Such a fine young man.

Humanists UK on the long history of godless Prime Ministers:

In the run-up to the general election, several newspapers published stories saying that Keir Starmer would be the UK’s ‘first atheist Prime Minister’ – but as Humanists UK pointed out at the time, that simply was not true! As a non-religious person with a belief in ‘irreducible human dignity’ (as he put it to a recent biographer), Sir Keir is only the latest in a long line of non-religious and humanist heads of government in the UK.

I’m envious. It’s decidedly not the case over here in The Colonies.

Prior to becoming the first ever Labour Prime Minister in 1929, Ramsay MacDonald was the Chair (sometimes ‘President’) of Humanists UK, in 1902 and 1904. Although [he is] sometimes remembered, even by biographers, for his early religiosity, MacDonald’s views changed significantly with age – starting off strict Calvinist, then Church of Scotland, before later giving sermons that were non-committal about the existence of god as a Unitarian, and then being drawn into the British Ethical Culture movement and the London Ethical Societies that together merged to become today’s Humanists UK.

…

Although a controversial figure for making political compromises and forced to implement austerity measures once in office, MacDonald is significant in history for being one of the earliest examples of an explicitly humanist Prime Minister. The fact that this is often left out of histories is a great example of a pattern in historical writing that the Humanist Heritage project was set up to challenge and redress.

Humans have a very conspicuous advantage over this putative “God” person: humans can be talked to, argued with, held to account. “God”? Not so much. Postulating a magic being undetectable to human senses who made and controls everything but can’t be personally confronted is a pretty reckless way to run a planet.

I’m surprised to see Churchill in the list. I don’t think I knew that.

Churchill was an agnostic atheist whose writings to friends evinced a deep personal dislike of Christianity. In one letter he said ‘I do not accept the Christian or any other form of religious belief.’ In common with the German communist philosopher Karl Marx, he likened religion to a drug, calling it a ‘dangerous narcotic’. He was no secularist, saying of the state Anglican church that he ‘supported it from the outside’.

Keeps the plebs in line wot wot.

Clement Attlee was a politician whose socialist and humanist values underpinned a commitment to implementing sweeping reforms in social welfare. Described by historian R.C. Whiting as an ‘unobtrusive atheist,’ Attlee believed in ‘ethics’ without ‘mumbo-jumbo’, and earned a reputation as a principled, decisive, yet modest politician.

Despite being a heathen.

Originally a comment by Sackbut on Look how energizzzzzzzz.

Kevin Drum raised an interesting point on his blog. He began by expressing some sympathy for the Republicans who don’t like Trump, but nonetheless feel compelled to vote for him. Drum then muses about what it would take for him to vote for the Republican candidate for president (not specifically Trump, just in general).

At least one commenter noted that we aren’t just electing a president, we are electing an administration. The people appointed and hired by the president and those around him matter as much as the president. And they almost always come from one political party, that of the president. Given this, and even absent the aberration that is Trumpism, I cannot conceive of a situation where I’d vote to give the Republican Party the administration. The goals and aims of the Republicans are contrary to what I think is reasonable. I am much more aligned with the positions of the Democratic Party, and would vote to give them the power to create an administration, even if I didn’t care for the candidate.

Trump and his followers have gravely damaged the Republican Party, but I expect there are many Republican voters who nonetheless want their party to be in charge of the administration, and will vote for the Republican candidate, even if that candidate is as awful as Trump.

It is of course the case that the election will not be decided by people like me or that hypothetical Republican who values which party is forming the administration, but rather by people who are open to voting for the other party. Personally, I’d hope that people who might vote Republican can see how terrible the Republicans have become under the influence of Trump and his followers, and they might vote, if not so much for the Democratic Party, at least against Trumpism. But it is more likely voters will vote for or against Biden or Trump, rather than for a party.

If the Democratic Party were to undergo a transformation as macabre as what’s happened to the Republican Party in recent years, maybe I’d vote against them. I still can’t see voting for the Republicans, though.

