidance, despite ministers promising to crack down on woke gender-free language in medical advice.

…

Now MailOnline has found ‘women’ and ‘woman’ have also been omitted from official advice about the menopause, which is unique to biological females.

In its online overview about the menopause, NHS advice used to contain six gender-specific mentions. But it was updated on May 17 to remove the terms.

Experts have warned de-gendering medical advice could be dangerous for women by over-complicating vital health messaging.

NHS Digital, which manages health information webpages, told MailOnline it wanted to ensure language was ‘inclusive’.

One, the goal of health information is to inform, as clearly and fully as possible.

Two, being “inclusive” by removing the word “women” from health information for women is the opposite of inclusive.

A spokesperson added: ‘The NHS website provides information for everyone. We keep the pages under continual review to ensure they use language that is inclusive, respectful and relevant to the people reading it.’ 

Oh fuck off. It’s not inclusive to exclude women from health information that applies to women only. It’s not respectful to exclude women from health information for women. It’s not relevant to exclude women from health information for women. Use your god damn brains.

The word “women” is replaced by “you” throughout. That’s stupid and childish as well as insulting and dangerous.

Janice Turner cops to having grown up thinking the feminist women who preceded her generation were dreary old has-beens.

Other political movements respect their elders even when their views no longer align with modern mores. Black Lives Matter would never forsake Marcus Garvey or Malcolm X; the LGBT movement deifies those who in 1969 bravely defied homophobic police at the Stonewall Inn in New York City. Feminism alone lays waste to each preceding generation of leaders, campaigners and thinkers as impure, backward, irrelevant, wrong.

It’s true. That “second wave”? We weren’t really second at all, we just thought we were. I wonder often why feminism is that way, and if it’s rooted in the perceived need to Reject Mommy in order to be an adult, and if that perceived need is really a general need or just a cultural habit.

The Pankhursts: rich bitches. Marie Stopes: eugenicist. Andrea Dworkin: man-hater, fun-sucker and (most unforgivably) ugly. Germaine Greer: transphobe, no matter The Female Eunuch rocked the world. Hillary Clinton: privileged, white, pantsuit girlboss. Besides they’re all old, like your mother, the very worst thing a woman can be. So let’s wipe feminism clean and start again.

Oopsy, we wiped it too clean and lost it altogether! Trans women shoving us aside on the one hand and abortion rights disappearing on the other. Looks like carelessness.

But why would young liberal women think feminism has damaged their lives? Complacency, of course, about existing rights. But also the desire to please, to abnegate, to “be kind”, which is so strongly indoctrinated into girls that to demand a movement of your own in which you place your rights uncompromisingly front and centre is pushy, selfish, unkind. Moreover the term “Karen” has lately expanded from its original meaning of aggressive female racist to encompass any uppity woman who won’t shut up.

And any uppity woman who won’t shut up = basically all women.

In the US, feminism is increasingly a mean-girl game, a purity test in which those guilty of transgression are “called out”, their careers and reputations ruined. Looking from Britain at America’s broken, sclerotic politics, it is understandable that you’d go for the quick serotonin hit of getting someone’s book deal cancelled rather than address seemingly impossible goals, such as paid maternity leave or solid abortion laws, to replace the legal lean-to of Roe v Wade.

Understandable but a short walk off a very high cliff. Life is grim down here at the bottom.

I wonder too what making the very word “woman” so toxic that it is unsayable has done for feminism’s standing. Better stay away in case you misspeak on a placard. Or why bother with feminism at all when with just a change of pronouns you can identify out of womanhood. Notably when expressing outrage about Roe falling, US politicians including even Obama, plus civil rights bodies like Planned Parenthood and the ACLU, all avoided describing abortion as a woman’s right. “People will suffer”; “Americans will die”; “We demand bodily autonomy.” But which people, which Americans, whose bodies?

The ones who must not be named. We can talk about men all day long, and far into the night, but the word “women” is an unexploded bomb…unless it refers to men.

This happened.

I can’t get the Twitter version to magnify but it’s readable if I copy it in here, so that’s what I’m doing, because we need to be able to read it.

“You cannot discriminate in the provision of services because you are prejudiced.”

Oh. Bump. How disappointing.

“Irrespective of what Stonewall has told you, I fear it is simply unlawful.”

“the cancellation was the product of misguided and systemically unlawful policy.”

Oh. Bump. Oops.

Boys and men get to be called boys and men, but girls and women don’t get to be called girls and women. Who made that rule I wonder? And why are so many people obeying it?

JL via The Spectator in A Week in the War on Women:

Young Scot is a publicly funded organisation which received a £975,000 grant from Scottish Government last year for various projects, one of which is the provision of information for young people.

Young Scot has produced advice about menstruation but there is no mention of ‘girls’ or ‘women’ in the text. Instead, it makes vague references to “Those of us that have both our ovaries and a womb” and “Half the world’s population”. It does, however, mention ‘transgender men and non-binary individuals’.

It’s like a burqa for language. Women and girls must be forcibly kept out of sight, but men and boys can stride all over the landscape as much as they like. New boss just like the old boss.

Similar information providing advice for young males about puberty refers to them as ‘men’ and ‘boys’. No vague or confusing language here.

Susan Smith of For Women Scotland told The Scottish Sun, “Once again advice for girls is offensively dehumanising: while boys and men get the dignity of a name, girls and women are reduced to body parts”.

A spokesman for Young Scot said, “We’ve worked in partnership with the Scottish Government to ensure we’re as inclusive as possible”.

No they haven’t. That’s ridiculous. Of course they haven’t. It’s not “inclusive” to conceal the existence of female people: it’s the antithesis of inclusive. It excludes female people – the ones without whom no one would exist.

I wish people would hurry up and get a fucking clue. We don’t have time for this grotesque and dangerous messing around.

Eilis O’Hanlon in the Independent (Ireland):

The coalition now known as Trans Equality Together launched last Monday with the stated aim of ensuring “trans and non-binary people are equal, safe and valued”.

By Thursday, it had secured the signatures of such august bodies as the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Amnesty Ireland and the National Women’s Council on a letter denouncing RTÉ for daring to host a debate on Liveline with women who refuse to bend to the notion that anyone with a penis must be automatically accepted as a woman if they say they are one.

So that’s what equal, safe and valued mean? That women are not allowed to say men are not women?

I don’t have the rest of the article but Glinner has letters in reply:

It is notable that the overwhelming majority of letters are strongly supportive of the views expressed by Eilis O’Hanlon. Had we received more letters critical of the column, we would of course have published a selection of these in the interests of balance. What is on the page, however, is strongly representative of the views received.

Alan English, Editor, Sunday Independent.

Sir —A huge thank you to Eilis O’Hanlon. I am a working-class, middle-aged woman who is very concerned about what I see as the attempted erasure of the word ‘woman’ from Irish legislation.

I have fought and marched for women’s rights all my life, and also campaigned for marriage equality and to Repeal the Eighth. On social media, which I have now left because of the toxic atmosphere, I’ve been called a dinosaur, a bigot, transphobic and hateful, all for respectfully asking questions and attempting discussion. I have never been called anything close to these things in all my years, and it is extremely hurtful to say the least.

Women must be allowed to speak, and we must be listened to.

And much more along the same lines. It’s very cheering.