Open Democracy adds its lashes to the dead horse.

“When the trans community is discussed in the British media, there is a particular word that crops up again and again,” said Niamh Simpson, a trans illustrator and community organiser from Oxford. “That word is ‘debate’.”

A trans illustrator? So he identifies as an illustrator but actually can’t draw a recognizable stick figure?

“Trans people cannot simply exist. We must justify our existence in the public arena – in a format that is inherently dehumanising because it assumes that a fundamental aspect of our personhood is up for discussion.”

Ha no. “Trans people can’t simply exist” because they have to be always telling us about themselves. Trans people are the last people who want to “simply exist” and get on with their lives in peace – they want the rest of us to devote all our attention to them.

Simpson was one of more than a dozen speakers who addressed a crowd of trans people and allies outside the BBC’s London headquarters on Saturday (8 January), protesting against the broadcaster’s “agenda of hate and discrimination”.

What about the trans agenda of hate and discrimination? The activist wing of trans people is not exactly cuddly or eager to persuade.

2021 was the deadliest year on record for trans people: at least 375 trans, non-binary or gender nonconforming people were murdered worldwide, most of them trans women or transfeminine people of colour. At least 125 of these murders took place in Brazil…

…among trans women who worked in the sex trade. 375 worldwide is not a huge number.

There are several more paragraphs of the same stale flat reheated sludge. It’s almost as if they have nothing to say beyond “oh poor us, pay more attention to us, ignore those bleeding women over there, oh poor us.”

People may eventually get bored with it.

Loathsome man.

He’s a Republican representative from Ohio.

Linda Blade on the Lia Thomas question:

The recent editorial in Swimming World Magazine defending the right of Lia Thomas (LT) to swim as a woman deserves a response.

Allow me to begin this critique with applause for author Lucas Draper (LD). As a female athlete who self-identifies as a man, LD has chosen the ethical pathway in competing in a much more difficult field with male swimmers rather than to be competing unfairly against fellow females while doping.

Unfortunately, in the manner typical of proponents of gender ideology, LD’s editorial comments deploy escalating levels of emotional gaslighting.

Facts and arguments don’t make their case, so emotional bludgeoning is all they have. Unfortunately it works.

Fourthly, there is an appeal to victimhood while victimizing others: “Lia Thomas experiences far more scrutiny over her physical form than I will ever have to deal with” and putting the focus on LT is “mean.” Also, Lia “does not deserve to be at the center of this issue.” Yes, of course LT is scrutinized! Because being biologically male in a female competition is not fair. Scrutiny by officials and the public is part of sports. It is not being “mean.” LT chooses to be in the spotlight.

He also chooses to compete against women half his size.

Contrary to what was presented to the NCAA back in 2011, all research to date indicates that medical intervention is completely inadequate in transforming a male body into the female design – anatomically or physiologically – as discussed in this review of the literature by Hilton and Lundberg.

Given the overwhelming scientific evidence now available showing that males will always maintain a physical advantage over females in sports involving strength, speed, power and reaction time, the NCAA must undertake a re-assessment of its policy ASAP!

No matter how much emotional blackmail is sent their way.

Things are not going all that well for Boris Johnson. Now that everyone has been discussing that “work party” for days he has admitted it was a booboo and “apologized” – if it can really be called apologizing when it doesn’t happen until it has been discussed into the ground and out the other side.

The prime minister says he went into the garden of Downing Street on 20 May 2020 to thank staff before going back into his office 25 minutes later.

He says in hindsight he should have sent everyone back inside.

“In hindsight” meaning “now that everybody is screaming at him and won’t shut up.”

He says he should have recognised that even if it could be seen as technically inside the guidance there would be millions who would not see it that way.

The PM ends his statement by offering his “heartfelt apologies” to the House and to those who were not able to see loved ones at the time.

Yes very heartfelt which is why it took him days and days to admit.

It doesn’t get much more absurd than this.

Who is Brian Piddick? Profile: Lib Dem Spokesperson on Home Affairs in House of Lords. Ran for Mayor of London 2008 & 2012.

He’s a politician. That’s what he does. Politicians engage with lots of people; that’s what they do. It’s the nature of the work: engaging with lots of people. Yet here he is complaining because lots of people are talking to him.

Maybe he identifies as a recluse?

Originally a comment by Artymorty on THIS is the culture war.

Latsot, you’ve really nailed it here. It’s all about narratives now. People want a tidy story to explain things, not the complicated, underivative truth. A tidy and familiar and comforting story. This is dangerous because sometimes the truth doesn’t have a precedent to model itself on; we can’t just rely on pattern recognition and narrative familiarity to figure out what’s real and true versus what’s illusory and untrue.

