Some actual DATA on British attitudes to the Trans issue
TLDR: not that many people care
"Two thirds of Britons say they pay little attention (42%) or no attention (24%) to the debate in the media and politics about trans rights.
"Only one in three say they pay more attention than this, including just 8% who say they pay “a lot” of attention."
However if the smaller group that cares contains a lot of swing voters - women? - then that could be significant in an election
Another takeaway. As is sadly predictable, trans extremism has been bad for trans people
"How have attitudes on transgender issues changed over time?
"Elements of this survey have been asked three times: first in December 2018, then again in June 2020 and finally in May 2022. Some others have been asked in the 2020 and 2022 tranches only.
"What the results consistently show is an erosion of permissiveness towards transgender rights over that time period. In some cases the difference is small, but in others there has been a substantial shift."
Don’t ever forget what the LGBTQ+ movement and the liberal left were trying to do by banning ‘trans conversion therapy’. It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Kafka meets Orwell, but I hope this short thread explains. And makes you angry.
And the real kicker? We were saved from this barbaric law at the eleventh hour by the Tory government of Boris Johnson which, venal and incompetent as it was, was able to spot a pig in a poke. What does that say about these clowns?
To my shame, I had no idea what ‘trans conversion therapy’ was. I too presumed it was something horrible like gay conversion therapy
That’s an eye opening thread. The entire trans activist sandcastle is crumbling
The Cass Interim Report spells it all out. As does the judgment in the Keira Bell case. As do the multiple whistleblowers at the Tavistock who were ignored. Or the parents who presented evidence about the harm and lack of evidence to the Chief Executive in 2018, which he ignored.
The scientific evidence for much of what the Tavistock did simply is not there. God knows how they can say they got informed consent for their treatment. The legal liability they now face is dreadful.
Yes indeed. My excuse is that I turned away from this debate as it is so toxic. But now it is impacting friends and fam I can’t avert my gaze
I’m curious about apparently sensible people captured by this madness? Do they all sincerely believe it? Are they bullied into it? Is it a career move?
The Tavistock / GIDS was a law unto themselves that was widely disliked & distrusted by trans people in the UK as far as I can tell.
Their replacement by a new, larger service that a) might be able to cope with demand and b) will operate under more transparency & according to the norms of trans healthcare elsewhere in Europe is probably a good thing for everyone involved.
If the new service follows what is happening in France, Sweden and Finland, which have put a halt to the use of puberty blockers and look at the child holistically then that will be a good thing.
Whatever is done should be based on proper scientific research not on what lobby groups demand.
Medical matters should be based on the principle of best for the patient as agreed with their doctor in the relevant field. It seems the Tavistock sometimes departed from that. Ideology in the mix - which it shouldn't be - and also massive overdemand for its services.
There is a rational reason why a young person who is transgender might want puberty blockers and later on surgery as an adult - which is that their life will be easier if the divergence of their body from their lived-in gender is minimized.
I suggest the healthcare professionals at the Tavistock still based their actions on what they thought was best for the patient. They may (or may not) have been mistaken as to what was best for the patient, but I don't believe they were deliberately doing things while thinking, "This is bad for my patient."
This is why a comparison with, say, Mengele is so ridiculous, not that I can imagine anyone ever making such a comparison except as a rhetorical flourish.
No, not Shipman or Mengele type behaviour. Those guys were evil devils. That's not really the Tavistock situation.
In Oz they went to voters and said Labor was woke. People said why are you asking me this, I can't afford to eat.
Maybe culture wars could win an election in a good economic climate but in the current one, the Tories just look out of touch. Polling is very clear on this.
It’s not “what is woke?”
It’s “what is a woman?”
But again, Starmer the other day said what a woman is, somebody with a vagina.
Got a link to that?
This was his most recent comment I could find on the matter:
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
Civil disobedience in this country because of Putin's warmongering? That's doesn't make sense to me.
Back to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Putin is not directly threatening the safety of Britons, but many people are genuinely not going to be able to afford the bills this winter.
Don’t ever forget what the LGBTQ+ movement and the liberal left were trying to do by banning ‘trans conversion therapy’. It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Kafka meets Orwell, but I hope this short thread explains. And makes you angry.
And the real kicker? We were saved from this barbaric law at the eleventh hour by the Tory government of Boris Johnson which, venal and incompetent as it was, was able to spot a pig in a poke. What does that say about these clowns?
To my shame, I had no idea what ‘trans conversion therapy’ was. I too presumed it was something horrible like gay conversion therapy
That’s an eye opening thread. The entire trans activist sandcastle is crumbling
The Cass Interim Report spells it all out. As does the judgment in the Keira Bell case. As do the multiple whistleblowers at the Tavistock who were ignored. Or the parents who presented evidence about the harm and lack of evidence to the Chief Executive in 2018, which he ignored.
The scientific evidence for much of what the Tavistock did simply is not there. God knows how they can say they got informed consent for their treatment. The legal liability they now face is dreadful.
Yes indeed. My excuse is that I turned away from this debate as it is so toxic. But now it is impacting friends and fam I can’t avert my gaze
I’m curious about apparently sensible people captured by this madness? Do they all sincerely believe it? Are they bullied into it? Is it a career move?
The Tavistock / GIDS was a law unto themselves that was widely disliked & distrusted by trans people in the UK as far as I can tell.
Their replacement by a new, larger service that a) might be able to cope with demand and b) will operate under more transparency & according to the norms of trans healthcare elsewhere in Europe is probably a good thing for everyone involved.
If the new service follows what is happening in France, Sweden and Finland, which have put a halt to the use of puberty blockers and look at the child holistically then that will be a good thing.
Whatever is done should be based on proper scientific research not on what lobby groups demand.
Medical matters should be based on the principle of best for the patient as agreed with their doctor in the relevant field. It seems the Tavistock sometimes departed from that. Ideology in the mix - which it shouldn't be - and also massive overdemand for its services.
There is a rational reason why a young person who is transgender might want puberty blockers and later on surgery as an adult - which is that their life will be easier if the divergence of their body from their lived-in gender is minimized.
I suggest the healthcare professionals at the Tavistock still based their actions on what they thought was best for the patient. They may (or may not) have been mistaken as to what was best for the patient, but I don't believe they were deliberately doing things while thinking, "This is bad for my patient."
This is why a comparison with, say, Mengele is so ridiculous, not that I can imagine anyone ever making such a comparison except as a rhetorical flourish.
No, not Shipman or Mengele type behaviour. Those guys were evil devils. That's not really the Tavistock situation.
No, but startlingly ascientific. I am handicapped by the fact that I would rather pop my eyeballs out with a teaspoon than research the question how the "affirmation only" theory got off the ground, but it is obvious bollocks. If a youngish child comes to you and says I think I am the opposite sex to what it looks like there's a dozen explanations which immediately come to mind, and privileging one of them irrespective of the evidence is an ideological not medical decision.
Some actual DATA on British attitudes to the Trans issue
TLDR: not that many people care
"Two thirds of Britons say they pay little attention (42%) or no attention (24%) to the debate in the media and politics about trans rights.
"Only one in three say they pay more attention than this, including just 8% who say they pay “a lot” of attention."
However if the smaller group that cares contains a lot of swing voters - women? - then that could be significant in an election
Another takeaway. As is sadly predictable, trans extremism has been bad for trans people
"How have attitudes on transgender issues changed over time?
"Elements of this survey have been asked three times: first in December 2018, then again in June 2020 and finally in May 2022. Some others have been asked in the 2020 and 2022 tranches only.
"What the results consistently show is an erosion of permissiveness towards transgender rights over that time period. In some cases the difference is small, but in others there has been a substantial shift."
in the run up to the local elections in London this May the most important thing for wannabe councillors appeared to be to be able to answer the question 'does a woman have a penis?'. However, other than a few cranks, nobody gave a fuck when it came to actually voting.
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
Might do, though why people think Martin Lewis is strong evidence for this, is a mystery. This is the first suggested tactic which looks feasible and effective to me, i never thought gas bill payers were going to lie down on railway lines
Interesting development IMO. The latest Dutch opinion poll has the governing VVP in first place on just 14%. In second place on 11.5% is the Farmer-Citizen Movement which polled 1% at the last election.
I don't think I've ever seen a national opinion poll with the leading party as low as 14%.
Dutch politics was always extremely fragmented, but this is ridiculous. It would be one thing if it were merely factional or ethnic like in Israel, because you could form a government with common policy ground, but the Dutch parties actually believe different things.
The leading party in Sweden - the Social Democrats - are on just 30%, which is actually a high. They were in the low 20s in 2020.
Some actual DATA on British attitudes to the Trans issue
TLDR: not that many people care
So, you can stop your drunken obsession, right there.
As if!
I'm flattered you are so personally interested in my alcohol consumption. This is the second time you've mentioned it just today. I can put your tiny mind at rest: I'm more sober now than I've been in many years. I go entire days, even half weeks, without touching a drop
I'm certainly not teetotal but I'd say my intake has halved, or more. And I'm quite enjoying the days of sobriety. The evenings can get dull, but then, being mildly drunk every night can get dull, as well. And a bit of weed takes the edge off
The noose around the Russian forces west of the Dnieper is tightening.
Another day, another Russian ammo store in Ukraine on fire…
The Yale piece is also very good, debunking the Russian narrative that life is good under sanctions, spread by propogandists and useful idiots in the West - a couple of whom were on the previous thread. It’s taken perhaps a little longer than many expected, but the Russian economy is being squeezed hard. They’re self-sufficient in food, so they’re not going to starve, but with GDP down 10% there’s going to be mass unemployment and unsustainable state intervention in the economy.
