Do not call us “cis”

Feb 13th, 2020 11:19 am | By

The ACLU’s Staff Attorney on their National LGBT & HIV Project:

They’re not “cis” girls. Chase Strangio doesn’t get to other them from their own sex like that. They’re just girls. They didn’t choose it, they were born it, as we all were. That doesn’t make them a subcategory of their sex.

But even more dishonest is that “because their trans peers are able to participate fully in school life.” Strangio lies like that constantly, and it’s infuriating, especially coming from the ACLU. That is not why the girls are suing, and Strangio knows it. They are suing to prevent boys from competing on the girls’ team and thus depriving girls of medals and scholarships. Those boys don’t have to compete on the girls’ team to participate fully in school life. They could compete on the boys’ team (since they are boys). They wouldn’t come in first, but there is no “right” to come in first, especially by cheating.

How would those two boys – Yearwood and Miller – like it if all the boys in the school joined them on the girls’ team? Not much, because they would lose again.

It’s a sanctimonious and kind-of-racist lie to say this is about “urging the state to police young Black women.” Yearwood and Miller are not young Black women, because they are not women.

Chase Strangio is despicable.



Lesson learned

Feb 13th, 2020 10:32 am | By

Now that Trump has been impeached by the House but not removed by the Senate, he is hell-bent on revenge and dictatorship.

In the week since his acquittal on impeachment charges, a fully emboldened President Donald Trump is demonstrating his determination to assert an iron grip on government, pushing his Justice Department to ease up on a longtime friend while using the levers of presidential powers to exact payback on real and perceived foes.

And we are helpless to do anything about it and we could be completely and utterly screwed.

Trump has told confidants in recent days that he felt both vindicated and strengthened by his acquittal in the Senate, believing Republicans have rallied around him in unprecedented fashion while voters were turned off by the political process, according to four White House officials and Republicans close to the West Wing…

In short he’s even more dangerous than he was before.

In recent days, the White House has yanked a senior Treasury Department nomination away from a former Justice Department official who supervised the prosecutions of several of Trump advisers. The administration also fired an EPA official who claims he was ousted because he was deemed too friendly with Democrats.

“We are witnessing a crisis in the rule of law in America — unlike one we have ever seen before,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday. Schumer called for the Justice Department’s independent inspector general to probe the department’s action in the Stone case. Later, House lawmakers announced Attorney General William Barr would come before them next month to answer questions.

Late next month. When the date comes he’ll probably say he has to do laundry that day.

Trump turned testy during an Oval Office appearance when reporters asked him about interfering in the Stone case and whether he learned anything from his impeachment ordeal.

He didn’t “turn testy.” He carried on like a bad-tempered bully as he so often does.

He slammed the four prosecutors who recommended the stiff sentence for Stone and asserted they “ought to apologize for a lot of the people whose lives they’ve ruined.”

He described the lesson he gleaned from being just the third president to endure an impeachment trial: “Democrats are crooked. … They’re vicious, they shouldn’t have brought impeachment and that my poll numbers are 10 points higher because of fake news.”

He learned the lesson a childish stupid narcissist would learn: he’s right and everyone else is wrong.



The clearest terms yet

Feb 13th, 2020 10:07 am | By

We’re supposed to be impressed-like that John Kelly has said a little more about what a dangerous lunatic Trump is. I’m not impressed.

Over a 75-minute speech and Q&A session, Kelly laid out, in the clearest terms yet, his misgivings about Trump’s words and actions regarding North Korea, illegal immigration, military discipline, Ukraine, and the news media.

But he provided cover for Trump when he was Chief of Staff.

Kelly, a retired Marine Corps general, said that Vindman is blameless and was simply following the training he’d received as a soldier; migrants are “overwhelmingly good people” and “not all rapists”; and Trump’s decision to condition military aid to Ukraine on an investigation into his political rival Joe Biden upended long-standing U.S. policy.

