The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
It's the sort of thing Conservatives are accused of starting a "culture war" over for opposing but, of course, most people agree with them.
It's the one thing I think this Government have done a half-decent job on opposing.
If most people believe gender identity as something distinct from birth sex is a load of baloney where does this leave the 2004 Act which recognizes it? And where does this leave transgender people?
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does.
The law can shove it then.
"I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion."
This scandal is like Hillsborough, the authorities protect their own and not the victims.
No one will serve time for this shocking miscarriage of justice.
Perhaps, but unlike Liverpool we don't have a planet-sized chip on our shoulder and wallow in mawkish sentimentality and ugly self-pity, so we'll focus our efforts on change not bile.
You really are a twat when it comes to Liverpool.
At least 41 lives could have been saved that day if the authorities hadn’t screwed up and then covered it up.
Nothing has changed, nobody has served time for the deaths of 97 people.
How many lives could have been saved at Heysel if so many Liverpool fans weren’t drunken, homicidal louts?
It’s incredible how much Liverpool FC witters on about Hillsborough (which was undeniably awful) yet NEVER mentions Heysel. It’s not like they were centuries apart
Casino tees them up for you, and you hit them straight and true down the fairway of Political Betting.
Edwards II, III and IV tried to banned football on the grounds of public danger and nuisance.
They were of the opinion that mandatory assault weapon practise was better for the commonweal.
My views are slightly odd.
The first stirrings of self-awareness are always beautiful to behold….
That Prigozhin "mahogany desks" video... Something's got to break in Moscow. Saner elements in NATO governments will be hoping it's not Putin.
Actually, they might be hoping it's Prigozhin *and* Putin. Preferably with Medvedev, Mishustin, Lavrov, Bortnikov and Shoygu thrown in.
Can Debbie Harry revert to her 1977 form too and come and give me a private concert? By "saner" I meant those who don't want nuclear war and who can keep a grasp of what the set of likely possibilities is in Russia, even if it doesn't overlap with what they'd most prefer.
For sure, Prigozhin talking that way can't continue for long for obvious reasons.
No, she can't
The problem is, as I said before the current war started, that Russian Imperialism is coming to a bad end.
Russia has been an Imperial state, conquering and exploiting the surround countries, from the start. The USSR was just a regime change on the way.
The way that the UK and France handled the end of Empire was especially good, but the current Russian policy makes Suez and Algeria look like 8 dimensional chess.
I'm going to disagree with you about France. I don't think they've handled it very well at all. Maybe I'm wrong but their foreign policy, particularly in relation to Russia/Eastern Europe, the global south and maybe even China, strikes me as at best rooted in vanity and at worst wholly cynical.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
Whilst unnecessary in everyday speech, the word "cis" can be useful in certain contexts: trans being the obvious one, but there are others. One interesting example is the lunar missions (dearMoon, HLS) being planned by SpaceX. At some point they will presumably use terms such as "cis-lunar orbit" and "trans-lunar injection", since they have been used in circumlunar missions for over half a century.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The law isn't always right, as we've seen over the centuries.
One thing I find so tiresome about the 'culture war' is the way it's most energetic participators behave in the style of so many football managers. They only ever see the opposition's fouls but never any infraction by one of their own players. Their side are all infallible* actors.
*I considered using (the never booked for foul play) Gary Lineker as a metaphor though Gary himself has now become problematic of course.
Yes. Also the attempts to push all moderates into one of the "teams"
My opinion on the whole gender thing goes like this
1) People get to do their own thing. Not my business 2) However, in a small number of cases - prisons, shelters - there needs to be some system of protection. This system of protection should be specified in law. I would suggest controlled via the courts, rather than the fiat of a political. So subject to openness of decisions, appeals etc. 3) Medical Intervention. Since the medical intervention hasn't gone through classic trials and there are conflicting accounts of efficacy, handle it using the human trials legal and ethical frameworks. No, this does not necessarily mean double blind trials. There are plenty of occasions where that has not been done, for moral and practical reasons. As handled and recognised in the legal and moral framework for medical trials. We can still collect data and do science, even without double blind trials.
That Prigozhin "mahogany desks" video... Something's got to break in Moscow. Saner elements in NATO governments will be hoping it's not Putin.