I hope that's true. The war needs to end, and I would welcome that to happen from Russian capitulation, though I will admit it seems less than likely.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It needed to be politicised to bring about change. The problem is hat once you have politicians saying "its ok to be who you are" there are other politicians who say "no it isn't"
Don’t ever forget what the LGBTQ+ movement and the liberal left were trying to do by banning ‘trans conversion therapy’. It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Kafka meets Orwell, but I hope this short thread explains. And makes you angry.
And the real kicker? We were saved from this barbaric law at the eleventh hour by the Tory government of Boris Johnson which, venal and incompetent as it was, was able to spot a pig in a poke. What does that say about these clowns?
To my shame, I had no idea what ‘trans conversion therapy’ was. I too presumed it was something horrible like gay conversion therapy
That’s an eye opening thread. The entire trans activist sandcastle is crumbling
The Cass Interim Report spells it all out. As does the judgment in the Keira Bell case. As do the multiple whistleblowers at the Tavistock who were ignored. Or the parents who presented evidence about the harm and lack of evidence to the Chief Executive in 2018, which he ignored.
The scientific evidence for much of what the Tavistock did simply is not there. God knows how they can say they got informed consent for their treatment. The legal liability they now face is dreadful.
Yes indeed. My excuse is that I turned away from this debate as it is so toxic. But now it is impacting friends and fam I can’t avert my gaze
I’m curious about apparently sensible people captured by this madness? Do they all sincerely believe it? Are they bullied into it? Is it a career move?
The Tavistock / GIDS was a law unto themselves that was widely disliked & distrusted by trans people in the UK as far as I can tell.
Their replacement by a new, larger service that a) might be able to cope with demand and b) will operate under more transparency & according to the norms of trans healthcare elsewhere in Europe is probably a good thing for everyone involved.
If the new service follows what is happening in France, Sweden and Finland, which have put a halt to the use of puberty blockers and look at the child holistically then that will be a good thing.
Whatever is done should be based on proper scientific research not on what lobby groups demand.
Medical matters should be based on the principle of best for the patient as agreed with their doctor in the relevant field. It seems the Tavistock sometimes departed from that. Ideology in the mix - which it shouldn't be - and also massive overdemand for its services.
There is a rational reason why a young person who is transgender might want puberty blockers and later on surgery as an adult - which is that their life will be easier if the divergence of their body from their lived-in gender is minimized.
I suggest the healthcare professionals at the Tavistock still based their actions on what they thought was best for the patient. They may (or may not) have been mistaken as to what was best for the patient, but I don't believe they were deliberately doing things while thinking, "This is bad for my patient."
This is why a comparison with, say, Mengele is so ridiculous, not that I can imagine anyone ever making such a comparison except as a rhetorical flourish.
No, not Shipman or Mengele type behaviour. Those guys were evil devils. That's not really the Tavistock situation.
No, but startlingly ascientific. I am handicapped by the fact that I would rather pop my eyeballs out with a teaspoon than research the question how the "affirmation only" theory got off the ground, but it is obvious bollocks. If a youngish child comes to you and says I think I am the opposite sex to what it looks like there's a dozen explanations which immediately come to mind, and privileging one of them irrespective of the evidence is an ideological not medical decision.
I thought we agreed it would be good to de-escalate the discussion. That comment seems more rhetorical than helpful. It was never the case that a youngish child was immediately pushed into a drug treatment having said something once. There is an issue around how to present options to children and about how much to push back against what they are saying, and it's important to get that right, but the picture being painted of practice at the Tavi is highly exaggerated at best. There was a very long delay before anything happened (because of long waiting lists). Lots of children were exited from the service with a decision not to transition. You're misrepresenting subtler shades of opinion.
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
Might do, though why people think Martin Lewis is strong evidence for this, is a mystery. This is the first suggested tactic which looks feasible and effective to me, i never thought gas bill payers were going to lie down on railway lines
IIRC, utilities can’t disconnect you without a court order, a process which take months of increasingly agressive letters before they actually go looking for a judge - and will find a very long queue. If people stop paying on 1st October, I bet the utilities won’t actually be able to cut anyone off until March or April.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
Yes it has as I keep posting. Australia! And they lost!
Yep. For Starmer the Tories doing lots of Culture War is a case of "Go ahead make my day".
Change of mind from me here too. I used to think they could win a GE like that. Now I don't.
A brief look at Mumsnet says you are wrong. The Kulturkrieg - in all its manifestations - really matters to a lot of vocal people, and it will eventually impact our politics, as it already has done in the USA. Sadly
It's 'impacting' our politics, yes, but can the Cons mine it to win the next GE? Regardless of Mumsnet I think not. The good news is this is one of those things where it will be proven objectively whether I'm right or not.
In Oz they went to voters and said Labor was woke. People said why are you asking me this, I can't afford to eat.
Maybe culture wars could win an election in a good economic climate but in the current one, the Tories just look out of touch. Polling is very clear on this.
It’s not “what is woke?”
It’s “what is a woman?”
Are you a woman btw, Carlotta? I didn't think so but someone was saying the other day you are?
Vladimir Solovyov suggested destroying England with a nuclear missile but leaving Wales intact in order to ensure that the UK is over.
Speaking on Rossiya1, the state-owned news channel, he said that “quiet” Wales would then be “independent”.
“Listen Brits, wake up, you showed the whole world that you are arrogant, illiterate and can’t do anything but steal,” he said.
“The only reason you don’t have Egyptian pyramids in the British Museum is that you physically couldn’t steal them. You stole everything.
“They are lecturing us, a country we can destroy with one nuclear missile,” he added.
He’s not wrong about the Pyramids
The balkanisation of England as a hostile act pretty much tells us all we need to know about the EU federalist agenda, which is still popular amongst many of our political class. It's the perennial solution looking for a problem.
TL:DR. A wildcat strike in Bury. At an entirely non-unionised factory. Which of course means there's no TU legislation. No ballot, no notice. Just all out. How does the government propose to ban this? And how do you solve it by agency workers, when that would cost the employer far more than the meagre wages? Nobody can get anyone anyways.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
Yes it has as I keep posting. Australia! And they lost!
Yep. For Starmer the Tories doing lots of Culture War is a case of "Go ahead make my day".
Change of mind from me here too. I used to think they could win a GE like that. Now I don't.
A brief look at Mumsnet says you are wrong. The Kulturkrieg - in all its manifestations - really matters to a lot of vocal people, and it will eventually impact our politics, as it already has done in the USA. Sadly
It's 'impacting' our politics, yes, but can the Cons mine it to win the next GE? Regardless of Mumsnet I think not. The good news is this is one of those things where it will be proven objectively whether I'm right or not.
I agree it is quite unlikely to be a big factor in the next election. There will be so many bigger issues, the Cost of Living for one, which will drown it out. Also, people find the debate off-putting on a basic level. And I am one of them. Do I really want to hear Sir Beer Starmer talking about vaginas, penises and cervixes? Not really. There's an ick factor
However I do believe the culture wars will rise in salience over time, unless one side or other is completely defeated or surrenders (seems unlikely). We are following America, as usual (but thank God we don't have the same bitterness over abortion or guns)
Final thought, there is one slight chance the culture wars could figure large in GE24. That's if things are so grey and grim the voters decide no party has an answer to the economic questions, and then people might vote on other things - like Wokeness
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Mordaunt had three options under those attacks:
1) Make the reasonable case for reform of the Gender Recognition laws, towards Self ID* with protections in certain areas.
2) Say that her views have changed and that she now thinks differently.
3) lie and deny what was on the record.
That she chose 3) shows both poor character and political judgement, perhaps driven by a culture of lying in government.
*Self ID is as poor a nomenclature as "Defund the Police" or ""Black Lives Matter" as it too is easily mis-interpreted.
The parliamentary proposals are essentially a demedicalisation of getting a GRC. The parliamentary proposals are here, and do include protections for sex aligned spaces where appropriate.
TL:DR. A wildcat strike in Bury. At an entirely non-unionised factory. Which of course means there's no TU legislation. No ballot, no notice. Just all out. How does the government propose to ban this? And how do you solve it by agency workers, when that would cost the employer far more than the meagre wages? Nobody can get anyone anyways.
I don't think this could be banned, but why would they want to ban it? People should be free to withdraw their labour at any point, but that can come with consequences.
Phil - If a person is born "trans", then that implies the cause is genetic. And, that they will be unlikely to have many descendants. Which in turn implies that such genes -- if they exist -- will be rapidly be eliminated from the population.
So, if there are people with such genes, they must be extremely rare, far rarer than those now claiming to be "trans" in the US and the UK. And such people -- if they exists -- would deserve our sympathy and, if possible, our help.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Mordaunt had three options under those attacks:
1) Make the reasonable case for reform of the Gender Recognition laws, towards Self ID* with protections in certain areas.
2) Say that her views have changed and that she now thinks differently.
3) lie and deny what was on the record.
That she chose 3) shows both poor character and political judgement, perhaps driven by a culture of lying in government.
*Self ID is as poor a nomenclature as "Defund the Police" or ""Black Lives Matter" as it too is easily mis-interpreted.
The parliamentary proposals are essentially a demedicalisation of getting a GRC. The parliamentary proposals are here, and do include protections for sex aligned spaces where appropriate.
In Oz they went to voters and said Labor was woke. People said why are you asking me this, I can't afford to eat.
Maybe culture wars could win an election in a good economic climate but in the current one, the Tories just look out of touch. Polling is very clear on this.
It’s not “what is woke?”
It’s “what is a woman?”
Are you a woman btw, Carlotta? I didn't think so but someone was saying the other day you are?
I can’t believe Truss wants to get Redwood back. The man is certifiable.
If tax cuts are the equivalent of taking a firm grip of the tory party's shaft, talking about appointing John Redwood is shoving the other hand down the party's undercrackers and cupping its nuts.
