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where they are safest

Classic of indifference to women and their safety and wellbeing.

He means the decision to ban men from the spaces where women are safest, but of course he can’t say it that way.

He’s a women-hating weasel, Thomas Willett is.… Read the rest

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where they are safest
By Ophelia Benson, February 19, 2026

Classic of indifference to women and their safety and wellbeing.

He means the decision to ban men from the spaces where women are safest, but of course he can’t say it that way.

He’s a women-hating weasel, Thomas Willett is.… Read the rest

Archives
Bad Moves
Articles
Flashback
In Focus
Latest News
Letters
Notes and Comment Blog

where they are safest 

Classic of indifference to women and their safety and wellbeing.

He means the decision to ban men from the spaces where women are safest, but of course he can’t say it that way.

He’s a women-hating weasel, Thomas Willett is.… Read the rest

Strengthen up 

Trump has set up his very own imitation UN, and he’s giving it 10 billion dollars of our money.

Trump promised that the United States would commit $10 billion to his Board of Peace, the body created for the security and redevelopment of the Gaza Strip, although he did not specify the source of that funding.

Well it’s not coming out of his wallet.

Trump described the Board of Peace as an institution that would “strengthen up the United Nations,” perhaps answering those who questioned whether he was trying to set up a competitor to the U.N. But he also described the Board as a group that is “going to almost be looking over the United Nations and making

… Read the rest
Hiring 

This raises an interesting question, at least for me.

At first glance “Nobody should lose their job because they have a ‘gender identity'” seems right, but then second glance isn’t quite so sure.

Having a gender identity=having a very feeble grasp on reality.

In a card shop that probably wouldn’t matter much, but in a lot of other jobs it would. I don’t think employers in general want to hire people who live a fantasy life that’s not tucked … Read the rest

Based on self-identification 

In single-sex spaces news:

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has concluded its regulatory action following the review of policies identified through the UK Government’s 2024 call for input exercise on single-sex spaces.

In August 2025, the EHRC wrote to 19 organisations identified through this exercise whose policies misrepresented the Equality Act 2010 by wrongly suggesting there is an automatic legal right to access single-sex spaces based on self-identification. These organisations spanned the policing, education and health sectors. All 19 organisations have now removed the policies in question.

In other words people can no longer bounce into the other sex’s spaces simply by announcing “I am that other sex.” It makes sense. It’s kind of like the policy … Read the rest

Submit 

Where we are:

Christian nationalist pastor Doug Wilson, who has argued that wives should submit to their husbands, women should be denied the vote, and Christian enslavers were on “firm scriptural ground,” led a worship service at the Pentagon this week at the invitation of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Women should be stomped into submission, while men should be free to do all the things Donald Trump has done, because that’s the Christian rule. Just ask the bible if you don’t believe me.

Critics have questioned Hegseth’s elevation of Christianity within the Defense Department. The secretary instituted monthly prayer meetings at the Pentagon last May.

Fred Wellman, a West Point graduate and 20-year Army veteran running for Congress from

… Read the rest
Grizzled veterans 

Akua Reindorf on the protracted refusal to comply:

Even for grizzled veterans of the gender wars, it was surreal that the court needed to spell out that, for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010, a woman is a person born female and not a person born male. More surreal still is the fact that, for ten months now, many employers and service providers have simply ignored the judgment and have continued to allow males to use women’s facilities.

What is not a surprise is that this widespread defiance of the law has been brought about by a campaign of disinformation waged by trans rights activists. It was just such a campaign that convinced employers and service providers they

… Read the rest
We don’t know what it’s like? 

You have got to be kidding us.

https://twitter.com/sappholives83/status/2024099224212664735

Oh yes, there’s a lot we take for granted, because we’re…not punished for acting in a way that is feminine. Is that right Bucko? Are you sure? Have you ever taken a peek at the stats on male violence against women? Given those stats, isn’t it kind of obvious that we are punished for acting in a way that is feminine? Granted not in the way you mean, i.e. being a man and putting on lipstick and a tiny skirt, but in the more general way, which codes everything women do as irritatingly wrong and sly and womany. Women are very much at risk from men with short tempers, and such men … Read the rest

Highly disturbing allegations 

Andy Borowitz:

California US House Rep. Ted Lieu has dropped explosive new allegations against Donald Trump over the mention of the latter’s name in the Epstein files. Lieu claimed that the unredacted Epstein files, which were viewed by a select group of US House Reps, contain disturbing allegations against Trump.