It’s pattern recognition and narrative familiarity that has led everyone to treat gender identity ideology like it’s just as simple as Gay Rights 2.0. It’s also what’s behind the cringeworthy line “my truth” that I hear all the time among certain people. What they’re saying is, I’ve made sense of something complex by making it comfortable and familiar and digestible to me, and that’s what truth means to me: comfort and safety.

It’s probably also behind the fact that the entertainment industry only wants to reboot and repackage old familiar “media properties” these days: they treat entertainment consumers (a creepy way to describe what are otherwise known as people) like they don’t have the energy to invest in entirely new stories — new ideas — anymore.

If we take it a step back and speculate about why this is happening now, I guess the primary culprit has to be information overload due to social media and the internet? We have access to everything and everyone all the time now, and social media algorithms have eroded our attention spans to the point that it feels too exhausting to sort the truth out, so we just seek comfort instead. It’s quite depressing.

More and more I feel like civilization can’t survive the Internet age unless we start formally teaching everyone how to manage our lives in the digital age. Maybe the Three Rs of elementary school should become four: Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, and Reason(able thinking in the digital age).

Hottest on record:

Last year was New Zealand’s hottest year on record, according to the country’s National Institute of Water and Aeronautic Research (NIWA), and seven of the past nine years are among New Zealand’s warmest ever. The country’s steadily rising temperature brings increased risk of major floods, bushfires and storms.

And – surprise! – that’s not going to change.

The increases won’t end anytime soon without significant action on climate change, said Victoria University of Wellington’s Dr Nathanael Melia. “Every year we spin the roulette wheel of weather variability; however, like a casino, we have rigged the game, and the hothouse always wins in the end.”

…

In July 2021 heavy rain engorged the West Coast’s Buller River, accelerating its flow to 10 times its normal rate – the highest recorded in a New Zealand river since 1926. The resulting flood devastated the town of Westport. Many residents had to be evacuated after hundreds of houses were inundated, causing an estimated NZ$132m in damage. Development West Coast’s chief executive, Heath Milne, expects the rebuild to take up to two years.

Meanwhile in the Pacific Northwest a fire destroyed a British Columbia town. Tomorrow is today. Next year is tomorrow.

They what?

Washington state now appears to allow minors to undergo life-changing gender reassignment surgery without parental consent.

Under a new law, health insurers must cover “gender-affirming” care, including surgical treatments that were previously denied coverage. Democrats rejected a proposal to apply the new law to patients over 18 years old.

So young Billy age 13 can get his penis lopped off and present his parents with a fait accompli? Seems a bit rash.

Up until this law, gender reassignment surgery and other procedures like facial reconstruction or laser hair removal were considered cosmetic by health insurance companies. Due to its classification as cosmetic, health insurers did not usually cover the procedures, even when doctors medically recommended them.

If only it were just “cosmetic.”

The source self-identifies as “conservative talk radio” but…sometimes the other team has its head up its ass.

Tennis coach Judy Murray is not convinced that trans women should compete against women.

[Murray] told Radio Times magazine: “It could be really off-putting to female athletes to feel you could train for years to get to whatever level and then be knocked out or beaten by someone born with a physical strength advantage.”

To say the least. I would use words stronger than “off-putting,” myself.

“I don’t know enough about it and it’s incredibly complex but it’s important there’s a lot of research into creating a fair solution. Where there are clear physical advantages, (for) governing bodies involved in creating the rules about the point at which there is too much of a disadvantage, it’s really important they get that right.”

I don’t think it’s all that complex. I think it’s just obvious that men shouldn’t do it, at all, ever, no matter how intensely they feel “like women.” They have the male bodies. They shouldn’t use them in that way.

That reply is garnering a lot of laughter. Not a tennis coach’s area of expertise? Really?

Well, let’s think about it.

Is it controversial to say that white people and black people have distinct but overlapping experiences of oppression, or is that standard intersectional anti-racism?

I suppose one answer is that it’s not exactly controversial to say that, because hardly anyone does say it, so there’s no fuel for controversy. But if white people did say that? A lot, and noisily, and with menaces and insults? Yes I think we can surmise that would be controversial.

Sorry we missed your call, we were busy playing Pokémon.

Two Los Angeles police officers were fired for chasing Pokémon rather than fleeing robbers, court documents show.

So the robbers caught them?

No no don’t be silly, the BBC means they were chasing Pokémon rather than chasing fleeing robbers.

The pair were parked nearby when a radio call came in for officers to respond to a shop robbery.

But a review of their in-car camera footage showed they had been playing Pokémon Go and chose to pursue a nearby Snorlax – a relatively rare catch – instead of providing back-up.

