Originally a comment by Your Name’s not Bruce? at Miscellany Room.

A local greenspace was the site for a Pride event today. We went through, checking out the vendors. The last time I felt this out of place was back in the days when I used to do wedding photography, when I ended up shooting a wedding where the parents and pastor did the whole Evangelical, loud, praying over the couple routine. Most of the church weddings I shot tended to be in more staid, bland, formalized, un-zealous traditions, which I found less jarring to my atheist sensibilities. I’ve usually found unbridled, vocal, demonstrative piety disconcerting, partly because displays of delusional thinking, however sincere, are kinda creepy. More creepy … Read the rest

A thing I often wonder: why is the subjunctive so taboo in the UK even when it’s necessary for meaning?

I ask because I’ve just happened on an example of the kind of thing.

From a statement issued by Durham University:

While individuals and groups within the University community may express lawful views on any issue, we insist that this is done in a safe and respectful way.

See that’s not what they mean. By not using the subjunctive they said something they’re not trying to say. They say they’re insisting that this is in fact done in a safe and respectful way, when what they’re trying to say is that they insist it should be done … Read the rest

Slowly, inch by inch, institutions are rediscovering that people can’t change sex even if a piece of paper says they have done so.

The equalities watchdog is urgently reviewing its guidance for employers on single-sex jobs as women’s refuges are “routinely” and “unlawfully” advertising positions to male-born applicants.

The Equality Act has exemptions which allow employers to restrict a job role to a particular sex if they can show it is an “occupational requirement” and is “a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim”. Under these rules, it is lawful for women’s domestic violence and rape charities to advertise female-only positions.

But there’s a catch!

However, the feminist campaign group Fair Play For Women (FPFW) has alerted the Equality and

I’m nostalgic for the days when we didn’t sell T shirts for little girls urging them to Bend Over.

So this is for sale on @tiktok_uk as suitable for 8 year old girls. It baffles me any mother would buy this for her little girl, or that any woman would sell it but here we are. #childsafeguarding pic.twitter.com/3P6AIYEYwW

— Joolz Denby (@JoolzDenby) June 8, 2024

… Read the rest

The New Republic reminds us that what Trump is doing is not legitimate response to rivals but something else entirely.

The idea that Trump should pursue “revenge” and “retribution” for prosecutions is everywhere on the right. After a federal judge ordered Steve Bannon to surrender to prison, numerous MAGA influencers, including the MAGA God King himself, angrily vowed such payback. Republicans have said Trump should “fight fire with fire” (Senator Marco Rubio) and that GOP district attorneys should declare open season on Democrats (Stephen Miller). Trump, of course, has offered many versions of this, including to Dr. Phil and Hannity.

In the media, this story tends to be framed as follows: Will Trump seek “revenge” for his legal travails,

Oh good GOD.

How do they get this way? How do they not see it?

Do you know what is ‘toxic’, @Keir_Starmer?
To respond to a question about the abuse and harassment of one your own female MPs with a story of a murder.

Still no comment from you or @UKLabour about the trans activist protest at Rosie Duffield’s launch in Canterbury tomorrow? pic.twitter.com/c2gupNoGpq

— Venice Allan (@roseveniceallan) June 8, 2024

The woman asks him why he said, in connection with Rosie Duffield, that “only women have a cervix” is “something that shouldn’t be said” and “is not right.”

“Well,” he says, “look, what I said then and on other occasions is simply that I do not like the … Read the rest

You will sign the Loyalty Oath or else.

Staff at a top university say they feel coerced to subscribe to a Stonewall agenda by signing a pledge to oppose transphobia and demonstrate “allyship” by sharing their pronouns.

Exeter University last week asked its academics to sign the “inclusive practitioners commitment” produced by its “LGBTQ+ colleague and student” group.

Well that will be why they feel coerced, then – the fact that their employer “asked” them to sign a pledge to believe in bullshit.

The online document requests staff make six pledges to prove they are “the kind of person that LGBTQ+ people can confide in and feel safe around”.

Isn’t it fascinating that universities have never “requested” (actually demanded) … Read the rest

I saw this

A bloodless period is a periodless period.

