Kmele Foster, David French, Jason Stanley and Thomas Chatterton Williams in the NY Times on laws banning Critical Race Theory:

In recent weeks, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Iowa, Idaho and Texas have all passed legislation that places significant restrictions on what can be taught in public school classrooms, and in some cases, public universities, too.

Tennessee House Bill SB 0623, for example, bans any teaching that could lead an individual to “feel discomfort, guilt, anguish or another form of psychological distress solely because of the individual’s race or sex.” In addition to this vague proscription, it restricts teaching that leads to “division between, or resentment of, a race, sex, religion, creed, nonviolent political affiliation, social class or class of people.”

In other words you can’t teach anything at all about race, sex, religion, politics, or class. Anything you did teach could lead to division or resentment of some sort, so you just can’t teach it. Good luck teaching history.

Texas House Bill 3979 goes further, forbidding teaching that “slavery and racism are anything other than deviations from, betrayals of, or failures to live up to, the authentic founding principles of the United States.” It also bars any classroom from requiring “an understanding of the 1619 Project” — The New York Times Magazine’s special issue devoted to a reframing of the nation’s founding — and hence prohibits assigning any part of it as required reading.

What exactly makes the “founding principles” the authentic, and slavery and racism the aberration?

These initiatives have been marketed as “anti-critical race theory” laws. We, the authors of this essay, have wide ideological divergences on the explicit targets of this legislation. Some of us are deeply influenced by the academic discipline of critical race theory and its critique of racist structures and admire the 1619 Project. Some of us are skeptical of structural racist explanations and racial identity itself, and disagree with the mission and methodology of the 1619 Project. We span the ideological spectrum: a progressive, a moderate, a libertarian and a conservative.

And they all think these laws are a threat to liberal education.

The laws differ in some respects but generally agree on blocking any teaching that would lead students to feel “discomfort, guilt or anguish” because of one’s race or ancestry, as well as restricting teaching that subsequent generations have any kind of historical responsibility for actions of previous generations. They attempt various carve outs for the “impartial teaching” of the history of oppression of groups. But it’s hard to see how these attempts are at all consistent with demands to avoid discomfort. These measures would, by way of comparison, make Germany’s uncompromising and successful approach to teaching about the Holocaust illegal, as part of its goal is to infuse them with some sense of the weight of the past, and (famously) lead many German students to feel “anguish” about their ancestry.

Indeed, the very act of learning history in a free and multiethnic society is inescapably fraught. Any accurate teaching of any country’s history could make some of its citizens feel uncomfortable (or even guilty) about the past.

Humans are humans. We don’t reliably behave well in all circumstances. It’s better to try to know more about that than to hide from it. Chronic self-flattery gets you nowhere.

What’s more, these laws even make it difficult to teach U.S. history in a way that would reveal well-documented ways in which past policy decisions, like redlining, have contributed to present-day racial wealth gaps.

That’s exactly the example I cited the other day to make the same point. This stuff is real, and should not be hidden.

Let’s not mince words about these laws. They are speech codes. They seek to change public education by banning the expression of ideas.

Which is, ironically, another example of the way we don’t live up to our putative ideals. Land of the free, where public schools are subject to speech codes.

Well…

…yes freedom is very important, but so is not spreading a lethal pandemic. Lots of things are important, and some of them are incompatible with each other, so we have to choose among them.

As for “showing our faces is part of being human” – other things being equal, yes, but when showing our faces=risking the spread of a lethal pandemic, not so much.

Freedom is a good, no question, but so is respecting the needs of everyone else. Freedom that’s all for the self and to hell with everyone else is not a good.

Ok back to that polemic at Science-Based Medicine.

Early on there is a one-sentence paragraph that is arresting under the circumstances:

Bad science, however, remains bad science, and personal opinions based in confirmation bias and politicized beliefs are bad science.

Dr. Eckert “their”self isn’t being parsimonious with the personal opinions based in politicized beliefs in this review.

More accurately, Shrier’s subjects are “AFAB”, or “assigned female at birth“, because no one gets to choose what sex they’re assigned at birth. When discussing transgender and gender non-conforming individuals, this terminology is generally preferred over “biological male/female”, “male/female bodied”, “natal male/female”, and “born male/female”, which are considered defamatory and inaccurate.