Actually, they might be hoping it's Prigozhin *and* Putin. Preferably with Medvedev, Mishustin, Lavrov, Bortnikov and Shoygu thrown in.
Can Debbie Harry revert to her 1977 form too and come and give me a private concert? By "saner" I meant those who don't want nuclear war and who can keep a grasp of what the set of likely possibilities is in Russia, even if it doesn't overlap with what they'd most prefer.
For sure, Prigozhin talking that way can't continue for long for obvious reasons.
The nuclear blackmail works even when the leadership seem to be fumbling and squabbling like little children. Very powerful effect. It reminds me of the fear that cast a long shadow over Italian investigations into the Costa nostra long after they’d ceased to be the most powerful mafia group in Italy. Or those who didn’t want to prosecute Trump in case it “makes a martyr” of him.
Those wanting to keep Putin in place at all costs by continuing to ration military aid to Ukraine need to reckon on the risks of doing that too.
Can somebody who understands this shit explain what, exactly, was wrong with the stupid software?
A person(*) or computer tries to tell another person or computer that a transaction has occurred. This fails for some reason. How do you prevent lost transactions, double counting (if you just resend)?
The software in question was shit at this. Phantom transactions all over the place.
This problem has been solved many times. Fucking it up like this means that the design was shit.
*it’s a problem from long before computers.
The question is why this software wasn't properly vetted before they started to use it.
That’s a very good question.
Even after it started to be challenged, you’d think it would be easy to set up a dummy post office and run a batch of trial entries through it to see if it worked properly and provided the expected outputs.
That Prigozhin "mahogany desks" video... Something's got to break in Moscow. Saner elements in NATO governments will be hoping it's not Putin.
Actually, they might be hoping it's Prigozhin *and* Putin. Preferably with Medvedev, Mishustin, Lavrov, Bortnikov and Shoygu thrown in.
Can Debbie Harry revert to her 1977 form too and come and give me a private concert? By "saner" I meant those who don't want nuclear war and who can keep a grasp of what the set of likely possibilities is in Russia, even if it doesn't overlap with what they'd most prefer.
For sure, Prigozhin talking that way can't continue for long for obvious reasons.
The nuclear blackmail works even when the leadership seem to be fumbling and squabbling like little children. Very powerful effect. It reminds me of the fear that cast a long shadow over Italian investigations into the Costa nostra long after they’d ceased to be the most powerful mafia group in Italy. Or those who didn’t want to prosecute Trump in case it “makes a martyr” of him.
Those wanting to keep Putin in place at all costs by continuing to ration military aid to Ukraine need to reckon on the risks of doing that too.
From 1938 onwards British Intelligence got messages from members of the German General Staff suggesting backing for assassinating Hitler.
It was considered by the "professionals" that backing this would be a bad idea. Since this would take control of the German military from the Corporal and give it to the Generals.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
No, but the term “cis” is about shifting the term of reference. A biological male has the right to say that it is a question of fact, not the result of “identifying” and a gender “assigned” at birth.
The GIC is an alternative path for people who believe that the biological facts don’t align with who they believe themselves to be. It is right that there is an alternative path. But the proponents of “cis” are denying the validity of other beliefs in pursuit of their own ideology.
That Prigozhin "mahogany desks" video... Something's got to break in Moscow. Saner elements in NATO governments will be hoping it's not Putin.
Actually, they might be hoping it's Prigozhin *and* Putin. Preferably with Medvedev, Mishustin, Lavrov, Bortnikov and Shoygu thrown in.
Can Debbie Harry revert to her 1977 form too and come and give me a private concert? By "saner" I meant those who don't want nuclear war and who can keep a grasp of what the set of likely possibilities is in Russia, even if it doesn't overlap with what they'd most prefer.
For sure, Prigozhin talking that way can't continue for long for obvious reasons.
No, she can't
The problem is, as I said before the current war started, that Russian Imperialism is coming to a bad end.
Russia has been an Imperial state, conquering and exploiting the surround countries, from the start. The USSR was just a regime change on the way.
The way that the UK and France handled the end of Empire was especially good, but the current Russian policy makes Suez and Algeria look like 8 dimensional chess.
