All entries by this author

Comply or else

Oct 27th, 2019 11:55 am | By

The hideous bullies at Gendered Intelligence are doing their bit:

We would encourage everyone to write a letter of to GCC expressing your concern about the barrister in question and the new group.

Yeah! Everybody get together to get the black lesbian barrister fired! Social justice, maaaaan.

Jane Clare Jones retorts:

Stop trying to bully women who don’t agree with your ideology you jumped up totalitarians.

The more you bully us, the more people can see that this is not just about asking for compassion, it’s about asking for complete and total compliance.

We. Will. Not. Comply.

Seriously.

Any political project that decides a Black lesbian human rights lawyer is the enemy is not on the right side

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Under investigation

Oct 27th, 2019 11:40 am | By
Under investigation

From the Sunday Times:

A lesbian barrister who is under investigation for her stance on transgender ideology has said her chambers bowed to the “hate mob”.

Allison Bailey is being investigated by Garden Court Chambers after she hailed the launch of the LGB Alliance pressure group, of which she is a founding member.

Bailey was subjected to a torrent of abuse and death threats after she posted on social media: “Gender extremism is about to meet its match.”

The LGB Alliance has said its mission is “asserting the right of lesbians, bisexuals and gay men to define themselves as same-sex attracted”. Its stance that “gender is a social construct” faced immediate opposition from trans groups.

Garden Court said on

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Which vocal minority are we abusing and which are we flattering?

Oct 27th, 2019 10:24 am | By

No you may NOT leave, the doors are all locked, the windows are barred, no one can hear your screams.

Laurie Penny:

There is no LGB without the T. It’s deeply disappointing that a vocal minority has devoted its misguided energies to persecuting its vulnerable trans siblings instead of building a better world together. Transphobia is shameful and has no place in any progressive movement.

But there is LGB without the T, of course. How could there not be? They’re not the same thing, so why have people become so convinced so quickly that there is no one without the other? In one direction, that is – T is allowed to caucus by itself, but LGB is not. But … Read the rest



Evacuate Sonoma County

Oct 27th, 2019 9:15 am | By

This isn’t what global warming will be like, it’s what it is like. This is global warming.

Californian authorities have issued new evacuation orders as wildfires that led to mass power cuts continue to sweep through the state.

The orders, covering large parts of Santa Rosa city, markedly increases the number of residents told to evacuate.

Some 90,000 people had already been ordered to leave towns in northern California.

“Anyone left in this mandatory evacuation areas need to leave now,” the sheriff’s office said in a warning.

The new evacuation order encompasses a huge area of Sonoma County, including Santa Rosa, where an estimated 175,000 people live.

Sonoma County is just north of San Francisco and Marin County; the … Read the rest



Some gross, reductive, naturalizing maternal industrial complex

Oct 26th, 2019 5:45 pm | By

Kate Manne’s next in the series is even loopier. To recap, the first was

Cis women confusing “erasure” with not being at the center of a discourse is fast becoming one of my pet peeves. Why not be inclusive of everyone who menstruates? There is no good reason. Obviously.

Next is

Same when it comes to pregnancy and breast/chestfeeding. The truth is, we *all* gain when these activities aren’t essentialized and made into part of some gross, reductive, naturalizing MIC (maternal industrial complex).

Gain? Gain what? What do I gain from being told that it’s not only women who menstruate, get pregnant, and breast feed? What, exactly, do I gain from that? All I’m conscious of gaining is fury and … Read the rest



One of her pet peeves

Oct 26th, 2019 3:32 pm | By

Kate Manne again:

Cis women confusing “erasure” with not being at the center of a discourse is fast becoming one of my pet peeves. Why not be inclusive of everyone who menstruates? There is no good reason. Obviously.

Women who purport to be feminists who talk contemptuously about “cis women” have been one of my pet peeves for years now.

You cannot do that and be a feminist – it makes no sense. Women are subordinated and dominated and treated with contempt because they are women, so using a hostile neo-label for them that means actual women as opposed to men pretending to be women cannot possibly be combined with advocating an end to that subordination and domination. Women … Read the rest



Book’s off

Oct 26th, 2019 3:15 pm | By

Remember last May when Naomi Wolf was informed on live radio that she was wrong on some of her facts?

A couple of days ago her US publisher just threw the whole book out.

The US publisher of a new book by Naomi Wolf has cancelled its release after accuracy concerns were raised.

