Darkly interesting.

I think of that grim relationship between Trump and sickness as I read the latest stories about how so many Republicans continue to refuse COVID vaccines. 2/xhttps://t.co/Lg7kVsAuwh pic.twitter.com/kKbgvUnbp6

— David Frum (@davidfrum) April 21, 2021

… there's an issue of personal responsibility here too. A heroic scientific effort – achieved at huge cost – has delivered vaccines that are astonishingly effective at protecting life from COVID. So effective that we may not need to worry about herd immunity. If so … 5/x

— David Frum (@davidfrum) April 21, 2021

Trump and the Fox leadership have vaccinated themselves of course. But they have a different message for their followers. They have persuaded them that it's a test of

Originally a comment by Sackbut in Miscellany Room 6.

The various discussions about transracialism and transgender ideology spurred some thoughts that I couldn’t quite fit anywhere, so I thought I’d put them here. It’s possible I’ve already related this story before, but it came to mind again.

My father was black, my mother was white, and I am one of those light-skinned people who might be considered black by the One Drop Rule. When I was in high school, decades ago, before all this “identity politics” and postmodern Critical Theory stuff became current, I was considering applying for an Achievement Scholarship, an award from the same outfit that does the National Merit Scholarship, but reserved for black students. The … Read the rest

The AHA statement about Dawkins rejects the interpretation that he was pointing to an apparent inconsistency in the current norms of political correctness, while simultaneously providing an example of precisely the confused thinking that he claims he was pointing out. Discuss.

— Daniel Dennett (@danieldennett) April 21, 2021

My Discuss: of course they do, because they can’t do anything else, because the confused thinking is baked in, because the whole idea is confused and absurd and solipsistic.

Or maybe not? Maybe it’s all just gloriously simple.

Comparing a lady pretending to be black is not the same as someone asking to be identified as man/woman. He’s needs to unequivocally say that those are not the same. He hasn’t done

Scottish Women’s Aid is recruiting:

Do you want to get involved in making Scotland a happier, safer place for young women? Are you interested in learning more about feminist research? Would you like to a shape an exciting national digital campaign? If yes, this advisory panel opportunity is for you!

We want to understand where young women and girls look for support and advice when they are faced with abuse from someone they are in an intimate relationship with, and how Women’s Aid can help them in that situation.

And by “abuse from someone they are in an intimate relationship with” they mostly mean someone male. Lesbians can be abusive too, of course, but the power dynamics are different, … Read the rest

He burned them.

Professor Richard Dawkins has been stripped of an award by the American Humanist Association, after the organisation said his statements on transgender rights “demean marginalised groups”.

Voting to withdraw a 1996 “humanist of the year award”, the AHA said that the evolutionary biologist and author of The God Delusion was no longer “an exemplar of humanist values” after his tweets appeared to question whether people can choose their gender.

Or, rather, their sex.

Dawkins, 80, claimed that the loss of the award would have little practical effect on him because he had never used it. “Apparently the honour hadn’t meant enough to me to be worth recording in my CV,” he said.

That’s the burn. Not … Read the rest

That’s a relief, anyway.

Derek Chauvin found guilty on all charges. https://t.co/RdYLvfcKDu pic.twitter.com/xOSPF9KECa

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) April 20, 2021

Guilty on all counts. Right result.

— Preet Bharara (@PreetBharara) April 20, 2021

Relief is all it is. The horror remains.… Read the rest

Heh this one is funny to me if no one else.

Serial trolling from 2014: pic.twitter.com/x8U9pxuKA5

— Peter Aldhous (@paldhous) April 20, 2021

I had to look up the dates to make sure: that July 28 1914 2014 pair is the one he perpetrated two days after he co-signed with me that truce-thing saying let’s agree to disagree without abusing each other. He co-signed it with me and posted it on his blog. I wrote it and asked him to co-sign it with me because a hell of a lot of aggressively misogynist men had been exercising their aggression on women and a lot of those men were big fans of his. I had to laugh when he tweeted … Read the rest

People are losing their shit because this happened.

LGB Alliance to be entered onto the Register of Charities.
Read our decision: https://t.co/tmp5dxGduW

— Charity Commission (@ChtyCommission) April 20, 2021

This creepy guy for instance:

As a charity CEO, I am concerned at the reputation damage this will cause to the third sector. It is clear the Commission no longer have rigorous safeguards and due diligence in place, I’m afraid this brings your authority into disrepute.

— Dr Liam Hackett MBE (@DiageoLiam) April 20, 2021

Creepy guy four days ago:

We need to stop normalising the term “gender critical” and refer to it only as transphobia. It is impossible to be critical about the existence and identity of a person or

Originally a comment by Sastra on You may not question.

Are you anti questions?

Yes.

What is “gender?” What is the meaning of the word “gender” in the phrase “gender identity?”

How are you defining “man” and “woman?” What is the difference between a man and woman?

What would falsify the existence of an innate gender identity present from birth?

Why does gender identity outweigh the cumulative effect of DNA, chromosomes, gametes, genitals, and hormones in the womb?

What would change your mind?

I consider these type of questions to be critical in understanding and analyzing any claim, including the claims TRAs are making. They’re basic to both philosophy and science. But the above are known as “JAQing off” … Read the rest

It turned abruptly abnormally hot and dry here a week ago. And…

We've responded to 91 wildfires in one week. It's April. pic.twitter.com/3TO16dPjbx

— Washington State Dept. of Natural Resources (@waDNR) April 20, 2021

It’s another sunny cloudless smoggy day out there.… Read the rest

Reactions to the American Humanist Association’s shunning of Dawkins are not universally admiring.

might as well go back to the notion of humours pic.twitter.com/ECMo03qtyp

— Michael Herbert (@MJHerbert) April 20, 2021

Every other living scientist or rational humanist among the remaining 66 should return their awards. They'll be coming for you, next.