Somebody knows the the conservative erogenous zones.
John Redwood seems like he talks sense on economics, and has been in Cabinet before. It'll be interesting to see if he can handle it.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
I don’t think so.
I think gender identity is so primal than pretty much everyone can get worked up about it if they’re exposed to the “right” narrative.
I agree everyone can, but moral panics about kids and marginal lifestyles often seem to target higher-income groups who fear more loss of social status than parents in sink estates for example.
"Moral panic" is one for the banned list. WTF are you on about anyway? If I am opposed to the proliferation of child pornography on the internet does that make me a posho having a "moral panic about kids?" Where does loss of social status come in to it?
Some friends of mine are really worried about their young daughter declaring she's trans, and demanding dangerous medication aged 15, and going to war with them about it when they object - by running away a lot, being picked up by police at 5am, and so on
Perhaps they too are in a silly "moral panic"
Then again, once we make it practically illegal for such a thing to happen, the same people can then get on with making teenage girls have less rights than the current generation. Which is absolutely the trajectory of the "war on woke".
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
I don't see a big difference between transgender toddlers and Christian or Muslim toddlers. It is a shorthand for the parent's beliefs and intentions.
Gender is not a matter of “faith”.
In a way it is. There's no rational basis to believe someone can be in the 'wrong' body.
That's the same as saying the concept of gender is irrational. It's meaningful only if it can differ (in an individual) from biological sex. If it can't it means gender is null and void for all practical purposes hence so is the notion of transgender. I reckon this view is quite widely held.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
I don’t think so.
I think gender identity is so primal than pretty much everyone can get worked up about it if they’re exposed to the “right” narrative.
I agree everyone can, but moral panics about kids and marginal lifestyles often seem to target higher-income groups who fear more loss of social status than parents in sink estates for example.
"Moral panic" is one for the banned list. WTF are you on about anyway? If I am opposed to the proliferation of child pornography on the internet does that make me a posho having a "moral panic about kids?" Where does loss of social status come in to it?
Some friends of mine are really worried about their young daughter declaring she's trans, and demanding dangerous medication aged 15, and going to war with them about it when they object - by running away a lot, being picked up by police at 5am, and so on
Perhaps they too are in a silly "moral panic"
Then again, once we make it practically illegal for such a thing to happen, the same people can then get on with making teenage girls have less rights than the current generation. Which is absolutely the trajectory of the "war on woke".
Would you accept the validity of the slippery slope argument if it were being made in the other direction?
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
HIGH levels of civil disobedience will happen unless the government intervenes. The new cap is completely unaffordable for so many people. So when you have big chunks of the country literally unable to turn the heating on they will go make themselves warm on the streets. With government ministers sneering at them and trying to outlaw/marginalise them the way they are union members.
TL:DR. A wildcat strike in Bury. At an entirely non-unionised factory. Which of course means there's no TU legislation. No ballot, no notice. Just all out. How does the government propose to ban this? And how do you solve it by agency workers, when that would cost the employer far more than the meagre wages? Nobody can get anyone anyways.
I don't think this could be banned, but why would they want to ban it? People should be free to withdraw their labour at any point, but that can come with consequences.
Banning strikes is something of a talking point in this leadership campaign. It appears to be being lapped up by its intended audience.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Rishi’s campaign is over. He is just demeaning himself now. Astonishing bad calls for a man who had a near who’s who of senior Tories lined up behind him, and the very best operatives behind the scenes.
Phil - If a person is born "trans", then that implies the cause is genetic. And, that they will be unlikely to have many descendants. Which in turn implies that such genes -- if they exist -- will be rapidly be eliminated from the population.
So, if there are people with such genes, they must be extremely rare, far rarer than those now claiming to be "trans" in the US and the UK. And such people -- if they exists -- would deserve our sympathy and, if possible, our help.
People are born with lots of things that are not genetic.
There are lots of genes that one might naively believe would be rapidly eliminated from the population, which are not for a variety of reasons. Sickle cell, cystic fibrosis, schizophrenia.
Don’t ever forget what the LGBTQ+ movement and the liberal left were trying to do by banning ‘trans conversion therapy’. It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Kafka meets Orwell, but I hope this short thread explains. And makes you angry.
And the real kicker? We were saved from this barbaric law at the eleventh hour by the Tory government of Boris Johnson which, venal and incompetent as it was, was able to spot a pig in a poke. What does that say about these clowns?
To my shame, I had no idea what ‘trans conversion therapy’ was. I too presumed it was something horrible like gay conversion therapy
That’s an eye opening thread. The entire trans activist sandcastle is crumbling
The Cass Interim Report spells it all out. As does the judgment in the Keira Bell case. As do the multiple whistleblowers at the Tavistock who were ignored. Or the parents who presented evidence about the harm and lack of evidence to the Chief Executive in 2018, which he ignored.
The scientific evidence for much of what the Tavistock did simply is not there. God knows how they can say they got informed consent for their treatment. The legal liability they now face is dreadful.
Yes indeed. My excuse is that I turned away from this debate as it is so toxic. But now it is impacting friends and fam I can’t avert my gaze
I’m curious about apparently sensible people captured by this madness? Do they all sincerely believe it? Are they bullied into it? Is it a career move?
The Tavistock / GIDS was a law unto themselves that was widely disliked & distrusted by trans people in the UK as far as I can tell.
Their replacement by a new, larger service that a) might be able to cope with demand and b) will operate under more transparency & according to the norms of trans healthcare elsewhere in Europe is probably a good thing for everyone involved.
If the new service follows what is happening in France, Sweden and Finland, which have put a halt to the use of puberty blockers and look at the child holistically then that will be a good thing.
Whatever is done should be based on proper scientific research not on what lobby groups demand.
Medical matters should be based on the principle of best for the patient as agreed with their doctor in the relevant field. It seems the Tavistock sometimes departed from that. Ideology in the mix - which it shouldn't be - and also massive overdemand for its services.
There is a rational reason why a young person who is transgender might want puberty blockers and later on surgery as an adult - which is that their life will be easier if the divergence of their body from their lived-in gender is minimized.
I suggest the healthcare professionals at the Tavistock still based their actions on what they thought was best for the patient. They may (or may not) have been mistaken as to what was best for the patient, but I don't believe they were deliberately doing things while thinking, "This is bad for my patient."
This is why a comparison with, say, Mengele is so ridiculous, not that I can imagine anyone ever making such a comparison except as a rhetorical flourish.
No, not Shipman or Mengele type behaviour. Those guys were evil devils. That's not really the Tavistock situation.
No, but startlingly ascientific. I am handicapped by the fact that I would rather pop my eyeballs out with a teaspoon than research the question how the "affirmation only" theory got off the ground, but it is obvious bollocks. If a youngish child comes to you and says I think I am the opposite sex to what it looks like there's a dozen explanations which immediately come to mind, and privileging one of them irrespective of the evidence is an ideological not medical decision.
I thought we agreed it would be good to de-escalate the discussion. That comment seems more rhetorical than helpful. It was never the case that a youngish child was immediately pushed into a drug treatment having said something once. There is an issue around how to present options to children and about how much to push back against what they are saying, and it's important to get that right, but the picture being painted of practice at the Tavi is highly exaggerated at best. There was a very long delay before anything happened (because of long waiting lists). Lots of children were exited from the service with a decision not to transition. You're misrepresenting subtler shades of opinion.
The core point remains: one hypothesis was preferred on ideological grounds when it should not have been.
Institutional guidelines for transgender children and adolescent minors fail to adequately address a critical juncture of care of this population: how to proceed if a minor and their parents have disagreements concerning their gender-affirming medical care. Through arguments based on ethical, paediatric, adolescent and transgender health research, we illustrate ethical dilemmas that may arise in treating transgender and gender diverse youth. We discuss three potential avenues for providing gender-affirming care over parental disagreement: legal carve-outs to parental consent, the mature minor doctrine and state intervention for neglect. Our discussion approaches this parent–child disagreement in a manner that prioritises the developing autonomy of transgender youth in the decision-making process surrounding medically assisted gender affirmation. We base our arguments in the literature surrounding the risks and benefits of gender-affirming therapy in transgender children and the existing legal basis for recognising minors’ decision-making authority in certain medical situations.
see? If child says it is TG and its parents think it might not be, here's three legal manoeuvres to thwart the parents. And nothing else.
TL:DR. A wildcat strike in Bury. At an entirely non-unionised factory. Which of course means there's no TU legislation. No ballot, no notice. Just all out. How does the government propose to ban this? And how do you solve it by agency workers, when that would cost the employer far more than the meagre wages? Nobody can get anyone anyways.
I don't think this could be banned, but why would they want to ban it? People should be free to withdraw their labour at any point, but that can come with consequences.
Banning strikes is something of a talking point in this leadership campaign. It appears to be being lapped up by its intended audience.
You are suggesting that the government wants to ban people leaving their jobs? I don't see it happening.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
I don’t think so.
I think gender identity is so primal than pretty much everyone can get worked up about it if they’re exposed to the “right” narrative.
I agree everyone can, but moral panics about kids and marginal lifestyles often seem to target higher-income groups who fear more loss of social status than parents in sink estates for example.
"Moral panic" is one for the banned list. WTF are you on about anyway? If I am opposed to the proliferation of child pornography on the internet does that make me a posho having a "moral panic about kids?" Where does loss of social status come in to it?
Some friends of mine are really worried about their young daughter declaring she's trans, and demanding dangerous medication aged 15, and going to war with them about it when they object - by running away a lot, being picked up by police at 5am, and so on
Perhaps they too are in a silly "moral panic"
Then again, once we make it practically illegal for such a thing to happen, the same people can then get on with making teenage girls have less rights than the current generation. Which is absolutely the trajectory of the "war on woke".