Oh look, another agentless passive again. Generally preferred by whom, pal? Sure as hell not everyone. Not by most people. It’s preferred by gender idenniny zealots and their “allies” and no one else. Most people are unaware of the term “assigned at birth,” and a hefty percentage of people who are aware of it think it’s idiotic or insulting or both.

Moreover, disturbingly, most of the individuals covered in Shrier’s book were not personally interviewed. Their stories are told exclusively by their parents, all of whom use she/her pronouns for their trans children.

That’s just childish. Why did SBM publish this piece? If Shrier’s book is about the parents and gender ideology then Shrier needs to talk to them. It’s one aspect of the subject; there’s no requirement to talk only to “trans children” when writing about trans ideology.

Shrier’s use of she/her pronouns for her subjects, “for the sake of clarity and honesty”, is also problematic. She defends her referring to these subjects using pronouns that do not correctly reflect the gender with which they identify, commonly referred to as “misgendering,” by appealing to the First Amendment, a common strategy employed to attack the rights of LGBTQ people.

Again, childish. It’s not a “right” to be referred to by a reality-contradicting pronoun. The idea that it is is a silly innovation based on a grotesque ideology, and nobody is required to obey its mandates.

Throughout her book, Shrier characterizes those who ask that their accurate names and pronouns are respected as demanding, volatile teenagers who “fly into rage” when their request is denied. She scoffs at pronouns in email signatures, referring to them as “gender Ideology”.

omigod does she really?! That’s awwwful. What did she say next? Let’s not sit at her table tomorrow. Let’s put salt in her Coke.

I think that’s all I can stand to read. This person isn’t even bright. Why would Novella and Gorski post such an amateurish embarrassing exercise?

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey at Maybe science.

because no one gets to choose what sex they’re assigned at birth.

I object on behalf of the English language.

There is no general rule that says that the statement “Person A is Category X” implies that Person A chose to be X. I didn’t choose to be white, or blue-eyed, or even human, but if I went around declaring that I was “assigned human at birth,” people would back away slowly and look for an escape route.

There are, of course, some types of X where there arguably is (or should be) an implication of choice. I’m thinking of Richard Dawkins’s complaint about referring to “Christian children” or “Muslim children” as being as ridiculous as a “monetarist child.”

But then, that’s just it, isn’t it? The underlying belief is that there is no biological sex at all, only gender, which is a choice. Except when it isn’t, of course. It’s a choice when protesting that “you can’t say I’m female, because I didn’t choose to be female.” but it’s not a choice when complaining that “I can’t just choose to be female, that’s not who I am.”

Wo, this is a big step.

This at a blog called “Science-based Medicine.”

So let’s take a look.

Irreversible Damage to the Trans Community: A Critical Review of Abigail Shrier’s book Irreversible Damage (Part One)

Very science-based title.

Editor’s note: This is the second guest post discussing Abigail Shrier’s Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters solicited from experts in transgender medical care. In this post, Dr. A.J. Eckert describes the many errors, misrepresentations, and misunderstandings of science in Shrier’s book, doing so in more detail than was done in our recent guest post by Dr. Rose Lovell, who provided an excellent overview of the problems with the book. Dr. Eckert plans a second part to this discussion, which they are currently working on. We look forward to its completion.

Dr. Eckert is “non-binary.”

Does that make Dr. Eckert part of “the trans community”? Or no?

Clearly the mandated answer is yes, but the reality is that that’s absurd, because the very idea of being “trans” relies on the binary, so claiming to be some of each and to be “part of the trans community” is having it both ways, i.e. ignoring a contradiction.

Dr. Eckert starts with some poison.

Over the last couple of weeks, Abigail Shrier’s controversial 2020 book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters has enjoyed a renewed surge of interest and controversy on the Internet. On June 15, Dr. Harriet Hall, retired family physician and longtime contributor to the Science-Based Medicine blog, posted a favorable review of Shrier’s book on SBM.

The physicians behind SBM characterize their blog as one “dedicated to evaluating medical treatments and products of interest to the public in a scientific light and promoting the highest standards and traditions of science in health care”. SBM is widely regarded in its dedication to evidence-based medicine. Hall’s review was pulled from the SBM blog less than two days later for review, having been found not to meet the standards of SBM. Shrier sees this move as bullying.

So do I, and you know what else I see as bullying? This intro. This spiteful nasty intro.

Ms. Shrier, Lisa Littman, whose 2018 study proposed the diagnosis of “rapid onset gender dysphoria” (ROGD), and now apparently Dr. Hall see themselves as victims of a “woke” activist movement trying to censor science. 

