Originally a comment by Michael Haubrich on From kulaks to Mariupol.

I watched a program in the nineties about the economic struggles in Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union. I think that Yeltsin was the mayor of Moscow at the time, and the government was in flux. Many people welcomed the freedoms that they had under Glasnost that they had not had under the Soviets. Recall that art exhibits in the public square, up until very recently, could be bulldozed by the Ministry for Culture if they included any Modern Art. I was surprised at how many of the older Russians longed for the days of Stalin. They said they knew exactly where they stood, and that … Read the rest

It just gets better and better.

*** Speechless *** pic.twitter.com/try2vX267s

— Dr Debbie Hayton (@DebbieHayton) April 28, 2022

Note that “another minority woman.” Joss Prior is neither a woman nor a minority. He’s a vicious toad of a white guy. “Trans”activism should just change its name to vicious toad activism.… Read the rest

This guy was actually an MP for two years.

I appreciate your previous role, but I’d be interested to learn why as a trade minister you are looking to work with two people with views that are very much contrary to #IOC guidance: https://t.co/pXzQOBlO3j #TransRightsAreHumanRights #trans #lgbt #LGBTQ https://t.co/IVJZlYQZAs

— Ben Howlett (@benhowlettuk) April 27, 2022

A Tory MP at that, but he changes the wording just as obstinately as the “activists” do.

The intellectually honest response, in support of your position, would be to say “I know the research, I understand it, but I believe that inclusion should be the priority, and so even though it may not be fair, I support the IOC’s framework”. At least own that.

Hoo boy – as if it weren’t terrifying enough already. Climate change–more pandemics:

There will be at least 15,000 instances of viruses leaping between species over the next 50 years, with the climate crisis helping fuel a “potentially devastating” spread of disease that will imperil animals and people and risk further pandemics, researchers have warned.

As the planet heats up, many animal species will be forced to move into new areas to find suitable conditions. They will bring their parasites and pathogens with them, causing them to spread between species that haven’t interacted before. This will heighten the risk of what is called “zoonotic spillover”, where viruses transfer from animals to people, potentially triggering another pandemic of the

Temperatures are rising in India.

Millions of Indians are experiencing a brutal heatwave that is throwing lives and livelihoods out of gear – and there is no relief in sight.

…

While heatwaves are common in India, especially in May and June, summer began early this year with high temperatures from March itself – average maximum temperatures in the month were the highest in 122 years. Heatwaves also began setting in during the month.

…

The effects are visible. Farmers say the unexpected temperature spikes have affected their wheat harvest, a development that could potentially have global consequences given supply disruptions due to the Ukraine war.

We’re told to remember that weather is different from climate, and not to … Read the rest

Russia has things back to front here.

Sending heavy weapons and other arms to Ukraine is dangerous for European security, the Kremlin has warned Western nations.

Sure, and if I set fire to a neighbor’s house it’s dangerous for the neighbor to summon the fire trucks.

What’s really dangerous for European security is this whole thing of Putin trying to smash Ukraine back into being a branch of Mother Russia. You broke it you pay for it.

Spokesman Dmitry Peskov was responding to a speech by UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss urging Kyiv’s allies to “ramp up” military production to help Ukraine.

Western allies have maintained their support does not amount to a military confrontation between Moscow and Nato.

Originally a comment by Bjarte Foshaug on From kulaks to Mariupol.

Ukrainian peasants, deprived of food, ate rats, frogs, and boiled grass. They gnawed on tree bark and leather. Many resorted to cannibalism to stay alive. Some 4 million died of starvation. […] Soviet propaganda had repeatedly told them that supposedly wealthy peasants, whom they called kulaks, were saboteurs and enemies—rich, stubborn landowners who were preventing the Soviet proletariat from achieving the utopia that its leaders had promised.

According to Jung Chang the same was true in China during the so called Great Leap Forward. There were villages where there was no bark left on the trees because the starving peasants had nothing else to eat after everything else … Read the rest

We are much worried about Allison Bailey. (Who’s we? Her admirers, friends, colleagues, comrades, fans.) She’s in the hospital and there is no news.

We are celebrating the brave and principled Allison Bailey. She's in hospital, as you will know.

Was this tweet a deliberate troll?#LesbianVisibilityWeek

— For Women Scotland (@ForWomenScot) April 27, 2022

The majority view is yes, it was a deliberate troll by Stonewall.

Also this:

H/t Holms… Read the rest

Oh the endless quest to be more special than everyone else. How tiring it is, how strenuous, how exigent, how pointless.

The “friendly reminder” bit is always charming, because of the way it assumes you’re interested in the person saying it, and lavish attention on her them daily, and know all about Them but just need the occasional loving refresher course.

But even better is the woman saying “I am not a woman.” Yeah you are. Just as the people helping a woman deliver a baby know what sex the baby is, you are a woman because you are a woman. Words aren’t magic, and saying “I am not a woman” doesn’t make you not a woman any more … Read the rest

This does indeed seem like a very odd, not to say stupid, thing to tell children.

I still can’t get over the sheer audacity of this book aimed at young children.

To suggest to a child that a doctor or even their own family made a “guess” about their sex when they were born, which could be “wrong”, sows a cruel seed of doubt and confusion.

