Jill Rafferty-Weinisch at Celebrations Beyond Belief explains what the big deal is about Lands End’s repudiation of its own celebration of Gloria Steinem.

But this is just a clothing retailer right? Isn’t it unfair to place the mantle of social justice on a catalog company that sells cute cardigans and water shoes? Here’s my view.

Women and girls are routinely socialized that their rights are acceptable – as long as they do not offend or make anyone else uncomfortable. Our existence is regularly constrained by the possibility we might make someone feel bad, or horny, or angry, or threatened. It has broad and sweeping ramifications in terms of violence against women, educational attainment, workplace equity, the provision of medical care,

Grim news from Manchester:

Anti-terror police have been called in to investigate the death of Rochdale imam Jalal Uddin.

The investigation into Mr Uddin’s death has been escalated after the discovery of material linked to the Islamic State terror group during a series of raids last week.

Mr Uddin had made efforts to turn youngsters away from radical Islam.

The 64-year-old was attacked as he walked through a children’s park last month.

He was taken to hospital but died later.

Trying to turn people away from Islamism is not popular with Islamists.

Detectives investigating the death raided three properties last week, and so far three people have been arrested.

But the discovery of material connected to the so-called Islamic

RH Reality Check on Facebook:

Martha Plimpton, dressed in Shout Your Abortion style

Photo by Amy Sedaris

 … Read the rest

Pelting rain all morning – then clearing this afternoon – so Cooper and I went here:

It was good.

 … Read the rest

I’m wondering how much the potential for doing something useful in a movement for political change relies on a rejection of fantasy.

By fantasy I don’t mean an optimistic vision for the future, I don’t mean ideas about how things should be, I mean actual pretending that X is so when it’s not.

My hunch is that the answer is: a lot.

Many MRAs and other anti-feminists claim that feminism is largely based on fantasy, but that relies on the belief that women really are stupider and less competent than men, and that’s something of a fantasy itself.

Feminism isn’t the belief that women are magical god-like beings. It’s the belief that women are people coupled with the belief that … Read the rest

In hilarity news, Milo Yiannopoulos – who is a tweeter, not a journalist – crashed the White House press briefing on Friday to tell Obama that Twitter took his blue tick away.

Yiannopolous began by quoting Reddit founderAaron Schwartz, who argued that the importance of free speech also extended to social media sites, and brought up Obama’s previous statements denouncing university safe spacesand the coddling of college students.

“It’s becoming very clear that Twitter and Facebook in particular are censoring and punishing conservative and libertarian points of view…” he argued. “Is there anything the president can do to encourage Silicon Valley to remind them of the critical importance of open free speech in our society?”

Can Obama … Read the rest

So guess what François Hollande did on Friday – gave the god damn Legion of Honor to Saudi Arabia. To Saudi Arabia.

The French government was among the most vocal outside the Middle East in its condemnation of Saudi mass executions earlier this year, calling the kingdom’s killing of 47 people “deeply deplorable”.

Yet almost two months to the day after that statement was issued, President François Hollande awarded his nation’s most prestigious award to the heir to the Saudi throne, Prince Mohammed bin Naif.

Thus letting him know the French government didn’t really mean it about those 47 executions.

They tried to keep it a secret. There was a meeting with Angela Merkel the same day and … Read the rest

My god people are confused. This particular confusion is from a year ago but the brand of confusion is still everywhere.

Rutgers University assistant professor Brittney Cooper joined HuffPost Live on Monday to discuss the exclusion of prominent black LGBT activists like Pauli Murray, who helped in the the progression of the civil rights movement.

From her campaign to matriculate into the University of North Carolina to her countless articles on race relations, Murray was an influential civil rights activist. Even with her list of accomplishments, Murray, who was of mixed-race heritage, saw her complex gender and sexual identity muted in favor of “respectability politics,” Cooper said.

…

Murray is part of a long history of gender nonconforming activists

Is this real advice or is it satire? I don’t know.

In trying to find the source I found advice from the Unitarian Universalist Association, which included this bullet point:

• Use words that encompass all genders rather than only two
  For example, “people of all genders” instead of “women and men”; “children” instead of “boys and girls”; “siblings” or “kindred” instead of “brothers and sisters.”

Hmm.

The things you happen on when stumbling around Twitter. I found an article by someone named Wardah Khalid, which says some strikingly unpleasant things about reformist Muslims and ex-Muslims.

The title, which may not have been her choice, is a bad start:

The Ayaan Hirsi Ali problem: why do anti-Islam Muslims keep getting promoted as “experts”?