I voted once for a Republican for a top office, William Weld for Governor of Massachusetts, against the conservative Democratic candidate John Silber. I don’t think I’d make the same choice now.

Remember “Sophie Molly”? From The Scotsman a few weeks ago:

parliamentary candidate for the Scottish Greens has defended calling JK Rowling a “torn-faced cow” on social media.

Sophie Molly, a trans woman who is standing in Gordon and Buchan at the general election, said she stood by the comment. Ms Rowling highlighted the insult after becoming embroiled in a row with Ms Molly on X over the weekend.

The Greens hopeful criticised a book the author has contributed to called The Women Who Wouldn’t Wheesht, which includes essays from a range of women who have been critical of the impact of trans issues on women’s sex-based rights. It was co-edited by Susan Dalgety, a columnist for The Scotsman, and will be published on May 30.

That guy.

He didn’t do very well.

He did grab himself some fun on the way to losing though.

Sigh.

Nothing more than a bad night, eh? So we can be very sure it will never happen again? Even though it’s clearly been happening a lot, and getting worse? Even though we all know the arrow of time does not reverse course?

And then there’s the headline saying he stumbled over his words.

We’re doomed.

There’s nothing to worry about, it’s just that he gets exhausted and needs a lot of sleep.

Questions about Biden’s fitness for office and ability to seek a second term have swirled since his stunningly halting debate performance at last week’s CNN presidential debate.

CNN reported Thursday that Biden privately acknowledged to an ally earlier this week that the next stretch of days are critical as to whether he can save his reelection bid. The White House and campaign have insisted the president is not considering ending his campaign.

Asked about concerns about Biden’s age, top advisers have repeatedly and emphatically cited his aggressive schedules during international travel as examples of his vitality and capacity to do the job at 81.

The president’s new explanation this week that he performed badly at the debate this week because of the grueling foreign travel before the debate – despite having had nearly two weeks back in the states before facing off against Donald Trump – has undercut that argument.

Just a tad!

It will be fine, look how energetic he is, he dashes off to Europe and then comes back again, also he’s wiped and needs a lot of sleep and has to stop working no later than 8 p.m.

It will be fine!

All RIGHT.

Ah. Yes, that’s the way to convince everyone that you’re the right choice for the grueling job – tell us you need more sleep and won’t be available after 8 pm. That’s very good, because there are never emergencies when presidents have to stay up late and deal with shit.

President Joe Biden told Democratic governors during a meeting at the White House on Wednesday that part of his plan going forward is to stop scheduling events after 8 p.m. so that he can get more sleep, according to three sources briefed on his comments.

Yeah, see, Joe, that was part of the issue all along. That’s always why it’s been tacitly understood that presidents over the age of 80 (or 70 or 65) would not be ideal. Reagan went doddery in office. It’s a risk.

The remarks, first reported by The New York Times, came as the 81-year-old Biden sought to reassure a group of more than 20 state leaders about his ability to defeat former President Donald Trump in November and govern effectively for another four years.

Pause for harsh bitter laughter. Yeah thanks Joe that’s not reassuring.

Biden’s comment during Wednesday’s meeting left several of the governors in the room frustrated, sources told CNN, and is one of the reasons that some of the participants have been rankled by the statement of loyalty and enthusiasm from them distributed by the Biden campaign on Thursday.

Oh great. They’re telling us Biden has to go to bed at 8 and they’re lying about how the governors responded. Brilliant.

We’re so screwed.

Oh that was a body positivity campaign was it? I didn’t realize.

Their fans are well accustomed to seeing Team GB’s women’s Olympic rugby players assert their prowess on the pitch. They are less accustomed, however, to seeing them in lingerie. 

Faced with a stiff training session ahead of the impending Olympic Games, the last thing sports aficionados would expect to encounter is these accomplished athletes practicing their moves in a series of racy lace bras, knickers, teddies and suspenders. Where were their sports bras? In fact, where were their clothes?