“Donald Trump is in the Epstein files thousands and thousands of times,” Lieu said. “In those files, there are highly disturbing allegations, allegations of Donald Trump raping children and threatening to kill children.”

I don’t think he would risk saying that if it weren’t true, because Trump.… Read the rest

Millions of files 

We do keep pointing it out – that misogyny is a thing, that it’s not obscure or rare, that a lot of men really do have profound contempt for women, which can easily tip into hatred and violence.

Millions of files related to the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein suggest the existence of a “global criminal enterprise” that carried out acts meeting the legal threshold of crimes against humanity, a panel of independent experts appointed by the United Nations human rights council has said.

The experts said crimes outlined in documents released by the US justice department were committed against a backdrop of supremacist beliefs, racism, corruption and extreme misogyny. The crimes, they said, showed a commodification and

… Read the rest
The limelight 

Jolyon gets dragged by a minor local journalistic outfit known as The Times.

That’s gotta sting.

Lawyers, academics and activists have turned on the Good Law Project, accusing it of “selling hope” through fundraising to fight for transgender rights, despite being repeatedly defeated in court.

In a letter to Bridget Phillipson, the equalities minister, more than 30 barristers and legal academics accused the project, a non-profit campaign organisation, of publishing “egregiously false” claims about a High Court ruling on single-sex spaces last week.

Mr Justice Swift on Friday dismissed a legal challenge brought by the project against Britain’s rights watchdog over a now-removed update on its website, which said that trans women “should not be permitted to use the women’s

… Read the rest
Egregiously false law project 

Jolyon gets the attention he so richly deserves. The Times:

More than 30 barristers and academics have accused the campaign group of making ‘egregiously false’ claims about a High Court ruling on single-sex spaces.

In other words they have accused Jolyon and his groupuscule of repeatedly lying.

Lawyers, academics and activists have turned on the Good Law Project, accusing it of “selling hope” through fundraising to fight for transgender rights, despite being repeatedly defeated in court.

In a letter to Bridget Phillipson, the equalities minister, more than 30 barristers and legal academics accused the project, a non-profit campaign organisation, of publishing “egregiously false” claims about a High Court ruling on single-sex spaces last week.

Mr Justice Swift on Friday

… Read the rest
Guest post: The conditions required 

Originally a comment by Artymorty on If.

It’s extra infuriating when it’s gay men making these kinds of arguments, because we know more than most how much male transvestism is driven by fetish — we see it in our community, on the dating apps, in the leather bars, etc. Within the gay male community, both online and in the real world in virtually any big city, there are designated secluded, judgment-free zones for men to let their sexual quirks and kinks out in private.

I can see how at least some degree of cameraderie between gay men and straight or bisexual transvestites emerged: both groups lived with sexual desires that were seen as incompatible with proper society. But … Read the rest

A striking anomaly 

Jonathan Kay at Quillette:

On 10 February, Jesse Van Rootselaar (also known as Jesse Strang) killed eight people in the remote British Columbia mining town of Tumbler Ridge. The first two victims were the killer’s mother and half-brother, whom Van Rootselaar shot at home. Van Rootselaar then went to a local secondary school and murdered six more people—five of whom were twelve- or thirteen-year-old students—before committing suicide. Twenty-seven others were injured. It was the deadliest Canadian school shooting in almost four decades, and the highest-casualty mass-shooting event in the nation’s history.

…

When news of the tragedy was first reported to Canadians on the afternoon of 10 February, it appeared to include a striking anomaly: The killer, we were

… Read the rest
Political asylum in the what now? 

The theocrat’s veto:

If the Turkish man on trial for burning a copy of the Quran loses his case on Tuesday, the Trump administration is preparing to offer him political asylum in the United States.

