Category: Notes and Comment Blog

Jo Bartosch on the sudden cancellation of Róisín Murphy:

Murphy’s crime was to have been forthright about her views on the use of experimental puberty-blocking drugs on children who are confused about their gender.

…

Murphy’s views are certainly not unfounded. Medical opinion across the world is now shifting against the use of puberty blockers to treat childhood gender distress. And yet Murphy could not have put a larger target on her own back had she announced her engagement to President Putin, with Andrew Tate as celebrant.

…

This week, it was reported that Ninja Tune, the record label behind Murphy’s long-awaited upcoming album, Hit Parade, has halted all marketing and promotion of her work. It has also committed to sharing proceeds from the new album with pro-trans groups. Today it was announced that two of her London gigs have been cancelled.

Punish punish punish the non-compliant woman. Keep punishing her until there is no punishment left.

It is a symptom of a profound social sickness that expressing concern over the safety of children leads to such hostility and public shaming. The real opprobrium should be reserved for those ghoulish medics and influencers who promote the myth of the transgender child, and who are harming countless numbers of children in the process.

Oh but it’s all fully reversible, they keep assuring us of that.

This guy is a medical doctor – it says so on the tin. And yet, he thinks a single word can change people’s sex.

Trans women are women.
Not “cheating men.”

Glad I could clear that up for you! #TransRightsAreHumanRights

— Alastair McAlpine, MD (@AlastairMcA30) September 1, 2023

He’s been trying to bully Martina.

When I was young, Martina Navratilova was accused of being too “butch and muscled” to compete against “normal women.” It was vile.

Now she’s bullying trans folk for being too “butch and muscled” to compete against “normal women.” Still vile.

The bullied become bullies.

— Alastair McAlpine, MD (@AlastairMcA30) August 25, 2023

Peak argumentative skills: put quotation marks on things people never said. Martina doesn’t bully anyone for being “too butch.” What a ridiculous claim. She doesn’t talk in terms of “normal women,” either.

I wouldn’t want to get a flu shot from that guy.

Proud dude sentenced to 17 years.

A leader of the far-right Proud Boys has been sentenced to 17 years in prison, one of the longest terms yet handed out over the US Capitol riot. US Army veteran Joe Biggs, 38, was an instigator of the storming of Congress on 6 January 2021, prosecutors said.

Another Proud Boys member, Zachary Rehl, was sentenced on Thursday to 15 years, also on a charge of seditious conspiracy. Rehl, a former US Marine and leader of the Philadelphia branch of the Proud Boys, was seen on video spraying a chemical irritant at officers outside the Capitol during the riot.

Biggs was convicted of a slew of charges in May, including seditious conspiracy, intimidation or threats to prevent officials from discharging their duties, and interference with law enforcement during civil disorder.

…

In court, federal prosecutor Jason McCullough said the crimes were “very serious” and that a stiff sentence would send a message ahead of next year’s presidential election. “There is a reason why we will hold our collective breaths as we approach future elections… They pushed this to the edge of a constitutional crisis,” he said.

Prosecutors used text messages, social media posts and videos to show that the Proud Boys were involved in a co-ordinated effort to stop the certification of the 2020 election at the Capitol.

It wasn’t just playacting, it wasn’t just boys getting a little overexcited, it was the real thing. It could happen again. It could succeed this time.

He’s absolutely right.

Idea known perpetrator of violence can get off scott free consequences of their very public incitement towards women, said with conviction, because they were having a "larf" – as opposed to this betraying aggravated contempt for said group – so back to front preposterous & sick.

— Shahrar Ali (@ShahrarAli) September 1, 2023

But see women don’t get to cite aggravated contempt. We’re not eligible. Racial minorities are eligible, LGB people are eligible, god-botherers are eligible, trans people are super eligible, but women are not. Some women are of course included in racial minorities and religions, some of course are lesbians, but women qua women are not entitled to claim that misogynist abuse is aggravated anything. We’re too privileged for that.