Would you accept the validity of the slippery slope argument if it were being made in the other direction?
Of course. If the aim was to make us all trans to thus enslave men under a Matriarchal dictatorship.
That Scotland stat is absolutely shocking. The SNP really are shite, yet get away with it endlessly
I'm less surprised by London. It is not the aggressively intoxicated place it once was. I observed this last night in Richmond, drinking by the river. OK Richmond is always quite genteel but nonetheless a hot Friday night with everyone boozing on the riverbank - fifteen or twenty years ago there would have been rowdiness. Yet none. It was like a pleasant drinks party but with 3,000 people
My older self quite likes it. My younger self might have found it boring
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
Might do, though why people think Martin Lewis is strong evidence for this, is a mystery. This is the first suggested tactic which looks feasible and effective to me, i never thought gas bill payers were going to lie down on railway lines
IIRC, utilities can’t disconnect you without a court order, a process which take months of increasingly agressive letters before they actually go looking for a judge - and will find a very long queue. If people stop paying on 1st October, I bet the utilities won’t actually be able to cut anyone off until March or April.
That is right, and the queues for judges are long enough anyway. It is not easy to see what the counter is to this move (make the £400 bung contingent on carrying on paying?)
Phil - If a person is born "trans", then that implies the cause is genetic. And, that they will be unlikely to have many descendants. Which in turn implies that such genes -- if they exist -- will be rapidly be eliminated from the population.
So, if there are people with such genes, they must be extremely rare, far rarer than those now claiming to be "trans" in the US and the UK. And such people -- if they exists -- would deserve our sympathy and, if possible, our help.
Do you apply this line of thinking to homosexuals too?
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
That Scotland stat is absolutely shocking. The SNP really are shite, yet get away with it endlessly
I'm less surprised by London. It is not the aggressively intoxicated place it once was. I observed this last night in Richmond, drinking by the river. OK Richmond is always quite genteel but nonetheless a hot Friday night with everyone boozing on the riverbank - fifteen or twenty years ago there would have been rowdiness. Yet none. It was like a pleasant drinks party but with 3,000 people
My older self quite likes it. My younger self might have found it boring
Might be a coke vs heroin divide?
The lethality spectrum of illegal drugs is extraordinary. Opiates and oids is sudden death, coke gives you early onset heart attacks, psychedelics about as lethal as tap water.
Campaign for everybody to cancel their fuel direct debits on 1 October
Interesting
Low-level civil disobedience is definitely going to happen, if the predictions for winter fuel prices are anywhere close to accurate.
Might do, though why people think Martin Lewis is strong evidence for this, is a mystery. This is the first suggested tactic which looks feasible and effective to me, i never thought gas bill payers were going to lie down on railway lines
IIRC, utilities can’t disconnect you without a court order, a process which take months of increasingly agressive letters before they actually go looking for a judge - and will find a very long queue. If people stop paying on 1st October, I bet the utilities won’t actually be able to cut anyone off until March or April.
That is right, and the queues for judges are long enough anyway. It is not easy to see what the counter is to this move (make the £400 bung contingent on carrying on paying?)
Isn't the killer people on prepay? No cash upfront, no heat and light.
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
In the US, there's a strong correlation between parental income and trans teenagers.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
I don't see a big difference between transgender toddlers and Christian or Muslim toddlers. It is a shorthand for the parent's beliefs and intentions.
Gender is not a matter of “faith”.
In a way it is. There's no rational basis to believe someone can be in the 'wrong' body.
That's the same as saying the concept of gender is irrational. It's meaningful only if it can differ (in an individual) from biological sex. If it can't it means gender is null and void for all practical purposes hence so is the notion of transgender. I reckon this view is quite widely held.
I don't think it's the same. Even if you accept the theory of gender as something socially constructed, it doesn't automatically follow that someone who identifies as the opposite gender to their biological sex literally is a man/woman trapped in a woman/man's body.
Why put something so obvious in writing? It's like murderers who are rumbled because they have notebooks called HOW TO MURDER GRANDAD AND INHERIT HIS MONEY. And several hundred google searches.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
In the US, there's a strong correlation between parental income and trans teenagers.
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
There are a surprisingly large number of people who don't have just XX or XY chromosome - everyone with Down Syndrome for a start.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
In the US, there's a strong correlation between parental income and trans teenagers.
Well, what does one buy for the teenager who has everything?
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
I don’t think so.
I think gender identity is so primal than pretty much everyone can get worked up about it if they’re exposed to the “right” narrative.
I agree everyone can, but moral panics about kids and marginal lifestyles often seem to target higher-income groups who fear more loss of social status than parents in sink estates for example.
"Moral panic" is one for the banned list. WTF are you on about anyway? If I am opposed to the proliferation of child pornography on the internet does that make me a posho having a "moral panic about kids?" Where does loss of social status come in to it?
Some friends of mine are really worried about their young daughter declaring she's trans, and demanding dangerous medication aged 15, and going to war with them about it when they object - by running away a lot, being picked up by police at 5am, and so on
Perhaps they too are in a silly "moral panic"
Then again, once we make it practically illegal for such a thing to happen, the same people can then get on with making teenage girls have less rights than the current generation. Which is absolutely the trajectory of the "war on woke".
Would you accept the validity of the slippery slope argument if it were being made in the other direction?
Of course. If the aim was to make us all trans to thus enslave men under a Matriarchal dictatorship.
Do you agree with Peter Tatchell on lowering the age of consent?
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
There are a surprisingly large number of people who don't have just XX or XY chromosome - everyone with Down Syndrome for a start.
That's true, but that is a different chromosome, no. 21, and AFAIK trisomy 21 doesn't affect gender per se. But you are quite right in the sense that there are various dispositions of the sex chromosomes such as XXY or XYY, of course.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
I don’t think so.
I think gender identity is so primal than pretty much everyone can get worked up about it if they’re exposed to the “right” narrative.
I agree everyone can, but moral panics about kids and marginal lifestyles often seem to target higher-income groups who fear more loss of social status than parents in sink estates for example.
"Moral panic" is one for the banned list. WTF are you on about anyway? If I am opposed to the proliferation of child pornography on the internet does that make me a posho having a "moral panic about kids?" Where does loss of social status come in to it?
Some friends of mine are really worried about their young daughter declaring she's trans, and demanding dangerous medication aged 15, and going to war with them about it when they object - by running away a lot, being picked up by police at 5am, and so on
Perhaps they too are in a silly "moral panic"
Then again, once we make it practically illegal for such a thing to happen, the same people can then get on with making teenage girls have less rights than the current generation. Which is absolutely the trajectory of the "war on woke".
Would you accept the validity of the slippery slope argument if it were being made in the other direction?
Of course. If the aim was to make us all trans to thus enslave men under a Matriarchal dictatorship.
Do you agree with Peter Tatchell on lowering the age of consent?
bondegezou said: "There are lots of genes that one might naively believe would be rapidly eliminated from the population, which are not for a variety of reasons. Sickle cell, cystic fibrosis, schizophrenia."
The first two examples are genetic, and have evolutionary explanations. Sickle cell anemia, for example, if you have just one gene for it, gives you some protection against malaria. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sickle_cell_disease
Cystic fibrosis is rare, but there are evolutionry explanations for why it isn't even rarer, though none is yet widely accepted.
In my opinion, shizophrenia is an unsolved problem.
(On the good news front, there have been a couple of cures for sickle cell disease.)
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
I wouldn't be too confident about the theory of evolution predicting this or that. Almost half a century ago, by 1977 at least, the feminisation of males was recognised as a highly effective breeding strategy in certain cases. Not this particular human instance, of androgen insensitivity, presumably, but it does remind ome of the complication of possible strategies.
Don’t ever forget what the LGBTQ+ movement and the liberal left were trying to do by banning ‘trans conversion therapy’. It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Kafka meets Orwell, but I hope this short thread explains. And makes you angry.
And the real kicker? We were saved from this barbaric law at the eleventh hour by the Tory government of Boris Johnson which, venal and incompetent as it was, was able to spot a pig in a poke. What does that say about these clowns?
To my shame, I had no idea what ‘trans conversion therapy’ was. I too presumed it was something horrible like gay conversion therapy
That’s an eye opening thread. The entire trans activist sandcastle is crumbling
The Cass Interim Report spells it all out. As does the judgment in the Keira Bell case. As do the multiple whistleblowers at the Tavistock who were ignored. Or the parents who presented evidence about the harm and lack of evidence to the Chief Executive in 2018, which he ignored.
The scientific evidence for much of what the Tavistock did simply is not there. God knows how they can say they got informed consent for their treatment. The legal liability they now face is dreadful.
Yes indeed. My excuse is that I turned away from this debate as it is so toxic. But now it is impacting friends and fam I can’t avert my gaze
I’m curious about apparently sensible people captured by this madness? Do they all sincerely believe it? Are they bullied into it? Is it a career move?
The Tavistock / GIDS was a law unto themselves that was widely disliked & distrusted by trans people in the UK as far as I can tell.
Their replacement by a new, larger service that a) might be able to cope with demand and b) will operate under more transparency & according to the norms of trans healthcare elsewhere in Europe is probably a good thing for everyone involved.
If the new service follows what is happening in France, Sweden and Finland, which have put a halt to the use of puberty blockers and look at the child holistically then that will be a good thing.
Whatever is done should be based on proper scientific research not on what lobby groups demand.
Medical matters should be based on the principle of best for the patient as agreed with their doctor in the relevant field. It seems the Tavistock sometimes departed from that. Ideology in the mix - which it shouldn't be - and also massive overdemand for its services.
There is a rational reason why a young person who is transgender might want puberty blockers and later on surgery as an adult - which is that their life will be easier if the divergence of their body from their lived-in gender is minimized.