I think you mean ‘wasn’t’ ? Also Vietnam; France bollocksed that so badly that they brought down a US president and kick-started a decades long cultural war in the US.
In local government a new phenomenon in the social media age is where managers get 'forced out' by political campaigns about certain issues in response to local mobs. Often the underlying error is very minor and has no merit. What this has led to is a change from permanent employment to contracting on one weeks notice. So instead of being a manager on the local government pay scale Council's have to pay 'interim managers' 2-3 times as much to do the job. If the mobs start approaching the Councillors play along with it then the interim manager can just issue a threat to walk off to another council, leaving the work in total chaos and no one for the Councillors to blame; the positive impact of this being that Councillors are now a bit more cautious about going along with mobs.
I am seeing a similarity here to the post office situation - there is 'mob like' thinking going on and ultimately I don't think it will work out well.
I'm seeing the word "mob" here a lot and have no clue to what it is referring. The one thing you must never do as a senior local Government officer or manager is to publicly disagree with or contradict a senior Councillor such as a Cabinet member or especially the Council leader. I know one who did that and she was gone the next day.
IF they are carrying out agreed Council policy, Councillors should and in my experience do back Officers even if that means conflicting with local Members from the same Party. The local Member is doing his or her job supporting his or her constituents and that's an accepted part of the process.
The use of Interims is more to do with the recruitment process which means senior posts can be quickly filled instead of waiting for an applicant to work out their notice at their previous employment. Interims are as you say overpaid and are a mixed blessing at best. It's not the specialist contracting you see especially in IT but as insidious in its way. Sometimes the Interim will apply for the post and even accept a pay cut but not that often.
This scandal is like Hillsborough, the authorities protect their own and not the victims.
No one will serve time for this shocking miscarriage of justice.
Perhaps, but unlike Liverpool we don't have a planet-sized chip on our shoulder and wallow in mawkish sentimentality and ugly self-pity, so we'll focus our efforts on change not bile.
You really are a twat when it comes to Liverpool.
At least 41 lives could have been saved that day if the authorities hadn’t screwed up and then covered it up.
Nothing has changed, nobody has served time for the deaths of 97 people.
How many lives could have been saved at Heysel if so many Liverpool fans weren’t drunken, homicidal louts?
It’s incredible how much Liverpool FC witters on about Hillsborough (which was undeniably awful) yet NEVER mentions Heysel. It’s not like they were centuries apart
Casino tees them up for you, and you hit them straight and true down the fairway of Political Betting.
Edwards II, III and IV tried to banned football on the grounds of public danger and nuisance.
They were of the opinion that mandatory assault weapon practise was better for the commonweal.
My views are slightly odd.
The first stirrings of self-awareness are always beautiful to behold….
As regular PB posters, we’re all slightly odd.
We are all odd is true, but I'll lay evens we are not all slightly odd.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
Can somebody who understands this shit explain what, exactly, was wrong with the stupid software?
A person(*) or computer tries to tell another person or computer that a transaction has occurred. This fails for some reason. How do you prevent lost transactions, double counting (if you just resend)?
The software in question was shit at this. Phantom transactions all over the place.
This problem has been solved many times. Fucking it up like this means that the design was shit.
*it’s a problem from long before computers.
The question is why this software wasn't properly vetted before they started to use it.
That’s a very good question.
Even after it started to be challenged, you’d think it would be easy to set up a dummy post office and run a batch of trial entries through it to see if it worked properly and provided the expected outputs.
But, like I said, I know little about IT.
That’s exactly the sort of thing that the software testers and quality assurance teams should have been doing.
But hey, we built this system to pick up all the fraud, and it’s picking up loads of fraud, so trebles all round!
Can somebody who understands this shit explain what, exactly, was wrong with the stupid software?
A person(*) or computer tries to tell another person or computer that a transaction has occurred. This fails for some reason. How do you prevent lost transactions, double counting (if you just resend)?
The software in question was shit at this. Phantom transactions all over the place.
This problem has been solved many times. Fucking it up like this means that the design was shit.
*it’s a problem from long before computers.
The question is why this software wasn't properly vetted before they started to use it.
That’s a very good question.
Even after it started to be challenged, you’d think it would be easy to set up a dummy post office and run a batch of trial entries through it to see if it worked properly and provided the expected outputs.