Preposterous and sick indeed.

I wish Seattle would do the same.

Paris says au revoir to rental e-scooters

They’re a menace. It’s like allowing people to drive their cars on the sidewalks.

A ban on rental electric scooters has come into effect in Paris in response to a rising number of people being injured and killed in the French capital.

…

Paris is now one of the first capitals to have outlawed the rented electric vehicles, just five years after being one of the first to adopt them.

Come on, Seattle, do the same.

As a cyclist of the traditional variety, I am more than a little peeved by the way electric “personal vehicles” like e-scooters are crowding out our space. Forty years campaigning for cycle paths, only to be squeezed to the side by a new kind of motorised transport – that gets one’s goat.

Nor do I take kindly to what – as a father of young children – I have in recent years witnessed all too regularly: scooters powering down the pavement and requiring urgent avoidance. A good friend of mine broke a rib when he was knocked over by an e-scooter in Paris. This was last year, and it still hurts when he coughs.

Pedestrians on the sidewalk. Everyone else – including people riding bicycles – on the street.

Keith Olbermann really is a piece of dung.

Second team all-conference. Happily for nasty, stupid, unsuccessful transphobe @Riley_Gaines_ she has no reputation to ruin

Anyhoo, don't forget to listen to the Countdown podcast because Trump also sucks: https://t.co/IFzDwY6MdN pic.twitter.com/hkc52w4YOV

— Keith Olbermann (@KeithOlbermann) August 31, 2023

I guess that whole revival of feminism thing was a hallucination. It’s still 1960 and women are still a joke and a punching bag.

The BBC account of Baker’s girlish prank:

A transgender activist who told a crowd to “punch a terf” has been cleared of intentionally encouraging the commission of an offence.

Because telling a crowd to punch feminist women in the face is not encouraging the commission of an offence. It’s…something else. Crocheting, or rock climbing, or tennis. Something.

The court heard that during the arrest, which Baker live-streamed on to social media, she said “don’t punch terfs, I’m really sorry I said that”. The court was told she accepted she had said the words but denied any intent to incite violence.

See that’s the special kind of trans activist urging people to stab or choke or punch feminist women – the kind that has absolutely no intent to incite violence. This applies especially to Baker, who was in prison for…er…extreme violence.

Baker is the subject of a life sentence for the attempted murder of a fellow inmate she attacked when in prison serving a sentence for kidnapping and torturing her stepmother’s 19-year-old brother.

See? With that kind of history it’s obvious that he didn’t mean to incite violence. Right?

Baker told the court: “The only people suffering more than us is migrants – thank God I’m not a transgender migrant.”

She added: “We’re living in dark times and this anti-trans rhetoric is being actively encouraged by our government.”

But anti-female rhetoric about punching women is an entirely different kind of thing and clearly not intended to incite violence.

When Deputy Chief Magistrate Tan Ikram found Baker not guilty, the public gallery applauded.

Yay! He sounds like such a great guy, doesn’t he?

Of course it’s not.

There has been some confusion about prosecutorial decisions of late. What follows is not aimed at any particular case. I know not why some cases are prosecuted and other are not. But the points below are perhaps not widely known.

— Roddy Dunlop KC (@RoddyQC) August 30, 2023

3- the PF is not obliged to prosecute every reported crime. Again, there is a discretion.

4- once more, however, the discretion not to prosecute is removed, of at least tightly circumscribed, where there is an aggravation.

— Roddy Dunlop KC (@RoddyQC) August 30, 2023

7- likewise, being gender critical may be covered under the Equality Act. But it is not covered by aggravations under the criminal law.

— Roddy Dunlop KC (@RoddyQC) August 30, 2023

Of course. Of course. Of course. Racial minorities matter. Religious people matter. People with non-conformist sexual orientations matter. People who have swapped gender matter. But women? Pffff. Women don’t matter. Who cares about women? They can just take their lumps. Stupid cows.