Any apology for the lies about Representative Frederica Wilson?

When Vindman heard the president tell Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated, that was tantamount to hearing “an illegal order,” Kelly said. “We teach them, ‘Don’t follow an illegal order. And if you’re ever given one, you’ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss.’”

Good, but way too late.



What is “self-identifying”?

Feb 13th, 2020 9:14 am | By

Why do this?

https://twitter.com/Stemettes/status/1222061193105375232

Why hedge it? Why say “self-identifying woman” instead of just “woman”?

Why can’t women just be women any more?



Define “civil liberty”

Feb 13th, 2020 8:38 am | By

God damn ACLU.

“Andraya,” who is a boy, “just wants to run” against girls, so that he will have a nice big unfair advantage.

Even if Andraya really does think of himself as a girl, and really does think that he “feels like a girl” on the inside (the meaning of which is impossible to pin down), he still should not, and should not be allowed to, compete against actual girls. It’s grossly unfair and it should not be allowed.

Ahhhhhhh that is such bullshit. What does “echo” mean? Nothing. This isn’t a poetry class. The arguments used to keep men who say they are women out of women’s sports are the opposite of those used to keep women out of sports. We argue that men should not be invading women’s sports because they have a sizable physical advantage; that is not why women were kept out of sports until the past few decades.

Men cheating women out of prizes in sport are not exercising their civil rights but trampling on those of women. The ACLU should change its name if it’s going to keep on with this garbage.



If they say

Feb 12th, 2020 3:25 pm | By

Here’s the exchange between Selina Todd and Lloyd Russell-Moyle: just the audio.

So, Russell-Moyle didn’t say: “If people don’t consider transwomen to be women then that is against the law and they should face disciplinary procedures.” He said, beginning at about 6:30:

Well if they say a trans woman is not a woman and I will never recognize that, that’s against the law, and actually they should either have to explain themselves in great detail, and if they were unable to do that, then yes they should look at disciplinary procedures

Similar but not the same, and especially he didn’t say “consider” but “say,” and that’s a very important difference.

That said – he still has a hell of a nerve announcing that we can’t say that trans women are not women without explaining ourselves in great detail or facing “disciplinary procedures.” Trans dogs are not dogs, trans houses are not houses, trans tulips are not tulips. Nobody should be disciplined for saying that.



Who sparked what?

Feb 12th, 2020 12:05 pm | By

There’s a French schoolgirl who had the audacity to film “an anti-religious diatribe on social media,” to use the Guardian’s terminology.

The Guardian also buried what inspired her to do so halfway down the page.

Mila, 16, from near Lyon, became a cause célèbre in January after she made a live broadcast on her Instagram account in which she spoke about her homosexuality. A Muslim commentator responded she was a “dirty lesbian” and a “dirty whore”. She responded by posting a video diatribe against Islam.

Her outburst sparked death threats and social media users posted her personal information online, including where she was attending school. The public prosecutor has opened an investigation for “death threats, threats to commit a crime and harassment” against her attackers and a separate inquiry into whether she had “provoked religious hatred”, which is punishable by the law.

Abdallah Zekri, general delegate of the French Council for the Muslim Faith (CFCM), told French radio: “This girl knows exactly what she has done … they who sow, reap.” Zekri added that the teenager’s comments were not covered by freedom of expression but were insulting and provocative. Afterwards, Mohammed Moussaoui, the new head of the CFCM, said criticism of Islam had to be accepted and no remarks justified death threats. “We have to accept all the debates and refuse all violence,” Moussaoui wrote.

“Insulting and provocative” does not mean “deserving of death threats.” Note, also, that the Guardian did what it so often does: said “Her outburst sparked death threats” rather than, say, “some people responded to her video with death threats.” Notice it didn’t say the guy who called her a dirty whore “sparked” her video.

