May 8th, 2019 5:05 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
There was a conversation on violence against women (“domestic abuse”) on Fresh Air yesterday. The subjects were Rachel Louise Snyder, author of No Visible Bruises, and Suzanne Dubus, CEO of the Jeanne Geiger Crisis Center. Guess what: narcissism came into it.
GROSS: I want to bring up narcissism because, Rachel, you mentioned narcissism as being one of the characteristics that a lot of abusers and murderers have. How does narcissism figure into domestic violence?
SNYDER: Narcissism is one of the key components of an abuser. You know, we have, I think, a vision of what an abuser is. Right? Even in – even when you see media reports of domestic violence, the pictures of – that most often accompany
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May 8th, 2019 4:07 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
I don’t consider Julie Burchill the best of the Julies, but she says good things at (sorry) Spiked:
Paradoxically, redrawing the boundaries of what is ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate’ in order not to make anyone feel ‘excluded’ actually has the counter-productive effect of literally excluding many groups from both social media and public platforms: ex-Muslims espousing atheism, women querying the rights of the transgendered to play them at sport, and lesbians not attracted to a penis even if it has a frock over it. A whole page of last week’s Sunday Times was entirely composed of items reflecting what I call the Perils Of Inclusivity: ‘Tax expert fired for saying trans women aren’t women’ – ‘Gallery covers up art after
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May 8th, 2019 3:20 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
A Twitter thread with much wisdom.
There’s a thread reader but I’m just going to knit it all together for ease of reading, because I think it’s that useful.
The mad thing is, every feeling or lived experience in “gender dysphoria” can far more readily be explained by the clinical characteristics & traits of many other psych conditions. It’s forbidden to speak of this.
Through our dysregulated emotions & incessant
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May 8th, 2019 4:58 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Asia Bibi has escaped Pakistan and arrived in Canada.
Pakistani government officials did not reveal her destination, or say when she left.
But her lawyer Saif ul Malook told the BBC she had already arrived in Canada, where two of her daughters are understood to have been granted asylum.
Asia Noreen – commonly known as Asia Bibi – was kept at a secret location while arrangements were made for her to leave the country.
The Supreme Court’s quashing of her sentence last October led to violent protests by religious hardliners who support strong blasphemy laws, while more liberal sections of society urged her release.
The thing is, though, you can “support strong blasphemy laws” and still not insist on applying … Read the rest
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May 8th, 2019 4:36 am |
By Ophelia Benson
The Guardian took the bait. Eejits.
A production of Don Giovanni opening this weekend in Tulsa, Oklahoma, stars a transgender woman in the title role.
While operas around trans themes are starting to emerge, Tulsa’s take on Mozart’s classic represents the first time a professional opera company in the United States has hired a trans person to sing the lead in a standard work.
But is it the first time a professional opera company in the United States has hired a man to play the male lead in a standard work? Well, no. But if you put it that way how would an opera company in Tulsa, Oklahoma get a story in the Guardian?
Lucia Lucas, the woman
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9 comments
May 7th, 2019 4:58 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
The Times has scored some Trump tax information and found that he was basically setting fire to billions in the late 80s-early 90s.
By the time his master-of-the-universe memoir “Trump: The Art of the Deal” hit bookstores in 1987, Donald J. Trump was already in deep financial distress, losing tens of millions of dollars on troubled business deals, according to previously unrevealed figures from his federal income tax returns.
Mr. Trump was propelled to the presidency, in part, by a self-spun narrative of business success and of setbacks triumphantly overcome. He has attributed his first run of reversals and bankruptcies to the recession that took hold in 1990. But 10 years of tax information obtained by The New York Times
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Tags: Trump
May 7th, 2019 4:20 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
A first! Another door thrown open! Another marginalized group represented!
Lucia Lucas makes her debut in Don Giovanni at Tulsa Opera tonight, making her the first trans woman to perform a principal opera role in the US.
Lucia Lucas is a transgender woman who has a baritone voice. And she is about to make her US debut, singing the title role in Mozart‘s Don Giovanni.
First ever trans woman to play a principal man in an opera! And the title role at that!
Artistic director of Tulsa Opera, Tobias Picker said: “Making history, Tulsa Opera presents baritone, Lucia Lucas in her American operatic debut as a transgender woman. Lucia Lucas’ appearance here will mark the first time a
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May 7th, 2019 11:56 am |
By Ophelia Benson
This is from last September but I’m pretty sure I hadn’t seen it until just now, though I’m well familiar with South Yorkshire Police’s dedication to scouring out “hate crimes” in places like Norfolk.
Hate crime is an incident or crime, which is perceived to be motivated by prejudice or hostility against a person’s race, faith, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity.
So much to question in that. First, hate crime … Read the rest
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7 comments
May 7th, 2019 11:26 am |
By Ophelia Benson
The UN has a warning:
THE BONDS THAT hold nature together may be at risk of unraveling from deforestation, overfishing, development, and other human activities, a landmark United Nations report warns. Thanks to human pressures, one million species may be pushed to extinction in the next few years, with serious consequences for human beings as well as the rest of life on Earth.
