Author: Ophelia Benson

But that’s not the question.

Of course they do. I don’t know of anyone who has said “Trans people are not equal” or “Trans people are inferior”. That’s not where the disagreement is at all. The disagreement is very simple and clear: dissenters from trans ideology do not agree that men can be women or that women can be men. That’s it.

It’s quite a tell that Pink News misrepresents the disagreement this way. It hints at how difficult it is to keep trying to argue that men can be women if they just simper and bat their eyelashes enough.

Of all things he could be doing Trump comes up with re-opening Alcatraz. Bro, it was closed for a reason. It’s a not very big rock just off San Francisco; it’s not a practical site for a prison.

Trump is seeking $152m (£115m) to reopen the infamous Alcatraz prison as part of his proposed budget for the 2027 fiscal year.

Located near San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, the site, also known as The Rock, was once regarded as one of America’s most notorious prisons, but has served as a tourist attraction in recent years.

The budget request is seeking money “to rebuild Alcatraz as a state-of-the-art secure prison facility”, with funds covering the first year of costs.

What on earth for? It’s a very small island in San Francisco Bay. What’s his point?

I suppose it’s just the usual Stupid Impulse of a Stupid Impulsive Peabrain who wants a new toy.

The maximum security facility was closed in 1963. As a tourist site, it is currently run by the National Park Service.

Maybe that’s it. Trump hates the National Park Service.

Previous criticism of Trump’s plan has pointed to the lack of running water and sewage on the island, and the fact all supplies are required to be brought in by boat.

By the time Alcatraz closed, it was three times more expensive to operate than any other federal prison, according to the US Bureau of Prisons.

Never mind, we’ll just defund Yosemite and the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. Everybody wins!

Oh, so that’s the plan. Palm the kids off on the grandparents. There’s just one tiny flaw, JD – what makes you think the grandparents will comply?

Make it so that maybe grandma and grandpa wants to help out a little more. How does one do that exactly? How does one arrange or manipulate or disguise the situation such that grandparents who are not currently being daycare for the children will consent to become daycare for the children? “Hi Mom, hi Dad, we want to make it so that you want to help out with our kids a little more, by which we mean take care of them from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. (or more if the commute is bad) five days a week. How can we make it so that you want to do that?”

This rosy question of course assumes that the grands live next door; if there’s a second commute to get the kids to the grands or the grands to the kids then it’s from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Roughly. Could be a little less, could be a little more.

There’s just one tiny snag. If the grands wanted to do this, wouldn’t they be doing it already?

But hey, Vance just said a little of the pressure, so maybe he means that the grands could drop in for an hour on Wednesday afternoons. Of course that assumes they live in the same city or suburb, which is true of some families, but certainly not all of them.

Annnnyway. I’m sure the great minds in the Trump regime will figure it out.

Inside Trump’s recreational sadism:

Trump brutally ended Pam Bondi’s career as his attorney general while they rode in his limousine to the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

“I think it’s time,” Trump told Bondi, The Wall Street Journal reported.

He had in fact decided to fire her earlier in the week, but waited to do it in the back of the Beast, turning what is seen as an honor given to a chosen few—a one-on-one in his limousine—into a humiliation ritual.

That’s our boy – goes out of his way to pinch people harder. I have zero sympathy for Bondi but I do marvel at Trump’s passion for torture.

Trump, it has been reported, was displeased with Bondi’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and the lack of progress on prosecutions of his perceived political enemies, like former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Bondi, according to the report, said to others that some of Trump’s demands weren’t possible and were “outside of things she could do.”

On account of how Trump hasn’t yet managed to replace every single prosecutor with a Trump stooge, and non-stooges won’t charge people with imaginary crimes.

Bondi is out. Expect someone even worse to replace her.

Trump has fired Pam Bondi as attorney general. She will be replaced for now by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who will serve as acting attorney general, Trump said.

The president wrote on Truth Social that Bondi would be “transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector,” praising her for her work in his administration and offering no specific reason for why she would be leaving.

I bet I know what the reason is. I bet it’s because he likes firing people. It’s fun!

Trump had been frustrated with Bondi on multiple fronts, sources said, including her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and that she had not investigated or prosecuted enough of his political opponents. She is the second Cabinet secretary to be ousted in recent weeks; last month, Trump removed Kristi Noem as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. One source said Trump felt that firing went smoothly, making him less wary of removing others.

