From the Telegraph a couple of weeks ago:

Journal of Medical Ethics article defends female genital mutilation

The British Medical Journal Group has published an article defending female genital mutilation (FGM).

Researchers from 25 different global institutions claim the widespread condemnation of the practice is based on “misleading, often racialised, stereotypes” and “Western sensationalism”.

FGM involves the partial or total removal of a female’s external genitalia, or other cutting of the organs, for non-medical reasons.

Like the “Because Mohammed said so” reasons.

More than 230 million girls and women around the world have had their genitalia mutilated, mostly commonly in Africa, but also in parts of Asia and the Middle East, usually on historic religious or cultural grounds.

But they look like Barbie dolls between the legs, so it’s fine.

However, writing in the BMJ Group’s Journal of Medical Ethics, researchers from around the world, including the UK, have defended FGM and “rejected” the use of the word “mutilation”. Instead, they label it “female genital practices” so they can “refer inclusively and descriptively to a diverse set of practices without prejudging their ethical, medical or cultural status”.

Not all that “inclusively”. Not inclusive of girls and women who struggled and screamed, for example.

“Most affected women themselves rarely use the word ‘trauma’ to describe their experiences of the practices. If they describe the experiences in negative terms, they may use words such as ‘difficult’ or ‘painful’,” the authors write.

“Even if women report unwanted upsetting memories, heightened vigilance, sleep disturbance, recurrent memories or flashbacks during medical consultations, a prior genital procedure may not be the primary cause for their distress,” they add.

Stop right there. It’s not a “procedure”. It’s not medical. It’s an intrusion, a removal, a stitching up, a scraping – a mutilation. There is no medical reason to tamper with girls’ genitalia. There is no “procedure”.

The essay also blames the “mainstream media coverage of female genital practices in Africa” for relying on “sources from within a well-organised opposition”.

Mmmyeah. How dare opponents of slashing female genitals be an organized opposition.

“In North America, Australia and European countries like the UK and Sweden, such coverage has frequently fallen short of journalistic standards of impartiality, often using stigmatising and denigrating language that fuels suspicion and surveillance of migrant communities,” the authors write.

They add that the press has “played a central role” in the “abolitionist narrative of ‘FGM’”, and call out the Guardian newspaper’s “Global Media Campaign to End FGM”, as well as the BBC and CNN’s “advocacy-driven coverage focused on eradication, often lacking cultural nuance”.

Some cultural nuance needs to be lacked.

With all its faults, twitterx is still a great place to find terrible people bluntly informing us on how terrible they are.

For Women Scotland are quoting Nicola Sturgeon:

Yes yes yes by all means protect women’s rights, that’s important, yes indeed, BUT – first you gotta protect trans people, and then if there’s any protect left over, you can give that to women. Clear?

It’s the women and equalities minister again.

Bridget Phillipson has warned her critics that transgender people must not be used as a “political punchbag” amid accusations that she is blocking guidance on single-sex spaces.

The women and equalities minister’s comments come in the face of criticism that she is delaying the publication of the draft guidance, which was submitted to the government by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) in September.

She’s told you: she has to read it first. That obviously takes way more than a mere five months.

Phillipson told the Political Currency podcast this week that her own experiences of running a women’s refuge informed her view of “how important it is that women have spaces that are women-only”.

She continued: “Feminists and campaigners fought for a very, very long time to establish that principle and it is an important principle, but it’s there for a good reason because it’s about safety for women and about having the space and the time to really heal after trauma.

“But I don’t see that as being in conflict with making sure you can treat trans people with dignity and respect as well. We have had the Supreme Court ruling, which I welcome.”

But it’s gone way beyond dignity and respect. It’s more like worship and submission.

“I’ve now received the code of practice from the EHRC. We’ve got to go through that properly and thoroughly.

“But in recent times trans people have been used as a political punchbag in order to make an argument. We’ve got to take a step back from this and do it responsibly.”

In order to make what argument?

It’s a good deal more the other way around: trans people use women as a punchbag, political and otherwise.