The case has brought echos of the Charlie Hebdo massacre in 2015, which the perpetrators claimed was in retribution for the satirical newspaper publishing cartoons several years previously of the prophet Mohammed that were considered offensive by many Muslims. In a 2007 legal case against the paper, judges declared: “In France it is possible to insult a religion, its figures and its symbols … however, insulting those who follow a religion is outlawed.”

But many believers take the view that insulting the religion is insulting those who follow it.



That is against the law

Feb 12th, 2020 11:21 am | By

Politics Live on the BBC today:

I’ve seen a couple of clips but I’m not sure I’ll be able to see the whole thing. I haven’t seen the bit where he says that so I can’t confirm that he did say it, but if he did…oy. He’s an MP.



Doing his job

Feb 12th, 2020 10:35 am | By

From the Committee to Protect Journalists:

The New York City Police Department should drop all charges against photojournalist Amr Alfiky and provide a public explanation for his arrest, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Police arrested Alfiky, a photo editor at ABC news and a contributor to Reuters and The New York Times, at about 7 p.m. yesterday in New York’s Lower East Side neighborhood as he was filming the arrest on the street of another individual, according to the journalist’s friend, Mostafa Bassim, who captured Alfiky’s arrest on video and spoke with CPJ in a phone interview.

Police held Alfiky at Manhattan’s seventh precinct station for about 3.5 hours, where he was given access to a lawyer and was released after being charged with disorderly conduct, according to Bassim and a report by the New York Daily News, a local daily.

We know Trump considers journalism “disorderly conduct” but you’d hope New York cops would know better. (I know, probably a feeble hope.)

Officers confiscated Alfiky’s press credential, a card issued by the city’s police to grant journalists’ access to restricted spaces, during the arrest and have not returned it, Bassim said.

According to the New York Daily News, an NYPD spokesman said that Alfiky “refused to comply with repeated requests to step back” and did not identify himself as a journalist until after he was in custody. However, in Bassim’s video of the arrest, Alfiky can be heard repeatedly and loudly telling police officers that he is a journalist and offering to show his press credentials as the officers handcuffed him.

Sure enough – you can hear him saying it. Repeatedly.



Off with his head

Feb 12th, 2020 10:08 am | By

Trump continues to tell damaging lies (aka libel) about Vindman.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said the military will likely look at disciplinary action against Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, just days after the National Security Council official was ousted from the White House after giving damaging testimony during the House impeachment hearings.

“That’s going to be up to the military, we’ll have to see, but if you look at what happened, they’re going to certainly, I would imagine, take a look at that,” Trump said in response to a follow-up question about what he meant when he said, “the military can handle him.”

I’m so sick of his idiotic stock phrases – “we’ll have to see,” “if you look at what happened” – empty meaningless filler because he has nothing of substance to say. Then there’s the genius juxtaposition of ” they’re going to certainly, I would imagine” – well which is it? Are you certain, or do you imagine?

Trump also said he wasn’t “happy” with Vindman and his twin brother Yevgeny, who served as a senior NSC lawyer and was also recalled on Friday despite not being a witness in the president’s impeachment hearings.

“Happy” – another meaningless filler word. He has zero reason to punish Yevgeny Vindman but doesn’t like to say so, so he’s just “not happy” with him. He might as well wear a neon sign saying his head is entirely empty.

Trump, without providing evidence or specific examples, said Alexander Vindman reported “very inaccurate things” about the “perfect” call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“It turned out that what he reported was very different,” Trump said. “And also when you look at the person he reports to, said horrible things, avoided the chain of command, leaked, did a lot of bad things. And so we sent him on his way to a much different location, and the military can handle him any way they want.”

Horrible things, bad things. Well ok then.



And falling

Feb 12th, 2020 9:26 am | By

President Scary.



You don’t though

Feb 11th, 2020 5:32 pm | By

He thinks he has “the absolute right” to interfere in criminal prosecutions. He thinks wrong. It would be nice if he knew the basics of this job he decided to pretend to do.

Also, “aberition.”