— Adam Hibbert, SDP PPC Sevenoaks (@adhib) April 20, 2021

https://twitter.com/HackneyReSiste2/status/1384408736748523521

Good humanists never ask questions

— Rebecca (@FeministBec) April 20, 2021

https://twitter.com/RustySoF/status/1384437256367353856

2/2 Part II:https://t.co/6SI3qGiwbR

— Dr EM (@PankhurstEM) April 20, 2021

He asked why it was considered offensive to assume a black identity, but not a female one. He didn’t take a stance.

Are you anti questions?

— Dave Baxter (@JustDavidDavid) April 20, 2021

… Read the rest

Al Jazeera reports:

Pakistani police have registered a blasphemy case against organisers of the feminist Aurat Azadi [Women’s Freedom] March in a northwestern city, while a court in the country’s second city dismissed the same charges as having no grounds.

Police in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar registered the First Information Report (FIR) under the country’s strict blasphemy laws, which can carry a mandatory death penalty, on Thursday.

So Pakistan may kill some women for organizing a women’s march. That’s a pretty thought.

In a statement, organisers of the march, which is held annually to mark International Women’s Day on March 8, condemned the allegations as “baseless and false”.

“Since the March, women marchers have been met with

The American Humanist Association has put Dawkins on the naughty step.

Established in 1953, the Humanist of the Year Award is conferred annually by the American Humanist Association (AHA), recognizing the awardee as an exemplar of humanist values. Communication of scientific concepts to the public is an important aspect of advancing the cause of humanism. Richard Dawkins was honored in 1996 by the AHA as Humanist of the Year for his significant contributions in this area.

Regrettably, Richard Dawkins has over the past several years accumulated a history of making statements that use the guise of scientific discourse to demean marginalized groups, an approach antithetical to humanist values.

Like women for instance? Dear Muslima? Like the schoolboy from … Read the rest

Aww I’m jealous.

New Yorkers can soon get vaccinated under the 94-foot-long model of a blue whale at the American Museum of Natural History, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Monday. The museum is set to be one of the city’s newest mass vaccination sites. https://t.co/9XhDB9AvDF

— NYT Metro (@NYTMetro) April 19, 2021

I can’t complain though. Where I got mine is normally a sitting area with a coffee/snack bar (closed for vax days), with a two-story glass wall on one side, so not at all a bad place for the 15 minute wait afterwards.

Still…Under the Whale…… Read the rest

I might have known – Katha Pollitt was already on it, way back last August.

I admit I took it a bit personally when Planned Parenthood of Greater New York took the name of the organization’s founder, Margaret Sanger, off its flagship clinic in Manhattan in July. It will now be called Manhattan Health Center. What am I supposed to do now with the two Planned Parenthood Maggie Awards I’ve won for articles on reproductive rights?

Call herself Karen, I guess.

Whether erasing Sanger was an olive branch to Black staffers or part of a deeper self-investigation, there’s no question that the main winners here are abortion opponents. For decades, they’ve claimed that Sanger was a racist bent

So should we read that “barn-burner” letter that Bari Weiss is so excited about? Sure.

He The author addresses fellow Brearley parents to say why he’s taking his daughter out of the school. It’s because it’s not good enough.

It cannot be stated strongly enough that Brearley’s obsession with race must stop. It should be abundantly clear to any thinking parent that Brearley has completely lost its way. The administration and the Board of Trustees have displayed a cowardly and appalling lack of leadership by appeasing an anti-intellectual, illiberal mob, and then allowing the school to be captured by that same mob. What follows are my own personal views on Brearley’s antiracism initiatives, but these are just a handful of

Andrew Sullivan is stirring the pot again.

This barn-burner denies that there’s been systemic racism in the U.S. since the 1960s. His daughter must be mortified. https://t.co/2EGWpuosd6

— Will Wilkinson (@willwilkinson) April 17, 2021

This is a defamatory lie.

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) April 18, 2021

Race IS inherited to a great extent. Are we at the point where you are denying that two white parents will have white children? I mean please. Have you read any Darwin?

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) April 19, 2021

So, it’s a defamatory lie, but here I am saying it again.… Read the rest

No biggy, just a little drone flight on MARS.

Monday, NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter became the first aircraft in history to make a powered, controlled flight on another planet. The Ingenuity team at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California confirmed the flight succeeded after receiving data from the helicopter via NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover at 6:46 a.m. EDT (3:46 a.m. PDT).

“Ingenuity is the latest in a long and storied tradition of NASA projects achieving a space exploration goal once thought impossible,” said acting NASA Administrator Steve Jurczyk. “The X-15 was a pathfinder for the space shuttle. Mars Pathfinder and its Sojourner rover did the same for three generations of Mars rovers. We don’t know exactly where

We’re not the only ones.

Disturbing to ponder that there are actual real-life breathing humans who read these paragraphs and aren't embarrassed pic.twitter.com/z388kFWFGD

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) April 18, 2021

So embarrassing to have focused on 50% of the population and their critically underserved health needs.

— em (@margerymeanwell) April 18, 2021

It’s the wrong 50%, you see.… Read the rest

The head of Planned Parenthood, in the New York Times yesterday, breast-beating over the racism of Margaret Sanger:

What we don’t want to be, as an organization, is a Karen. You know Karen: She escalates small confrontations because of her own racial anxiety. She calls the manager. She calls the police. She stands with other white parents to maintain school segregation.

No, I don’t know Karen. What I know is this stupid new trick of blaming women for things like racism and pasting belittling nicknames on us at the same time. What I know is this filthy habit of throwing women overboard and patting yourself on the back for doing it. Planned Parenthood can go fuck itself.

And then