Originally a comment by Mike Haubrich on Feminism is for everyone except women.

I fully understand why many feminists say that men can’t be feminists, and I understand why they are suspicious of men who claim to be. It’s because we have a tendency to take over when we get involved, and when it comes to transactivists, they are living up to those expectations. What I don’t understand is how people can make declarations such as “MY feminism will be intersectional” as if people could buy a feminism and paint it any color that works best for them.

I think that moving Women’s studies over to Gender Studies has had an obvious and negative effect on people’s understanding of … Read the rest

Last year Michael Biggs wrote a piece for The Critic about…it’s simpler to quote.

Threats of violence against “trans exclusionary” or “gender critical” feminists — who do not believe that people can change sex merely by announcing preferred pronouns or wearing different clothes — have become ubiquitous on social media. It is nevertheless surprising to discover that such threats can now be submitted as academic work for a master’s degree.

The London School of Economics held a conference in April 2021 for students taking the MSc in Gender (Sexuality). One session was entitled “No Time, No TERFs, No Norms”; the disparaging acronym stands for Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists. A paper in the session concluded:

“If TERFs think trans* is

From an interview with Maggie Haberman about Trump and her book about Trump and reporting on Trump:

He fixated on the paper and attacked me because of it. There were times when he attacked me over coverage — it was always over a story or something he saw me say on TV. One thing he got very upset about seeing me say on TV was that he watches a lot of TV, and then that became a fixation. He’s incredibly hostile to anyone suggesting he watches a lot of TV because he thinks it’s some knock on his intelligence.

Of course it’s a knock on his intelligence. It’s also a knock on his intellectual energy, his discipline, his abilities, his … Read the rest

An online course at the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research is titled Who is Feminism For? The instructor is Sophie Lewis.

The seemingly uncontroversial idea that feminism is synonymous with “the women’s movement”—i.e., that feminism is “for women”—has in fact never been widely accepted, least of all among feminists. From the beginning, comradely holes have been poked in feminism’s myriad attempts to define itself, not to mention the word “woman.” For centuries, feminists have debated: what does feminism encompass? Who is feminism for?

No they haven’t. Not for centuries – the word hasn’t been current for that long, let alone the movement.

In this course, we’ll enter that debate, unpacking questions of feminism’s purpose, scope, and possible limits. Along the

The BBC tells us:

Relatives of a girl who died during protests in Iran have been forced into making false statements, a source close to the family has told BBC Persian.

Nika Shakarami, 16, went missing in Tehran on 20 September after telling a friend she was being chased by police. On Wednesday night, a state TV report showed her aunt, Atash, saying: “Nika was killed falling from a building.” Her uncle was also seen on TV speaking against the unrest, as someone seems to whisper to him: “Say it, you scumbag!”

They apparently smashed every bone in her body.

Tehran judiciary official Mohammad Shahriari was cited by state media as saying on Wednesday that a post-mortem showed Nika

Shambolic Neutral on The Divine Trans/The Trans Divine:

“Transpeople are sacred. We are the divine”. If that’s not cult-speak then I do not know what is. Some of us have been saying gender ideology is the new religion for over a decade. Finally, it clearly feels secure enough to make it blatant.

Or at least the branch of it that hangs out at the Globe does.

In a way of course that makes sense – it’s what drama and acting are all about. You could get up on a stage and say “drama is the divine” and I would see it quite differently. It would be a metaphor as opposed to a lunatic boast. There is something magical (metaphorically … Read the rest

Scotland goes full magic gender:

A Holyrood committee tasked with scrutinising the Scottish government’s gender recognition reform bill has given its support to the key principles for simplifying how transgender people can update their birth certificates – including the introduction of self-declaration.

Great. Let’s introduce self-declaration for everything. I’m Bill Gates, so give me the contents of his bank account.