Gee, why would they think that.

In contrast to claims of Shrier having been “silenced,” her book has garnered praise and support, with several sites taking up her cause in the past week alone. Before Dr. Hall’s review, Shrier had previously appeared at a high-profile Senate hearing. She still has a platform as a columnist for the Wall Street Journal and has expressed her views on several podcasts, including Joe Rogan’s massively popular one. Meanwhile, in part due to Shrier’s enthusiastic promotion, Littman’s made-up diagnosis of ROGD has enjoyed a renewed interest, spread widely, and is accepted by many as a real medical diagnosis.

Bad science, however, remains bad science, and personal opinions based in confirmation bias and politicized beliefs are bad science.

Says non-binary Dr. Eckert who is clearly not at all influenced by personal opinions or politicized beliefs.

Throughout her book, Shrier refers to her subjects as “biological girls,” a term that conflates sex with gender and mischaracterizes Shrier’s subjects. The reason is that a person’s sex refers to the identity assigned by doctors, parents, and medical professionals at birth, most often based on external anatomy (genitals).

That’s not right.

More accurately, Shrier’s subjects are “AFAB”, or “assigned female at birth“, because no one gets to choose what sex they’re assigned at birth.

That’s not more accurate. At all.

It’s breathtaking that they’re doing this.

More later, maybe, or maybe I’ll just leave it to fester.

National Weather Service Seattle is on Lake Washington, so they take nice snaps.

You can just barely see Mount Rainier. On a sharply clear day it stands out like a giant upside-down scoop of ice cream.

When she became they:

The non-binary comedian’s hit TV show draws heavily on an often troubled life. They talk about addiction at 14, the loving parents who kicked them out, the older men who abused their trust – and the happiness they eventually found.

How do they know those older “men” were actually “men”? Is they the only person who gets to be special in this story?

Feel Good is a disarmingly autobiographical love story. It tells the story of a character called Mae struggling with relationships, addiction, identity and life on the comedy circuit. Mae is attracted to men and women, but to women more, particularly women who identify as straight. The first series focuses on Mae’s relationship with Georgina, a teacher who had previously only slept with men and is reluctant to admit to her super-straight, super-posh friends that she and Mae are living together. Mae is a mix of streetwise and naive – reckless, precocious, promiscuous, self-absorbed and a bag of nerves.

I’m not clear on what “disarmingly autobiographical” is supposed to mean. What’s disarming about autobiography? Self-obsession is all too common and I can’t say I ever find it disarming. Tiresome and irritating is more like it.

By the end of series two both characters have evolved. George is happy with her bisexuality, while Mae changes from she to they, announcing: “I think I’m transgender or non-binary or whatever the term is these days.”

The term is “more interesting than everyone else.” You think you’re special and more interesting, and these days that translates to something under the “trans umbrella.”

It’s not surprising people react like this when you write and star in a TV series using your real name and telling a version of your life story. But this is where things start to get complicated. As Martin reminds me, it is a fictionalised version. So whereas in Feel Good, Mae talks about being trans or non-binary, Martin is non-binary but not trans.

Ohhhhhhhh. Thank god we cleared that up. How creative of they to make their character so different from theirself.

The Canadian standup thinks of Feel Good as a dramatised version of life 10 to 15 years ago. But while the addiction at the heart of the story goes back that far, the decision to identify as they rather than she is recent.

Better advertising, innit.

Laurie Penny again pretending we all know that sex is a spectrum and that we’ve always known that and that there’s just no question about it:

The suggestion that two transgender women were close to being selected for the British Olympic team was met with outrage earlier this month. LGBT advocates were upset that trans athletes would have to face any queries at all over their right to compete as women, while others insisted that only “biological females” should do so.

Well, yes, biological females, as always. Why the scare quotes?

We are assured that the inclusion of trans women in Olympic sports, which is now possible after a rule change, is unfair because they will have a “natural advantage” over other women.

And “we” are assured that because it’s true. Of course men have an advantage over women. Humans are sexually dimorphic; that’s just reality.

Penny goes on to play the “all competitive athletes have an advantage” card, which is just infantile.

The debates about sport show just how difficult it is to draw a sharp distinction between men and women, between male and female bodies. What should a “woman” be, for the purposes of professional sport?

No, it isn’t difficult at all, and what a woman should be for the purposes of professional sport is a woman.

