Culture war:

Culture has long been a proxy in the assertion of power by one people over another. Recent egregious examples include the Chinese government’s attempt to suppress Uyghur religion, literature, music, even food, and Islamic State’s destruction of ancient monuments. In war, culture is a second front. At their most extreme, wars are about eradicating a people’s cultural memory altogether, wiping them from the slate as if they had never been.

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In some ways, intentions are less important than effects, amid war’s messy reality. A missile strike in Kyiv that reportedly killed five people was seemingly directed at the television tower, but it lies close to Babyn Yar, the site of the massacre of 150,000 people

One good thing:

A virtual gallery to showcase Mali’s cultural history has been launched, featuring tens of thousands of Timbuktu’s ancient manuscripts.

The manuscripts were smuggled to safety from Timbuktu after Islamist militant groups took control of the city in northern Mali in 2012.

They contain centuries of African knowledge and scholarship on topics ranging from maths to astrological charts.

“Central to the heritage of Mali, they represent the long legacy of written knowledge and academic excellence in Africa,” said Dr Abdel Kader Haidara, a librarian known for smuggling the manuscripts out of Timbuktu, who was also involved in the project.

The site is called Mali Magic and from a quick look it is pretty damn magic. It’s music … Read the rest

Chip chip chip chip away.

Hey you! Got a minute? That’s all it takes to contact your elected officials and urge them to #EndPeriodPoverty in the US! ➡️ https://t.co/yWSv2XHBUz pic.twitter.com/DHqO4vmAyr

— Always (@Always) February 16, 2022

It’s not young people. Boys don’t miss school because of period poverty.

Do you think it's going to help that *you're* so ashamed to use the word "woman" that you'd rather create a completely nonsencial stat, @Always? pic.twitter.com/GjRqfrnp0I

— Eva Kurilova (@eva_kurilova) March 9, 2022

Say the word. The word is “girls.” It’s not blasphemy or porn; we can say it. Girls.

To be fair, they do know how to say it.

Without encouragement and support to keep playing from her dad, Jennifer

Suzanne Moore on the strange mystery of what the word “woman” means:

I guess it would be funny if the consequences of this evasion were not so deadly serious. On Woman’s Hour – on International Women’s Day – the redoubtable Emma Barnett asked Anneliese Dodds a simple question.

You know the one – “wossa woman?”

Dodds prevaricated for what seemed like hours. Stuff like: “Well, I have to say that there are different definitions legally around what a woman actually is. I mean, you look at the definition within the Equality Act, and I think it just says someone who is adult and female, I think, but then doesn’t see how you define either of those things.”

How about … Read the rest

Susan Smith of For Women Scotland testifying on the proposed Hate Crime and Public Order Bill:

I echo what Lucy Hunter Blackburn said powerfully and from the heart. The heart of the issue is that women in Scotland are furious and frightened by some of the implications of the bill not least because, the other week, a series of amendments were proposed, none of which seems to cross a line to being hateful, yet parliamentarians stood up and denounced them as shocking and “transphobic” for including phrases such as

“there are only two sexes”.

We have a real issue that, although there are reasonable person tests in the bill, there are also people who are determined to use the

Trump’s plane had an engine failure last weekend and had to make an emergency landing. Therefore, naturally, he is begging people to give him money to make a new one, which he absurdly calls “Trump Force One.” I can think of better words than “force” in that name.

“I have a very important update on my plane, but I need to trust that you won’t share it with anyone,” wrote Trump in the newly released email. “My team is building a BRAND NEW Trump Force One.”

He needs to trust that the people on his mailing list won’t share it with anyone, so that’s why he sends it out to his mailing list. Does he think they’re that stupid?… Read the rest

Updating to add the prompt for this post:

“There are issues that have to be addressed about what you do about safe spaces & so on & I think that can be done in a common sense way. I do think we mustn’t let that become a hurdle in trying to deal with something that happens to 52% of the population.”

— James Matthews (@jamesmatthewsky) March 8, 2022

The National (Scotland) reports:

A RADICAL new report has recommended world-leading misogyny laws should be introduced in Scotland to protect women and girls from male violence.

Baroness Helena Kennedy was tasked with investigating how the Scottish justice system deals with misogyny in January 2021, with the results revealed in the report 

War crime.

A maternity hospital in the southern port city of Mariupol has been hit by a Russian air strike, Ukraine says.

It doesn’t get much more blatant than that. Bonus: they did it during an agreed ceasefire.

Mariupol has been surrounded by Russian forces for several days, and repeated attempts at a ceasefire to allow civilians to leave have broken down.

“The whole city remains without electricity, water, food, whatever and people are dying because of dehydration,” Olena Stokoz of Ukraine’s Red Cross told the BBC, adding that her organisation would continue trying to organise an evacuation corridor.

I would like to see Putin in the Hague.

Updating to add: Other heads of state have done bad things, so … Read the rest

An endorsement.

I too believe in the basic principles of liberal democracy

I think that people trying to dismantle them need to come up with some very good reasons https://t.co/s5QyXgd5QG

— John Cleese (@JohnCleese) March 9, 2022

… Read the rest

Scottish Government to women (on International Women’s Day): sucks to be you.

THREAD: The Scottish Government has finalised the Explanatory Notes for the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 for the Freedom of Expression provision. https://t.co/CTAlLvl64x

— MurrayBlackburnMackenzie (@mbmpolicy) March 9, 2022

The then Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf stated to the Committee that he was “making an offer to those who would like to see more specific detail in the bill” & would engage with stakeholders to put more details into the Explanatory Notes to secure a “common-ground compromise”. pic.twitter.com/Y0Bv5MSKtT

— MurrayBlackburnMackenzie (@mbmpolicy) March 9, 2022

You can see how important this is. It’s about how easy it will be for the cops in Scotland to haul women … Read the rest

Apparently “queer” people have been denied access to the outdoors?