“The evidence is crystal clear: Nature is in trouble. Therefore we are in trouble,” said Sandra Díaz, one of the co-chairs of the Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. A 40-page “Summary for Policy Makers” of the forthcoming full report (expected to exceed 1,500 pages) was released May 6 in Paris.
Based on a
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May 7th, 2019 10:16 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Everything is subject to “executive privilege.” Everything. Nobody can give anything to any Congressional hearing ever because “executive privilege.” It’s an eternal law and it covers everything in this universe and all others.
The White House on Tuesday invoked executive privilege to bar former White House counsel Donald McGahn from complying with a congressional subpoena to provide documents to Congress related to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation.
In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone said McGahn does not have the legal right to comply with its subpoena for 36 types of documents — most relating to Mueller’s nearly two-year probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Rather, Cipollone argued
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Tags: President Mob Boss, Trump
May 7th, 2019 9:31 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Oh, this is ugly.
President Donald Trump on Monday granted a pardon to a former first lieutenant in the US Army who was sentenced to prison in 2009 for killing an Iraqi detainee, according to the White House.
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Behenna deployed to Iraq in 2007, according to The Washington Post. The following year, two soldiers and friends of Behenna were killed in a roadside explosion and he was on the scene, the newspaper reports.
Shortly after the soldiers’ death, there was an intelligence report saying then-Iraqi operative Ali Mansur possibly helped organize the explosion, the Post reports.
Mansur was interrogated but then freed, the Post reported, because the military did not have conclusive evidence tying him to the
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Tags: Trump
May 6th, 2019 5:05 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
The Post reports:
More than 450 former federal prosecutors who worked in Republican and Democratic administrations have signed on to a statement asserting special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s findings would have produced obstruction charges against President Trump — if not for the office he holds.
The statement — signed by myriad former career government employees as well as high-profile political appointees — offers a rebuttal to Attorney General William P. Barr’s determination that the evidence Mueller uncovered was “not sufficient” to establish that Trump committed a crime.
The statement is on Medium so let’s read it:
We are former federal prosecutors. We served under both Republican and Democratic administrations at different levels of the federal system: as line
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May 6th, 2019 4:27 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
What happens when one non-material “identity” competes with another non-material “identity”? Do they stare at each other in blank confusion? Do they start competing to see who can make the most accusations of ___phobia?
Vice asked some otherkin in 2016:
But something that is common within the otherkin community are struggles with mental health. “A lot of otherkin who don’t struggle with mental illness are older and usually have well established identities by this point. They’re aware of who they are and don’t necessarily have to talk about it online anymore.”
Ooh. What would that be like? Having an identity and not talking about it online anymore? That just sounds weird, man.
This is true for 17-year-old Miranda, who
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May 6th, 2019 4:10 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
It’s a big No on the tax returns.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Monday told House Democrats he would not furnish President Trump’s tax returns despite their legal request, the latest move by Trump administration officials to shield the president from congressional investigations.
The latest move by Trump administration officials to shield the corrupt thieving cheating lying president from congressional investigations.
Mnuchin added that requests from Congress “must serve a legitimate legislative purpose” and that the request from Democrats does not.
A number of legal experts have said it would be unprecedented for Mnuchin to refuse to turn over the tax returns, as the power for lawmakers to seek the returns is written explicitly in a 1924 law.
In … Read the rest
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May 6th, 2019 3:54 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Another day another woman suspended from Twitter for…this time it’s for telling a man, or boy, that he’s not a lesbian.
Let’s take a closer look at that photo.
happy #LesbianDayOfVisibility my self worth is directly tied to how fucked up my hair is. anyways down with cis
“down with cis” – down with 99.9% of people because they are not trans, but that’s just fine, while a woman telling him he’s not a lesbian merits suspension. Also, of course, while relentless harassment of women might as well be Twitter’s middle … Read the rest
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9 comments
Tags: Enforced belief
May 6th, 2019 11:13 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Madigan is busy covering himself with glory as Labour Student Women’s Officer.
But he’s Labour Student Women’s Officer. Surely he’s supposed to represent (or advocate for or whatever it is that a student women’s officer does) her regardless of her views.
I don’t know that that’s true, and I have … Read the rest
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Tags: Maya Forstater
May 6th, 2019 10:32 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Pelosi isn’t the only one who thinks Trump might refuse to leave if he loses the next election.
Allan Lichtman, a distinguished professor of history at American University, reiterated Pelosi’s worries, telling Salon, “I think Trump will do everything he possibly can to hold on to his power.”
“Remember Trump cannot be embarrassed— cannot be shamed. You can’t appeal to morality, because he has none. You can’t appeal to compassion, he has none. You can’t appeal to the law, he doesn’t care,” Lichtman added. “And if he thinks he can get away with it — absolutely, he will do anything.
Lichtman’s concerns were also echoed by Laurence H. Tribe, the Carl M. Loeb university professor and professor
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Tags: Trump