Fun fun fun. One of the many perks of the job. Sadism is the best part of squatting in the Oval Office.

She tried to cling on but alas…

Bondi in recent weeks had spent more time around Trump, including by joining him at the Supreme Court for oral arguments in the birthright citizenship case on Wednesday. It’s the opposite tack taken by other top officials in the first Trump administration, who reduced their time around the president when they determined he was growing dissatisfied with their work.

Well there you go. Avoid him; yer fired. Cuddle up to him; ya fired.

Lie down with rats, get up with bubonic plague.

The Good Law Project aka Jolyon Maugham’s project is sad to have to tell you that it has failed to punish a barrister who doesn’t subscribe to The Sacred Ideology.

Bar Standards Board fails to act on barrister harassment

Barrister Sarah Phillimore repeatedly deadnamed and misgendered a trans woman online. Her regulator has rejected our complaint but we won’t be giving up

But this is the law we’re talking about. Is there a law that says people have to call men women and say “she” when they know he’s a he? Is that in fact something lawyers should be doing at all? Aren’t there very good reasons for the law to stick to reality, the facts, the truth?

In August 2025, we complained to the Bar Standards Board (BSB) after Sarah Phillimore shared more than 50 posts across multiple social media platforms that referred to Kate*, frequently in derogatory terms. In those posts, Phillimore misgendered, deadnamed and shared photos of Kate, and used graphic language about her genitals. Following that campaign Kate made an attempt on her own life – as is evident from her GP records.

Kate who? Why just Kate? Why a first name only?

Anyway, Kate is Euan Weddell, who calls himself Sophie Molly, and shouts disgusting insults at women through a megaphone. He is not a nice guy.

As a barrister, Phillimore is meant to be held to high standards by the Bar Standards Board. The board’s handbook makes clear that barristers must not “behave in a way which is likely to diminish the trust and confidence which the public places in you or in the profession”.

I think a barrister who insists that a man is a woman is behaving in a way likely to diminish trust and confidence. I certainly wouldn’t trust that barrister.

In its decision, the BSB said that “The context of [Kate’s] social media and public comments has brought her own trans status into the debate” and “We do not consider that [Phillimore] singles [Kate] out for cruel treatment, such that her behaviour victimises [Kate]”. You can read its decision, redacted of private information, here. 

But of course it’s true that Weddell’s social media and public comments have brought his trans status into the debate. They have also brought his venomous hatred of noncompliant women into the debate. The clip where he calls JK Rowling “you heinous old bitch” at a public demonstration is still there for all to see.

*Kate’s name has been changed because of concerns about her safety. We have also redacted the BSB’s letter only to remove information which might identify Kate.

No concerns about Sarah Phillimore’s safety though. Why’s that?

Five plus years ago…

A Boise State professor’s comments calling independent women “medicated, meddlesome and quarrelsome” have spurred backlash in the Treasure Valley.

Scott Yenor, a political science professor at Boise State University, made the comments on Oct. 31 during the National Conservatism Conference in Orlando, Florida. But the comments went viral when a Boise nurse posted a Nov. 25 video with excerpts of his speech on TikTok.

“Our culture is steeped with feminism,” Yenor said during the conference. “It teaches young boys and girls that they are motivated by much the same things and want much the same things.”

“Thus girls are told to become as independent as boys are said to be. … They are more medicated, meddlesome and quarrelsome than women need to be.”

He went on to condemn feminism and said its teaching of individualism is a fundamental threat to strong families.

Because what “strong families” mean = men in charge and women obeying.

So why doesn’t Scott Yenor just move to Afghanistan? He’d love it there.

One:

Two:

Originally a comment by Papito on Another first.

Trump can glower all he wants to, it’s not going to work. His argument is too wacky and ahistorical to win. All the same issues and questions have been hashed out extensively, on the record, in the past. You’d have to go all the way back to Wong Kim Ark, and say the Court decided that case wrongly, or even before, to to Lynch v Clarke, before the 14th Amendment was even passed. It’s a position that is so far outside American legal tradition that I expect a 9-0 ruling.

For lagniappe, the lawyer arguing the case on behalf of the ACLU is a citizen thanks to birthright citizenship – her Taiwanese parents were on student visas when she was born.

And because Trump is dumb and wrong about just about everything, no the US is not the only country with a tradition of jus soli. Almost every other country in the Americas does, for starters.

Worse and worse.