Air Traffic Control to pilot: I wish I could deal with your questions but I can’t right now, there’s a Snorlax down the block.

Eric Trump, Constitutional scholar.

Eric Trump has called New York Attorney General Letitia James the “most unethical prosecutor in the history of the United States” while saying her office’s investigation[s] into his father’s business practices are unconstitutional.

No, hon. He’s not president any more. He’s just a shameless crook, and the law can touch him.

Donald Trump’s son made the remarks on Monday during an appearance on Sean Hannity‘s Fox News show more than a week after it was revealed James had subpoenaed two of the former president’s adult children, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump, as part of the inquiry.

Chronologically adult. Intellectually, morally, psychologically, not so much.

James’ office is looking into allegations Donald Trump fraudulently inflated the value of assets to get better loans from banks and undervalued them to reduce his tax bills. James began the investigation after Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen testified to Congress in 2019.

It’s her job.

“You have Letitia James out there, probably the most unethical prosecutor in the history of the United States, who literally said on video ‘I’m going to go into office every single day and I’m going to sue Trump and then I’m going to go home,'” Eric Trump said.

We’re all really fascinated to hear what Eric Trump thinks is unethical.

“She ran on the campaign promise of suing my father because she didn’t believe in his political party, because she didn’t like us, because the people of Washington, D.C. told her to do that. It violates the Constitution, it’s unethical, it’s wrong.”

That might be a little more credible if Trump were in fact not a crook, but since this is the real world and not a fantasy, it’s not.

In December 2021, Donald Trump sued James while arguing that the inquiry violates his constitutional rights.

“The investigations commenced by James are in no way connected to legitimate law enforcement goals, but rather, are merely a thinly-veiled effort to publicly malign Trump and his associates,” the lawsuit filed in New York court reads.

“Her mission is guided solely by political animus and a desire to harass, intimidate, and retaliate against a private citizen who she views as a political opponent. James has deprived, and will continue to deprive, Plaintiffs of their rights under federal law, state law and common law by virtue of her callous acts.”

Goodness. That doesn’t sound like lawyer-speak, it sounds like Trump-speak. I guess he doesn’t let his lawyers re-write his rage blurts. “Callous” is a nice touch – what, she’s supposed to have sympathy for the pack of filthy rich crooks?

I don’t even recognize this world.

Who are these people they’re talking about? Nobody I know.

Originally a comment by latsot on “Mass formation psychosis”.

Ah that word narrative – be very cautious around anyone telling you something is a “narrative” when it bears no resemblance to a story. It’s a favorite of bullshitters.

That’s partly because to many, many people ‘narrative’ is the same thing as ‘evidence’. I mean this in the most literal sense; I come across many people, especially on social media, who seem to sincerely believe that being able to tell a story about something – even if that story doesn’t really seem to explain the facts – is the same as providing huge great chunks of evidence of something being true.

In fact, they feel it gives them license to dismiss evidence, because to them, that evidence belongs to a different story so just isn’t valid. They’re happy to cite ‘evidence’ when it appears superficially to support their story but they’re unable or unwilling to distinguish between what is evidence and what is not.

So they get to tell their lovely story and cite any willy-nilly thing as evidence because the story is always so meandering and vague. And they also get to dismiss our evidence because they believe it belongs in another, nastier story they want nothing to do with.

Meanwhile, we are explaining what our evidence says and why it says what it says (and doesn’t say) and it’s being entirely ignored.

This is the culture war.

We’ve only spelled out our goals eleventy billion times.

Policy goals – not allowing trans ideology to erode women’s rights and women’s prizes, set-asides, honors and the like. I think we’ve been very clear and very forthcoming about it. Where’s he been?

The replies are uniformly nuts.

“the genocidal” – yes sure, plus we’re vampires and that thing from Alien.

More brazen by the day.

Glinner tells us which women missed out because a man won Best Actress.

Creepy shirtsleeves guy defies the law:

The Ohio Republican Jim Jordan is the second sitting congressman to refuse a request for cooperation from the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack.

In a Sunday night letter to the committee chair, Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the Trump ally accused the panel of “an outrageous abuse” of its authority.

Sure, it’s “outrageous” for the House to investigate a violent attack on the Capitol and Congress. BLM protests are of the devil, but actual violence inside the legislative building is fine.

In columns for the Guardian, the former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal has laid out Jordan’s extensive contacts with Trump before and on 6 January, throughout legalistic efforts to throw out results and the Capitol riot itself.

…

On Sunday night, a spokesperson said the committee would respond to Jordan soon and “consider appropriate next steps”.

“Mr Jordan has admitted that he spoke directly to President Trump on 6 January and is thus a material witness,” the spokesperson said. “Mr Jordan’s letter to the committee fails to address these facts.”