According to the Telegraph, State Department officials are already making plans to help him leave the country. Let that sink in. A man who came to Britain as a refugee — fleeing the Islamic terrorism that, as he puts it, destroyed his family’s life in Turkey — may soon have to flee Britain itself and seek asylum in America because we cannot protect his human rights. I cannot think of anything more embarrassing for Sir Keir Starmer.

So what’s this case about? On 13

… Read the rest
Bawdy 

One small item from a Mother Jones piece about Trump and Epstein:

Murdoch and the Wall Street Journal’s response rips the hide off Trump’s case on many levels. For instance, it contends, rather reasonably, that reporting Trump was pals with Epstein before Epstein was busted is not defamatory. But the killer argument is that the WSJ article was “consistent with plaintiff’s reputation.” Trump, Murdoch’s lawyers maintain, “admitted to instances of using bawdy language when discussing women. Plaintiff thus cannot allege that the Article damaged his reputation.”

“Bawdy” is doing a lot of work here. Murdoch’s lawyers could have gone with “sleazy” or “lecherous” or “misogynist.” But they landed on a Benny Hill-ish description that’s less offensive in tone. 

… Read the rest
If 

Peter Tatchell longs to see women’s rights demolished.

Peter Tatchell wishes women were required to have “a legitimate reason” for not taking our clothes off in the presence of male strangers. It looks as if he thinks simply not wanting to take our clothes off in the presence of male strangers is not a legitimate reason. All the tender concern is for men who want to … Read the rest

Heated blankie 

Priorities.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s relationship with U.S. Coast Guard officials has become strained throughout her first year leading the department, according to two U.S. officials, a Coast Guard official and a former Coast Guard official.

The tensions between Noem and the only branch of the U.S. military overseen by DHS stem from some early decisions she made that rankled Coast Guard officials, including a verbal directive to shift Coast Guard resources from a search-and-rescue mission to find a missing service member, the sources said.

So she’s the “let them drown” kind of Coast Guard boss.

Noem’s focus on meeting the Trump administration’s deportation quotas appears poised to further impact Coast Guard operations in the coming months, according

… Read the rest
Who’s a naughty boy then? 

The Daily Mail on the fall of Lynsay Watson:

A transgender activist who accused Father Ted co-writer Graham Linehan of harassment has been arrested outside court over a separate case. Former police officer Lynsay Watson was detained by officers near Manchester Civil Justice Centre, with pictures of the appearance outside court widely shared online.

Widely shared because Watson turns out not to be a harmless slender wisp of a girl.

Former PC Watson was sacked by Leicestershire Police for gross misconduct in 2023 after allegedly harassing a free speech campaigner and critic of gender ideology.

Watson appeared for an oral permissions hearing for judicial review of a Cambridgeshire Police decision not to prosecute Helen Joyce for misgendering another trans

… Read the rest
The toxin known as Pam Bondi 

Andy Borowitz yesterday:

Can the attorney general of the United States go to prison?

The answer, of course, is yes: John Mitchell, who served under Richard M. Nixon, later served 19 months behind bars for crimes related to the Watergate cover-up.

Will the toxin known as Pam Bondi follow in his footsteps?

It’s worth considering in light of her appearance before Congress on Wednesday, a performance that Kimberly Guilfoyle might call “too shouty.”

Her testimony was unquestionably obnoxious. But was it criminal?

When you examine the evidence, it doesn’t look good for Pam.

This was the pivotal moment: responding to a question from California Rep. Ted Lieu about the Epstein scandal, Bondi snapped, “There is no evidence that Donald

… Read the rest
Highly inappropriate 

Krauss says let’s not go crazy here.

As Epstein was nearing the end of his thirteen-month jail sentence in 2009, he called me. He had learned that I had moved to ASU and that I was hoping to establish the Origins Project program there. Jail time, he said, had convinced him that making money should no longer be his primary goal. He wanted to support science and science education, and he wanted advice about where to direct his money. He expressed interest in supporting the ASU effort. I told him that the conduct for which he had been convicted had been, aside from its illegality, highly inappropriate and plainly stupid. I also thought that his plan was laudable and

… Read the rest