Disgraceful. pic.twitter.com/7TJd3jONqj

— James Esses (@JamesEsses) April 22, 2022

“They looked at you and made a guess.” No they didn’t! Any more than they looked at your mother and “made a guess.” They knew your mother was pregnant and giving birth; they had to, in order to help her with the giving birth part. … Read the rest

Anne Applebaum starts with Stalin’s genocide of the “kulaks” in Ukraine in 1932-3.

Ukrainian peasants, deprived of food, ate rats, frogs, and boiled grass. They gnawed on tree bark and leather. Many resorted to cannibalism to stay alive. Some 4 million died of starvation.

But it was all ok, because there was a story to explain why they deserved it.

Soviet propaganda had repeatedly told them that supposedly wealthy peasants, whom they called kulaks, were saboteurs and enemies—rich, stubborn landowners who were preventing the Soviet proletariat from achieving the utopia that its leaders had promised. The kulaks should be swept away, crushed like parasites or flies. Their food should be given to the workers in the cities, who deserved it

Originally a comment by Lady Mondegreen on These questions take on new urgency.

Is there some set of core experiences distinctive of womanhood, some shared set of adventures and exploits that every woman will encounter on her journey from diapers to the grave?

What a leading way to put it. No, women won’t all have a “shared set of adventures and exploits.”

What we will share is the fundamental fact of existence in a female body as opposed to the other kind.

From that it follows that the vast majority of us will share at least some experiences unique to women. Menstruation, for example. The possibility of pregnancy. Pregnancy itself, and childbirth. From that follows the sociopolitical consequences of … Read the rest

This reads like parody but apparently isn’t. Dear god.

I'll be giving a talk (in person!) about trans inclusion called "Women are Women" at the Center for Global Ethics & Politics at the CUNY Graduate Center this Thurs at 6:30pmET.

Please join over zoom if you're interested!

Register here: https://t.co/DTy19PaLAb

— Carol Hay (@DrCarolHay) April 25, 2022

I’ll just quote the rest to make things simple.

And here’s the abstract: Who counts as a woman? Is there some set of core experiences distinctive of womanhood, some shared set of adventures and exploits that every woman will encounter on her journey from diapers to the grave?

The relatively recent visibility of and sensitivity to the experiences of trans people gives us

Linda Riley has a venomous hit piece on lesbians at Stonewall.

Two years ago, I came to the conclusion that a single day for lesbian visibility was simply insufficient. We needed, and deserved, more time to shine a light on some of the amazing women in our community, and to celebrate who we are without fear of prejudice, harassment or vilification. As the publisher of DIVA, the leading magazine for LGBTQI women and non-binary people, I wanted to use our platform to create a unique space.

There are no such women. There are no LGBTQI women, there are no LGBTQI men, there are no LGBTQI people. Nobody can be all of those things, so it’s a stupid label, but … Read the rest

Naomi Cunningham at Legal Feminist on the pronouns campaign, one front in the larger Gender War:

There are two sides in this war. They call each other various names, but we can call them – fairly neutrally – genderists and gender criticals.

The genderists claim that sex doesn’t matter. Whether you’re a man or a woman depends not on your body, but on your inner sense of identity. A male person who says that he is a woman should be treated, referred to – and even thought of – as a woman for all purposes; and vice versa.

Meanwhile, though, the rest of the world will go on treating women the way it always has.

Gender criticals think biological

Oh she did, did she.

Days before Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration, Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene appeared [in a text to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows] to press for Donald Trump to overturn his 2020 election defeat by invoking martial law, new messages show.

Brackets added. MTG didn’t actually appear in a text to Meadows.

“In our private chat with only Members several are saying the only way to save our Republic is for Trump to call Marshall [sic] law,” Greene texted on 17 January. “I just wanted you to tell him. They stole this election. We all know. They will destroy our country next.”

Eleven days after the attempted coup she said that.

Greene – one

Suzanne Moore on Stonewall’s grotesque desertion of the very people it’s supposed to be for:

Last October it was agreed that Bailey could pursue her claim against her employer and Stonewall for direct discrimination against her gender critical beliefs, as well as indirect victimisation. The case is due to start tomorrow. 

[Now yesterday.]

So what did Bailey do so wrong that has caused Stonewall to complain to her employers? She has done “wrongthink”. She will not swallow the dogma. She believes that biological sex is immutable and that conflating sex with the made up notion of “gender identity” will leave women with no legally enforceable boundaries against men. She does not think womanhood is just a feeling in

Never in a million years would you…

But what you would have in a million years, indeed in a few seconds, is a man telling women that men are women if they say they are, and telling women we have to agree with that on pain of relentless bullying, and telling women what we can talk about and how we can talk about it. That’s what you would have. That’s what we do have, and we’re beyond tired of it.… Read the rest

Simon Edge at the Glinner Update starts with Linda Riley’s tweet bashing JK Rowling and moves on to that other bully:

Also yesterday, Owen Jones tweeted that ‘transphobes’ – by which he means people who think sex is real, gender ideology is harmful, and lesbians and gays have the right to organise separately from the trans movement – should be banned from ‘every lgbtq bar’.

“We’re overwhelmingly united behind our trans siblings,” he said cloyingly. “An attack on them is an attack on all of us.”

Solidarity forever blah blah blah. Imagine a workers’ organization saying “We’re overwhelmingly united behind our billionaire boss siblings; an attack on them is an attack on all of us.” Imagine a BLM activist saying … Read the rest