Phillipson said the “majority” of the public accepted the need for female-only provision, and that there were valid questions of “fairness” on issues including women’s sport.

She added: “I think that’s where the majority of people are but at the same time we’re a compassionate nation, commonsense in their approach. We don’t abuse or target trans people because of who they are, that’s not … in keeping with what people would believe.”

No, we don’t abuse or target trans people, but they abuse and target us. Check out India Willoughby and Sophie Molly and Sarah Jane Baker to name just a few.

“But you do need to make sure you’ve got fairness in areas like sport and good access for services for women.”

She says, grudgingly. Ok ok those stupid women want fairness in sports and “good access for services” – whatever that means – so they can have it, but then they need to sit down and shut up. Trans people are much more important, and, dare I say it, more interesting.

Originally a comment by Artymorty on New York New York.

Israel is a political entity, a nation, one that is currently led by a far-right political apparatus that is unabashedly racist, and which is actively opposed by a large number of the citizenry under its present leadership.

Anti-semitism is a worldview, an ideology, that is held in deep disrepute — rightly — because it generalizes a heterogeneous group of people — those who identify as Jewish — as universally subhuman or evil. Antisemitism is almost superstitious in that it attributes negative forces to a group of people based on nothing but the almost-arbitrary line between who counts as Jewish and who doesn’t. The fact that the defining line between a Jew and a gentile is virtually impossible to police is just the beginning of a long chain of logical absurdities behind that reasoning.

But ironically, the Israeli state, as it’s seen by its current far-right leaders, actually works to empower antisemitism because it actively works to harden the fuzzy line between Jewishness and non-Jewishness, and, so it believes, between Israeli-ness and non-Israeli-ness.

The argument against anti-semitism in today’s climate rests largely on the fact that Jewishness is NOT synonymous with political alignment with the far-right Netanhayhu regime. Naturally, the Jewish extremists have sought to associate opposition to their strain of Jewishness with antisemitism as a concept because in the confusion around boundaries in the present political situation, that’s the angle that gets them the most clout.

It’s the exact same playbook as the Islamists who plotted to position Muslim identity itself as synonymous with a legal right to segregate males and females and to discriminate against gays. We all saw the fallout when the Southern Poverty Law Centre took the position that liberal Muslims were the enemy: they framed moderate Muslims as active bigots for dissenting with, and therefore undermining, the hardline conservative Muslim movement. The uninspected assumption was that more hardline Muslims were more “oppressed” somehow. It was a strange chain of logic that they kinda sleepwalked into, which would not withstand serious scrutiny. (They paid millions in damages after facing lawsuits.)

Same shit with the activists who insist that far-right Israeli Netanyahu-ism is directly analagous to Jewish identity.

I now work in the Jewish neighbourhood in my city, and pretty much all of the Jews I interact with have nothing to do with the Netanyahu-ists. It seems so strange that in broader politics the far right have succeeded in co-opting my friends’ identities for their political goals. They don’t identify with that mess, and it appalls me that they should face any kind of splashback discrimination because of it. They’re innocent.

Day one.

Israel’s foreign ministry has accused the New York mayor, Zohran Mamdani, of pouring “antisemitic gasoline on an open fire” after he reversed a recent order by the outgoing mayor, Eric Adams.

“On his very first day as @NYCMayor, Mamdani shows his true face: he scraps the IHRA definition of antisemitism and lifts restrictions on boycotting Israel. This isn’t leadership. It’s antisemitic gasoline on an open fire,” the foreign ministry said in a post on X.

Mamdani revoked an Adams-era order that adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism, which the previous administration said included “demonizing Israel and holding it to double standards as forms of contemporary antisemitism”.

Israel is not the same thing as being Jewish, but that’s not to say that hatred of Israel has no connection at all to hatred of Jews.

From Mother Jones last September:

Colleagues call Gordon Guyatt the “godfather” of evidence-based medicine.

