Peak insanity
Now there’s a headline – and a BBC headline at that.
Martine Croxall broke rules over ‘pregnant people’ facial expression, BBC says
You might wonder what a pregnant people facial expression even is, but it’s the BBC saying, so it must be true.
The BBC has upheld 20 impartiality complaints over the way presenter Martine Croxall altered a script she was reading live on the BBC News Channel, which referred to “pregnant people” earlier this year.
Croxall was introducing an interview about research on groups most at risk during UK heatwaves, which quoted a release from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).
The presenter changed her script to instead say “women”, and the BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit (ECU) said it considered her facial expression as she said this to express a “controversial view about trans people”.
Ahh yes. Of course. The “view” that women are the people who get pregnant is a view, while the ridiculous fantasy that it’s “people” in general who get pregnant is not a view but just the obvious reality.
The presenter said: “Malcolm Mistry, who was involved in the research, says that the aged, pregnant people … women … and those with pre-existing health conditions need to take precautions.”
In other words the subject here is safety and precautions, so clarity is absolutely necessary, but never mind that, it’s wicked to say “women” when you mean “women”.
The ECU said it considered Croxall’s facial expression laid it open to the interpretation that it “indicated a particular viewpoint in the controversies currently surrounding trans ideology.”
Blah blah blah fucking blah. Knowing that women are women and men are not women is not a “viewpoint.” Knowing that rocks are not food is not a viewpoint, knowing that jumping off a tall building will make you go splat is not a viewpoint, knowing that rain is wet is not a viewpoint. We know some basics or we don’t survive.
The ECU said Croxall’s facial expression after she said “pregnant people” had been “variously interpreted by complainants as showing disgust, ridicule, contempt or exasperation.”
It added that “congratulatory messages Ms Croxall later received on social media, together with the critical views expressed in the complaints to the BBC and elsewhere, tended to confirm that the impression of her having expressed a personal view was widely shared across the spectrum of opinion on the issue”.
It’s not a “personal view” that women are women. It’s basic human knowledge. It’s basic mammalian knowledge. It’s not fancy, it’s not arcane, it’s not something you have to have a PhD in to understand. We all exist because of a woman. We all emerged from a woman. It’s not mean or reactionary to know that and to say it.
So the BBC’s investigation concluded that the word “woman” indicates a viewpoint on trans issues, but the term “pregnant people” does not? Hah, hah, hah, who are they kidding? Chalk up another victory for the LGBT Desk.
Well there it is. Croxall should have pursued a career in radio.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%27Origine_du_monde
Just because so far each of us has so far emerged from a woman, it does not mean that we have to go on doing so, forever more. The BBC is wisely covering all the possibilities, just in case, etc, etc, etc. One day, a human child could emerge from a giraffe; (a female one of course.) Then all the smartypantses will have egg all over their collective face. It’s called ‘post hock ergo ergo proctor hock.’
Or something.
Apparently, the original article from which Ophelia quoted didn’t meet the standards of the LGBT Desk.
Can’t be letting people get away with so much as suggesting that anybody could even have a controversial view about the oh-so uncontroversial trans people. And it wouldn’t be trans if the ideology itself doesn’t get to identify as an identity.
But a strong expression is just what it DOESN’T give – it’s much too fleeting for that. MUCH too fleeting. I’ve re-watched it several times and I’m never really sure it’s even there. She doesn’t roll her eyes or anything, it’s just that quick stare thing we do when we’re expressing covert disdain or disagreement. Blink and you miss it.
To paraphrase: Birds know it. Bees know it. Even educated fleas know it. (And trees, too. Plants are able to discern not only the male – pollen – grain, but able to tell when it is self vs. non-self. Otherwise, they might accidentally be pollinated by a species they can’t procreate with, or by themselves, which can lead to all the same genetic problems it does in other species…unless, of course, they are a self-pollinating species. Plants manage, using only chemical signals, to deal with a much more complex male/female/self/non-self/species differentiation. Surely, humans, with our nervous system and brains, could do at least as much.)
Goodness gracious, her face moved.
“The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself–anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face (to look incredulous when a victory was announced, for example) was itself a punishable offence. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: FACECRIME, it was called.”
The BBC owns a statue of Orwell, but I doubt many of its staff have ever understood his books.