All entries by this author
Apr 7th, 2025 4:43 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
The fix is in.
The Supreme Court has granted a request by the Trump administration to temporarily block a lower court order requiring that a deported Salvadorian man be returned to the US.
Chief Justice John Roberts agreed to pause a ruling that Kilmar Abrego Garcia should be brought back from El Salvador by midnight on Monday.
The government has said Mr Garcia was deported on 15 March due to an “administrative error”, although they also allege he is a member of the MS-13 gang, which his lawyer denies.
They admit it was an error but they insist on leaving him there anyway.
US Attorney General Pamela Bondi welcomed Justice Roberts’ stay, and said the administration will “continue to
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2 comments
Apr 7th, 2025 10:12 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Whine whine whine. But we caaan’t, it’s too hard, we don’t have enough time, we don’t want to, we have to go potty, we want more ice cream.
The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court for emergency intervention in the case of a Maryland man the government — by its own admission — removed to El Salvador by mistake and now must return by 11:59 p.m. on Monday under a lower court’s order.
Yes we sent him to El Salvador by mistake but it WASN’T OUR FAULT and anyway we can’t get him back right this second because we’re giant babies and we don’t know how.
Abrego Garcia, despite having protected legal status, was sent to the notorious
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6 comments
Apr 7th, 2025 9:37 am |
By Ophelia Benson
All the headlines say “transgender” players instead of “male” players. Every damn one.
Women’s Pool Final Played by Two Transgender Athletes
Two male transgender players. The male bit is important and should be in the headline and the lede. It’s the women’s final and two men played it.
Two transgender players faced-off in the final of a women’s championship pool match on Sunday—adding fuel to the fiery social debate surrounding trans athletes’ participation in women’s sports.
Harriet Haynes and Lucy Smith, who were both assigned male at birth, fought for the title at the Ultimate Pool Women’s Pro Series Event 2 in Wigan in the UK this weekend.
Harriet Haynes and Lucy Smith, who are both men, fought for the … Read the rest
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4 comments
Apr 7th, 2025 9:00 am |
By Ophelia Benson
I have a great idea – let’s stop talking about “asexuality” and instead go back to what it used to be called: low libido.
Funny thing: if you ask Google if “asexuality” is a sexual orientation it says yes and provides a shower of links to politicalish sites, but if you ask about low libido you get medical sites.
Hmmmmm.
Should we just start making all medical issues a matter of idenninny instead of physical realities? Or are we already halfway down that road?
Here’s the Cleveland Clinic on low libido:
Low libido (low sex drive) is a decrease in sexual desire. It’s common and can be temporary or long-term. Libido naturally varies from person to person and can
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1 Comment »
Apr 6th, 2025 6:31 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Originally a comment by Your Name’s not Bruce? on Happy Asexuality Day to those who celebrate.
If you’re not announcing your “asexuality” to the world, how does anyone know to oppress you on the basis of this supposed asexuality? It’s completely invisible, or at least it is until you wave the flag and/or wear the Approved Colours, and having looked them up in the appropriate volume of the Official Licorice All-Sorts Field Guide to Gender Identity Vexillology and Hair Dye Selection (or nearest British Rail Inclusivity Poster), innocent bystanders now know that they probably should be oppressing you in order for them to do their bit, so that you can earn your LGBTQIA%$?@√π Community Martyrdom Merit Badge. It’s the … Read the rest
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3 comments
Apr 6th, 2025 4:49 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Notes on Trump and Denmark and Greenland:
In a Newsmax interview, Trump Jr. accused Denmark of mistreating Greenland. When he was asked about the idea of making Greenland an American territory, he bragged about his father’s prowess: “My father understands how to wield America’s economic might. He understands how to wield America’s military might. He knows how to do these things.”
As to his father’s talk of absorbing Canada and the Panama Canal, Trump Jr. gloated that Americans were “starting to again assert their dominance—not taking a back seat to, you know, little countries that don’t have, again, our economic might.”
All very upfront: we are bullies and we want your stuff and we’re going to take it.… Read the rest
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4 comments
Apr 6th, 2025 3:35 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Oh but they’re so sweet in their Corporate Memphis.
Ok, maybe there is such a thing, but why does it need a day? Why does it need an international day? What is the point of these “days” anyway? They’re not holidays, so what are they for? If you tell me it’s international paper bag day, what are you expecting me to do about it? Who is deciding which days are what, and why haven’t I been consulted? Is there any place where we can lodge a dissent, and demand a different day, or the … Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
22 comments
Apr 6th, 2025 12:41 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Oops, it appears they made a booboo.
English universities are scrambling to review policies related to transgender students and staff amid “anxiety” over whether they comply with free speech duties after the University of Sussex was hit with a record fine.
Several institutions appear to have removed documents from their websites in the wake of the Office for Students’ ruling last week, which found that Sussex failed to uphold its academic freedom obligations when its former professor, Kathleen Stock, was forced to resign because of protests over her gender-critical views.
The case – which saw Sussex fined £585,000 – centred on Sussex’s trans and non-binary equality policy that required academics to “positively represent trans people and trans lives”
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Apr 6th, 2025 10:19 am |
By Ophelia Benson
“Rachel” Saunders trying to convince onlookers that he’s a deep thinker:
My contention is that the history of gender critical discourse is rooted in a reaction against third wave feminist approaches to trans inclusive feminism…
So his contention is that gender critical discourse is rooted in criticism of gender bullshit. Well ya don’t say, Sherlock. How long did it take you to work that one out?