Guyatt, a distinguished professor of medicine at McMaster University in Canada, has had sweeping influence on medical research: GRADE, the framework he helped pioneer to assess the evidence behind clinical recommendations, is a standard at more than 100 medical organizations, including the WHO. Before Guyatt, medicine relied much more on the judgment calls of senior clinicians; today, standardized research is increasingly central.

Guyatt was also, until August, a reluctant icon of the movement against trans health care.

Hang on. Let’s be clear. What are we meaning by “trans health care”? Health care for people who idennify as trans? Or health care that cures the disease of being trans? Or “health care” that assists people who are trying to look like the other sex?

His was by far the biggest name associated with the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM), a group known for casting doubt on the safety and efficacy of gender-affirming care by framing it as risky and supported only by “low-quality” evidence within the GRADE framework.

There, that’s clearer. Gender-affirming care is not the same thing as trans health care, which can mean just standard health care used by/for people who idennify as trans.

Speaking to me on a video call, the bespectacled doctor emphatically called it “an unconscionable use of our work to deny people gender-affirming care”—insisting that, until student activists at McMaster spoke out about the collaboration, he hadn’t been fully aware of SEGM’s involvement with the university’s research on transgender health care.

Good, that’s clear. Now all we have to wonder about is an adult doctor claiming there’s such a thing as “gender-affirming care.” Does lipstick count as gender-affirming care?

A key argument advanced by opponents of gender-affirming care is that its treatments are only supported by “weak” or “low-quality” evidence, as the SEGM–affiliated reviews and others have found.

The thing is, so are a lot of standard—and essential—medical interventions. Cancer drugs have a notoriously low-quality evidence base, including many FDA-approved treatments. Almost all nutritional guidelines are supported by what Guyatt’s system labels poor evidence. About five million youth have asthma in the United States—yet the evidence for medical guidelines for pediatric asthma care is regularly rated “poor” or “weak,” as are many of the treatments, which have indisputably saved countless lives. 

Ahhhh but there’s a crucial difference here. “Gender-affirming care” is not the same kind of thing as medical interventions. It’s an intervention, but not a medical one. It’s a thoughts intervention, a psychic intervention, an ideological intervention, an emotional intervention. It’s a fantasy-endorsing intervention, which is a pretty bizarre concept.

Mother Jones of course would not dream of admitting that.

John Cleese terfing like a boss.

Trump wants to control what we are allowed to know.

The Trump administration escalated pressure on the Smithsonian this week, threatening to withhold federal funds if it does not submit extensive documentation for a sweeping content review. President Donald Trump earlier this year set out to purge what he called “improper ideology” from the nation’s most prestigious museum system, efforts that are expected to intensify as his administration tries to shape the country’s 250th anniversary celebrations next year.

Ah yes improper ideology, meaning history that Trump doesn’t want to hear about and doesn’t want us to hear about.

In a staff email obtained by The Washington Post, sent Friday evening after the funding threat, Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III said the Smithsonian had sent information to the White House in September and intended to submit more that day. He asserted that “all content, programming, and curatorial decisions are made by the Smithsonian.”

Well it sounds as if Trump is going to change that.

“Funds apportioned for the Smithsonian Institution are only available for use in a manner consistent with Executive Order 14253 ‘Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,’ and the fulfillment of the requests set forth in our Aug. 12, 2025 letter,” Haley and Vought wrote. The letter specifically referenced the Museum of American History, the Museum of Natural History, the Air and Space Museum, the Museum of African American History and Culture, the Museum of the American Indian, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Museum of African Art and the National Portrait Gallery.

Trump and his enforcers are not the right people to be “restoring truth and sanity” to anything, let alone to the Smithsonian.

An earlier letter, in August, called for an aggressive review of eight museums to ensure they align with the president’s directive to “celebrate American exceptionalism” and asked the Smithsonian tosubmit all requested materials within 75 days and “begin implementing content corrections” within 120.