But, like I said, I know little about IT.
The problem was, almost certainly, that they only did that.
What they needed was a test with hundreds of faked up post offices, all entering transactions at the same time. Over flakey internet connections, with payments systems failing etc etc.
A classic of this in the Boeing Starliner space capsule testing, Where they never tested the software for a full, all up mission. Because it was too hard. They still haven't launched a manned mission on it yet, in the real world.
SpaceX took the approach of a massive series of layers of testing - unit testing, functional testing integration testing, failure testing, performance testing etc etc.
A major part of these layers of testing is/was creating problems and seeing the reaction of the system as a whole.
Any code change had to go through all the layers, was incorporated into a final build and then run on an actual spacecraft sitting in a lab for the full duration of a mission.
The response from professional software engineers was
1) Boeing - WTAF? 2) SpaceX - they seem to have implemented a good testing regime. This isn't a new idea, just good practise.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The law isn't always right, as we've seen over the centuries.
Well we are similar to most developed countries in recognizing gender identity and transgender people. Those who want us to become the first country to roll back on this and remove this recognition - which is what the "biology rules!" talk implies - should say so rather than claiming they're not "anti-trans". Because that position IS anti-trans. Of course it is.
That Prigozhin "mahogany desks" video... Something's got to break in Moscow. Saner elements in NATO governments will be hoping it's not Putin.
Actually, they might be hoping it's Prigozhin *and* Putin. Preferably with Medvedev, Mishustin, Lavrov, Bortnikov and Shoygu thrown in.
Can Debbie Harry revert to her 1977 form too and come and give me a private concert? By "saner" I meant those who don't want nuclear war and who can keep a grasp of what the set of likely possibilities is in Russia, even if it doesn't overlap with what they'd most prefer.
For sure, Prigozhin talking that way can't continue for long for obvious reasons.
No, she can't
The problem is, as I said before the current war started, that Russian Imperialism is coming to a bad end.
Russia has been an Imperial state, conquering and exploiting the surround countries, from the start. The USSR was just a regime change on the way.
The way that the UK and France handled the end of Empire was especially good, but the current Russian policy makes Suez and Algeria look like 8 dimensional chess.
I'm going to disagree with you about France. I don't think they've handled it very well at all. Maybe I'm wrong but their foreign policy, particularly in relation to Russia/Eastern Europe, the global south and maybe even China, strikes me as at best rooted in vanity and at worst wholly cynical.
should have been "wasn't especially good" - bloody autofuckup.
Well, they didn't threaten to nuke everyone over Algeria. De Gaulle accepted the end of empire.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The law can state what it pleases. For me, it’s not a matter of identification.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
It's the sort of thing Conservatives are accused of starting a "culture war" over for opposing but, of course, most people agree with them.
It's the one thing I think this Government have done a half-decent job on opposing.
You are entitled to your point of view.
So how do you feel the best way to include trans people in society is?
Stop indulging the madness and help the vanishingly few that are diagnosed with gender dysphoria by actual medical experts with medical intervention if necessary.
One less discussed trend in the 2019 GE results was that the Lib Dems, despite not gaining many seats, made serious progress in their so-called 'Blue Wall' targets.
Reminiscent of May's progress in the so-called 'red wall' in 2017, which only came to fruition in GE2019.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
Stop indulging the madness and help the vanishingly few that are diagnosed with gender dysphoria by actual medical experts with medical intervention if necessary.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
I wrote an article Saturday, and it seems to be well-liked. As you may know I do post-match debriefs: discussions backstage on the article, added info, etc. If you or anybody else wants to join it you can do so by telling me and I'll add you. Two of you have already joined and they now have access to the ins-and-outs of the article and why the hell I did such a silly thing in a five-day spurt.
I will also be online in that backstage area between 7pm and 8pm BST on Tuesday March 9th to answer any questions. Please restrain your excitement. IRL I would bring cake, but alas we cannot do that online...
So: if you want access to either the backstage area, or the online Q&A sesh, or both, then please let me know and I'll add you.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If it was somebody else Leon would be telling us how woke they were. This is why Biden is still there.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
Anyone else?