(Bit of a fuckup that lesbians apparently matter, but no doubt that’s discreetly managed by just looking the other way when a lesbian is assaulted.)

8- accordingly, neither an assault on a woman for being a woman, or for being a gender critical woman, is an aggravated crime. A report of such could be dealt with by police warning, or not prosecuted by the PF, under the discretions mentioned above.

— Roddy Dunlop KC (@RoddyQC) August 30, 2023

Why? Because women don’t matter. Never forget that.

Final tweet:

10- what this means is a breach of the peace involving verbal abuse of certain minorities must be prosecuted; but the assault of a woman does not have to be. Whether this is desirable or advisable I leave to others. But it’s where the law stands right now.

It’s not desirable.

From the Toronto Star:

Róisín Murphy’s record label ceases promotion of her new record following transphobic social media comments

Subhead:

The Irish singer-songwriter is facing heavy backlash following inflammatory social comments about the trans community.

Nice neutral reporting you got there – her comments are “transphobic” and “inflammatory” right out of the gate.

For the billionth time I have to point out that the news media have never reported on misogyny in this way. Femalephobic inflammatory comments and indeed whole articles are commonplace, and journalists don’t even notice, let alone shriek about phobia and inflammation.

Róisín Murphy’s record label is ceasing all marketing and promotion of “Hit Parade,” the Irish singer’s highly anticipated album just days before the project’s release date, a source told the Star.

That is outrageous and disgusting, especially since what she said isn’t even “transphobic.” She didn’t say she hates trans people, she didn’t even say men are not women, she said “puberty blockers are FUCKED” and “little mixed up kids are vulnerable and need to be protected.” None of that=hatred of trans people.

Last week, a screenshot began circulating online that appeared to show comments made on Murphy’s personal Facebook account calling young trans people “little mixed up kids,” and criticizing puberty blockers.

She didn’t “call young trans people ‘little mixed up kids,’” she could perfectly well have meant that little kids who think they’re trans are mixed up. The reporter who is busily exaggerating and hyperbolizing her putative crimes has no business tweaking what she said.

The comments quickly drew criticism from Murphy’s fans and members of the LGBTQ+ community, who called the singer’s words harmful to the trans community. 

Just as the “reporter” is doing in this venomous article. The reporter is named Richie Assaly.

Ninja Tune, an independent record label based in London, U.K., will release Murphy’s album on Sept. 8, but it is ceasing all marketing and promotion activities, a source familiar with the matter told the Star on background.

Because she thinks puberty blockers are bad and kids who take them are being harmed.

Last two paragraphs of this loathsome piece:

Hate crimes against the LGBTQ+ community — and specifically the trans community — have risen sharply in Canada and the U.S. in recent years.

A recent study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found trans youth are at five times the risk of suicidal ideation as straight kids, and 7.6 times the risk of attempting suicide. The Canadian Trans and Non-Binary Youth Health Survey found that 64 per cent of trans youth have seriously considered suicide.

HINT HINT

It’s contemptible.

Watch what you say in public. Actually, to be safe, watch what you say, period.

A performer says he was ‘shocked’ to hear an alleged transphobic conversation at the hotel hosting Manchester Pride’s media accreditation suite.

Dev Mistry was staying at the Malmaison Hotel in the city centre on Friday (August 25) for Pride weekend, where he was performing burlesque. The 30-year-old says he was having a coffee while wearing headphones in the hotel lobby when he overheard the alleged conversation.

“I picked something up and I took my headphones out to confirm that I could understand what I heard over the music,” Dev told the Manchester Evening News.

As one does. It’s a public duty to monitor other people’s conversations.

“It was [a staff member] talking to others about trans people. It was not necessarily malicious but it was that ‘men are men’ and ‘women are women’ and there’s no in between.”

Well we can’t have that. People saying that women are women! In public! Would you believe it?!

“It felt like a one sided conversation with the others. It was in the coffee shop, that’s shocking.”

In the coffee shop is shocking? I don’t quite follow.