I suggest the healthcare professionals at the Tavistock still based their actions on what they thought was best for the patient. They may (or may not) have been mistaken as to what was best for the patient, but I don't believe they were deliberately doing things while thinking, "This is bad for my patient."
This is why a comparison with, say, Mengele is so ridiculous, not that I can imagine anyone ever making such a comparison except as a rhetorical flourish.
No, not Shipman or Mengele type behaviour. Those guys were evil devils. That's not really the Tavistock situation.
No, but startlingly ascientific. I am handicapped by the fact that I would rather pop my eyeballs out with a teaspoon than research the question how the "affirmation only" theory got off the ground, but it is obvious bollocks. If a youngish child comes to you and says I think I am the opposite sex to what it looks like there's a dozen explanations which immediately come to mind, and privileging one of them irrespective of the evidence is an ideological not medical decision.
I thought we agreed it would be good to de-escalate the discussion. That comment seems more rhetorical than helpful. It was never the case that a youngish child was immediately pushed into a drug treatment having said something once. There is an issue around how to present options to children and about how much to push back against what they are saying, and it's important to get that right, but the picture being painted of practice at the Tavi is highly exaggerated at best. There was a very long delay before anything happened (because of long waiting lists). Lots of children were exited from the service with a decision not to transition. You're misrepresenting subtler shades of opinion.
The core point remains: one hypothesis was preferred on ideological grounds when it should not have been.
Institutional guidelines for transgender children and adolescent minors fail to adequately address a critical juncture of care of this population: how to proceed if a minor and their parents have disagreements concerning their gender-affirming medical care. Through arguments based on ethical, paediatric, adolescent and transgender health research, we illustrate ethical dilemmas that may arise in treating transgender and gender diverse youth. We discuss three potential avenues for providing gender-affirming care over parental disagreement: legal carve-outs to parental consent, the mature minor doctrine and state intervention for neglect. Our discussion approaches this parent–child disagreement in a manner that prioritises the developing autonomy of transgender youth in the decision-making process surrounding medically assisted gender affirmation. We base our arguments in the literature surrounding the risks and benefits of gender-affirming therapy in transgender children and the existing legal basis for recognising minors’ decision-making authority in certain medical situations.
see? If child says it is TG and its parents think it might not be, here's three legal manoeuvres to thwart the parents. And nothing else.
I'm not arguing about the core point. I'm suggesting that hyperbolic rhetoric around the core point is unhelpfully heating up the debate, preventing any resolution. That article is a lot more nuanced than some of the discussion earlier in this thread (although I'm glad you have walked back your Mengele comparison).
If you think that a transgendered state does not exist at all, then obviously you will disagree with any discussion of medical interventions. Until recently, most people accepted that a small number of people are transgendered and that those people generally report first experiencing gender dysphoria in childhood. If you accept that, then there needs to be discussion of how medical professionals should proceed. There are lots of other situations in healthcare where we should take the child's view over the parents. That becomes truer as the child comes closer to the age of majority. How those apply to transgender care should be discussed. The article isn't saying a healthcare professional has to take the child's view over the parents. That all is not meant as a defence of that article, but I'm trying to put it in some context, instead of just constantly coming up with OTT rhetoric.
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
I don't see a big difference between transgender toddlers and Christian or Muslim toddlers. It is a shorthand for the parent's beliefs and intentions.
Gender is not a matter of “faith”.
In a way it is. There's no rational basis to believe someone can be in the 'wrong' body.
That's the same as saying the concept of gender is irrational. It's meaningful only if it can differ (in an individual) from biological sex. If it can't it means gender is null and void for all practical purposes hence so is the notion of transgender. I reckon this view is quite widely held.
I don't think it's the same. Even if you accept the theory of gender as something socially constructed, it doesn't automatically follow that someone who identifies as the opposite gender to their biological sex literally is a man/woman trapped in a woman/man's body.
Kind of does though. "Trapped in wrong body" is code for "My sex is different to my gender."
If the concept of gender is meaningful it follows it is different to sex. If it isn't we don't need the term.
And if the 2 things are different a person can have their sex and gender misaligned - ie be trapped in the wrong body.
This is only irrational to somebody who thinks the notion of gender is bollox.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
There are individuals intersex in other ways who are fertile and can have kids, e.g. someone can be a chromosomal chimera.
Originally charging £20 for this Rishi Rally tomorrow. A rare supply side reform from Rishi means now giving away tickets. Wonder if those who coughed up for tickets will get a refund?
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
And homosexuals? Is there an Evolution angle there iyo?
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
She reminds me of the British Hard Right demagogue - Vivienne Rook - played by Emma Thompson in the dystopian drama Years and Years. Except Kari Lake is real, and better at the demagoguery
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
Originally charging £20 for this Rishi Rally tomorrow. A rare supply side reform from Rishi means now giving away tickets. Wonder if those who coughed up for tickets will get a refund?
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
She reminds me of the British Hard Right demagogue - Vivienne Rook - played by Emma Thompson in the dystopian drama Years and Years. Except Kari Lake is real, and better at the demagoguery
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
The MAGA evolution of the GOP have no care for things like democracy. They simply declare victory when they lose, and rig the system when they win.
So yes, why not have all-American fascism? After all its what all right-thinking people want - less liberals, less non-native proper Americans, less fags, less uppity women.
I fully understand that leaving the EU was a dreadful idea, but I also understand that it's much better for my career if I pretend Brexit is brilliant. This is because my supporters are idiots and I need to pander to their stupidity! https://twitter.com/LizTruss_MP/status/1553393751250423808/photo/1
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
There are, of course, a few unfortunates who are physically intersex, such as those suffering from complete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen_insensitivity_syndrome . (A geneticist would look at their chromosomes, see the Y, and say that's a male. Were you to see one in a shower, you'd say that's a female. And a technician doing a scan would be shocked, because they are born with testicles, rather than ovaries.)
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
And homosexuals? Is there an Evolution angle there iyo?
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
Yes there would be, he could be impeached by Congress and the US armed forces take an oath to the constitution as much as the President. Trump would need to amend that so they solely take an oath of loyalty to him.
I also still think Buttigieg has an excellent chance of the Presidency in 2024, Trump may not even run
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
I don't see a big difference between transgender toddlers and Christian or Muslim toddlers. It is a shorthand for the parent's beliefs and intentions.
Gender is not a matter of “faith”.
In a way it is. There's no rational basis to believe someone can be in the 'wrong' body.
That's the same as saying the concept of gender is irrational. It's meaningful only if it can differ (in an individual) from biological sex. If it can't it means gender is null and void for all practical purposes hence so is the notion of transgender. I reckon this view is quite widely held.
I don't think it's the same. Even if you accept the theory of gender as something socially constructed, it doesn't automatically follow that someone who identifies as the opposite gender to their biological sex literally is a man/woman trapped in a woman/man's body.
Kind of does though. "Trapped in wrong body" is code for "My sex is different to my gender."
If the concept of gender is meaningful it follows it is different to sex. If it isn't we don't need the term.
And if the 2 things are different a person can have their sex and gender misaligned - ie be trapped in the wrong body.
This is only irrational to somebody who thinks the concept of gender is irrational.
Arguably it's the other way round. If you see social gender and biological sex as two independent things, then even if they are misaligned, your body is your body; you are you.
If you say that someone has the 'wrong' body then you're actually denying that gender is separable from sex.
Also on Spectator out loud podcast, although I warn you against listening through to the end. You’ll be subjected to a terrible piece by the awful Toby Young.
The Speccie is, these days, just about worth wading through the swamp of bullshit to find the occasional nugget of genius, imo. The magazine for right wing rich kids, written by right wing rich kids is occasionally insightful and often entertaining, at least. Also, quite why anyone would pay for a subscription when they give out almost all of their content for free, is beyond me. Does anyone on here sub?
Oh for goodness sake! Could the Tory leadership race get any dumber? It’s not the Equality Act that’s the problem! 🤦♀️ It acknowledges the biological reality of sex as Scotland’s Supreme Court held recently thanx to @ForWomenScot
Let's choose. He is either - a) an idiot b) badly informed c) well-informed but pandering to the gallery d) panicking e) using this issue to attack equalities law more generally.
The possibility of (e) worries me, especially given the nonsense Suella Braverman has been coming out with. Yet even now the Labour Party cannot be relied on to protect womens' rights or the rights of troubled children to have the best possible medical care.
Is it beyond them to get advice from well-informed equalities lawyers?
I did tell you that your anti-trans activism would rebound on you Cyclefree in exactly this way, with a rolling back of all the advances made for women and other minorities in the C20th but you wouldn’t have it.
What a pile of fat hairy bollocks
The truth is often unpalatable, I agree.
You’re literally claiming that the right to vote will be taken away from women. Get a grip
Well, I wouldn’t put that past some of the people involved, sure. But the most recent stuff will go first, if they get their way.
My personal belief is that Cyclefree et al have been used by people with a much wider agenda: They don’t give a stuff about trans people particularly, (I mean, they believe them to be degenerate perverts who have rejected God’s mercy, but they hardly limit that attitude to trans people...) they’re really after the unrolling of the liberal project. Gay rights, women’s rights, the whole lot.
I am quite certain that there are people with precisely that agenda. Especially in the US. And groups in Europe too.
But the problem we have - and I genuinely wish you would engage with it rather than dismissing it - is this: TRAs also have an agenda and it is very explicitly and openly to replace sex with gender and to limit or remove existing rights for women. Stonewall, for instance, has openly called for the single sex exemptions in the Equality Act to be removed, for the offence of rape by deception to be removed. These proposals and self-ID will diminish the position of women, not simply in relation to single sex spaces but in relation to equal pay (the use of a comparator is rendered meaningless if self-ID is permitted). Abolition of one of the crimes of rape is in no sense a progressive cause.