It’s very totalitarian, this stuff. Normal presidents, even very conservative ones, don’t do this telling all the government institutions what to do thing – it’s not their job, it’s not their territory, it’s not what they’re hired to do. Trump doesn’t have the authority to do these things, but he’s doing them anyway.

The Trump administration amplified its rhetoric over the summer, with the president posting on social media that the nation’s museums are “essentially, the last remaining segment of ‘WOKE’” and that the Smithsonian is too focused on “how bad Slavery was.” 

Ah. Is that so. How focused is the right amount of focus, I wonder? Should we ignore it entirely? Should we pretend it just plain never happened, and that if it did happen it was a good thing? Do we all wish our grandparents and their grandparents had been enslaved? Do we think that’s a proud bit of our history? Do we buy the old Southern myth that slavery was a good thing for the enslaved?

Trans people must not be used as political punchbag, says Phillipson

Eh? Who is using trans people as any kind of punchbag?

From where I sit it’s much more the other way around – women are constantly and relentlessly pushed around and told to shut up and deprived of our rights by the trans lobby.

Transgender people must not be used as a “political punchbag”, Bridget Phillipson has said, after she was accused of blocking guidance protecting safe spaces for women. The minister for women and equalities said the debate surrounding gender issues should be conducted more responsibly by those in public life.

Ms Phillipson made the remarks after it emerged she was blocking the publication of trans guidance that would force business and public bodies to protect women-only spaces.

In other words she’s using women as a punchbag.

Source currently unknown.

Dude is unfamiliar with the concept of going for a walk.

President Donald Trump told The Wall Street Journal in an interview published Thursday that he takes a higher dose of aspirin than his doctors have recommended, blaming that for the visible hand bruises that have generated renewed questions about his health.

“They say aspirin is good for thinning out the blood, and I don’t want thick blood pouring through my heart,” Trump, 79, said of why he takes a larger dose. “I want nice, thin blood pouring through my heart. Does that make sense?”

“They’d rather have me take the smaller one,” Trump added. “I take the larger one, but I’ve done it for years, and what it does do is it causes bruising.”

Good. Keep doing that. Ignore what the medics advise and act on your own superior wisdom.

Aspirin helps thin the blood, which can prevent clots from forming, but it also comes with the risk of excessive bleeding. In recent years, medical guidelines stopped recommending daily aspirin for many adults because the risks outweigh the benefits, and some suggest halting aspirin therapy entirely when patients are in their 70s.

Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a professor at George Washington University’s School of Medicine and Health Sciences who was a longtime cardiologist for former Vice President Dick Cheney, said the latest updates from Trump and his team raise more questions than they answer.

“It’s uncommon to see that kind of bruising with one aspirin a day,” Reiner said. “My question is, ‘Does the president take any medications that have not been disclosed by the White House?’”

…

Reiner said 325 milligrams of aspirin each day is not a very high dose, but there’s no medical reason to take that much on a daily basis. When someone sprains an ankle, he said, they might get a 325 milligrams of aspirin every four hours, which would be considered a high dose.

“Aspirin has been studied in varied doses, and the reason why 81 milligrams is given to people is that’s the dose which appears to have the best combination of protection from clotting events and bleeding caused by the drug,” Reiner said. “In other words, 325 milligrams increases the bleeding risk but doesn’t increase the efficacy. So we never use that.”

But Trump does, because he knows better.

Trump also addressed steps he has taken to treat other conditions, including swelling in his lower legs that the White House announced in July was due to chronic venous insufficiency — a common condition frequently found in older people.

Trump told the Journal he tried compression socks but “didn’t like them.” He also suggested he was not interested in taking up regular exercise.

“I just don’t like it. It’s boring,” Trump said. “To walk on a treadmill or run on a treadmill for hours and hours like some people do, that’s not for me.”

There it is – there’s the idea so stupid that no one else could have come up with it.

He can’t possibly walk somewhere scenic and interesting, no no, it’s a treadmill or nothing.

Granted there are security issues but other presidents have managed to go for walks or runs all the same. Trump would rather squat in a golf cart than walk 100 yards.