Fuck knows. Let him bow out and open up the primaries to everyone. That’s democracy. He’s a sad old git clinging on to power, and risking a Trump victory
Stop indulging the madness and help the vanishingly few that are diagnosed with gender dysphoria by actual medical experts with medical intervention if necessary.
The law can state what it pleases. For me, it’s not a matter of identification.
So if somebody who was born a man and is now a "woman", would you call them her?
It doesn't matter what you or anyone else thinks.
You call her what she would like to be called, because that is the polite thing to do.
Presumably that isn't unqualified. If somebody told you they would like to be called the Queen of Los Angeles, to what extent would you indulge them?
If someone had a particularly stupid name/pronoun then I'd avoid seeing that person, and go to extreme lengths to avoid uttering either. Elon and Grimes's child - X Æ A-12 - for instance, would probably be a victim of this.
But pronouns and names are simply the way people wish to be addressed.
And as much as possible, I will oblige because that is is simple common courtesy.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does.
The law can shove it then.
"I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion."
To coin a phrase: me too.
The law recognises an *alternative* route. It’s doesn’t eliminate the traditional biological fact based route
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
The Met said it had "a duty to intervene when protest becomes criminal and may cause serious disruption". Commander Karen Findlay, who led the Met's policing operation during the Coronation, said on Saturday: "Earlier this week we said our tolerance for any disruption, whether through protest or otherwise, will be low and that we would deal robustly with anyone intent on undermining the celebration."
This is incredibly sinister!
The bar has now been set so low, if I oppose the Government in public it seems like I can now arrested.
If you even think about it they now think they can arrest you, police state. In Scotland SNP are planning to take out juries so next step is police can imagine you will [rotest , arrest you and a tame judge jail you before you actually do anything , exteremely sinister
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
This scandal is like Hillsborough, the authorities protect their own and not the victims.
No one will serve time for this shocking miscarriage of justice.
Perhaps, but unlike Liverpool we don't have a planet-sized chip on our shoulder and wallow in mawkish sentimentality and ugly self-pity, so we'll focus our efforts on change not bile.
You really are a twat when it comes to Liverpool.
At least 41 lives could have been saved that day if the authorities hadn’t screwed up and then covered it up.
Nothing has changed, nobody has served time for the deaths of 97 people.
I'd have stopped at word five.
Hmm. I'll save this one for the next time you complain about anyone getting personal at you.
Thanks for my first ever "flag". A badge of honour knowing it was awarded by you.
Liverpool should be nuked and levelled. Maybe we evacuate a few musicians first.
We can then start again. It hasn't worked.
Why do PB allow you to write such prejudicial nonsense without sanction? You wouldn't stereotype a specific race or creed, so why is it acceptable for the citizens of a city you don't like to be slandered by you?
Anyway off to polish my "flag".
I am describing the culture of the city. And I have said not all are like that, but many are.
I was very offended and insulted by the behaviour of Liverpool fans booing the national anthem the day before yesterday. Hillsborough was and is a scandal, that is for sure, and it needs redressing, but (honestly?) I think even if it were this wouldn't go away. No redress would never be enough and/or that legitimate grievance would be replaced by something else in the victim culture: class, snobbery, Fatch etc. There is something profoundly illogical here. The Royal Family had nothing to do with it - they are just a symbol and following through on that by targetting them has made them look disloyal, angry, aggressive and disrespectful and upset a lot of people.
I am now disinclined to lift a finger to help them - unlike I would for Aberfan and the Post Office scandal - which will no doubt reinforce their grievance. So the most likely outcome is that this goes on and on. I think it's important the facts and behaviour are called out so a change can be made.
Think about it.
The people of Liverpool are utterly distraught that you "are disinclined to lift a finger to help them". How will they cope?
By trying to ban me and call me a bigot, it seems.
Banning you would mean we can't ridicule you. Where's the fun in that?
I don't mind a bit of ridicule. It's probably healthy at some level.
I do mind the T and C word a bit though, and being called a bigot. We're better than that.
This subject seems to make otherwise normal people totally irrational.
You are a bit bigoted, though. You hate people who arent ultra monarchists, poor people, Scousers, Vegans, eco-activists, anyone who votes Green. You'd see me arrested and beaten up by the police or event stewards for protesting animal rights or climate change whereas I'd be ashamed if that happened to you. Maybe more than a bit bigoted?