All four quit

Feb 11th, 2020 5:02 pm | By

So much for law and order, which used to be a Republican lodestar.

The entire team prosecuting Roger Stone abruptly resigned from the criminal case on Tuesday after the Justice Department said it planned to reduce the recommended sentence for Stone, a longtime Trump associate.

The Justice Department on Tuesday said it was pulling back on its request to sentence Stone to seven to nine years in prison after President Donald Trump blasted the sentencing proposal as “a miscarriage of justice.”

After reports that a softer sentencing recommendation was imminent, lead prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky withdrew as a prosecutor in the case. A footnote in his court filing noted that “the undersigned attorney has resigned effective immediately.”

Zelinsky, who was a part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s team investigating Russian election interference, is not resigning from the Justice Department but is leaving the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office and returning to his old job with the U.S. attorney in Maryland.

Another prosecutor, Jonathan Kravis, also resigned — both from the case and as an assistant U.S. attorney. Kravis on Tuesday filed a notice with the judge saying he “no longer represents the government in this matter.” The other two prosecutors, Adam Jed and Michael Marando, also withdrew from the case.

Never mind, we’re still dealing out long prison sentences to black people and poor people.



Jumping aboard

Feb 11th, 2020 4:46 pm | By

Have YOU signed?

Labour leadership contender Rebecca Long-Bailey has signed up to a pledge to expel party members who have expressed “transphobic” views.

#ExpelMe.

It is part of a 12-point plan by the Labour Campaign for Trans Rights.

The plan has also been backed by deputy leader hopeful Angela Rayner – but critics say it could lead to a “witch hunt” of party members.

It could and it will. You know it will.

The pledges include accepting that there is “no material conflict between trans rights and women’s rights” – and supporting the expulsion of Labour members who “express bigoted, transphobic views”.

The group states that “trans women are women, trans men are men”.

But they’re not and they’re not, which is why they’re called “trans.”

They also back the fight against what the group alleges are “transphobic organisations”, naming two in particular; Woman’s Place UK and the LGB Alliance.

Woman’s Place UK, which says it campaigns to defend women’s “hard-won rights”, said it “absolutely refutes” claims their organisation is transphobic, describing the allegations as “scurrilous” and “defamatory”.

Yes but they’re just women, so what do they know.

https://twitter.com/RLong_Bailey/status/1227230364961210368

What about women? Do women matter at all?



Some of the actions required

Feb 11th, 2020 4:21 pm | By

#ExpelMe is trending on Twitter. What’s it about?

There’s this:

https://twitter.com/AngelaRayner/status/1227188845642424320

Which we can read here.

Below find our founding statement and pledges for all Labour Party members who support trans rights to sign.

Meaning, I guess, if you don’t sign, you don’t support trans rights.

The Labour Campaign for Trans Rights has been founded by transgender and non-binary Labour members in order to advance trans liberation through the Labour Party. Trans people today are disproportionately affected by the evils of homelessness, unemployment, poverty and hate crime. We live under a Conservative government which restricts our rights and puts those with transphobic views in positions of power; whilst we are attacked relentlessly by a reactionary press.

Liberation from what, though?

Obviously no one should suffer homelessness, unemployment, poverty, or hate crime. But what’s this about restricting rights? What rights exactly?

As the party which stands for socialism, the Labour Party must play an active and crucial role in the fight for transgender liberation. Although Labour is the party which has worked hardest to advance LGBT+ rights, when considering the level of oppression trans people face, our commitment to trans liberation has often been equivocal or inadequate. There are still transphobes in our ranks, and we have often failed to act as transphobia has gained ground within our party. Now that trans people face the onslaught of a Conservative majority, this must change, and it is this campaign’s goal to create a Labour Party which stands firmly on the side of trans people.

That’s just more of the same, and it clarifies nothing. Liberation from what? What is transphobia? What does “standing firmly on the side of trans people” entail?