Outrages: Sex, Censorship and the Criminalisation of Love details the persecution of homosexuality in Victorian Britain.

But during a BBC radio interview in May, it came to light that the author had misunderstood key 19th Century English legal terms within the book.

Legal terms that were crucial to her whole argument. She thought they recorded executions when they did the opposite.

Following the BBC radio interview,

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Hilarious

Oct 26th, 2019 11:48 am | By

Today Emilia Decaudin tweets:

It’s absolutely hilarious how many transphobic people from other parts of the world feel the need to jump on every tweet coming out of this account.

Was what I posted last night uncouth? Probably. Was I also out with good friends having a good time while being reminded of transphobic violence every time I scrolled through my feeds on my phone? Yes. Was every reply to my tweet ultimately transphobic in nature? Yes.

Uncouth? Not quite the right word, I think. He seems to have deleted the tweet but some of those naughty “transphobic people” kept the record.

Radical feminists can suck this guy’s dick. That’s not really “uncouth,” it’s more like rapey. It doesn’t … Read the rest



Guest post: The Werther Effect

Oct 26th, 2019 11:24 am | By

Originally a comment by Sastra on YOU become responsible.

I just don’t get it.

One of the things therapists are trained to be aware of is what’s called the “Werther Effect,” named for an 18th century fictional character who killed himself, thereby setting off a rash of nonfictional suicides inspired by the romantic depiction. Suicide is in a sense contagious, and telling vulnerable populations that there’s a good chance they will die by their own hand is verboten. Even portraying victims as somehow noble or beset upon is risky — good intentions can backfire. You wouldn’t want to set up a program in high schools warning teens that the most popular reason for teen suicide is breaking up, for … Read the rest



Guest post: A boiling frog effect

Oct 26th, 2019 9:42 am | By

Originally a comment by Artymorty on More carefully, this time.

I can tell you how I understood trans to be part of the Pride rainbow, and I suspect it’s the same for many others:

I wasn’t paying attention to what was going on. In my mind, I always had a vague discomfort with transsexualism’s connection to gender stereotypes, but told myself not to think too much about it because I didn’t know what their experience felt like and I couldn’t judge, analogous to how homophobes don’t know what being gay feels like and don’t understand that it’s not a choice. And besides, these people were gender-role outsiders like us but only more so, coping with homophobia in their own … Read the rest



Woman sets person on fire

Oct 26th, 2019 9:34 am | By
Woman sets person on fire

A striking headline:

Florida woman sets person on fire in Taco Bell, and then may have gone on arson spree, cops say

Underneath is, I guess, a mugshot of the Florida woman:

A Tallahassee woman may have went on a arson spree Wednesday and Thursday, starting at a Taco Bell where a woman was set on fire, cops say.

So apparently the Miami Herald has illiterate reporters and no editors, but more to the point, I’m puzzled as to why in the headline the beardy guy in the photo is called a woman while the woman he doused in gas and set on fire is called a person.

On Wednesday, Mia Williams, a 32-year-old who was born male but identifies

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More carefully, this time

Oct 25th, 2019 3:55 pm | By

Kate Manne

Congratulations to @rachelvmckinnon on her amazing accomplishments! And fuck the haters.

By “haters,” sadly, she means the people – especially the women – who simply don’t think men should compete in women’s races, even if they do “identify as” women.

An observer today:

I’m now absolutely convinced Kate Manne doesn’t understand her own book.

Manne’s reply:

Because I deplore white cis women like you making #downgirl moves to trans women? Um, no. Read my book again. More carefully, this time.

Oh yes, “cis” women objecting to being shoved aside by men who say they are women – those are the women philosopher Kate Manne deplores. In other words all women are privileged and suspect; it’s … Read the rest



MAVA

Oct 25th, 2019 3:07 pm | By

Colorado! Home of the wall!

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You must consult Head Office first

Oct 25th, 2019 3:00 pm | By

You may not leave, you may not choose which people you consider allies, you may not distinguish among reasons or categories, you may not form new organizations, you may not do anything except what you’re told.

@GrahamSmith_ lays out the rules:

The alliance is a deliberate attempt to marginalise and exclude trans people. Trans people have always been part of the lgbt community and to try to exclude them is clearly motivated by transphobia.