Originally a comment by maddog on Everybody across all.

Stephenson added that she believes in the importance of protecting the rights of all, including trans people, in the debate around single-sex spaces.

“The rights of trans people” with respect to “single-sex spaces” include the right of trans-identified women to access women’s single-sex spaces, and the right of trans-identified men to access men’s single-sex spaces. The waffling term “trans people” allows everyone to interpret Stephenson’s statement as supporting their own particular viewpoint.

If “trans people” means, just as it says, transgender people in general, then Stephenson must be contemplating the two different sexes of trans people: ie., those trans people who are of the male sex, and those who are of the female sex. Transgender people who are actually female are obviously included in the set of people entitled to use women’s single-sex facilities.

However, if Stephenson is using the term “trans people” as an equivocation for “trans women” (ie., men), then Stephenson’s statement is far more concerning. Saying “trans people” when the speaker means only “trans women” (men), is a common obfuscation. It betrays that the real purpose of the transgender agenda is to destroy women’s rights. Transgenderism is a men’s rights movement. The men are the only “trans people” who count. Any women who also happen to be transgender are beneath consideration. Their existence doesn’t even enter into the equation. Women don’t matter, same as ever.

I don’t trust Stephenson’s statement. I think she intends to favor the “rights” of “trans women” (aka, men), to the detriment of and at the expense of women, while ignoring “trans men” altogether, and acting as if they are not “trans people.”

Ok we’re not allowed to throw the front door open to them, but we can open a window in the back.

A transgender row is threatening to tear the Women’s Institute apart.

The National Federation of Women’s Institutes (NFWI), the institute’s umbrella organisation, announced earlier this month it would ban transgender women from becoming members in line with the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling on sex and gender.

But it has now been accused of attempting to “breach the law” by creating “sisterhood” groups that would be open to transgender women.

But transgender women=men, so creating sisterhood is not possible. If you’re a sheep farmer you can’t create sheephood groups that would be open to wolves, because wolves are not sheep and wolves like to eat sheep. On both epistemic and safety grounds, these back door arrangements are not reasonable.

The nationwide network of trans-inclusive groups will allow “all people, including transgender women, to come together to socialise, learn from each other and share their experiences of living as women”.

Men don’t have any experiences of living as women. They can’t; it’s not possible. Why do we have to keep repeating such an obvious and familiar fact. Tigers don’t have any experiences of living as rabbits and men don’t have any experiences of living as women.

Cathy Larkman, of the Women’s Rights Network, told The Times that the plans were “highly disturbing”.

“It’s highly disturbing that there is a cohort of women in the WI who are not only determined to either circumnavigate or completely breach the law but … are also entirely willing to trample over the rights of all the other women in their group to continue admitting men,” she said.

“I suggest these women leave the WI and find a mixed-sex organisation to join instead, where they will be free to prioritise men.”

That. Make your own god damn groups that welcome all genders yadda yadda; just stop hijacking the existing groups that were set up for women and women only.

It’s called stalling.

The government is facing renewed pressure to publish delayed guidance on single-sex spaces after the new chair of the equalities watchdog insisted the document was “legally sound”.

Dr Mary-Ann Stephenson addressed the issue of the guidance after replacing Baroness Falkner of Margravine as head of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) earlier this month.

The EHRC submitted its updated code of practice to Bridget Phillipson, the women and equalities minister, in September. But four months on, the guidance, which will be used by businesses and other organisations to inform their provision of single-sex services such as toilets and changing rooms, is still awaiting ministerial approval.

The government has defended the delay in publication, saying it needed time to properly assess the complex 300-page document.

They might as well say the dog ate their homework. The government has had time, months of it. They just don’t want to, because The Ideology has eaten their brains too.

Rosie Duffield, a former Labour politician who stands as an independent MP after resigning from the party, said in the wake of Stephenson’s comments women’s groups were “furious” about the delay and urged the government to act.

