This is what’s holding us hostage. This.

WTF?

Donald Trump just interrupted his own Press Conference to brag about getting a photo from Vladimir Putin that he will be signing and sending back.

He then says that Putin wants to be at the World Cup in Washington DC, and says he's been very respectful.

What is wrong… pic.twitter.com/vzHhRGFgH3

— Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) August 22, 2025

… Read the rest

This will go very well.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered National Guard troops patrolling the streets of Washington for President Donald Trump’s law enforcement crackdown to start carrying firearms, the Pentagon said Friday.

…

The step is an escalation in Trump’s intervention into policing in the nation’s capital and comes as nearly 2,000 National Guard members have been stationed in the heavily Democratic city, with the arrival this week of hundreds of troops from several Republican-led states.

Trump initially called up 800 members of the District of Columbia National Guard to assist federal law enforcement in his bid to crack down on crime, homelessness and illegal immigration. Since then, six states have sent troops to the city,

He done undercut the principle again.

When federal agents armed with a search warrant showed up at John R. Bolton’s home outside Washington at dawn on Friday, it was a display of one of the government’s most intimidating powers, in this case deployed against a fierce and high-profile critic of President Trump.

It is not yet clear what evidence the Justice Department cited in convincing a federal judge to sign off on the search warrant, or what culpability Mr. Bolton might have in an on-and-off investigation into whether he mishandled classified information dating back to when he served as Mr. Trump’s national security adviser during the president’s first term.

But the episode illustrated how Mr. Trump’s campaign of retribution

The Australian:

A parliamentary committee examining the impact of stillbirth on mothers has prefaced its evidence by acknowledging that men who have transitioned or are transitioning to become women should also be part of the conversation around the loss of babies during labour and pregnancy.

What???

Obviously fathers are affected by stillbirths, but that’s not what this says. This singles out fathers who pretend to be women, and what the hell is the point of that?? I can guarantee you that men who pretend to be women are not physically affected by stillbirths the way women are, so what remains? There’s no reason to think fathers who pretend to be women are emotionally more affected than fathers who are … Read the rest

I couldn’t find any Anglophone news on this but for what it’s worth…

If it’s true it’s hard to think of anything more calculated to insult and harm women.… Read the rest

Why does he do this on “social media”? Why not just run around DC writing it on the walls of toilets?

Wait a second…

Citation Justice – what it is and how you can practice it

Citations play a powerful role in academia, both institutionally and for individual careers. They form the bedrock of research assessment practices and are increasingly influential in job applications, promotions, grant applications and university rankings. There is no denying that citations matter. However, there is increasing evidence that women, people of colour, and other minoritised groups are systemically under cited, serving to exclude and silence many voices from scholarly and academic debates. Take a look at the paper you’re writing, or the texts in your reading lists: how many of these authors are men and/or white? How many women or people of colour have you

Sounds interesting.

Period pain and heavy bleeding linked with lower school attendance and GCSE results – new study

The article is by two women, in fact two women named Gemma.

Menstrual cycles are experienced by roughly half of the population for half of their lives. The experiences of menstruation on teenagers are incredibly important, especially as young people are starting periods earlier. Our research shows that this impact extends to their school attendance – and GCSE results.

Previous studies have reported that many young people take time off school and struggle to concentrate in school because of difficult experiences related to menstruation.

By roughly half the population is it? Any particular half? Teenagers, young people, yes, but can you … Read the rest

Well this took my breath away. The NPR article is about Trump’s plan to meddle with all the museums, not just the federal ones, and that’s breathtaking enough, but then it got even more so.

In a statement to NPR Wednesday, the president and CEO of the American Alliance of Museums, Marilyn Jackson, framed the issue as one of creative and scholarly independence. She wrote:

“The idea of extending federal reviews to the nation’s 22,000 museums misunderstands how museums operate. The vast majority are independent nonprofits, guided by professional standards and community trust. Museums cannot and should not be subject to government review of their exhibitions. The integrity of museums depends on their independence, and that’s what makes them so

Hoist by their own petard much?

A German neo-Nazi will be allowed to start serving an 18-month sentence in a women’s prison after he used a new government policy to register a change in gender.

Sven Liebich, who has been photographed at far-Right rallies wearing a Nazi-style uniform, will be sent to the Chemnitz women’s prison in Saxony, according to FAZ, a German newspaper.

Because he’s obviously not taking the piss, right? Totally sincere?

Also of course there’s the issue of the safety of actual women in the prison, but meh, that doesn’t matter.

Dennis Cernota, a senior prosecutor in Saxony, said that Liebich would be interviewed upon arrival to check whether it was appropriate for him to be placed

Hot news from the Trans Legal Clinic –

[Does that mean self-identified Legal Clinic? So not a real legal clinic?]

The Trans Legal Clinic have launched our new Strategic litigation service in partnership with legal heavyweights at W Legal. Joitnly, we have today filed an application on behalf of Dr Victoria McCloud to the European Court of Human Rights, challenging the United Kingdom following the Supreme Court’s ruling in For Women Scotland Ltd v the Scottish Ministers [2025] UKSC 16.

They might want to hire a decent editor while they’re at it.

Anyway. Is it really the job of courts to force everyone to agree that this man here is actually a woman because she says so?