Is there nothing they won’t appropriate? pic.twitter.com/VOsHiqNViu

— Jennifer 🟥🔴🧙‍♀️🦉🐈‍⬛ 🦖 (@babybeginner) June 7, 2024

and rolled my eyes and moved on, but later decided to see if I could find more and whaddya know, the whole thing is there for the reading.

Shall we sample? Let’s.

Page 1:

Menstruation is defined as “the monthly shedding of the lining of [the] uterus”
(Cleveland Clinic, 2019, para. 2). Although menstruation is often considered in the
context of the experiences of cisgender women (Brantelid et al., 2014; DeMaria et al.,
2020; Donmall, 2013; Jackson & Falmagne, 2013; Mason et al., 2013), many scholars
have begun to critique the idea of menstruation

There’s a thing called Clarks Village, for (it says) Somerset Outlet Shopping. Lots of stuff to buy, for up to 60% off! Whoopee! Also have you heard about our lord and savior the things you can do to support the LGBTQIA+ community? HAVE you?

Happy Pride month! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

Clarks Village is a place where everyone is accepted. Here you can be proud to be your true, authentic self at all times. 💖

Take a look at some of the little things you can do to support the LGBTQIA+ community 👇https://t.co/2nq3xGRQMU pic.twitter.com/gnp2tzMBYD

— Clarks Village. Somerset Outlet Shopping (@ClarksVillageUK) June 3, 2024

You may think you’re there to find bargains but nope nope nope you’re there to support the LGBTQIAZXNRMWD%%%% … Read the rest

Pragna Patel on why religious courts are bad for women.

On 1 June 2024, the world’s first Sikh court will open in London. This demands our urgent attention. For many years, I – as the co-director of Project Resist, and the former director of Southall Black Sisters – along with groups such as One Law for All have campaigned against the growth of religious courts because we believe they are tied to a wave of religious fundamentalism targeting the rights and freedoms of women.

Let’s face it: one of the core claims of most (or all) religions is the inferiority hence subordination of women. A goddy court that doesn’t think women are lesser beings is unlikely in the extreme.… Read the rest

Awkward.

Now that Donald Trump is a convicted felon, his list of countries to visit has gotten much shorter.

Trump was found guilty on Thursday of 34 counts of falsifying records in an effort to keep adult film star Stormy Daniels quiet about an affair that occurred in the 2000s. That means certain freedoms Mr Trump once enjoyed may be out of his reach — and could have a serious effect on his ability to carry out his presidential duties, including travelling to foreign countries.

Nearly 40 nations – including Canada and the UK – have strict policies when it comes to allowing individuals with criminal records across their borders, and barring a special accommodation, Trump would be held

The lack of gender is your real gender.

Hey don’t yell at me! I’m just sharing the wisdom.

"regardless of whether it matches the gender one was assigned at birth."

The book could have been called: "Reality Denial"@cathoderayzone pic.twitter.com/Zk7QSvx1qC

— Miroslav Imbrisevic (@Miroandrej) June 7, 2024

Our book is called Real Gender for two reasons. The first is to emphasize our conviction that the gender (or lack thereof) that one lives or feels authentically is one’s real gender, regardless of whether it matches the gender one was assigned at birth.

The lack of gender is one’s real gender.

That’s a universalizable claim, by the way. The lack of hair is one’s real hair. The lack of teeth is one’s … Read the rest

Excuse me?

The Canadian Cancer Society is apologizing for using the term “cervix” on a web page for transgender and non-binary people assigned female at birth.

On the page dedicated to cervical cancer screenings for members of the LGBTQ+ community, the charitable organization explains in a disclaimer they “recognize that many trans men and non-binary people may have mixed feelings about or feel distanced from words like ‘cervix.’”

They probably have “mixed” feelings about words like “cancer” too; so what? Is the Canadian Cancer Society going to change its name to “Canadian Owie Society”?

The charity acknowledged in a section titled “Words Matter” that some members of the community may prefer to use other terms such as “front hole.”

Yes, … Read the rest

Originally a comment by Artymorty on While Tatchell rages.

The left walked right into this, and they’re so entrenched, we’re seeing a mass exodus to the right among the very youngest cohort of voters and young adults.