Thursday’s report by Holyrood’s equalities, human rights and civil justice committee recommends, by a majority of five to two, the move to statutory self-declaration before the registrar general for legal gender recognition, thus removing the need for a psychiatric diagnosis of gender dysphoria.

It also supports reducing the age at which people can apply for a gender recognition certificate

The Telegraph reports The Globe’s mad dash to pretend it never did call women bitches:

Shakespeare’s Globe has been criticised for sharing a “derogatory” poem challenging “transphobic Terfs”, as the theatre promoted a play about a non-binary Joan of Arc.

A play about one of history’s rare Famous Women that pretends she wasn’t a woman after all.

Verses that begin by using the word “bitch” to descibe feminists who are critical of gender ideology were shared on the Globe’s website and the venue’s Twitter feed to promote I, Joan, a play about the French heroine.

Well that’s what the good people do now – call feminists bitches and cunts. It’s The Monstrous Regiment of Women updated.

It also

Throwing down.

India, I swear to God, if you want to start a petition for Mermaids to take me on in court, the first signature will be mine. https://t.co/1HZ6BbCX55

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) October 5, 2022

… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Freemage on A small but important right.

It always blows my mind how swiftly virtually the entire Left forgot about the phrase “Schroedinger’s Rapist”. It was the go-to for the explanation why women couldn’t just trust a random guy, even though he might seem all right – because rapists don’t wear neon signs on their heads, and thus you only know a guy is a threat when he actually reveals himself to BE a threat.

And of course, this was true even though the vast, vast majority of men not only aren’t rapists, but are repulsed and revolted by the idea of rape. The harm that can be committed by the small minority of men … Read the rest

And Glosswitch shares another narcissistic display from the Globe:

Just seen the poem tweeted – later deleted – by @The_Globe and wow, that's a lot of words to say "fuck off Mummy, I hate you, please will you give me a cuddle" pic.twitter.com/1KZIlKQGWR

— Victoria Smith (@glosswitch) October 5, 2022

Blah blah blah my right to proudly self-identify blah blah blah my beauty astounds them –

This is not social justice or anything like it. This is just an unholy blend of aggression and conceit. I can’t wait for it to fall over and end.… Read the rest

Ah so they’re admitting it.

The Globe’s current pinned tweet:

The dogma has been hinting it for ages, but not quite saying it out loud.

Eye-rolls aside, this is why the “movement” is so terrible and boring and ruinous. This conceit and megalomania and histrionic narcissism. No you’re not “the divine,” you’re just a very naughty cult.

Update: the Globe deleted the tweet so here’s the clip via a different tweet:

Why did Shakespeare's Globe delete this stunning and brave Joan of Arc soliloquy? pic.twitter.com/985qBUscKS

— Not the Bee (@Not_the_Bee) October 6, 2022

… Read the rest

It started from Sally Hines ranting at Rebecca R-C on Twitter and led to a lot of eye-popping stuff I hadn’t seen before.

In April of this year, "gender expert" @sally_hines chaired a panel at the "Living Gender in Diverse Times" conference called "Gender ‘Critical’ Feminism in the UK". The panel was made up of assorted genderloons, including our very own Jacob Breslow. https://t.co/LNQACldkHH

— Jack (@j4ppleby) October 4, 2022

Everything Mermaids needed to know about Jacob Breslow before they made him a trustee in July was out there and easily found if they did any due diligence at all. (1) His LSE profile tells you he is writing a book about "the queer life of children's desires". pic.twitter.com/ipyfFaG2zY

—

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on About the emotional stunting.

I think part of the problem is that these pundits live in a different world than the rest of us. I don’t mean just “they’re the elite and we’re the common folk,” though that can be part of it. I just mean that the stakes are different for them, in both directions: they’re often insulated from the consequences of the other side’s policies, yet they feel conflict more sharply because of the work and social circles in which they live.

Example 1: Opinion columnists/pundits. I’m sure Ross Douthat is a swell guy and easy to get along with. He seems nice in the podcasts and dialogues I’ve heard … Read the rest

The misogyny gets more blatant by the day.