I hope not.… Read the rest

The very right-wing but not absolutely always wrong about everything American Enterprise Institute on that ridiculous chart about white culture in July 2020:

In the wake of the police killing of George Floyd and subsequent protests over police brutality, interest in “anti-racist” education has exploded among educators and advocates. The case that educators should seek to combat racism seems self-evident. What’s less clear is how the admirable cause of “anti-racism” is fueling, in some corners, the inclination to denounce universal virtues and useful skills as the product of “white culture.”

Witness last week’s contretemps at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. The museum, which bills itself as “the only national museum devoted exclusively” to educating the

All you need is to idennify as.

Exclusive by @sammerriman_ @dailymailuk

£25K Women in Science UK award from @LOrealGroupe @UNESCO @royalsociety open to anyone who ‘‘identifies as a female postdoctoral level researcher”.@hjoycegender: “This entry criterion isn’t just nonsense, it’s unlawful.” pic.twitter.com/Prgd6cqEBL

— Sex Matters (@SexMattersOrg) August 20, 2025

It’s really very odd to word it that way. “Candidates must identify as” – well which is it? Must, or idennify as? The two are in opposition. Must=mandatory, while idennify as is as optional as it gets.

These days of course it’s easy to get away with idennifying as female, but the postdoctoral level researcher is not quite so simple. Or do they just take people’s word for it on … Read the rest

Fox News runs everything.

Several of Fox News’s most prominent on-air news personalities made clear their desire to help Mr. Trump shortly before and after the 2020 presidential election, according to a tranche of court documents released on Tuesday in a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox Corporation filed by Smartmatic, a voting technology company.

In one text message, Mr. Watters, who now hosts “Jesse Watters Primetime” on Fox News, said to his colleague Greg Gutfeld: “Think about how incredible our ratings would be if Fox went ALL in on STOP THE STEAL,” a reference to the movement trying to overturn the results of the election.

Apart from anything else, isn’t it thrilling that the drive for commercial success … Read the rest

Both sides.

The UK’s first transgender judge has launched a case against the UK in the European court of human rights challenging the process that led to the supreme court’s ruling on biological sex.

The retired judge Victoria McCloud, who is now a litigation strategist at W-Legal, is seeking a rehearing of the case, arguing that the supreme court undermined her article 6 rights to a fair trial when it refused to hear representation from her and did not hear evidence from any other trans individuals or groups.

Ok so suppose a group of people declare themselves judges, and the supreme court rules that trans judges are not judges. Would the court be expected to include trans judges before … Read the rest

Don’t forget the museums. Gotta micromanage the museums. They have to show how grate America is.

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he has ordered his attorneys to conduct a review of Smithsonian museums, calling their portrayal of U.S. history too negative and focused too much on “how bad Slavery was.”

Trump said he would subject the museums to “the exact same process” his administration has conducted of universities, with the goal of making the Smithsonian less “woke.”

Because without woke, nobody would think slavery was a bad thing.

Trump wrote on Truth Social: “The Smithsonian is OUT OF CONTROL, where everything discussed is how horrible our Country is, how bad Slavery was, and how unaccomplished

Peak Comerford.

Because trans women are women, and women talk about bras. I'm sure if I looked through your transphobic female friends' Twitter accounts, outside of their incessant transphobia, I would find them talking about bras too.

Are they perverts for doing that too?

— Aidan Comerford (@AidanCTweets) August 19, 2025

Women are telling him we don’t talk about bras, actually, but he knows better.… Read the rest

Do what?

UK culture secretary Lisa Nandy is coming under fire for wearing a black t-shirt emblazoned with the words ‘Protect the Dolls’ at Wigan Pride on Sunday.

If you keep up with trans-activist trends, the ‘Protect the Dolls’ slogan might sound familiar. Celebrities such as Pedro Pascal, Tilda Swinton, Alan Cumming and Madonna have all worn t-shirts bearing the phrase. According to the t-shirt’s creator, a New York-born fashion-school grad now living in London, ‘the dolls’ supposedly in need of protection are transwomen. In other words, blokes.

So men need protection and women don’t?

‘In queer communities, “doll” is a term of affection, pride and belonging – a coded word that speaks volumes without explanation’, claimed a piece in 

Yosemite Biologist Who Hung Trans Pride Flag From El Capitan Is Fired

Real biologist or self-idennified?

The National Park Service has fired a wildlife biologist at Yosemite National Park who helped drape a large transgender pride flag from El Capitan in May, saying that the demonstration had taken place in a prohibited area and lacked the required permits.

The former employee, Shannon Joslin, 35, who studies bats and has a Ph.D. in genetics, received a termination letter from the Park Service on Aug. 12.

A PhD in genetics but thinks people can change sex.

In the letter, the park’s acting deputy superintendent, Danika Globokar, wrote that Dr. Joslin, who is gay and identifies as nonbinary, had “failed to demonstrate acceptable

Another man takes steps to cancel women’s rights.

The UK’s first transgender judge has launched a case against the UK in the European court of human rights challenging the process that led to the supreme court’s ruling on biological sex.

The retired judge Victoria McCloud, who is now a litigation strategist at W-Legal, is seeking a rehearing of the case, arguing that the supreme court undermined her article 6 rights to a fair trial when it refused to hear representation from her and did not hear evidence from any other trans individuals or groups.

Why should people who are wrong about what sex they are be singled out for “inclusion” on a supreme court ruling?

The move comes as