That’s a stupid question. You can be opposed to X and be an expert in it. That’s not even unusual. Why shouldn’t people who are critical of Islam get promoted as experts?

And since she raised the question I tried to find out why she gets promoted as an expert, and I couldn’t find much reason. I think it’s probably because she’s a … Read the rest

The Muslim Reform Movement on Facebook:

Hizbut Tarir Australia has been found guilty of discriminating against women for making them sit at the back of PUBLIC POLITICAL meetings following a suit raised by progressive woman activist, Alison Bevege. Bevege has since been viciously subject to slurs such as “Islamophobe” and “bigot” by Hizbut Tarir members.

She writes on her twitter (@AlisonBevege): “progressive ‪#‎Muslims‬ and non-muslims together win – no forced gender segregation”

Video report

The Sydney Morning Herald:

Controversial Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir has been ordered to stop forcibly segregating men and women at its public events after a NSW tribunal found the practice constituted sexual discrimination.

Former NT News journalist Alison Bevege sued the organisation and

I cringe that this is my country. (I’m not very cis-American.) Donald Trump talks about the size of his penis in campaigning for president.

It’s “yuge” — or at least that’s what Donald Trump wants you to believe.

The leading contender in the GOP’s race for president made sure the size of his hands — and his manhood — were front and center during the Fox News debate on Thursday night.

“Nobody has ever hit my hands before. Look at those hands,” Trump said while holding them up, spread-fingered in a bid to address previous suggestions by rival Sen. Marco Rubio. “He referred to my hands — if they’re small, something else must be small.”

He added:

And then there’s India. Reuters via the Guardian:

India has denied visas for a delegation from the US government agency charged with monitoring international religious freedom.

The delegation from the US Commission on International Religious Freedom had been scheduled to leave for India on Friday for a long-planned visit with the support of the US state department and the US embassy in New Delhi, but India had failed to issue the necessary visas, the commission said.

The Indian embassy in Washington hasn’t responded to a request for comment.

Last year, despite a much-heralded fresh start in US-India ties under Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, the United States ran into problems arranging visits by the head of its office to

Mehreen Zahra-Malik reports at Reuters:

A powerful Pakistani religious body that advises the government on the compatibility of laws with Islam on Thursday declared a new law that criminalizes violence against women to be “un-Islamic.”

Thus throwing a massive spanner into the project of liberal secular Muslims who argue that it’s violence against women that’s un-Islamic.

The Women’s Protection Act, passed by Pakistan’s largest province of Punjab last week, gives unprecedented legal protection to women from domestic, psychological and sexual violence. It also calls for the creation of a toll-free abuse reporting hot line and the establishment of women’s shelters.

But since its passage in the Punjab assembly, many conservative clerics and religious leaders have denounced the new law

More from Sheffield University ASH. A later comment on that Facebook thread explaining why they were afraid to invite Maryam to speak:

Ellen Woods I ran this society several years ago (with a fairly “hardline” approach) and we had an ever increasing membership. I am frankly embarrassed by this statement.
I met Maryam Namazie at an event with Sheffield Humanist society a few years ago as well as rallies in London and think she, and everything she stands for, is fantastic.
I have honestly no idea who runs or is involved in the University society now but I apologise on behalf of myself and previous members. What a shame.

And a reply by the ASH Secretary, who is probably … Read the rest

Surprised not surprised – it turns out that contraceptives reduce the abortion rate. Women’s Health reports:

The new analysis from the Guttmacher Institute, which was just published in the New England Journal of Medicine, reveals that the unintended pregnancy rate declined by a whopping 18 percent between 2008 and 2011, bringing it to the lowest it’s been in 30 years.

The study’s authors also found that 42 percent of unintended pregnancies in 2011 ended in abortion, as compared with 40 percent in 2008—meaning that although the number of abortions has declined (due to the lower rate of unintended pregnancies), the proportion of unintended pregnancies that end in abortion has actually remained about the same (and even increased slightly).

“These

That icon of progressivism and social justice, Caitlyn Jenner, wants to be Ted Cruz’s trans ambassador.

To The Advocate, Jenner revealed that she wants to be Cruz’s “trans ambassador” should he become president. Here’s the relevant excerpt from Dawn Ennis’s Jenner profile:

Jenner reveals she met Cruz prior to her transition, more than a year ago, “and he was very nice.”

“Wouldn’t it be great, let’s say he goes on to be president,” she tells me in relating a conversation on the tour bus. “And I have all my girls on a trans issues board to advise him on making decisions when it comes to trans issues. Isn’t that a good idea?” she asked me.

“You’re going