Dev says he complained to a receptionist, and the individual who allegedly made the comments spoke to him. Dev went on: “[They] said I misheard the conversation and apologised for any offence.”

But don’t you worry, Dev wasn’t letting it go that easily. Not Dev!

“They said it was about everything changing and they/them. It felt like an apology to get out of jail scot-free.

“It made me uncomfortable having that conversation. Even if I got it out of context then it should not be in public.”

Since then, Dev says he contacted the hotel’s head office. They said the hotel has ‘launched an HR investigation’ and ‘agreed they needed more formal training around LGBTQ+ issues.’

What a disgusting little morality play.

Oh well that’s fine then.

A transgender activist who told the crowd at a London Pride event to “punch a Terf” has been cleared of encouraging violence after telling a court it was a stunt for publicity.

Sarah Baker, 54, was filmed addressing the crowd at the Trans+ Pride rally on July 8, and shouted into the microphone: “If you see a Terf, punch them in the f***ing face.”

But she told City of London magistrates court her words was not intended to incite violence, but rather to grab a front page newspaper headline.

Well he would say that, wouldn’t he.

I wonder if the same claim would work if the word “terf” were replaced with “nigger” or “muzzie” or “Paki.”

I seriously doubt it.

Paula Scanlan on being shoved aside by Lia Thomas:

In a recent congressional hearing, I beseeched lawmakers to keep women’s physical safety in mind when considering policies that affect women-only spaces like locker rooms. The issue is close to my heart: I was a swimmer at the University of Pennsylvania alongside my transgender teammate Lia Thomas, whose participation on the women’s team raised serious questions about the eligibility of athletes who identify as a different sex to the one they were born as.

…

The politics of womanhood has become increasingly bizarre in the aftermath of the #MeToo revolution. In 2020, the otherwise left-leaning British author JK Rowling fired the tweet heard around the world when she mildly criticised the excesses of the transgender rights movement. Like me, Rowling is a victim of sexual violence, and felt that the admission of male bodies into women-only spaces could pose a risk.

See I don’t accept the implication of “otherwise left-leaning” that knowing men are not women is right-leaning. You can’t have any kind of women’s rights or liberation or equality or “inclusion” if you don’t know what women are, which includes knowing that they’re not men. More curtly, feminism is not right-leaning.

There is very little that’s genuinely leftish about trans ideology. Carving out weird exceptions for the more powerful class is not leftish. A sense of entitlement that could power Chicago is not leftish. Calling women misogynist names is not leftish. Misogyny itself is not leftish (although the left has all too often been infected with it).

While sports is the most high-profile example, there are many sex-segregated arenas that have, in recent years, exchanged their sex-based eligibility for one based on “gender identity.” Most Americans are likely unaware that, due to a quiet administrative change, the federal Violence Against Women law is now being misused to violate the privacy rights of women in the most vulnerable of situations: domestic violence shelters.

…

Given today’s shift, a man – perhaps a domestic abuser with no history of gender dysphoria – could potentially follow his female victim to a women-only shelter, and those tasked with safeguarding would be powerless to deny him entry to what once was a sacred safe space. After-all, he only need tell them that he identifies as a woman to gain entry.

A safe space at any rate. I don’t think there’s any need to call it sacred.

Talk about chutzpah…

Can you just address the reality and move past it? You sucked at swimming. That's why you lost.

— Keith Olbermann (@KeithOlbermann) August 31, 2023

Riley Gaines “sucks at swimming” because she can’t swim faster than a man twice her size.

Trans ideology=an amusement park for men who hate women.

BBC “reporting”:

Danielle McGahey: Transgender cricketer set to play in women’s T20 international for Canada

That is, male cricketer set to play in women’s T20 international for Canada.

Canada’s Danielle McGahey is set to become the first transgender cricketer to play in an official international match.

That is, Canada’s Danielle McGahey is set to become the first male cricketer to play in an official international women’s match.

The 29-year-old opening batter has fulfilled all of the eligibility criteria the International Cricket Council (ICC) has for male-to-female transgender players before the event in Los Angeles from 4-11 September.