Meet the queer hikers proving the great outdoors isn't just for cis, straight, middle class folk https://t.co/gPYw3LZQR4

— PinkNews (@PinkNews) March 9, 2022

I’ll be darned. I could have sworn it was just for cis, straight, middle class “folk.” (What are “middle class folk” anyway? Is that similar to middle class peasants and middle class working stiffs?)

PN explains:

Ailish had personal reasons for setting up Queer Out Here. They grew up in the Yorkshire countryside where a love for the outdoors was practically mandatory. After university, and a period in which they stopped exploring the outdoors, Ailish “rediscovered it and found how beneficial it was for my mental

Originally a comment by Bjarte Foshaug on The problem was dogma.

The problem with this whole discussion as I see it is that beliefs are just taken as a given rather than the outcome of some cognitive process in their own right, even if it’s just accepting what you’ve always been told. My main problem with faith-based religion (and its secular equivalents) was always the part about leaving the most important questions in life – questions with real-world consequences and implications for the way we treat others – up to blind faith in the first place. I don’t think it’s any kind of excuse or mitigating circumstance to be doing the right thing as we see it if the … Read the rest

JKR is clearly all in, and for the long haul.

Someone please send the Shadow Minister for Equalities a dictionary and a backbone.#HappyInternationalWomensDay https://t.co/2dXZivMHyO

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) March 8, 2022

https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/1501291633165357056 https://twitter.com/millihill/status/1501334649754329093

This morning you told the British public you literally can't define what a woman is. What's the plan, lift up random objects until you find one that rattles? https://t.co/QoBPt5HpKf

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) March 8, 2022

HAhahahahahahaha that’s a good one.

Yep, all in.… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Sastra on A kind of Turing test.

In atheist forums I often promoted an unpopular opinion: the religious were no less ethical than we were. On the whole, they share the same values and moral goals. Even the Nazis didn’t really differ in their sense of right & wrong, or commitment to fairness, from the people they persecuted.

Because change what you thought were the facts, and you change what’s right and wrong. If God was a God of Love and homosexuals subvert the Loving Natural Order, thus harming not only themselves but leading whole nations into damnation, then gay marriage is wrong. And fighting against it is right. It does no good to see … Read the rest

Suzanne Moore on International Women’s Day:

As a feminist, though, I would indeed like the world to be a better place for women – and by the world, I don’t mean north London or a campus in California; I mean Herat, Tigray, Guatemala. For all the arguments about equality for women amount to nothing if we lose an international perspective. Feminism is global, or it is simply an exercise in consumer power dressed up as politics. That is exactly what happened to Western feminism in the 1990s, when everything from brunching to boob jobs was “empowering”.

Seriously. You don’t see women in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia or Nigeria running around exclaiming about their trans sisters – they have other … Read the rest

Meanwhile, we just can’t figure out what a woman is.

Woman’s Hour starting at 21:15:

Emma Barnett: And Labour’s definition of a woman?

Labour Equalities Shadow Minster Annalise Dodds: Well, I have to say that there are different definitions legally around what a woman actually is, I mean you look at the definition within the Equality Act and I think it just says someone who is adult and female I think but that doesn’t say how you define either of those things – I mean that said obviously you’ve got the biological definition, the legal definition –

In short we just don’t quite know. There are different definitions, it all depends, you have to ask around, there’s the legal definition … Read the rest

In London you can be fined for it.

Just one in every 1,000 drivers reported for unnecessary idling of their engines were fined in central London, data has revealed.

Toxic air pollution kills about 4,000 people every year in the capital and councils have targeted parked drivers who do not turn off their vehicles.

In Westminster, more than 70,000 idling drivers have been reported since 2017 via the council’s “report it” website. But only 63 fines of £80 were issued and just half of these were paid.

Damn I wish we could report it here. People do it more than they used to rather than less.

Air pollution may be damaging every organ in the human

The Vagina Museum kept its word, with 22 tweets celebrating men pretending to be women. Like…

Sisters LANA AND LILLY WACHOWSKI (1965-, 1967-) continue to smash box office records together in their careers as directors, producers and writers. Their 1999 film The Matrix is considered one of the greatest movies of all time, and is seen by many as a transgender metaphor. pic.twitter.com/vp7Xp22y61

— Vagina Museum (@vagina_museum) March 8, 2022

That one in particular interests me because the man looks frankly scary. You wouldn’t want to be trapped anywhere alone with him – he has that “I’m just barely keeping my temper” look. I think the Vagina Museum chose that photo for that reason. I don’t understand why they did … Read the rest

One day. We can’t even have one day.

This #InternationalWomensDay we're going to talk about trans women in history. We've turned replies off, because we know some people would prefer these stories to be erased and silenced.

— Vagina Museum (@vagina_museum) March 8, 2022

They’ve turned replies off because they know this is a calculated, intentional, with malice aforethought insult to women. “This International Women’s Day we’re going to talk about men, so fuck you, Karen.”… Read the rest

Originally a comment by latsot on Sitting on the gender spectrum.

I’ve tried many times (as have others) to engage with gender identity fans on this point, asking them to state the GC position in such a way that a typical person broadly on the GC side would agree with it. A sort of Turing test. I’ve spent considerable amounts of time and effort on this and on trying to return the favour: on trying to state the TA position such that a typical TA person would agree.

You know what? I’ve never had the slightest success in either direction.

When they’ve even made an attempt to state the GC position with any honesty at all (rare), we’ve never … Read the rest