… there are times when you have to wonder what story people think they’re living in. Even the most culturally oblivious commentator can recognise when they have become the villain in a feel-good sports movie about plucky underdogs overcoming prejudice.

Ah yes and Laurel Hubbard is the plucky underdog, is he? White, rich, middle-aged, male Laurel Hubbard? Not the young Tongan and Samoan women who have to compete against him?

Yet the question remains: what are exceptional athletes to do when they don’t fit into arbitrarily chosen biological categories on whose terms excellence is measured?

The categories are not arbitrarily chosen.

In sport, bodies are quite literally contested. Women’s participation was always an afterthought: the 2012 games in London were the first Olympics in which women took part in every sport. 

Exactly, and that’s why we don’t want to see women’s participation trashed by other means now! Every man allowed to compete as a woman means a woman loses a place, in addition to the fact that all the women are now at a disadvantage.

I hope one day Laurie Penny feels scorching shame over this betrayal.

Oh look, what was that I just said about the Essex Vice-Chancellor apologizing to “the trans and non-binary community” but probably not so much to the two female academics who were actually mistreated by the University of Essex? No sooner had I clicked Publish than I saw a brief Twitter thread by Rosa Freedman, one of those academics, which confirms that no, Essex did not apologize to them.

I’m so sick of these people – the ones like the sniveling Vice-Chancellor.

These ones:

The Guardian reports, or gloats:

A university has apologised to transgender and non-binary staff and students over a review that suggested it had unlawfully no-platformed two female academics whom some had accused of transphobia.

You’d think it was the two female academics who were owed apologies, wouldn’t you.

The vice-chancellor of Essex University has written to staff and students to say sorry for the timing of the highly critical report, which was released shortly before exams and Pride month, and for the stress under which it had placed staff and students.

Blah blah blah blah, and meanwhile the stress on the two invited academics, and anyone who wanted to hear them, who respected them, who had a hand in inviting them – that stress doesn’t matter and needs no apology.

The university accepted the report and Forster reasserted its commitment to protecting freedom of speech on the campus and apologised to the two academics.

“I was deeply concerned to read the input into the review from some staff and students who said that they felt constrained to self-censor their speech and activity because of concerns about how we manage the balance between freedom of speech and our commitment to diversity, equality and inclusion,” he wrote at the time.

On Friday he issued the further apology, which he said followed a meeting with trans and non-binary students and staff where they discussed the review’s impact on the community. “In the meeting we discussed how hurt people feel about the outcome and the very negative impact that this has had and continues to have on trans and non-binary staff and students.”

In the meeting there was a whole lot of emotional blackmail and for some reason this adult man took it seriously, so seriously that he insulted the two female academics all over again. People need to start recognizing emotional blackmail and telling it to stop mewling.

Forster added: “My personal view is that the current law in the UK does not fully respect and protect the identities of trans and non-binary people. I understand that in meeting our obligations to respect academic freedom and freedom of speech within the law, we have given the impression that we might not care about the lived reality of trans and non-binary people.

“As we revise our equality, diversity and inclusion policies and procedures we will continue to go beyond the minimum standards required by law, wherever we can, to ensure that we recognise, respect and protect the identities of trans and non-binary people.”

But not women. Nobody respects women. The very idea is absurd.

A fine rant by an anonymous someone on Facebook which is apparently open for sharing:

When Antifa and other anti fascist groups started, they were about defending communities from racist & fascist violence and attacks. It is sometimes necessary & reasonable to use violence to defend yourself or others from physical attack. In the 70’s-90’s fascists were graffitiing & firebombing the homes of black people, firebombing left-wing & anarchist bookshops, physically attacking black people in the street, attacking trade unionists & anti racists, gay bashing & so on. The police did nothing to stop those attacks and in fact regularly colluded with the racists / fascists. In those circumstances there was little alternative but for people to join together to fight back in order to stop fascists attacking people, so groups like antifa were created. At the end of the 90’s a fascist detonated bombs in Brixton, Brick Lane and a gay pub in Soho, maiming and killing people. By what measure are some on the left falsely comparing women fighting against sexism with racists and fascists? There are no feminist dictators, there is no campaign of violence and intimidation by women.