We firstly urge all allies and sympathetic Labour members to sign our founding pledges, and to encourage your comrades, and especially your representatives in the Labour movement, to do so as well. These pledges have been written to outline some of the actions required to rid the Labour Party of transphobia and to stand up for trans people.

Ok, finally we get to specifics.

1. Accept the material reality that trans people are oppressed and discriminated against in British society, facing a rising risk of hate crime, and difficulty accessing public services, healthcare, housing and employment.

I don’t know how true any of that is, but it’s not outlandish.

2. Believe that trans liberation must be an objective of the Labour Party, and that transphobia is antithetical to our collective aims.

Before I know what “liberation” we’re talking about and what “transphobia” is? No.

3. Commit to respecting trans people as their self-declared gender, and to ensure that the Labour Party is an inclusive environment for trans people.

Ah, there we go, finally something we can grasp.

And no, I’m not going to do that. It doesn’t matter, because I’m not in the UK and so not in the Labour Party, but if I were I wouldn’t. No. I’m not going to “commit” to respecting anybody as their self-declared anything. It’s much too general and sweeping an order to obey. No.

4. Accept that trans women are women, trans men are men, and non-binary people are non-binary.

No. They’re not, they’re not, and that doesn’t mean anything.

5. Accept that there is no material conflict between trans rights and women’s rights, and that all trans women are subject to misogyny and patriarchal oppression.

No, and fuck off.

6. Listen to trans comrades on issues of transphobia and transmisogyny, allowing trans people to lead the way on our own liberation.

I might, if I hadn’t been paying close attention for the past five or so years, but I have, so no.

7. Support the work of trans members and organisers within the Labour movement, including supporting motions on a local, regional and national level which are presented for the furthering of trans liberation.

See above.

8. Oppose transphobic motions which run contrary to our own party equalities policy, and support the NEC striking down such motions on this basis.

On whose say-so? What if we think they don’t run contrary to our own party equalities policy? So that’s another No.

9. Organise and fight against transphobic organisations such as Woman’s Place UK, LGB Alliance and other trans-exclusionist hate groups.

Oh hell no. Meanwhile – how about trans comrades listen to women more? There’s an idea.

10. Support the expulsion from the Labour Party of those who express bigoted, transphobic views.

Hence #ExpelMe.

Go on then.

11.Support reform of the Gender Recognition Act to improve transgender rights, as well as supporting policies which would improve trans people’s access to necessary healthcare, housing, and employment.

What rights? Improve them how? Better access to necessary healthcare, housing, and employment would be good for everyone, trans people included – included, not especially included, or singled out for extra.

12. Organise against and oppose any further transphobic policy from our own party or any other.

Clearly “transphobic” here just means not taking orders from entitled narcissists who want to kick feminists out of Labour.

So that’s why #ExpelMe is trending.



Gangsterism is contagious

Feb 11th, 2020 11:47 am | By

The gangsters are inside the house.

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) has faced a bitter GOP backlash after casting the lone Republican vote for President Trump’s impeachment. There have been angry tweets and calls for the party to expel the man it once nominated to lead the country.

On Sunday, one influential conservative went so far as to say he could not be sure of Romney’s safety at a major right-wing gathering, alarming some of the Utah senator’s defenders and — in some critics’ eyes — crossing a line from outrage to threat.

Matt Schlapp, chairman of the Conservative Political Action Conference, made the controversial comments Sunday as he explained why Romney would be excluded from this year’s four-day event. Schlapp announced last month via tweet that the senator was “formally NOT invited,” as Romney took heat for breaking from staunch Republican support of the president to call for witnesses in Trump’s impeachment trial.

The word for Republican support of Trump shouldn’t be “staunch.” That makes it sound admirable, like “loyal” and “dedicated” and “courageous.” I suggest mindless or slavish or shameful.

Schlapp has denied any threatening intent in his Sunday comments, tweeting that he has “no beef [with Romney’s] family” and hopes “they have happy healthy lives away from politics.”