Ten minutes before oral arguments for the birthright citizenship case at the Supreme Court began on Wednesday, a hush came over the courtroom. President Trump walked in and came face to face with justices whom he has tried to bully and intimidate.

Mr. Trump became the first sitting president to attend oral arguments at the court, watching from the courtroom’s public gallery as the justices across the ideological spectrum questioned his efforts to strictly limit birthright citizenship.

The first. Not the good kind of first; the other kind. Blatant intimidation move. Nice little court ya got here.

He watched as the arguments began and delved quickly into a history lesson about the 19th century debate surrounding the 14th Amendment.

That will have been gibberish to him. The what now? What century? What debate? What amendment? What mean? Is there a comic book version?

Trump, who has appointed three justices to the Supreme Court, has often talked about the justices not as independent checks on his power appointed for their expertise but as loyalists who should support his agenda. Last month, he suggested that Justices Neil M. Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett, whom he nominated during his first term, were “an embarrassment to their families” because they sided with the majority against him.

That’s what he knows. Mobster loyalty. The history of enslavement and the 14th Amendment, not so much.

Many people outside the court expressed strong opposition to the president’s presence.

“I think it’s basically kind of a strong-arming tactic, wanting to be there, intimidate them with his presence,” said Michelle McKeithen. “And, kind of a statement of: ‘Make a decision while I’m here, looking you dead in your eye — and don’t make the wrong decision.’”

Damn right that’s what it is.

They don’t see how insulting it is? Really?

Elizabeth I will be transgender in ITV drama

She will? Why? Because women are too weak and inferior to have the top job?

Elizabeth I will be portrayed as transgender in a forthcoming ITV drama.

The Tudor queen, who never married and established England as a rising imperial power, will be shown as a biological man in the six-part series next year.

The independence of the “Virgin Queen”, who ruled from 1558 to 1603 and defeated the Spanish Armada, has given rise to improbable conspiracies that she was a man masquerading as a woman.

Claims of her being a trans woman will be a central focus of the new series, titled Majesty, in which the monarch will be played by a transgender woman, according to reports.

So, insult piled on injury. Hey don’t stop there. Do a series on Jane Austen, because obviously no woman is intelligent enough to write Emma.

In 2022, academics working for Shakespeare’s Globe in central London said she could have been non-binary, when people believe they are neither male nor female.

Elizabeth I was presented as such in an essay published by the theatre which referred to the female monarch with the gender-neutral they/them pronouns.

Feminist thinkers have raised concerns that casting doubts on the womanhood of prominent women because they defied gender norms and did supposedly “manly” things will effectively write them out of history.

That plus the fact that it amounts to shouting that women are too weak and brainless to accomplish anything.

James Strong, the director behind the production company, previously said the series would “re-imagine” history to make it “modern and relevant to today’s viewer”.

“The brilliant scripts are a director’s dream as we get to re-imagine and recreate an iconic piece of English history and tell a period story that looks stunning but also feels modern and relevant to today’s viewer,” he said.

Yeah bro, claiming women didn’t do those important difficult things because they’re too stupid is the best way to feel modern and relevant to today’s viewer.

Well there’s a headline.

National Education Union conference to debate if Supreme Court trans ruling is ‘attempted genocide’

Of course it’s not. What a ludicrous and downright abusive question. No, kiddies, saying that men are not women is not attempted genocide. The question is insanely insulting and misogynistic.

The National Education Union (NEU) is set to discuss whether the 2025 UK Supreme Court ruling on the legal definition of a woman constitutes “attempted genocide” against transgender people.

Delegates are expected to debate the issue today (31 March) at the union’s annual conference in Brighton.

According to the Daily Mail, Britain’s largest teaching union may hear arguments that the judgment amounts to an “attempted erasure of a group from public life”, with criticism potentially directed at both the judiciary and the government.

Fancy footwork. “Erasure of a group from public life” is not genocide. It’s a sneaky rhetorical move to pretend that it does. “Erasure” can mean elimination but it can also mean simply ignoring, withdrawing attention from, indifference, disbelief, refusal to promote and amplify. It can include pointing out that a putative “group” is not necessarily or automatically entitled to public attention. You can call three people at a bus stop a group, but that doesn’t mean those three people are owed public attention. It’s not written on a Sacred Tablet somewhere that people who claim to be the sex they are not are owed fervent intense admiring public attention.

The word “group” is not sacred. The existence of a group does not automatically entail public enthusiasm and endorsement.