Duffield, who has been a long-time campaigner for female-only spaces and services to remain single sex, told The Times: “As the chair of the EHRC says, the work they have done is comprehensive and legally sound. All the government have to do is implement that and give clear guidance to the organisations who have been waiting for almost five months now.

“They have to abide by the Supreme Court’s ruling and have said they will, so why the huge gap between saying that and acknowledging the work of the EHRC, who have issued clear and straightforward guidance?”

Because they don’t want the trans lobby shouting at them. That’s obviously much more important than women and our pesky rights.

Maya Forstater, chief executive of Sex Matters, which campaigns for single-sex rights, warned that any further delays could land the government in court. She said: “The government seems to be engaged in a frantic search for loopholes in the Supreme Court’s judgment that sex in the Equality Act means biology, not paperwork.

“This is a shameful way to behave. Rather than dragging its feet, the government needs to lay the EHRC guidance before parliament without delay, and moreover ensure all its own policies comply with the law. The government has only two choices: follow the law or change the law. If it continues to prevaricate, it will end up in court.”

But ending up in court is much less scary than being yelled at by Sophie Molly and India Willoughby.

How not to show solidarity.

Minnesota Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan is facing a firestorm of criticism from conservative figures and political commentators after appearing in a hijab during a visit to a Somali market in Minneapolis.

The incident took place at the Karmel Somali Market, where Flanagan—flanked by Somali leaders and speaking in part in Arabic—opened with the greeting “Salam alaikum” and told viewers: “The Somali community is part of the fabric of the state of Minnesota.”

But the hijab is part of the fabric of the oppression and repression of women. Women in Afghanistan and Iran are beaten and imprisoned (or worse) for not wearing the hijab. It’s not a nice cuddly symbol of nice cuddly religion, it’s a concealment and repression of women imposed and violently enforced by men.

I’m pleased to see that I’m not the only one who emphatically insists that trans ideology is indeed an ideology.

Helen Lewis gives the prize to For Women Scotland.

If only people would tell the truth in these discussions, it would save so much time and effort. The endless evasions and concealments just prolong the misery.

THE new head of the UK’s human rights watchdog has said she will “endeavour” to protect trans people amid the ongoing row over access to single-sex spaces.

What does that mean? Protect them how? Nobody is trying to beat trans people up, so what kind of protection do they need? Spell it out!

Mary-Ann Stephenson said she is keen to “uphold the rights of everybody across all protected characteristics”, having taken up her role as Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) chair at the beginning of December despite a campaign to block the appointment.

Which rights?

Spell it out.

It’s not possible, for instance, to protect women’s rights to women-only spaces and women’s prizes and women’s awards and protect men’s “rights” to be treated as women in all circumstances without exception. If that’s the contradiction you’re trying to avoid, you have to spell it out so that everyone can point out you can’t do both. You can’t give men everything that belongs to women without violating the rights of women.

Some trans rights activists had argued that her track record suggested a “history of alignment with organisations and narratives that have contributed to the marginalisation of trans people in the UK”.

Who said that bit in the quotation marks? The Telegraph doesn’t say, so I asked Google, which gave me this article. So who said it? If it’s the Telegraph who said it, right here in this article, why is it in quotation marks? Surely it’s a basic duty of journalism to make that kind of thing clear.

Stephenson added that she believes in the importance of protecting the rights of all, including trans people, in the debate around single-sex spaces.

Well if by “including trans people” you mean protecting their non-existent “rights” to demolish women’s rights, then you can’t possibly protect the rights of all. Obliterating the rights of half the population is not the path to that goal.

She said: “I would say, you know, judge me on what I do. I am really keen, I think it’s really important for the chair of the EHRC to uphold the rights of everybody across all protected characteristics.

“I think it’s really important when we’re looking at this issue around single-sex spaces, to make sure that you also protect the rights of trans people. And yes, I will endeavour to do that.”

You can’t. You can’t. You can’t. Swallow the bitter pill. It is not possible. If you think men who idennify as trans have a right to be in single-sex spaces for women, and you act accordingly, then you will be doing the opposite of protecting the rights of women.