Your position seems to be that women should not campaign against this but accept it because otherwise they might possibly give succour to some right-wing groups. It assumes that Stonewall and others supporting their stance are progressive because they say they are. I judge them on what they advocate. And there is nothing progressive about what they are advocating.
So why should women not campaign against something that will harm them?That is an absurd and immoral view IMO. And, frankly, sexist because it is saying - whether you mean to or not - that women should never put their interests first.
My position is that you & people like you are taking sides in a culture war that will rebound on you in ways that you will find deeply unconformable if you “win”.
Be careful what you wish for, because you might get it & more besides.
It's a case of deciding issues on their merits. It's a false choice to say that either one must be on the side of trans activists or on the side of the hard right of the US Republican party.
Otherwise it is simply “Shut up and sit at the back of the bus.”
The argument that “X is supported by bad people, therefore X cannot be supported” is ignorant shit.
The Nazis were anti-smoking. Should we all get a 60 a day habit to prove our moral purity?
Liz "Free The Weed" Truss is growing on me. Even if she doesn't want to free the weed anymore
"At one freshers’ week, Lib Dem members including Alan Renwick, a friend of Truss who is now an academic on constitutional affairs, were decorating a stall and Truss, then a believer in cannabis legalisation, had a particular vision of how it should look. “She wanted the whole stall to be covered with these posters saying: ‘Free the Weed’, so I was scurrying around after Liz, trying to take these down again and put up a variety of different messages rather than just having this one message all over the stall,” Renwick told BBC Radio 4. She was putting them up again just as quickly." https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/30/liz-truss-profile-ambition-charm-thick-skin-thatcher
Will Liz be the first PM in history to have publicly backed legalizing cannabis and getting rid of the monarchy (even if she claims she doesn't believe these things now) ?
She will probably be the most libertarian PM we have ever had. If the Tories elect her it is very high risk, she might do surprisingly well or she might collapse the Conservative coalition completely, losing the white working class and traditional Tories as well
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
Until about 10 years ago these difficult issues weren't politicised in the way they are today. We need to return to that state of affairs in my opinion.
It is hard to see how the genie goes back in the bottle.
It is why I caution the view that the next election is lost for the Tories purely because of the economic disaster we’re seeing.
Identity and cultural issues do matter and the more entrenched people get into their positions the more this is going to be harder to unwind.
I don't see any UK polling suggesting it is a top issue for many people. I fully respect that it is a top issue for some people and governments have to deal with all issues, whether the bulk of the electorate cares much about them or not. But for it to be an election campaign decider, one would expect polling suggesting people prioritised such issues more than they currently do.
It’s a potent wedge issue.
At on some level, people expect the government not to be funding what looks to be quite odd medical experiments on vulnerable teenagers.
What is your evidence that it is a potent wedge issue? If it is so potent, surely some sort of polling would pick that up. Do you have any examples of polling you're drawing on here?
I don’t think it’s been deployed in an actual campaign yet, although it has in the US.
I don’t think people put it above “cost of living” etc, but look at the heat it inspires on here.
My theory is that high-income people who don't feel cost of living, and don't get offended by people from European or other heritages, are easier to get worked up over trans.
In the US, there's a strong correlation between parental income and trans teenagers.
Perhaps that is to an extent via an intermediate metric of "liberalness"?
ie wealthy family background more likely to be liberal and in turn more likely to be accepting of difference in their kids.
Watch that MAGA speech by Kari Lake. She is incredibly good: a natural-born populist politician. She whips up the crowd, and they love her right back
Frightening
"Thrilling" is what I think at least a part of you means?
Yes. Hitler could also be thrilling. He was a great orator in his own florid way. And yet I manage to hold this opinion without being a Nazi, and while wishing Hitler had never existed
Another speaker I find thrilling is the young Hugo Chavez. He has the same quality as Kari Lake: he commands your attention and it is difficult to look away. This is pure charisma. It is rare. Pay attention when you see it
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
She reminds me of the British Hard Right demagogue - Vivienne Rook - played by Emma Thompson in the dystopian drama Years and Years. Except Kari Lake is real, and better at the demagoguery
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
Kari Lake trails likely Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs 43% to 38% in the latest Arizona governor poll and was 9% behind in the poll before that
Warning! What is about to follow is about as politically incorrect as possible: Baker argued in the book that people could be born bisexual, and that they would be able, in experimenting with their own sex, to learn ways to have and advantage with the opposite sex. There are some interesting examples of that, for example, LUGs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_until_graduation (I have known a few.)
So he believed Bs could be genetic, but not Ls and Gs.
There are, as I assume most of you know, entire societies, for example, the Pashtuns, in which many of the men are, in our terms, "bisexual" (There was even a musical in the US celebrating their customs, "The Boy Who Danced On Air". It wasn't a great commercial success; it turns out that man-buys-boy has less popular appeal than the more traditional boy-meets-girl.)
(Yes, I am aware that some of Baker's conclusions in the book have less evidence than he claimed, and others may be false. But I am also aware that many, both in the US and the UK, would prefer not to think about evolution, as it applies to themselves.
One thing to keep in mind is that, although we may explain our behavior through its evolutionary purposes, the instincts operate on a lower level, and can "misfire". Examples abound from imprinting studies. )
Liz "Free The Weed" Truss is growing on me. Even if she doesn't want to free the weed anymore
"At one freshers’ week, Lib Dem members including Alan Renwick, a friend of Truss who is now an academic on constitutional affairs, were decorating a stall and Truss, then a believer in cannabis legalisation, had a particular vision of how it should look. “She wanted the whole stall to be covered with these posters saying: ‘Free the Weed’, so I was scurrying around after Liz, trying to take these down again and put up a variety of different messages rather than just having this one message all over the stall,” Renwick told BBC Radio 4. She was putting them up again just as quickly." https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/30/liz-truss-profile-ambition-charm-thick-skin-thatcher
Will Liz be the first PM in history to have publicly backed legalizing cannabis and getting rid of the monarchy (even if she claims she doesn't believe these things now) ?
She will probably be the most libertarian PM we have ever had. If the Tories elect her it is very high risk, she might do surprisingly well or she might collapse the Conservative coalition completely, losing the white working class and traditional Tories as well
Whatever happens at the next election will, for better or worse, only partly be about whatever Truss does. She will carry the legacy of Brexit and the Johnson premiership (whether you think those are good or bad legacies). She could partly repair the Conservative coalition, but still lose.
However, I suspect, she’ll be shit on top of a shit legacy, the Tories will lose, and then they’ll pick an even shitter new leader.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
She reminds me of the British Hard Right demagogue - Vivienne Rook - played by Emma Thompson in the dystopian drama Years and Years. Except Kari Lake is real, and better at the demagoguery
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
Kari Lake trails likely Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs 43% to 38% in the latest Arizona governor poll and was 9% behind in the poll before that
The endless trans culture war - for that is what it is - saddens me. I have various irons in this particular fire - I am a bisexual man with a wife and a daughter, I have a non-binary adult offspring who has had several relationships with trans men, and I have an old friend who is a trans woman.
I keep coming back to basic beliefs like all things in moderation, treat as you want to be tret, your freedoms can't trample on other people's freedoms etc etc. Too many of the activists on both sides simply want to defeat the other side who aren't just wrong but morally degenerate.
We do need to be very careful though. The "anti-woke" foamers don't want to pull back what they see as the excesses of modern attitudes to people like my eldest and their exes. They want to put deviants like me back in our boxes where we can't be heard. And want to stop women from getting in the way of man things like football and voting.
So we have to take all of this in moderation. Promoting trans rights can't trample on the rights of women. Protecting the rights of women can't become the momentum to reduce the rights of women. But when the talk is of sides, and of activists calling the other side blind or stupid or ignorant for questioning their own position, we slide backwards as a society whether we roll back progress or not.
It needs to stop.
The culture war in the UK has only recently become a heated ‘war’ - or so it feels - because until a few years ago the *progressive left* won every battle with barely a shot fired. They simply conquered. It wasn’t a war
It’s only now that the ‘progressives’ have moved on to truly suspicious, objectionable causes - transgender toddlers, all whites are racist - that people have said Enough. And they are fighting back. And it really is a war
Of course it wasn't a war. Section 28 wasn't Thatcher bigotry, it was just a woke myth.
Given the concept of “transgender toddlers” etc, it is now quite easy to see how the Thatcher government kneejerked itself into introducing Section 28.
I have new “appreciation” for how people like Harriet Harman ended up pretty much unwittingly supporting the pro-paedophile lobby of the 70s, too.
I don't see a big difference between transgender toddlers and Christian or Muslim toddlers. It is a shorthand for the parent's beliefs and intentions.
Gender is not a matter of “faith”.
In a way it is. There's no rational basis to believe someone can be in the 'wrong' body.
That's the same as saying the concept of gender is irrational. It's meaningful only if it can differ (in an individual) from biological sex. If it can't it means gender is null and void for all practical purposes hence so is the notion of transgender. I reckon this view is quite widely held.
I don't think it's the same. Even if you accept the theory of gender as something socially constructed, it doesn't automatically follow that someone who identifies as the opposite gender to their biological sex literally is a man/woman trapped in a woman/man's body.
Kind of does though. "Trapped in wrong body" is code for "My sex is different to my gender."
If the concept of gender is meaningful it follows it is different to sex. If it isn't we don't need the term.
And if the 2 things are different a person can have their sex and gender misaligned - ie be trapped in the wrong body.
This is only irrational to somebody who thinks the notion of gender is bollox.