The Supreme Court previously ruled that, under the Equality Act, the definition of a woman is based on biological sex, a decision that has prompted ongoing debate about the operation of single-sex spaces and the inclusion of trans people.

How do you prompt ongoing debate? If it’s ongoing it doesn’t need prompting, does it.

Anyway…you’ll never guess what’s coming next. Or perhaps you will.

Today’s debate follows a motion submitted to conference which describes the ruling as a “step towards an attempt to erase that group’s existence”.

“The goal of which is to completely erase transgender people” – Lemkin Institute on trans rights in the US

The discussion comes amid similar warnings internationally. The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention and Human Security has issued multiple Red Flag Alerts in response to anti-trans policies in the United States.

Oh good god. How many times do we have to point out that the “Lemkin Institute” is just one or two people and a label? They’re not Hannah Arendt, they’re not Philip Gourevitch, they’re not authorities.

I repeat. Saying men are not women is not genocidal.

Unconstitutional.

A federal judge ruled on Tuesday that President Trump’s executive order barring the federal funding of NPR and PBS violated the First Amendment.

Randolph Moss, a judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, said in his ruling that Mr. Trump’s order, signed last May, was unlawful because it instructed federal agencies to refrain from funding NPR and PBS because the president believed their news coverage had a liberal viewpoint.

“The message is clear: NPR and PBS need not apply for any federal benefit because the president disapproves of their ‘left-wing’ coverage of the news,” Judge Moss wrote. But the First Amendment, he said, “does not tolerate viewpoint discrimination and retaliation of this type.”

Sadly, the ruling doesn’t mean funding will be restored.

Two months after the executive order, Congress voted to claw back roughly $500 million in annual funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the organization that distributes federal money to NPR and PBS. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting has since shut down, and public radio and TV stations across the country have sought alternate forms of revenue.

But the ruling could have implications for any future money Congress decides to allocate to public media, removing a hurdle that could have prevented lawmakers from restoring funding for NPR and PBS.

Assuming there still is a Congress in that hazy future. Trump is still hell-bent on destroying everything before his time is up.

There are lots of things that children age 10 can’t understand. That’s why they can’t legally vote or drive or join the military or practice medicine.

Trans girl guide, 10, ‘can’t understand why she is being kicked out of beloved group’

That one seems pretty easy to explain, even to a child age 10. Girl guides are girl guides; trans girls are boys.

A trans girl guide, 10, has told her mum she cannot understand why she is being excluded from the group that made her feel accepted.

Sophie’s* mother Angela told Metro that Girlguiding’s decision that trans members must leave the charity by September feels like a ‘betrayal’.

The group said they were taking action following a Supreme Court ruling that women are defined by biological sex.

What else should women be defined by? Their souls? Whether or not they wear lipstick?

Sophie was just six when she began living life as a girl.

In other words Sophie was just six when adults told him he could “live life as a girl.” Six is hella young to tell a little boy he can change sex with the power of thought.

She joined Girlguiding two years ago and two years after her cis-gendered sister became a member.

Are journalists ever going to stop using this ridiculous reality-denying jargon? There is only one kind of girl: the kind that is actually a girl.

Hopeful but vague. Really really vague.

The UK government is to change when police forces in England and Wales record non-crime hate incidents (NCHIs), in a bid to end the policing of “everyday arguments”.

New Home Office guidance will say that forces should only log incidents that are potentially “relevant to policing”.

A tad circular, don’t you think? Once the police take a look at it it becomes relevant to policing, right?

It comes after a review by police chiefs found the system, developed in the mid-2000s, had increasingly seen officers drawn into policing debates on social media.

However the Conservatives say the move from Labour ministers does not go far enough, calling it “simply a rebrand”.

Well, I’m not a Conservative (or a conservative) but that’s what it looks like to me. Plod can just say “This is relevant to policing” and we’re back at square one.

NCHIs are recorded when police receive a report perceived by the caller to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards people with certain characteristics, such as race or gender, but which does not meet the bar for prosecution under hate crime laws.

Erm…”gender” meaning what? Sex? Or magic sacred fungible soul? It’s still ok to bully women while still not ok to say men can’t be women?

I’m not placing any bets.

Well whaddya know. Judge tells Trump he can’t do that.

A federal judge has knocked down the core of President Trump’s executive order barring federal funding for NPR and PBS, saying it violated the broadcasters’ First Amendment rights on its face.