Notice the tautology. “Trans people have always been part of the lesbian gay bisexual trans community” – well no shit, Sherlock, it’s right there in the name. But that doesn’t mean people can’t notice that that “community” is actually somewhat randomly assembled, because sexual orientation … Read the rest



One hell of a creepy “true self”

Oct 25th, 2019 11:43 am | By

Via @faintlyfalling

I saw this tweeted out by someone who claims to be a gender therapist. The imagery of your presumed “true self” emerging out of the corpse of your “wrong body” disturbs me greatly.

That, yes, but even more, to me, the creepy anime sprite representing WOMAN. She’s about 10 years old but with tits and presumably the all-important front hole, her eyes are the size of plates, and her hair could roof a building while everything else about her is barely there. Tits, hair, and eyes; what more do you want?!

That’s not what being female is. That stupid toon doesn’t represent Woman or Girl or female, it’s just a sketch of a sex doll.… Read the rest



Oh hai Harvey

Oct 25th, 2019 11:02 am | By

Speaking of horrible dudes who should not be allowed out

A woman comedian was booed and two attendees kicked out after they protested the appearance of disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein at an event for young performers in lower Manhattan on Wednesday night.

Weinstein turned up with an entourage to watch Actor’s Hour, a monthly event “dedicated to artists” at the Downtime bar in the Lower East Side.

Weinstein was welcome, it was the people who objected to his presence who were not. Power and money always come out on top, it seems.

One comedian, Kelly Bachman, called him out in her act onstage, referring to him as “the elephant in the room” and “Freddy Krueger.”

“I didn’t know

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A formal criminal investigation

Oct 25th, 2019 10:31 am | By

A scary dangerous development:

The Justice Department’s review of the origins of the Russia probe has become a criminal investigation, a source familiar with the matter confirmed to NPR.

It is unclear what prompted the shift from an administrative review to a formal criminal investigation, when the change took place or what potential crime is under investigation.

The change drew immediate criticism from Democrats, who have accused Attorney General William Barr of turning the Justice Department into a political weapon for President Trump.

Or to put it another way, the change is obvious and grotesque evidence that Barr is turning the Justice Department into a political weapon for Mob Boss Trump.

“These reports, if true, raise profound new concerns

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Human rights activist abducted in Peshawar

Oct 24th, 2019 5:34 pm | By

Gulalai Ismail reports that her father has been abducted.

A Pakistani human rights activist who recently fled the country to avoid harassment by security agencies says her father has been abducted by unidentified men.

In a tweet Thursday, Gulalai Ismail said Mohammad Ismail was picked up outside a courthouse in the northwestern city of Peshawar.

Her father’s lawyer Fazal Khan confirmed the incident, saying he saw men in plainclothes detain his client after a case relating to an NGO known as “Aware Girls.”

Gulalai Ismail recently went into hiding, then surfaced last month in the U.S. seeking asylum.

Human rights activists in Pakistan are often arrested on suspicion of links with so-called anti-state elements.

Aka being too liberal, too … Read the rest



It’s not just the military aid

Oct 24th, 2019 2:28 pm | By

Even uglier.

The White House’s trade representative in late August withdrew a recommendation to restore some of Ukraine’s trade privileges after John Bolton, then-national security adviser, warned him that President Trump probably would oppose any action that benefited the government in Kyiv, according to people briefed on the matter.

The warning to Robert E. Lighthizer came as Trump was withholding $391 million in military aid and security assistance from Ukraine. House Democrats have launched an impeachment inquiry into allegations that the president did so to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate the business activities of former vice president Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden. As part of the inquiry, lawmakers are closely scrutinizing the White House’s actions between July

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Paid professional dismissal of women

Oct 24th, 2019 2:01 pm | By
Paid professional dismissal of women

Amnesty International has an inspiring inspirational aspirational empowermenting inspiringational tweet for us:

Trans rights are women’s rights.
Queer rights are women’s rights.
Disability rights are women’s rights.
Abortion rights are women’s rights.
Migrant rights are women’s rights.

And women’s rights are human rights.
11:01 AM · Oct 22, 2019· Falcon Social Media Management

Sic. Yes really.

Note the very last item: Falcon Social Media Management. We’ll come back to that.

But first, what is this garbage? What is their point? To remind women that we alone of non-dominant groups don’t get to have our own struggles, our own rights, our own campaigns, our own petitions for redress of grievances? That we alone need constant reminding to Think Of Others instead … Read the rest