By this time next year he could be holding hearings on why there were hearings on the insurrection at all.

Oh give it a REST.

Narcissist comes out as first openly self-involved twerp shock-surprise.

American figure skater Timothy LeDuc is set to become the first openly non-binary athlete to compete at an Olympic Winter Games.

They might as well say he’s the first openly breathing athlete to compete at an Olympic Winter Games. He’s the first openly two legs-having athlete to compete at an Olympic Winter Games. He’s the first openly anthropoid ape athlete to compete at an Olympic Winter Games.

Unfortunately he’s not the first person or athlete to seek extra attention by claiming to be the first ever something or other, even if the something or other is of absolutely no consequence or interest to anyone at all.

“My hope is that when people see my story, it isn’t focused on me and saying, ‘Oh, Timothy is the first out non-binary person to achieve this level of success in sport,'” LeDuc said during a news conference Saturday, according to NBC Sports.

Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha no it isn’t. That isn’t his hope. His hope is the opposite of that. He’s non-binary-publicity-seeking.

“My hope is that the narrative shifts more to, queer people can be open and successful in sports. We’ve always been here, we’ve always been a part of sports. We just haven’t always been able to be open.”

If he means lesbian and gay that’s true; if he means “non-binary” it’s just hot air-attention seeking.

Our friend latsot has signed up for various wheelchair distance events in 2022 including the Leeds and Sheffield half marathons, the Middlesbrough 10k and (fingers crossed) the Great North Run.

He’s raising money for nia, a women-led, women-only, secular, rights-based registered charity which has been delivering services to women, girls and children who have been subjected to sexual and domestic violence and abuse, including prostitution, since 1975.

His crowdfunder for the Sheffield event (in March) is here.

He urges you to donate if you can and share the link if you like!

Liberal shmiberal – union-busting at the NY Times:

Last April, 650 tech employees at the New York Times announced that they were unionizing. Rather than applauding them and proceeding to negotiate a contract, the company instead refused to voluntarily recognize the union. This is despite its own editorial board supporting a bill that would have made it legally binding for employers to voluntarily accept union requests when they are backed by a majority of the staff.

As the paper’s own editorial explained: “Under current law, an employer can reject the majority’s signatures and insist on a secret ballot. But in a disturbingly high number of cases, the employer uses the time before the vote to pressure employees to rethink their decision to unionize.” Now, this is what the New York Times company is accused of doing to its own employees.

Since last year, the Times has been accused of trying to scare workers into changing their minds – to sow division among the employees, divide the unit, and erode support for organized labor. Last week, federal labor regulators claimed that the company had broken the law by telling large swaths of employees that they were actually “managers”, and that they were therefore prohibited from publicly supporting the union.

“Liberal” is often used as a synonym for “left-wing” or “progressive” in the US, but they’re not really the same. Unions aren’t really a liberal cause these days. Not sexy enough…as well as of course having to do with redirecting a little of the wealth from the bosses to the workers, when lots of liberals are bosses or allied with bosses.

The New York Times gets away with a lot. They are the journalism equivalent of the supreme court. They offer prestige, big budgets and job stability at a time when those things are in short supply in this industry. The half of our country terrified by Trump sees them as an army of truth, and everyone in media wants to work there. (Call me!) But let’s be honest: the people who control the New York Times company are acting like real weasels.

It’s not just that they are hypocritical, yammering about the public good while acting from pure selfishness – it’s that they want to have it both ways. While more outwardly evil media bosses like Rupert Murdoch may be proud to embrace their Ayn Randian reputation, those who lead the Times want to be accepted as good people on the Brooklyn-brownstone cocktail party circuit, even as they quietly try to stop those who work for them from having an equal seat at their tastefully appointed table. Screw that.

I think Hamilton Nolan is exaggerating the keenness of Times people to be seen as liberal. The news side is keen to be seen as non-partisan, and the editorial side is very mixed – there are plenty of conservatives and “centrists” along with some a little more leftish. The Times is more establishment than it is liberal.

I have covered hundreds of anti-union campaigns. No matter where they happen, they are all based on lies and fear. Whether they happen at an Amazon warehouse or at the New York Times, they are a demonstration of contempt for the idea that an employee may deserve to be treated as someone whose humanity is just as real as that of an employer.

Respectable people don’t engage in union-busting. People who run anti-union campaigns are not Good Liberals. Hundreds of workers raising their voices have not been enough to convince the New York Times executives to act right. Maybe it’s time to stop inviting them to the cocktail parties.

Ok, but I think it’s either naive or hyperbolic to say the Times sees itself as composed of nothing but Good Liberals.