I would argue we don't need the term gender. It used to just be a euphemism for sex. Are you male or female? What is your body? Do you have a willy or not? That is a meaningful question with a meaningful answer. But gender - do you feel like a man or a woman - how do you define what someone of the female gender is without getting into the circular logic of 'someone who identifies as a woman'? I'd argue that the term is redundant.
Also on Spectator out loud podcast, although I warn you against listening through to the end. You’ll be subjected to a terrible piece by the awful Toby Young.
The Speccie is, these days, just about worth wading through the swamp of bullshit to find the occasional nugget of genius, imo. The magazine for right wing rich kids, written by right wing rich kids is occasionally insightful and often entertaining, at least. Also, quite why anyone would pay for a subscription when they give out almost all of their content for free, is beyond me. Does anyone on here sub?
Liz "Free The Weed" Truss is growing on me. Even if she doesn't want to free the weed anymore
"At one freshers’ week, Lib Dem members including Alan Renwick, a friend of Truss who is now an academic on constitutional affairs, were decorating a stall and Truss, then a believer in cannabis legalisation, had a particular vision of how it should look. “She wanted the whole stall to be covered with these posters saying: ‘Free the Weed’, so I was scurrying around after Liz, trying to take these down again and put up a variety of different messages rather than just having this one message all over the stall,” Renwick told BBC Radio 4. She was putting them up again just as quickly." https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/30/liz-truss-profile-ambition-charm-thick-skin-thatcher
Will Liz be the first PM in history to have publicly backed legalizing cannabis and getting rid of the monarchy (even if she claims she doesn't believe these things now) ?
She will probably be the most libertarian PM we have ever had. If the Tories elect her it is very high risk, she might do surprisingly well or she might collapse the Conservative coalition completely, losing the white working class and traditional Tories as well
Whatever happens at the next election will, for better or worse, only partly be about whatever Truss does. She will carry the legacy of Brexit and the Johnson premiership (whether you think those are good or bad legacies). She could partly repair the Conservative coalition, but still lose.
However, I suspect, she’ll be shit on top of a shit legacy, the Tories will lose, and then they’ll pick an even shitter new leader.
I may be wrong but I expect the Tories will suffer a heavier defeat under Truss than they would have done under Boris.
She will have less appeal to the redwall white working class than Boris did and lose voters there to Labour and RefUK while still proving just as much of a turnoff for Remainers in London and the South who don't fear Starmer as they did Corbyn and have been moving Labour or LD.
The Telegraph headline today is 'Truss plans Thatcherite shake-up of the Treasury' including bringing back John Redwood, very bright but equally toxic in the redwall and Remain voting areas of the bluewall
Oh for goodness sake! Could the Tory leadership race get any dumber? It’s not the Equality Act that’s the problem! 🤦♀️ It acknowledges the biological reality of sex as Scotland’s Supreme Court held recently thanx to @ForWomenScot
Let's choose. He is either - a) an idiot b) badly informed c) well-informed but pandering to the gallery d) panicking e) using this issue to attack equalities law more generally.
The possibility of (e) worries me, especially given the nonsense Suella Braverman has been coming out with. Yet even now the Labour Party cannot be relied on to protect womens' rights or the rights of troubled children to have the best possible medical care.
Is it beyond them to get advice from well-informed equalities lawyers?
I did tell you that your anti-trans activism would rebound on you Cyclefree in exactly this way, with a rolling back of all the advances made for women and other minorities in the C20th but you wouldn’t have it.
What a pile of fat hairy bollocks
The truth is often unpalatable, I agree.
You’re literally claiming that the right to vote will be taken away from women. Get a grip
Well, I wouldn’t put that past some of the people involved, sure. But the most recent stuff will go first, if they get their way.
My personal belief is that Cyclefree et al have been used by people with a much wider agenda: They don’t give a stuff about trans people particularly, (I mean, they believe them to be degenerate perverts who have rejected God’s mercy, but they hardly limit that attitude to trans people...) they’re really after the unrolling of the liberal project. Gay rights, women’s rights, the whole lot.
I am quite certain that there are people with precisely that agenda. Especially in the US. And groups in Europe too.
But the problem we have - and I genuinely wish you would engage with it rather than dismissing it - is this: TRAs also have an agenda and it is very explicitly and openly to replace sex with gender and to limit or remove existing rights for women. Stonewall, for instance, has openly called for the single sex exemptions in the Equality Act to be removed, for the offence of rape by deception to be removed. These proposals and self-ID will diminish the position of women, not simply in relation to single sex spaces but in relation to equal pay (the use of a comparator is rendered meaningless if self-ID is permitted). Abolition of one of the crimes of rape is in no sense a progressive cause.
Your position seems to be that women should not campaign against this but accept it because otherwise they might possibly give succour to some right-wing groups. It assumes that Stonewall and others supporting their stance are progressive because they say they are. I judge them on what they advocate. And there is nothing progressive about what they are advocating.
So why should women not campaign against something that will harm them?That is an absurd and immoral view IMO. And, frankly, sexist because it is saying - whether you mean to or not - that women should never put their interests first.
My position is that you & people like you are taking sides in a culture war that will rebound on you in ways that you will find deeply unconformable if you “win”.
Be careful what you wish for, because you might get it & more besides.
It's a case of deciding issues on their merits. It's a false choice to say that either one must be on the side of trans activists or on the side of the hard right of the US Republican party.
Otherwise it is simply “Shut up and sit at the back of the bus.”
The argument that “X is supported by bad people, therefore X cannot be supported” is ignorant shit.
The Nazis were anti-smoking. Should we all get a 60 a day habit to prove our moral purity?
Totally, but OTOH it is not a sign of intelligent free thinking to pay no regard whatsoever to the type of people who agree or disagree with you on a topic. Eg if lots of palpable bigots are on the same side as you on an issue it merits a think about why this is. If having done so you remain happy with your position, fine, but to not bother with that step at all is vice not virtue. It's like skipping due diligence before buying something.
Liz "Free The Weed" Truss is growing on me. Even if she doesn't want to free the weed anymore
"At one freshers’ week, Lib Dem members including Alan Renwick, a friend of Truss who is now an academic on constitutional affairs, were decorating a stall and Truss, then a believer in cannabis legalisation, had a particular vision of how it should look. “She wanted the whole stall to be covered with these posters saying: ‘Free the Weed’, so I was scurrying around after Liz, trying to take these down again and put up a variety of different messages rather than just having this one message all over the stall,” Renwick told BBC Radio 4. She was putting them up again just as quickly." https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/30/liz-truss-profile-ambition-charm-thick-skin-thatcher
Will Liz be the first PM in history to have publicly backed legalizing cannabis and getting rid of the monarchy (even if she claims she doesn't believe these things now) ?
She will probably be the most libertarian PM we have ever had. If the Tories elect her it is very high risk, she might do surprisingly well or she might collapse the Conservative coalition completely, losing the white working class and traditional Tories as well
Whatever happens at the next election will, for better or worse, only partly be about whatever Truss does. She will carry the legacy of Brexit and the Johnson premiership (whether you think those are good or bad legacies). She could partly repair the Conservative coalition, but still lose.
However, I suspect, she’ll be shit on top of a shit legacy, the Tories will lose, and then they’ll pick an even shitter new leader.
I may be wrong but I expect the Tories will suffer a heavier defeat under Truss than they would have done under Boris.
She will have less appeal to the redwall white working class than Boris did and lose voters there to Labour and RefUK while still proving just as much of a turnoff for Remainers in London and the South who don't fear Starmer as they did Corbyn and have been moving Labour or LD.
The Telegraph headline today is 'Truss plans Thatcherite shake-up of the Treasury' including bringing back John Redwood, very bright but equally toxic in the redwall and Remain voting areas of the bluewall
I think you might be right, but OTOH we shouldn’t underestimate how much Boris trashed his own legacy and she has the one advantage of not being Johnson.
Given the toxic nature of the campaign will Mourdaunt serve under Truss?
She might be wise to keep her distance in case things do go horribly wrong.
Tugs and Wallace have nailed their colours to the mast, they look to be playing the Starmer game.
If a clean break from the past is needed next time maybe better for Mordaunt to stay above the fray. Although history suggests it didn't work for Hunt.
You would hope that Mordaunt would spend the time working out how to spot and then dismantle elephant traps. Especially those set by the Daily Mail. It was really surprising to see how badly she fared against the one issue that sank her - being painted as "woke".
She needs far better people around her prepping her if there is to be a next time.
Penny's time, as with Rishi, has been and gone. After Liz the next leadership election will be all about Kemi.
Last night, idly surfing, I came across the possible first female president of the USA, and, fuck me, she is scary
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
She reminds me of the British Hard Right demagogue - Vivienne Rook - played by Emma Thompson in the dystopian drama Years and Years. Except Kari Lake is real, and better at the demagoguery
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
Kari Lake trails likely Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs 43% to 38% in the latest Arizona governor poll and was 9% behind in the poll before that
Comments
TLDR: not that many people care
"Two thirds of Britons say they pay little attention (42%) or no attention (24%) to the debate in the media and politics about trans rights.
"Only one in three say they pay more attention than this, including just 8% who say they pay “a lot” of attention."
However if the smaller group that cares contains a lot of swing voters - women? - then that could be significant in an election
Another takeaway. As is sadly predictable, trans extremism has been bad for trans people
"How have attitudes on transgender issues changed over time?
"Elements of this survey have been asked three times: first in December 2018, then again in June 2020 and finally in May 2022. Some others have been asked in the 2020 and 2022 tranches only.
"What the results consistently show is an erosion of permissiveness towards transgender rights over that time period. In some cases the difference is small, but in others there has been a substantial shift."