Why the hell are antifa now using violence to defend the rights of males to sexually harass women – where the fuck is your analysis of who holds power in our society? Haven’t you heard of sexism and patriarchy? Do you not realise that males deliberately flashing their dicks at females is something that most women & girls have endured from a young age, and that it creates fear in very many women & girls – especially those who have already been subjected to sexual violence (99% of sexual offences are carried out by males). The women complaining in the Wi Spa video that went viral didn’t even say that the male was trans, so why have antifa even assumed that the women’s actions were founded in ‘transphobia’ rather than opposing sexual harassment?

There is no campaign of violence by women against males or people who identify as trans. There are just arguments about the impact on women of gender self-ID politics and how best to fight sexism. There is no justification whatsoever for violence or threats against women holding placards or wearing T-shirts just because you don’t like the message. When you use violence against people just because you don’t like their opinions, YOU become the fascist. You are trying to dictate and control what other people are allowed to say and think.

But but but my freedom to refuse to get vaccinated! My precious freedom I tell you!! Mine mine mine mine!!!

Unvaccinated people do more than merely risk their own health. They’re also a risk to everyone if they become infected with coronavirus, infectious disease specialists say.

That’s because the only source of new coronavirus variants is the body of an infected person.

“Unvaccinated people are potential variant factories,” Dr. William Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told CNN Friday. “The more unvaccinated people there are, the more opportunities for the virus to multiply,” Schaffner said.

Yes but freedom. Freedom freedom.

The current vaccines protect well against all the variants so far, but that could change at any moment. That’s why doctors and public health officials want more people to get vaccinated.

“The more we allow the virus to spread, the more opportunity the virus has to change,” the World Health Organization advised last month.

Vaccines are not widely available in many countries. But in the US, there is plenty of supply, with slowing demand. Just 18 states have fully vaccinated more than half their residents, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But freedom.

I used to be on the same blog network as this guy. I had no idea he was like this.

No, tell people not to display their “junk” around 9-year-old strangers, no maybe about it.

This guy…

That is, 60% of men who call themselves trans women are, according to another man who calls himself a trans woman, raped or sexually assaulted by other men in men’s prisons. Men assault other men in prison. Yes that’s a bad thing, and it shouldn’t happen. The solution, however, is not to put the men who call themselves trans women into the women’s prisons, because that just shifts the risk onto women, who are physically far more vulnerable. But Montgomerie thinks that is the solution. (Notice his breezy “most of which are non-violent.”)

I’m not replying with that, I’m replying with “don’t shift the violence onto women.” Montgomerie of course is expressing his indifference to women here.

What about Montgomerie’s indifference to the women being locked in a room with a load of men knowing the chance of sexual assault is sky high? What about them? What about them?

Also, LBC calls women “cis women.” News outlets need to stop doing that.

So progressive.

CBS Los Angeles reports:

Unlawful Assembly Declared As Violence Erupts Over Trans Rights Outside Koreatown Spa

Ah yes, violence simply erupted, like a volcano. It wasn’t one set of protesters physically attacking another set, it was an eruption.

And the issue was trans rights. Not women’s rights and trans rights, or trans rights versus women’s rights, but just trans rights. Women’s rights don’t matter enough to mention. We’re bored with women and their pesky rights.

Violence broke out at dueling demonstrations over trans rights in front of a Koreatown spa Saturday, fueled by a viral video posted by a woman upset that a person with male genitalia who identified as female was allowed to disrobe in the spa’s women’s section.

The demonstrations weren’t dueling though. One side was violent and the other wasn’t.

“I think we should let people live their lives, and let trans people live their lives how they want to,” Marie Dumouch, a demonstrator for trans rights told CBSLA’s Rick Montanez.

Of course we should, except when how they want to live their lives impinges on the lives of others. That’s the issue here. Obviously.

Video from the scene showed the trans rights supports clad in black assaulting protesters from the other side, spraying them with an unidentified substance, pushing them, punching them and demanding that they leave the area.

The protesters from “the other side” had done none of that.

Several of the black-clad demonstrators could be heard cursing at the protesters to “get the [fuck] out.”

One man in a blue T-shirt that said “Obey Jesus” was sprayed with something from a can. A few seconds later, a handful of trans rights supporters grabbed a large sign that said “God Does Not Make Mistakes” out of the hands of two protesters. Someone lightly shoved the man in the blue shirt in the back. He then lightly shoved a woman clad in black and was set upon by a group of men, who punched him and hit him twice in the head with a skateboard.

They followed the wounded man down a sidewalk taunting him to fight back until he reached the safety of a police officer.