Which doesn’t change the fact that he’s a man playing on a women’s team.

McGahey’s participation comes despite other sports – including athletics, cycling, swimming and both codes of rugby – banning transgender women from taking part in elite women’s competition.

That is, cricket is still letting men who claim to be women cheat, while other sports have stopped doing that.

A spokeswoman for the Women’s Rights Network (WRN) – a group which says it seeks to “defend the sex-based rights of women” – said transgender women had a “significant advantage” over athletes whose sex is recorded as female at birth, and called the ICC’s policy “unfair and unsafe”.

BBC carefully avoids admitting McGahey is a man while sneering that the WRN “says” it seeks to defend women’s rights. Skepticism for us, ValiDation for them.

McGahey emigrated from Australia to Canada in February 2020, socially transitioned to a woman in November 2020 and started medically transitioning in May 2021.

McGahey emigrated from Australia to Canada in February 2020, socially transitioned to a horse in November 2020, and started medically transitioning in May 2021.

McGahey told BBC Sport: “I am absolutely honoured. To be able to represent my community is something I never dreamed I would be able to do.”

Did he ever dream he would be able to intrude on women’s sport? I bet he did. I bet it was one of his favorite fantasies.

Man accused of homophobic comments towards Patrick Harvie arrested and charged

The alleged incident occurred while the Scottish Greens co-leader was launching his party’s candidate in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election.

It has now been confirmed that a man has been arrested and charged after the incident in Rutherglen. The Glasgow MSP was taking part in a live TV interview when the incident took place. 

A Police Scotland spokesperson [said]: “Following a report of homophobic comments a 59-year-old man has been arrested and charged. A report will be sent to the Procurator Fiscal.”

I have to wonder if Police Scotland have ever arrested any man for gynophobic comments. I have to wonder if they even know there is such a thing.

How about suspending him over a really deep gorge?

Kidding, kidding.

UCI has now recommended a suspension for cyclist Veronica Ivy (male who competes with women) for continual abusive and threatening behavior. Good on @UCI_cycling for holding Ivy accountable

Ivy wishes all who oppose male inclusion in women's sports should die in a grease fire pic.twitter.com/wn8Gv8TETu

— Riley Gaines (@Riley_Gaines_) August 30, 2023

That guy should be suspended from more things than cycling. Social media, for a start.

Fox News (sorry) on Rhys McKinnon/Veronica Ivy six weeks ago:

Veronica Ivy, a Canadian cyclist who became the first transgender woman to win a world track cycling championship, took issue with the sport’s governing body’s updated policy on transgender athletes’ participation in women’s events.

Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) released its new policy on Friday, prohibiting any trans cyclist from competing in women’s events if they “transitioned after (male) puberty.”

Ivy vented her frustrations on her Instagram account.

“However, now I’m forced into the humiliating ‘Men’s/Open’ category,” Ivy wrote. “No cis woman will be in this category, only trans women and CIS men. That means it’s not ‘open.’

“The UCI has said loud and clear that trans women are not real women and that we must be treated as other, and the cis women must be ‘protected’ from us innocent trans women.”

It must have been embarrassing that he had just quoted them as saying he is a woman.

Ivy called the UCI’s policy “nonsense.”

“It’s an indignity. It’s inhumane. It’s disgusting.

“I will not be deterred by this hateful targeted transphobic policy.”

Deterred from what? He will be deterred from forcing his way into women’s races if that’s what the official policy is. That’s a case where saying is definitive: rules. Just saying McKinnon/Ivy is a woman doesn’t make him a woman, but saying the new rule is that trans women can’t compete against women does make that the rule (if you’re the officials in charge saying it).

Note, of course, also, that he considers it “inhumane” to keep him out of women’s races but clearly not inhumane to allow him to compete in women’s races. Being humane=putting Rhys McKinnon first.