The history of feminist discourse is littered with ascendent ideas which wane as society moves on…
Hahahaha got enough mangled incompatible metaphors in there? How can history be littered with something? How high can ideas ascend? What are the signs of a waning idea? Where does society move on to?
Raymond’s book spurred
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2 comments
Apr 6th, 2025 7:48 am |
By Ophelia Benson
The return of measles:
The measles crisis in West Texas has claimed the life of another child, the second death in an outbreak that has burned through the region and infected dozens of residents in bordering states.
The 8-year-old girl died early Thursday morning of “measles pulmonary failure” at a hospital in Lubbock, Texas, according to records obtained by The New York Times. It is the second confirmed measles death in a decade in the United States.
We’re energetically going backwards. Hey team, let’s bring back lethal epidemics!
If the virus continues to spread at this pace, the country risks losing its measles elimination status, a hard-fought victory earned in 2000. Public health officials in West Texas have
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3 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 5:09 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Hemant Mehta – remember him? – has written a snotty abusive post about Jerry Coyne and his failure to subscribe to trans ideology. It’s not an intellectually respectable attempt.
In an essay published in print yesterday, on the Trans Day of Visibility, biologist Jerry Coyne wrote in the Wall Street Journal (archived link) about his recent self-own against the Freedom From Religion Foundation.
Weeds already. They do dash into them, the gender-worshippers. The sanctimonious “on the Trans Day of Visibility” is downright childish. Wtf is “the Trans Day of Visibility” and why should anyone care and above all why should anyone consider it a sanctified day on which it is unacceptable to say that trans ideology is bullshit? Hey, heads … Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
7 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 10:40 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Originally a comment by maddog at Before you find yourself throwing up your hands in a tizzy.
A separate division denies them their truth to compete as their authentic selves and is antithetical to USA Fencing’s Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) vision.
I call BS. Why is creating separate divisions* for transgender athletes not a proper solution?
One advantage to creating a separate division for trans women athletes is that there would be no need for artificial T suppression, as there would be no need to pretend that the trans woman was an actual woman.
Creating a division for trans women would not “deny them their truth.” “Their truth” consists solely of an internal, unexaminable feeling (or claim of a … Read the rest
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2 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 7:08 am |
By Ophelia Benson
What an unpleasant person.
It’s not “being a bigot” for a woman to object to a man competing in women’s races. It is being a bully and a cheat for a man to compete in women’s races. It’s bizarre for a woman who claims to be a radical to abuse women for … Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
15 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 6:34 am |
By Ophelia Benson
But sir…
From the Scottish Daily Express:
Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has claimed that banning trans women from using female bathrooms is a “dangerous road to go down” as he raised concerns about how this would be policed. He also insisted that he didn’t regret voting for Nicola Sturgeon’s controversial gender reforms, despite the issues they have raised now.
But sir. But sir. You say “dangerous” but what about the danger to women if men who claim to be trans are not banned from using female bathrooms? Why do you worry about the danger to men while ignoring the danger to women? You are aware that male violence to women is a good deal more common than … Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
4 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 6:04 am |
By Ophelia Benson
Aw, diddums.
Lia Thomas left feeling ‘devastated’ and ‘grief’
Is he now the poor wee mite?
Is anyone telling him to think about how girls have been left feeling because of him?
Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas has revealed she felt “devastated” and experienced “grief” after being banned from competing against biological women.
Thomas made these comments whilst serving as a keynote speaker at HiTOPS’ annual Trans Youth Forum at the weekend.
Makes sense. Trans ideology doesn’t work unless everyone is rigorously trained to be indifferent to the harms to women and girls.… Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
2 comments
Apr 5th, 2025 5:40 am |
By Ophelia Benson
This time I’m not the only one saying it, there’s a flood of people saying it. No, you lying shits: the nurses don’t object to trans nurse using their changing room; they object to MALE nurse using their changing room. Stop lying about it.
… Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
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Apr 4th, 2025 4:52 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
Ok let’s see if I can stomach this. Dreadful pompous smug fencing coach in August 2023 telling women and girls why they should take a back seat and like it.
So perhaps, before you dive in, it’s best to call out my beliefs up front before you waste your time reading this and find yourself throwing up your hands in a tizzy.
He means women there. It’s only women who “throw up their hands in a tizzy.” It’s so womany – stupid, weak, emotional, futile. Already we know where we are.
- Trasngender women are women and gender is not sex.
- Transgender fencers deserve the right to compete with the gender they identify with, and those of adult age should comply
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11 comments
Apr 4th, 2025 4:23 pm |
By Ophelia Benson
The rot is deep.
A director on the USA Fencing board once published an opus in support of trans athletes — less than two years before the athletic organization disqualified a female fencer from a tournament because she refused to compete against a trans opponent.
Damien Lehfeldt, the board’s elected at-large director, outlined his staunch position in a long-winded Aug. 30, 2023, blog post, in which he defended the right of trans fencers to compete against women, despite conceding they may have “a physical advantage.”
Can confirm. I started reading it but had to stop – it’s too enraging. I might go back to it later to gather some excerpts. It is indeed long-winded, and of course self-admiring, … Read the rest
Posted in Notes and Comment Blog |
4 comments