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/07/20/where-does-british-public-stand-transgender-rights
This was his most recent comment I could find on the matter:
https://amp.lbc.co.uk/news/keir-starmer-says-vast-majority-of-women-dont-have-a-penis-and-need-safe-spaces/
Unlike PBers, normal people have virtually zero interest in politics. They are only vaguely aware of the key people.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11064513/Russian-energy-giant-Gazprom-cuts-gas-supply-Latvia-refused-pay-roubles.html
I'm flattered you are so personally interested in my alcohol consumption. This is the second time you've mentioned it just today. I can put your tiny mind at rest: I'm more sober now than I've been in many years. I go entire days, even half weeks, without touching a drop
I'm certainly not teetotal but I'd say my intake has halved, or more. And I'm quite enjoying the days of sobriety. The evenings can get dull, but then, being mildly drunk every night can get dull, as well. And a bit of weed takes the edge off
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/wildcat-strike-bury-food-firm-24609809.amp
TL:DR.
A wildcat strike in Bury. At an entirely non-unionised factory.
Which of course means there's no TU legislation. No ballot, no notice. Just all out.
How does the government propose to ban this? And how do you solve it by agency workers, when that would cost the employer far more than the meagre wages? Nobody can get anyone anyways.
However I do believe the culture wars will rise in salience over time, unless one side or other is completely defeated or surrenders (seems unlikely). We are following America, as usual (but thank God we don't have the same bitterness over abortion or guns)
Final thought, there is one slight chance the culture wars could figure large in GE24. That's if things are so grey and grim the voters decide no party has an answer to the economic questions, and then people might vote on other things - like Wokeness
But I would not put a wager on that
So, if there are people with such genes, they must be extremely rare, far rarer than those now claiming to be "trans" in the US and the UK. And such people -- if they exists -- would deserve our sympathy and, if possible, our help.
It wouldn't have got her in the final two. But she didn't get there anyways.
https://twitter.com/FraserNelson/status/1553356670763515905?
Better first responder preparation?
It appears to be being lapped up by its intended audience.
There are lots of genes that one might naively believe would be rapidly eliminated from the population, which are not for a variety of reasons. Sickle cell, cystic fibrosis, schizophrenia.
Read this and tell me your jaw doesn't drop
https://jme.bmj.com/content/46/5/295
Abstract
Institutional guidelines for transgender children and adolescent minors fail to adequately address a critical juncture of care of this population: how to proceed if a minor and their parents have disagreements concerning their gender-affirming medical care. Through arguments based on ethical, paediatric, adolescent and transgender health research, we illustrate ethical dilemmas that may arise in treating transgender and gender diverse youth. We discuss three potential avenues for providing gender-affirming care over parental disagreement: legal carve-outs to parental consent, the mature minor doctrine and state intervention for neglect. Our discussion approaches this parent–child disagreement in a manner that prioritises the developing autonomy of transgender youth in the decision-making process surrounding medically assisted gender affirmation. We base our arguments in the literature surrounding the risks and benefits of gender-affirming therapy in transgender children and the existing legal basis for recognising minors’ decision-making authority in certain medical situations.
see? If child says it is TG and its parents think it might not be, here's three legal manoeuvres to thwart the parents. And nothing else.
I'm less surprised by London. It is not the aggressively intoxicated place it once was. I observed this last night in Richmond, drinking by the river. OK Richmond is always quite genteel but nonetheless a hot Friday night with everyone boozing on the riverbank - fifteen or twenty years ago there would have been rowdiness. Yet none. It was like a pleasant drinks party but with 3,000 people
My older self quite likes it. My younger self might have found it boring
The lethality spectrum of illegal drugs is extraordinary. Opiates and oids is sudden death, coke gives you early onset heart attacks, psychedelics about as lethal as tap water.
Once again, it's expensive being poor.
[Thread]
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jul/29/boris-johnson-lords-cronies-legitimising-bribery
Again, I will say such rare individuals deserve our sympathy, and, where possible, our help. But they aren't going to have children.
So there aren't many of them -- as the theory of evolution predicts.
How amazing.
Her name is Kari Lake, she's a Trumpite running for the Arizona governorship. She's also an ex TV news anchor. Her views are extreme (to me) and often ugly. Yet she has an undeniable charisma and confidence
https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/how-maga-darling-kari-lake-turned-from-obama-donor-to-a-trump-acolyte-144500805789
Chillingly effective on the podium. A demagogue
One thing that might tell against her is her age. She's in her mid 50s and when might she get a run at the White House? But she is good. She actually talks like Trump - identical cadences - yet delivered by an attractive, eloquent woman with presence, it is unsettling as heck
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4uA-jtsGwI
The first two examples are genetic, and have evolutionary explanations. Sickle cell anemia, for example, if you have just one gene for it, gives you some protection against malaria. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sickle_cell_disease
Cystic fibrosis is rare, but there are evolutionry explanations for why it isn't even rarer, though none is yet widely accepted.
In my opinion, shizophrenia is an unsolved problem.
(On the good news front, there have been a couple of cures for sickle cell disease.)
https://www.jasoncollins.blog/the-origin-of-the-phrase-sneaky-fcker/
Frightening
If you think that a transgendered state does not exist at all, then obviously you will disagree with any discussion of medical interventions. Until recently, most people accepted that a small number of people are transgendered and that those people generally report first experiencing gender dysphoria in childhood. If you accept that, then there needs to be discussion of how medical professionals should proceed. There are lots of other situations in healthcare where we should take the child's view over the parents. That becomes truer as the child comes closer to the age of majority. How those apply to transgender care should be discussed. The article isn't saying a healthcare professional has to take the child's view over the parents. That all is not meant as a defence of that article, but I'm trying to put it in some context, instead of just constantly coming up with OTT rhetoric.
If the concept of gender is meaningful it follows it is different to sex. If it isn't we don't need the term.
And if the 2 things are different a person can have their sex and gender misaligned - ie be trapped in the wrong body.
This is only irrational to somebody who thinks the notion of gender is bollox.
I recall reading something twenty years ago by a political analyst saying that America was basically a "pre-fascist" state. I think George W Bush was in office at the time. I can't recall what his logic was, but seems to me to have been eerily prescient.
When Trump wins in 2024 there will be no way of getting him out again as his fascist cult followers take all the levers of government and administration.
The country will tear itself apart and it will certainly be an extraordinarily dangerous time for the rest of the world.
Incredibly 40% or so of Americans seem to want this.
https://twitter.com/GuidoFawkes/status/1553391977340837891
A few days ago, on here, I said that I could envisage America voting for something close to Fascism. I believe I am looking at a woman who could deliver that
So yes, why not have all-American fascism? After all its what all right-thinking people want - less liberals, less non-native proper Americans, less fags, less uppity women.
God Bless.
It's hard to take your eyes off her. Like looking at a magnificent monster rising from the deep
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTn7ALbLYPI
I also still think Buttigieg has an excellent chance of the Presidency in 2024, Trump may not even run
If you say that someone has the 'wrong' body then you're actually denying that gender is separable from sex.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-technology-killing-nostalgia
Also on Spectator out loud podcast, although I warn you against listening through to the end. You’ll be subjected to a terrible piece by the awful Toby Young.
The Speccie is, these days, just about worth wading through the swamp of bullshit to find the occasional nugget of genius, imo. The magazine for right wing rich kids, written by right wing rich kids is occasionally insightful and often entertaining, at least. Also, quite why anyone would pay for a subscription when they give out almost all of their content for free, is beyond me. Does anyone on here sub?
Why?
The argument that “X is supported by bad people, therefore X cannot be supported” is ignorant shit.
The Nazis were anti-smoking. Should we all get a 60 a day habit to prove our moral purity?
ie wealthy family background more likely to be liberal and in turn more likely to be accepting of difference in their kids.
Or that Red Bull would have angered a witch.
Another speaker I find thrilling is the young Hugo Chavez. He has the same quality as Kari Lake: he commands your attention and it is difficult to look away. This is pure charisma. It is rare. Pay attention when you see it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFzbqFcePp8
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Arizona_gubernatorial_election
No, on that I follow the thinking of Robin Baker, evolutionary biologist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Baker_(biologist)
Warning! What is about to follow is about as politically incorrect as possible: Baker argued in the book that people could be born bisexual, and that they would be able, in experimenting with their own sex, to learn ways to have and advantage with the opposite sex. There are some interesting examples of that, for example, LUGs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_until_graduation (I have known a few.)
So he believed Bs could be genetic, but not Ls and Gs.
There are, as I assume most of you know, entire societies, for example, the Pashtuns, in which many of the men are, in our terms, "bisexual" (There was even a musical in the US celebrating their customs, "The Boy Who Danced On Air". It wasn't a great commercial success; it turns out that man-buys-boy has less popular appeal than the more traditional boy-meets-girl.)
(Yes, I am aware that some of Baker's conclusions in the book have less evidence than he claimed, and others may be false. But I am also aware that many, both in the US and the UK, would prefer not to think about evolution, as it applies to themselves.
One thing to keep in mind is that, although we may explain our behavior through its evolutionary purposes, the instincts operate on a lower level, and can "misfire". Examples abound from imprinting studies. )
However, I suspect, she’ll be shit on top of a shit legacy, the Tories will lose, and then they’ll pick an even shitter new leader.
As I also say, however, she may have left it too late in her life to have an impact. But she has the raw talent
She will have less appeal to the redwall white working class than Boris did and lose voters there to Labour and RefUK while still proving just as much of a turnoff for Remainers in London and the South who don't fear Starmer as they did Corbyn and have been moving Labour or LD.
The Telegraph headline today is 'Truss plans Thatcherite shake-up of the Treasury' including bringing back John Redwood, very bright but equally toxic in the redwall and Remain voting areas of the bluewall
https://www.thelines.com/governor-election-odds-republicans-democrats-2022/
https://www.sportsbettingdime.com/news/politics/arizona-governor-odds-favor-republicans-over-democrats/