In May, the organization defended its policy after trans cyclist Austin Killips became the first transgender female to win a UCI stage race at the fifth stage of the Tour of the Gila. 

After considerable backlash, UCI then said it would review its policy, which ultimately led to Friday’s announcement. 

Keep lashing back. Inch by inch, row by row.

It’s amusing to find that I quoted “Veronica Ivy” aka Rhys McKinnon just six weeks ago saying:

Trans women are women. Trans women are female. Our sport’s governing body (cycling’s Union Cycliste Internationale, the one that banned Armstrong for life) says I’m female. My U.S. and Canadian identification documents say I’m female, including my birth certificate. My medical records all list me as female. So officials in sports, government and medicine all consider me, a trans woman, to be female. The people who disagree are just wrong.

How times change.

It’s such a bizarre thing for him to say, anyway, as Francis Boyle pointed out in the first comment. “All these people and institutions say I’m a woman therefore I am one.” As if he believed in literal word-magic, like the anointment of royalty. The UCI said he was female, so he was female. He’s never heard of lying? He’s never heard of error? But his academic field (when he had one) was philosophy.

Plus he knows we know that lots of people and institutions say it – we know they repeat the lie – we know it all too well. We know that, and it’s what we object to so intensely. We object to the magical thinking, we object to the insult to our intelligence as well as our rights, we object to the infantile idea that fantasy=reality. We object to being forced to play Let’s Pretend with a lot of hulking males who hate us. Rhys McKinnon is high up on that list.

But what is a woman? Dodds is one of those who are confused on the subject.

What is a woman tho? pic.twitter.com/H3bbLOPlYQ

— Aja ♀️🇬🇧 (@AjaTheEmpress) August 30, 2023

This you? https://t.co/FPhVBUrS4E pic.twitter.com/3nEEWiIAts

— Bessie Braddock (@BraddockBessie) August 30, 2023

Canada warns its people against traveling to the US, where LGBTQMNROZDJFRT people are routinely genocided in the street.

Canada has issued a new travel warning to its LGBT citizens planning to visit the United States.

Anti-LGBT protests in the US rose 30-fold last year compared with 2017, while legal moves to restrict LGBT rights are on the rise.

That’s a lie though. The “legal moves” in question are mostly about people who claim to be the opposite sex, not about LGB people.

Global Affairs Canada warned that some state laws may affect them on their travels, but did not specify where.

Such warnings are usually reserved for countries such as Uganda, Russia or Egypt.

Which is the point. It’s meant to be insulting.

Mind you, the US has become all too much like Russia since 2017, but that’s because of Trump, it’s not because of some imaginary war on LGB people.

“Some states have enacted laws and policies that may affect 2SLGBTQI+ persons. Check relevant state and local laws,” reads its US travel advice page.

The term 2SLGBTQI+ is widely used in Canada for people who consider themselves two-spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning or intersex.

A spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada pointed to US laws targeting the transgender community. “Since the beginning of 2023, certain states in the US have passed laws banning drag shows and restricting the transgender community from access to gender-affirming care and from participation in sporting events,” they told CBC News.

So how is that going to affect people visiting from Canada? And why talk about in connection with “2SLGBTQI+ persons” as opposed to trans persons?

In March, Tennessee’s governor signed laws banning drag performances in front of children and restricting medical treatment for transgender youth.

The BBC keeps repeating that lie. The law doesn’t “restrict medical treatment” for kids who think they’re trans, it restricts novel, controversial, arguably harmful interventions that fiddle with kids’ sexual development.

Two months later, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed bills banning children from undergoing transgender medical treatments or going to drag shows, and restricting pronoun use in classrooms.

A little better, but only a little. The “treatments” aren’t medical and they aren’t treatments as commonly understood. The “restricting pronoun use” is absurd too. Legislators aren’t telling teachers to stop using pronouns.

The truth is, trans ideology and the practices that stem from it are so ridiculous that they can’t be reported on honestly without making it clear how ridiculous they are, so news outlets end up just lying about them.