Suspendies and a bra

Gregor Murray, the unhinged man who shouts derogatory abuse at women on Twitter, is still a Dundee councillor.

Funny thing about that – you can’t tell from his official page that he’s “non-binary.” Nobody looking at that page would have any idea that he’ll flip all the way out if you call him “him” or address him as “sir.” People looking at that page are going to just assume he’s a man, because his name is Gregor and he’s dressed in the business uniform for men and he has a beard and a receding hairline and so on – they’re going to assume it because he “presents as” a man.

So…is the “non-binary” thing just for after hours? A hobby? Part time?

Or is it perhaps not even that but just a pretext for shouting derogatory abuse at women? Maybe he’s “non-binary” solely on Twitter?

H/t latsot

Comments

8 responses to “Suspendies and a bra”

  1. Deety Avatar

    Language question from an American (sorry) — What does he mean by “my surgeries”? Is he also a doctor? Or is that a term that can be used for “office hours” in non-medical contexts? Thanks!

  2. Ophelia Benson Avatar

    Yes, in the UK it means office hours for political representatives, if I understand it correctly. MPs have “surgeries” meaning those times they are available to constituents who want to talk to them.

  3. Ophelia Benson Avatar

    So it’s not office hours in general but office hours specifically to talk to the people they represent. Similar to academics.

  4. guest Avatar

    We have project-related ‘surgeries’ at work; I’d suggest in these contexts a translation might be ‘drop-in’ (like ‘office hours’).

  5. Michael Haubrich Avatar
    Michael Haubrich

    I had never heard the term used in this way until David Amess was killed, and the British press reported that he was killed in his surgery. I had understood that one of the meanings for surgery in the UK is what we call a medical clinic, so the news was hard to understand until I found an explanation. I wondered if he was an MD, or if he had gone for a medical appointment.

    Separated by a common language.

  6. guest Avatar

    When I moved to the UK my boss and I started to keep a lexicon just of differences in terms of art in our profession, but eventually gave up when entries started getting into the hundreds.

  7. Deety Avatar

    Thank you for clearing that up!

  8. John the Drunkard Avatar
    John the Drunkard

    Perhaps he might receive a storm of demands for his pronouns? Wouldn’t he already be groaning under the burden of harassment if he was, you know, a woman?