For this particular training session at Richmond Rugby Club in south west London, the women’s usual kit was very much surplus to requirements. Team GB members Ellie Boatman, Celia Quansah and Jasmine Joyce were training in rather unusual circumstances, their every move captured on camera by Bluebella, the London-based lingerie brand whose underwear they were modelling in the shoot.

Released this week, the images are part of Bluebella’s ‘Strong Is Beautiful’ campaign, an initiative first launched in 2016 with the aim of encouraging teenage girls not to drop out of sport. 

Well, maybe, but also, and primarily, with the aim of encouraging teenage girls to buy Bluebella’s sexualized underwear.

According to a statement by Bluebella, the campaign’s rationale is “to encourage girls to be proud of their bodies and keep playing team sports. To emphasize their point, the athletes posed in body revealing lingerie for an impromptu training session.” 

But it’s primarily to sell the merchandise. This is a for-profit enterprise we’re talking about here, not a feminist organization.

But if the brand’s intentions were good, it rapidly transpired that the campaign had scored something of an own goal. 

Come on now. Are we pretending the underwear sellers never had the faintest clue that anyone would see the photos as insulting? Are we pretending that never crossed their minds? Get serious.

Maybe I have to be blunt. The underwear in the photos is not just underwear. It’s highly sexualized – it’s meant to make viewers see the women as fuck toys. Practical underwear is practical; lacy strappy tiny transparent bits of lace decorating drawing attention to the breasts and crotch are not practical.

While it’s not unusual for male athletes to star in underwear campaigns, these are usually shot in a studio, not during a training session. His nickname might be ‘Goldenballs’, but David Beckham has never been photographed on a football pitch, kicking a ball in nothing but a pair of designer boxer shorts.

Let alone a pair of designer boxer shorts the size of a postage stamp and made of lace.

For the broadcaster and former Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies MBE, the campaign is problematic in a number of ways. “If we’re trying to encourage young girls of all shapes and sizes to be involved in sport, it’s a regressive move to suggest they have to be ‘sexy’ at the same time as doing said sport,” she tells The Telegraph. “We wouldn’t do this to young boys.”

Duh. Wouldn’t you think that’s obvious? Even if the people of Bluebella aren’t feministically-inclined surely it could have occurred to them that men don’t do rugby ads wearing bikini pants and nothing else so why are we doing it this way with women?

The campaign has also been met with ire by Women in Sport, the charity whose research that over half of secondary schoolgirls (64 per cent) drop out of all sport before the age of 16 due to body insecurities was quoted by Bluebella in a press release.

“We’re very uncomfortable that we have been mentioned in this campaign without our knowledge, as this is not the way we would want our statistics to be applied,” says Women in Sport CEO, Stephanie Hilborne. “We urge the brand to reconsider its approach to this campaign.”

Girls drop out of sport due to body insecurities so let’s make them feel even more body insecure. Good thinking.

MSN reports:

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) has issued a rare rebuke against President Joe Biden after his administration recently stated its belief that gender-affirming surgeries should only be for adults. While transgender children rarely undergo such procedures, HRC said such decisions should be left between families and medical professionals rather than politicians.

While the nature and reality or lack thereof of “gender affirmation” of course should be left up to the “Human Rights” Campaign.

The Biden administration has repeatedly expressed support for the right of trans youth to access gender-affirming care. However, the White House said, “The Administration does not support surgery for minors,” after Fox News and The New York Times both reported on efforts by Adm. Rachel Levine, the out trans assistant secretary of health at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), to get the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) to drop its minimum age recommendations for different types of gender-affirming healthcare, including surgeries.

The Biden administration is happy to encourage “trans youth” to ruin their bodies and lives in general but it hits the brakes when it comes to cutting off the dicks.

H/t Blood Knight

So much for “higher” education.

Academics have condemned the University and College Union’s decision to campaign against a widely praised independent review into NHS treatment for gender-questioning children, claiming its position is “anti-scientific” and could expose researchers to harassment.