There seems to have been a delay of a few years between cause and effect, when the left went all-in on radical gender ideology, and the reaction among the electorate to it.

Well, it’s been a few years, the reaction is starting to manifest among the masses, and I fear the left is about to discover that it’s a MASSIVE rejection, and it will all be too little, too late for them.

And it breaks my heart, becuase there are global, universal, … Read the rest

I hate it that the Tories are better on women’s rights than Labour is.

Kemi Badenoch has said the Conservatives will change the Equality Act to rewrite the definition of sex and allow organisations to bar transgender women from single-sex spaces, including hospital wards and sports events. The party will make clear that the protected characteristic of sex means biological sex, enabling those who wish to bar male-bodied people from organisations or activities to do so.

Or to put it less pejoratively, enabling women who want organizations and activities just for women to have them. It’s not that women have a deep perverse longing to “bar” men from things, it’s that at some times for some purposes we want … Read the rest

News from the front:

A UK trans activist found guilty of sending threatening messages to author JK Rowling and Labour MP Rosie Duffield has now been sentenced. Glenn Mullen, 31, avoided jail as his eight-week prison sentence was suspended for two years.

Mullen, a Manchester-based trans activist, was arrested and charged with issuing violent threats to the two women which he sent in January of last year. 

Glenn Mullen, 31, given suspended prison sentence for posting threatening messages in Gaelic on social media about an author & MP in Jan last year.

More: https://t.co/CTOr78cv8N

John Moran for CPS North West said: "The social media messages were targeted and very concerning." pic.twitter.com/6cl6xJwmyH

— CPS North West (@CPS_NorthWest) June 4, 2024

The UK government issued a review thingy back in March about diversity and cohesion and similar feel-good words that clash with each other. It makes for deeply weird reading because of its total failure to make clear what it’s talking about.

The theme is something it dubs “freedom-restricting harassment” or (wait for it) frh for short.

Victims of freedom-restricting harassment suffer devastating impacts yet are often not treated as victims or offered the support they need. The impact on the religious studies teacher at Batley Grammar School provides a harrowing example.

As an in-depth victim case study and for the first time since the incident occurred, we reviewed the case of the religious studies (RS) teacher at Batley Grammar

Jolyon Maugham has a strange tale to tell. Very strange. Hard to credit kind of strange. Almost as if he’s making it up level strange.

He’s absolutely lost it. pic.twitter.com/1ocUnmDfpl

— Dennis Noel Kavanagh (@Jebadoo2) June 6, 2024

Really. There’s been a massive increase in deaths among young trans people. A massive increase from…zero? I ask because people who investigate the blackmailing “trans kids will kill themselves!!!” claims report that they find nothing. There is no detectable epidemic of suicide among young trans people. But maybe Maugham doesn’t mean suicide, maybe he means general deaths, deaths of any kind? That the NHS is somehow concealing?

Well, he put it in writing, so it must be true.… Read the rest

The BBC starts by saying it’s dangerous, then moves to saying be careful when you do it. They should have stuck with it’s dangerous.

Boys as young as 14 have been asking their teachers how to choke girls during sex, a teacher has told the BBC. Dr Tamasine Preece, who teaches at Bryntirion Comprehensive in Bridgend, said some children now felt it was a normal part of sex and asked if “a soft squeeze on the neck is OK”. Health experts said pornography was a key contributor and that there was no safe way to strangle someone.

There you go. Third sentence: there’s no safe way to strangle someone. And yet the Beeb goes on to give advice on … Read the rest

So the climate thing wasn’t a joke?

The planet just marked a “shocking” new milestone, enduring 12 consecutive months of unprecedented heat, according to new data from Copernicus, the European Union’s climate monitoring service. Every single month from June 2023 to May 2024 was the world’s hottest such month on record, Copernicus data showed.

The 12-month heat streak was “shocking but not surprising” given human-caused climate change, said Carlo Buontempo, the director of Copernicus, who warned of worse to come. Unless planet-warming fossil fuel pollution is slashed, “this string of hottest months will be remembered as comparatively cold,” he said.

Is planet-warming fuel pollution going to be slashed? Hahaha that’s a good one. The planes fly, the cars zoom, the … Read the rest