Which is another barely-veiled threat.

The Republican National Committee blasted the lawmaker in an email last Wednesday under the subject line “Mitt Romney turns his back on Utah,” while Donald Trump Jr. declared on Twitter: “He’s now officially a member of the resistance & should be expelled” from the GOP.

And yet, back in 2016, many in that GOP knew he was rotten to the core.

Truth matters. Right matters.



This miscarriage of justice

Feb 11th, 2020 11:08 am | By

The mafia boss issues instructions.

He says “cannot allow” as if he were a literal dictator.

Barr leaps to obey as if Trump were a literal dictator.

The president sent his message a little before 2am on Tuesday, after a rally in New Hampshire and a visit to Delaware to honour two US soldiers killed in Afghanistan.

On Tuesday, it seemed the tweet would have its desired effect.

The Washington Post quoted a “senior justice department official” as saying: “The department finds the recommendation extreme and excessive and disproportionate to Stone’s offences. The department will clarify its position later today.”

The Post characterised the move as “a stunning rebuke of career prosecutors that will surely raise questions about political meddling in the case”.

Questions which will go unheeded as the Trump mafia tightens its hold on everything.

Trump has indicated he might pardon Stone.

Tighter and tighter.



Women tend

Feb 11th, 2020 10:34 am | By

He’s an anthropologist so he must know.

[Editing to add: Actually, after a bit of googling, I suspect he’s not an anthropologist but a guy with a BA in anthropology. Maybe he’s filling or playing or performing the role of anthropologist and therefore, according to him, he is one.]

Innnnteresting. I suppose this is a special anthropological use of the word “fill”? I suppose “filling” a role is not the same as playing a role? We’re to understand it as not-fictional, not-pretend, truthy-true?

Not exactly. He does seem to mean performance – the acting kind, not just the doing the job kind.

Ahhhh. All that’s required is consistency. That does make things simple. So we could all put on a lab coat and ask medical questions and write “Dr.” in front of our names, and we’d be filling the role of doctor, and thus we would actually be doctors.

Uh oh. Is he evading the question? I think he’s evading the question. I think he’s fleeing the interview.

And there you go. “Woman” isn’t a real, material category, it’s a set of stage directions.



Pony soldier

Feb 11th, 2020 10:15 am | By

Biden: let’s not.

Anna North at Vox elaborates:

The phrase immediately got attention, with many confused by Biden’s choice of words. As it turns out, “lying dog-faced pony soldier” is a phrase Biden has used before. He attributes it to John Wayne, though its actual provenance is somewhat unclear.

And whether it is John Wayne or not, why say it? When campaigning for the presidency? To a very young female voter? Don’t we have enough of that kind of thing already?

Biden has been criticized in the past for responding to questions — especially questions posed by women — in ways that seem condescending, as when he called moderator Lyz Lenz a “lovely person” after her question at a September LGBTQ rights forum. And the moment in New Hampshire was another reminder that while Biden’s responses may seem folksy or homespun to some, to others they’re a sign that he’s not always treating voters with the seriousness they deserve.

And whether they seem folksy or homespun to some or not, why say it? When campaigning for the presidency? To a very young female voter? Don’t we have enough of that kind of thing already?

Biden’s “Uncle Joe” persona (sometimes, less flatteringly, “Creepy Uncle Joe”) was the subject of jokes during the Obama years. But he’s not the vice president anymore, the older foil to a young commander in chief. Now, Biden is running to be the leader of the country, and young voters are less likely to brush it off when he answers their questions with strange movie references — at 77, he has to prove that he actually understands them and their concerns.

He also has to convince us that he actually will live another five years, which is a little tricky when you’re 77.

I just think it’s egomaniacal of him to be running when he’s such a bad candidate in so many ways. Haven’t we had enough of egomaniacs yet?



By a mile

Feb 10th, 2020 5:41 pm | By

Er…Don…you missed the point.