Fucking hell this gets exhausting. Years and years spent telling grown-ass adults they can’t square the circle, and nobody budges. “And yes, I will endeavour to square the circle forever and ever and ever.”

The Government has said it will not be rushed in publishing an updated code of practice which will be used by businesses and other organisations to inform their provision of single and separate-sex services such as toilets and changing rooms.

No doubt because the Government knows you can’t square the circle and doesn’t want to be yelled at. We’re stuck at the red light forever.

The Women’s and Some Men’s Institute.

The Women’s Institute is facing a potential schism after one of its leaders advised members to hold “sisterhood” meetings to get around a ban on transgender women, The Times can reveal.

Funny kind of sisterhood, trying to sneak men into an organization for women.

The suggestion prompted warnings that such a move could mark the end of the 110-year-old female-only network.

Oh stop with the “could” shit. Don’t be ridiculous. It would do that by definition. Of course adding men to the WI would – not could, would – mark the end of the female-only network.

This month the National Federation of Women’s Institutes (NFWI) said it had decided to exclude trans women, males who identify as female, from joining the WI. Its chief executive Melissa Green said the decision had been taken with the “utmost regret and sadness” but insisted the single-sex organisation had no choice after a Supreme Court ruling in April defined “man” and “woman” as referring to biological sex under equality law.

Well phooey on Melissa Green. Men are not women.

The ban has been welcomed by gender-critical WI members who insist people cannot change sex and have previously railed against trans women being allowed to join.

Rude. Cynically, deliberately rude. Men insist or argue, women rail or rant or rage or squawk.

However, an internal “trans inclusion” meeting held via Zoom this month revealed the WI is now facing a split and discussions are under way among other members about defying the trans policy, which will come into effect next April.

The online session was hosted by Angie Leach, co-chair of the Surrey Federation of Women’s Institutes, which represents 8,000 women in WI groups across the county. A recording of the event seen by The Times showed Leach encouraging members to circumvent the ban by allowing trans women to attend the unofficial sisterhood meetings.

Why? Why is it so urgent to get some men into a thing for women?

Other women in the Zoom chat warned that the ban was “divisive and cruel” and would split the WI. Another member said trans allies within the WI were “a bit like a resistance”. Leach agreed that the new rules preventing trans women joining the WI were going to be “hateful”, expressing her distaste at the idea there would be a “hierarchy of women” whereby some were deemed to be more of a woman than others.

Wrong. Men are “deemed” to be zero a woman, by definition, because men are not women just as women are not men. Bucks are not does, stallions are not mares, cocks are not hens, bulls are not cows, men are not women.

Questions questions.

Trump-Kennedy Center says it plans to sue jazz musician who canceled Christmas performance over Trump name change

Well look. Suppose you’re booked to do a performance at a fundraiser for women in Afghanistan, and then after you signed up, the fundraiser is taken over by the Taliban. You would know the funds raised would not be going to women in Afghanistan, wouldn’t you. So, not wanting to fund the Taliban, you would cancel, right?

This is like that. A gig at the Kennedy Center is not the same thing as a gig at the Trump-Kennedy Center.

The Trump-Kennedy Center, led by President Donald Trump’s appointee Richard Grenell, says it is planning to file a $1 million lawsuit “after the holidays” against jazz musician Chuck Redd.

It comes after the artist canceled a Christmas Eve performance after Trump’s name was added to the building’s signage, a spokesperson for the center confirmed to ABC News on Monday.

After, and because. Post hoc ET propter hoc.

The threat to file a $1 million lawsuit was expressed by Grenell, the center’s president, in a letter that was addressed to Redd and obtained by ABC News.

“Your decision to withdraw at the last moment—explicitly in response to the Center’s recent renaming, which honors President Trump’s extraordinary efforts to save this national treasure—is classic intolerance and very costly to a non-profit Arts institution.”

What exactly are Trump’s extraordinary efforts to save this national treasure? Was it in danger of collapse or sliding into the Potomac or being redesigned as a gas station?