3 / This thread will (1) look at wider context of this misogynistic messaging, and (2) give an account of MrMenno, a gay man, protesting this language during the Saturday matinee performance on 01.10.22 pic.twitter.com/BNqYc3AqmS

— MrMenno Appreciation Society (@GayGenderPirate) October 4, 2022

It’s a very long thread so I’ll quote some of it, to speed things up.

“Wider context: women increasingly face hostility for defending their rights as members of the female sex, or for simply acknowledging that being sexed female is a thing, despite sex being a protected characteristic in the Equality Act 2010. Lesbians are facing abuse, assaults and exclusion when they assert being same-sex attracted (i.e. females … Read the rest

Meet “belief perseverance”:

Even now, when it is revealed that one of Mermaids’s trustees is an apologist for paedophilia, many of its supporters are doubling down.

This is what is known as “belief perseverance”.

[2/9]

— Andrew Doyle (@andrewdoyle_com) October 5, 2022

There is a lot at stake for those who have cheered on the Tavistock Clinic and groups like Mermaids. Many of the cheerleaders have encouraged the transitioning of children, sometimes their own.

Many of these kids will have been autistic, or will have grown up to be gay.

[4/9]

— Andrew Doyle (@andrewdoyle_com) October 5, 2022

Have any of the politicians who called for a ban on “trans conversion therapy” conceded that they had been hoodwinked by linguistic

Benjamin Cohen of Pink News is trying to salvage what he can, and it’s not going all that well.

Mermaids told @PinkNews that the conference Breslow spoke at “is completely at odds with our values”. Adding: “Safeguarding is of the utmost importance to Mermaids and the safety of the young people we support is our highest priority” (2/3)

— Benjamin Cohen (@benjamincohen) October 4, 2022

Well of course Mermaids said that, but it isn’t true. “Safety” isn’t helping children ruin their bodies in pursuit of a trendy illusion.

People are falsely claiming that Jacob Breslow reported for @PinkNews. He didn’t. We published a guest article by him via @pointfoundation at which he was a scholar in 2007. This was

I think truth is a defense in libel cases, no? Trump is suing CNN for “libeling” him by reporting on him.

Donald Trump has sued cable TV network CNN, claiming defamation and seeking punitive damages of $475m, according to a Florida court filing on Monday.

The US cable news station has attempted to smear the former US president “with a series of ever-more scandalous, false, and defamatory labels of ‘racist,’ ‘Russian lackey,’ ‘insurrectionist,’ and ultimately ‘Hitler’,” Trump’s lawyers claimed. The lawsuit has been filed in federal court in Fort Lauderdale.

I don’t think those claims will be very hard to defend as true. If CNN said he actually is Hitler that could be an issue, but I’m betting they compared… Read the rest

Victoria Smith in The Critic:

Much is made of Mermaids’ promotion of puberty blockers, which halt children’s physical growth. In many ways I am far more concerned about the emotional stunting. The #NoDebate, #ProtectTransKids message refuses to acknowledge that our identities are shaped through constant negotiation with others. 

By telling children that anyone who does not see them as they see themselves is a threat, Mermaids is preventing the development of mature individuals — adults who understand that we are all defined in the context of our relationships with others, including those with whom we may not always agree. 

Exactly. It’s the worship of The Self that is so stifling and damaging.… Read the rest

Trump didn’t study for the exam, in fact he has no idea what the course even is.

He starts with saying he likes Liz Truss, then moves swiftly into claiming he and King Choss are close friends.

Trump said that King Charles would be “different now” and would do “very well” in his new role.

“I know him very well, quite well. And I spent a lot of time when I was over there as president with him. And with his wife [who] was absolutely lovely, by the way, and we had a good time together,” he said.

No he didn’t. He was there for a couple of days and he of course didn’t spend “a lot of time” … Read the rest