I guess the police officer was just standing there watching.

More on some “Antifa” people (weird that they don’t realize they ARE fa) perpetrating violence against women.

Word is it was Antifa counter-protesters who did that. I suppose there will be news coverage later.

Much as I dislike sharing anything from Andy Ngo…

A male ego so bloated it blocks out the sun women.

A woman says she doesn’t want a male gynecologist; a man (who is an actor) says “You know I played a male midwife, right?”

Oh sir, I’m so sorry sir, I said a thing without taking into account your expertise on the subject of women not wanting a man poking around between their legs. How could I have been so rude? Of course performing a scripted role as a midwife is exactly equivalent to training and work as a midwife, and how dare I say anything about it to you with your vastly greater experience and education.

But seriously – David Paisley isn’t 3. He’s more than old enough to know that there are such things as predatory men, and that some of them are doctors, and some of those are gynecologists. He should be able to see the difficulty, and acknowledge it, and back off, but instead he pulls non-existent rank and then waves away the existence of male gynecologists who assault their patients.

It’s not comparing, it’s saying that some of them are, and as with trans women in prisons and shelters and rape crisis centers, we can’t know who is which, so we take the reasonable precautions. A decent human being would understand that. Paisley is indecent.

A tweet of Maya’s alerted me to some more abject groveling.

Do you think the words “trans and non-binary” appear often enough in that short extract?

It’s Professor [and Vice-Chancellor] Anthony Forster on the University of Essex staff blog:

Our commitment to our trans and non-binary staff and students

That’s nice, but is there any commitment to your female students? Any at all?

I met with trans and non-binary students and staff last Friday and we discussed the Reindorf Review, the publication of the Report (.pdf) and the actions (.pdf) agreed by Senate and Council in response to the recommendations in the Review, and the impact they have had on both the trans and non-binary community and the wider Essex community. In the meeting we discussed how hurt people feel about the outcome and the very negative impact that this has had and continues to have on trans and non-binary staff and students.

What about women? What about the impact on women?

I am committed to ensuring that everyone is made to feel welcome at the University and we discussed a range of actions that we can take to ensure that this is the case.

I don’t think he’s committed to that at all. He seems much more committed to making women feel unwelcome…unless they slavishly submit to the trans dogma, and put “trans and non-binary students” first at all times and in all disputes.

My personal view is that the current law in the UK does not fully respect and protect the identities of trans and non-binary people. I understand that, in meeting our obligations to respect academic freedom and freedom of speech within the law, we have given the impression that we might not care about the lived reality of trans and non-binary people. As we revise our equality, diversity and inclusion policies and procedures we will continue to go beyond the minimum standards required by law, wherever we can, to ensure that we recognise, respect and protect the identities of trans and non-binary people. Listening to our trans and non-binary staff and students will be central to us understanding the changes that will have the most impact in creating a welcoming, supportive and inclusive environment – and ensuring the lived experience of our trans and non-binary staff and students is positive.

And ensuring that the lived experience of our female staff and students will be complete crap.

We have received other suggestions as to how the University can demonstrate its commitment to our trans and non-binary staff and students. These include: allocating greater funding and resources for mental health services; putting in place a trans and non-binary support group for students facilitated by a trans/non-binary member of staff; identifying a common room/space for trans and non-binary students; encouraging positive action to support and promote greater diversity within leadership and across the University; respecting personal pro-nouns; further developing support and training for staff in leadership positions and across the University; and creating a Working Group to combat transphobia on our campuses.

Women, meanwhile, can get in the sea.

I have been asked to provide a number of apologies including: to anyone who felt excluded from or affected by the process of contributing to the Review; for the manner in which the Reindorf Report was released, and in particular for the timing of the release at the start of the examination period and for how this has felt during Pride Month; that the Report and the actions agreed by Senate and Council have required considerable time from our students to address the impact on them and on other students and especially students in leadership roles, in a context in which some have not received appropriate training; the public scrutiny this has focused on some of our students; and for any harassment or bullying that has taken place and for anyone having been made to feel unsafe as a result of the Review. I am sincerely sorry for this. We have a zero-tolerance approach to harassment and bullying and I am committed to taking action when needed to ensure that we treat everyone in our community with dignity and respect. I have been asked to make apologies to three students and will do this today, and I will also send an apology to our trans and non-binary staff through the LGBTQ+ staff forum Chair.

But not women. Never women. Shut up about women. We do not care.