The outcry follows the unanimous vote by the UCU’s national executive committee to adopt a motion which claims that the landmark Cass Review into gender identity services for young people, published in April, “falls short of the standard of rigorous and ethical research expected of research professionals” and “provides no evidence for the ‘new approach’ it recommends”.

Which being interpreted means “we don’t like it.”

The 388-page report by Hilary Cass, a former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, has been hailed as the most extensive and thorough examination of evidence relating to medical care for gender-dysphoric children.

Well, ok, yes, extensive, and thorough, but…er…still not good enough.

[T]he UCU motion – which was remitted from the union’s congress in May due to an industrial dispute – claims the report has “serious methodological flaws” and is defined by its “selective use of evidence and promotion of unevidenced claims”.

The motion asks the union to “commit to working with trans-led organisations to resist the Cass Report recommendations”.

That stance has been criticised by several union members. On X, one academic said the union’s position was now essentially “researchers against research”, a view echoed by others, one of whom questioned the wisdom of having an “academic union campaigning against research”.

Ok look. It’s like this. It isn’t about research. It’s about commitment. It’s about loyalty. It’s about solidarity. The holy dogma that Trans People Are What They Say They Are is just that: holy dogma. No amount of research can contradict holy dogma, because research is not holy.

Using a union motion to argue against a lengthy and detailed report was also unwise, suggested Alice Sullivan, professor of sociology at UCL. “The notion that the way to counter a scientific report is to vote against it shows a total lack of comprehension of the scientific method. It is sad to see a union which is supposed to represent academics opposing evidence-based medicine,” she said.

The union has shifted from representing academics to representing adherents of a dogma. They’re a small-scale Vatican.

A UCU spokesperson said the union was “an unequivocal supporter of trans rights, a position established and repeatedly endorsed by our annual congress”.

“This motion was brought by our members after listening to concerns about the Cass report from the trans community, including LGBTQ charities such as Mermaids and Stonewall.

“Our union will proudly work with trans-led organisations to resist any recommendations that could harm young trans people and will pressure the government for an approach to trans healthcare that affirms and centres the trans community.”

There you go. They come right out and say it. Their union will ignore or trash research and simply plough ahead with “affirming” and “centering” the “trans communinny.” Scholarship is entirely beside the point.

Consider carefully the malice. Seriously. Consider it very very very carefully. There’s a lot of it, and it’s persistent, and it targets mostly women. Get your considering boots on.

Sarah’s full tweet:

And as I have made very clear to the BSB, you need to consider carefully the malice behind much of this. This man requests anonymity – it is granted to the extent that I will not be informed of either complaint or response. Man then publishes entire thing to show that claimed fragility was bogus. If the BSB proceeded with this then presumably I would not be told the name of the accuser. I consider this unacceptable. Complainants must be named because – in my now considerable experience – the majority are vexatious.

A minor quibble. Isn’t “at [ ] earliest convenience” meant to be the earliest convenience of other people, not oneself? Isn’t “at my earliest convenience” rather absurd? It’s a semi-polite bossy order given to someone else, not a musing on one’s own future plans. Isn’t it?

As Biden digs in…

Defiance has become as much a part of Joe Biden’s psychology as Delaware.

Well that’s one way of putting it. Another way is that Joe Biden is all for Joe Biden.

But as the president and his inner circle dig in following his disastrous debate performance last week, a growing number of Democratic leaders are saying they want him to step aside for the good of the party – and the country.

“Digging in” isn’t always a virtue.

“There’s a large and increasing group of House Democrats concerned about the president’s candidacy, representing a broad swath of the caucus,” another House Democratic lawmaker told CNN on condition of anonymity to speak candidly. “We are deeply concerned about his trajectory and his ability to win. We want to give him space to make a decision [to step aside], but we will be increasingly vocal about our concerns if he doesn’t.”

Biden is expected to meet Wednesday with Democratic governors and congressional leaders, the White House said Tuesday. The announcement came after CNN reported that some governors expressed concerns about the president’s debate performance. The governors, one source said, were worried about going public with their concerns out of fear it would lead to Biden digging in further.