A District Court judge has found that a Trump White House executive order to defund NPR and PBS violated the First Amendment and is therefore “unlawful and unenforceable.” It wasn’t immediately clear what the decision, which could be appealed by the administration, would mean for the future of federal funding of public broadcasting.

In his ruling, Judge Randolph D. Moss of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, said “the First Amendment draws a line, which the government may not cross, at efforts to use government power – including the power of the purse – ‘to punish or suppress disfavored expression’ by others.”

Which a US president of course ought to know before he even thinks of running for public office.

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement: “This is a ridiculous ruling by an activist judge attempting to undermine the law. NPR and PBS have no right to receive taxpayer funds, and Congress already voted to defund them. The Trump Administration looks forward to ultimate victory on the issue.”

Of course she did.

Not so fast, Mango Mussolini. Put the crayons down.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon ruled Tuesday that construction on President Trump’s White House ballroom “must stop until Congress authorizes its completion.”

Using a notable number of exclamation points, Leon said the plaintiff, the National Trust for Historic Preservation in the United States, is likely to succeed in their lawsuit and therefore he is granting a preliminary injunction to halt construction.

“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” Leon wrote.

He’s delaying enforcement for two weeks though. Sigh.

A long-time dream project for President Trump, the ballroom is designed to seat 1,000 guests and will cost at least $300 million, according to estimates by the president. It has generated massive controversy and public pushback, but recently got approval from the Commission of Fine Arts, an architectural review panel now packed with Trump allies. 

If only he could pack the whole country with Trump allies. He’s working on it, but it’s going way too slowly.

Trump responded to the ruling in a social media post complaining that the National Trust for Historic Preservation doesn’t appreciate his efforts at “sprucing up” Washington’s buildings from the White House to the Kennedy Center.

Historic preservation isn’t about “sprucing up”. Trump would “spruce up” Stonehenge and the Colosseum and the Parthenon if he could, but that wouldn’t be historic prez. Rather the opposite.

Hmm.

I disputed something trans activist mushy crouton said the other day.

I didn’t bother to say we don’t “celebrate” the kid’s unhappiness, because of course we don’t; that’s just typical hyperbole plus assumption. I simply underlined for the billionth time that things for girls are for girls. A 10-year-old who identifies as a transgender girl is a boy. (I wonder if that subhead is even accurate. Does the boy really idennify as a transgender girl as opposed to as a girl? Or did the Mirror just put it that way in an attempt to clarify the usual murk?)

Mushy responded with the usual fairness and restraint.

Oh no!!! What have I done?!?

Pause for laughter.

Is the child going to know about it? No. If the child did know about it, would the child react to it the way mushy did? No. Does the child understand this whole thing the way mushy does? No. Do children understand any of this the way adults do? No. Is mushy on the side of the angels in flattering and encouraging the transing of children? No times a million.

Hmm. Secretary of State Marco Rubio wonders why they don’t what now?

And I would just say this – and I said this yesterday; I’ll say it again now. Iran is – not the Iranian people. The Iranian people are phenomenal people. They deserve way better than what they have, which is a radical, Shia clerical regime that has basically taken that country’s wealth and used it not to build roads and bridges, not to build health care systems or universities, not to build a better, more prosperous country. They’ve used the wealth of that country to sponsor terrorism, build rockets, build drones, build missiles, build sea mines.

Interesting. I wonder if we can think of any other countries that spend a whole lot of money on weapons (and vanity projects the boss wants) rather than health care systems or universities.

It’s a real puzzler.

Dan Roan, a BBC Sports editor, pretends not to know that men have physical advantages over women.

“This is a question where there is no one-size-fits-all solution. It differs from sport to sport.”

The words of former International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach in July 2021, when claiming that sex eligibility criteria should be left to each individual sport to determine.

…

Yet just five years on, Bach’s successor Kirsty Coventry has announced a blanket ban on transgender women, as well as athletes with differences in sex development (DSD) who have gone through male puberty from female events, “to protect fairness, safety and integrity”.

Oh dear, a blanket ban, how very crude and sweeping and not what the cool kids do.

From the 2028 LA Games, eligibility for women’s competition at all IOC events will be limited to biological females, and determined on the basis of a one time SRY gene screening, which detects the presence of a Y chromosome and male sex development.

Can you believe it? From 2028 men won’t be allowed to insert themselves into women’s competition – it’s outrageous!