Great. We can’t tell him to get out because he’ll just dig in, so we’re stuck with him. Heads he wins tails we lose.

BBC drools over guy who plays darts:

A transgender woman and darts player from Hull who has faced a wave of abuse and exclusion from competitions says she has been questioning her future within the game. Samantha Lewis’s passion for darts runs deep, and the sport has spanned generations in her family.

That is, his grandparents played darts and his father plays darts. Very generations-spanny, very newsworthy.

However, Ms Lewis, 28, has been left wondering if she should continue in the sport.

Here he is:

That arm, that wrist, that hand, those shoulders, that neck. Never mind darts, he could be wrestling bulls.

But oh dear, some people are saying men shouldn’t be playing in women’s darts competitions. Can you believe it?

Ms Lewis was banned from participating in the England Darts Open in Devon, receiving the rejection message via Facebook – a move she said was “very unprofessional”. The exclusion and online harassment have taken a severe toll on her mental health.

For some reason the BBC doesn’t say a word about the mental health of women who want to compete against women.

“England Darts has canvassed its players and executives on this very important issue concerning the future of women’s darts, and how England can continue to protect the integrity within our sport for its female members,” it said. It added that including “non-birth-gender females” in women’s competitions could “ultimately result in the demise of our women’s sport”.

Other darts competitions do allow transgender women to compete, depending on their testosterone levels. While Ms Lewis qualifies for them, she is taking a break at the moment to focus on her mental health. Her message to people who have contributed to her current struggles is a plea for empathy and respect. “Just keep your opinions to yourself. I’m still human at the end of the day. Think before you speak,” she said.

A plea for empathy and respect for him, that is. The BBC doesn’t see fit to say anything about empathy and respect for women.

Oh interesting, Willoughby is now claiming to be persecuted and marginalized the way immigrants are.

Which is so fascinating because you’ll never guess how he’s talked about immigrants himself.

Barbed wire in the Channel to drown migrants – yet here he is claiming he’s being treated as badly as migrants are.

He really is the worst of the worst, isn’t he.

Rock bottom.

The Bookseller informs us:

Three of the biggest UK publishers’ Pride networks have responded to the launch of an anonymous gender critical network, releasing a joint statement saying “publishing should be a safe and inclusive space for all, including our trans and non-binary authors and colleagues”.

Also including our spinach-eating authors and colleagues and our sedentary authors and colleagues and our poker-playing authors and colleagues and our beer-drinking authors and colleagues…one could go on this way into infinity.

Who is saying publishing should not be a safe and inclusive space for anyone?

No one, of course. Not one damn person. You can search until your pith helmet is a mere rag but you won’t find anyone saying that.

And while we’re on the subject, why are adults constantly driveling about “safe and inclusive spaces” anyway? Isn’t it a tad babyish for people over, say, five?

Ah well. The point of course, as always, is to join the bien pensants in stomping on a new organization that dares to be “inclusive” of female people.

SEEN in Publishing, launched online last week, with a press release stating that it was aimed at publishing professionals, authors and creatives who “believe in the material reality of sex”.

That comma after “SEEN in publishing” is a mistake. Ignore it and the sentence makes grammatical sense. Keep it and you’re left wondering what the verb was supposed to be. Funny that book boffins can’t even proofread their own press releases.

Pride networks from Pan Macmillan, Penguin Random House UK and Hachette UK released a joint statement to express their solidarity for trans and non-binary publishing professionals.

The group stated: “We are disappointed to see the announcement of the SEEN in Publishing group earlier this week. We are concerned that the anonymous nature of this group could negatively impact the work environment and undermine individual safety, affecting some of the most marginalised in our communities.”

Why “negatively impact”? Why not “harm” or “damage” or “injure”?

In fact there’s probably a common thread here. The kind of people who rush to adopt the idiotic vocabulary of “safe and inclusive space” and “the most marginalised in our communities” are also the kind of people who rush to adopt dopy periphrastic gargle like “negatively impacted” in place of “harmed.” I don’t say that in jest. The weird damp over-anxious concern that words like “harmed” are somehow dangerous is a close relative of the weird damp over-anxious concern about the feelings of men in lipstick.

It added: “We feel strongly that publishing should be a safe and inclusive space for all, including our trans and non-binary authors and colleagues. We stand in support of any LGBTQ+ colleagues that have been negatively impacted by this news and are here to assist those impacted by the announcement.”

Jesus. See what I mean? Their brains are mush.

In a statement, the SEEN in Publishing network said: “We founded this network because we believe our industry should be a safe and inclusive space for everyone, including for those with gender critical views. Our dearest wish is to foster a culture within publishing where everyone’s views are listened to without fear or favour.”

Yes but what about all the negative impactification???? And “the most marginalised in our communities”???? Where is your compassion and sympathy and concern and caring and worry and fret and sorrow?

Best wishes to SEEN in Publishing.

Another big surge forward on the road to hell.

The US supreme court’s decision on Monday to confer broad immunity to former presidents is likely to eviscerate numerous parts of the criminal prosecution against Donald Trump over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

In other words yes, the presidency is in effect a dictatorship.

Most crucially for the special counsel, Jack Smith, his prosecutors will not be able to introduce as evidence any acts deemed to be official, even as contextual information for jurors to show Trump’s intent.

“There’s such divinity doth hedge a king…”

The alleged illegal conduct came in five categories: Trump pressuring US justice department officials to open sham investigations into election fraud; Trump pressing his vice-president to return him to the White House; Trump trying to obstruct Congress from certifying the election; Trump giving a speech that led rioters to storm the US Capitol building and Trump’s plot to recruit fake electors .

Roberts undercut at least three of the five alleged categories in the opinion.

Trump’s interactions with justice department officials, including his threats to fire the then attorney general Jeffrey Rosen and the then acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue, were absolutely immune because overseeing the department was a core function, Roberts found.

So a president can tell justice department officials to do anything, no matter how depraved and/or criminal, because overseeing the department is a core function.

Trump’s interactions with Pence, including pressuring him to reject electoral votes for Joe Biden in Congress on January 6, were presumptively immune because presidential discussions about vice-presidential responsibility were part of the job.

So a president can tell a vice-president to murder heads of state, rob banks, hijack planes, because telling the vp what to do is part of the job, is that right?

The insults just keep rolling in.

Originally a comment by Artymorty on How it happened.

One of the reasons Biden won in 2020 is that the Democrats had not cultivated any good alternatives to him.

Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris. None of them looked like reasonable choices for President to me, and surely to many other Americans, too. I’m all for youthful “energetic grassroots” lefty mojo, but at the Presidential level, I want nation-leadership and world-leadership qualities, too. Big-picture compromise, shrewdness in global geopolitics, that kind of thing. Especially so, as progressivism has begun spiralling into absurd extremism at home, and the threats from abroad have gotten more severe.

The Dems have had four years to start building up-and-coming talent, and they’ve come up with bupkis.

They should take some cues from the entertainment world. The Hollywood system plants fresh crops of future A-listers years in advance. For example, I used to be roommates with a young actress, who was then relatively unknown, who seemed to know that she was going to be on the cover of certain magazines years in advance, based apparently on contracts for films that had not yet even completed production.

Sure enough, two or three years later, a batch of films in which she was the star came out, the Vanity Fair and Vogue and Elle and Interview covers came true, and she was even a presenter at the Oscars. (She’s since gone on to become an Oscar, Tony, and BAFTA nominee, too. She’s a major movie star.)

Actors compete fiercely with each other for coveted roles in films, but the industry as a whole still manages to come together to bring new talent into the fold, for the sake of the industry overall, to prevent existing stars hoarding all the good parts, leaving the well of new stars to run dry.

The Dems have not learned how to balance the competition between politicians in their stable with fostering a system of bringing in new talent. They’re overly reliant on dynastic politics instead — Clintons, Kennedys, Bidens, etc. Trusted names over fresh new faces. Everyone’s loyal to their tribe.