Err, no.
I think you just take yourself, and what I say on here, a little bit too seriously.
Fella, I'd say most people on here feel the same about you. This is the internet, it doesn't do nuance, tone and context so I'm more than willing to believe that that's not the real you, but your posts say otherwise. You sound pretty angry these days.
I use this site to vent a bit, sometimes without much/any of a filter.
It's not representative of what I'm like in real life, as several pb'ers who've met me will attest to, but we're all very interested in politics and issues on here, and it's a passionate and intense subject, and my wife can only take so much.
We all come on here to let off steam (see the Collected Works of Malcomg Esq) don’t worry about it
Tho you do seem a little more dyspeptic than usual, but you have also explained your new job is stressing you out bigtime
I am trying to do something about that.
My review gave me a high performer, and accelerated track to Partner, but at what cost?
I spend all my time working basically.
That's the trade off with these jobs. Having been at partner level for more than 10 years it doesn't get any easier!
It's a challenging and exciting job, and one that is well rewarded, but if you don't enjoy it, or the cost to your family is too great, get out before you get too used to the money.
Thanks. That's what they keep telling me: it only gets worse!
And, really, do I really want that?
I also don't want people to think me a loser and be bossed around by someone 10-15 years younger, though, which, whilst I recognise is a bit of ego talking, also is because I want autonomy and freedom of action as a Partner and because I believe I am capable of doing it.
I think it's true I have an anger issue. Not really sure what I do about it. I genuinely like most people on here. Sometimes I can't control myself though.
It’s a different sort of worse… I have less “actual” work and analysis to do. But I have a global business so get calls from clients early and late, weekends and bank holidays. For example on Saturday I had to draft a detailed email to stop a client making a stupid mistake and then hop on a board call at 6.30 AM on Sunday morning. Total work was probably 1.5 hours (including a long call with the chairman) but maximum disruption. I’m now en route to the airport for a 2 day trip to NY.
Against that, people trust you and listen to you and you get to work with fantastic people and see and help solve really interesting problems.
To be honest, I would never want to be a long term director with no prospect of partnership. It wouldn’t suit me - for me it would be up or do something different. But that’s a personal thing - others are very happy being a “doer” rather than a rainmaker.
I would address the anger issue head on. Figure out what is causing it and address. May be it’s just stress. But it will take a toll on your family life and your work performance - I was once told that I should “never make an enemy unintentionally”… uncontrolled anger will cause that. It’s worth spending the time seeing a professional, and no shame on doing that. Think of it as an investment in your career - like personal coaching.
That's really helpful.
Thank you.
I would also say that you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself, or perhaps could temper your expectations.
You have a young child, and maybe the intention of having more, and from my experience it’s hard to maintain the way you worked in your 20s and early 30s into your 40s with the additional responsibility of family.
Allow yourself to accept that for the next several years, you’ll simply have less time for work. And accept that this might also mean a slower rise up the ladder.
Or forget the ladder, when your kids don't know you or when you realise their are no pockets in a shroud , it may all be too late as you slide down that ladder.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You don't identify as male?
What pronouns would you like us to use?
Highness? Imperial Majesty? Your Worship?
Small timer.
The Most Worshipful and High Imperial Majesty.
I insist my staff call me 'Your Excellency.'
My biggest regret in not joining the Foreign Office is that I would have become an Ambassador and had the title 'Your Excellency' for life.
It seems the board/senior management have been paid bonuses they are not entitled to based on false information. The CEO will repay it but they are still considering whether the others should. I wonder if there will be a fraud investigation.....
It beggars belief, that knowing what had gone on and that the Management were responsible, as it was on their watch, that they thought any kind of bonus was appropriate.
Does it beggar belief more than the fact that these people, who prima facie conspired to pervert the course of justice, have not only not been prosecuted but are still in their jobs?
It may beggar belief. But it is also standard operating procedure around the world.
Above a certain level, there is no failure. Well failure is redefined as “Nothing will happen to you. At the very, very worst, you will lose your job. With a golden goodbye. Then a new job will be sorted out for you. Golden hello, more money”
When one of the senior people responsible for covering up Rotherham was offered a bigger, better job, running a child care organisation, overseas, someone suggested that providing a reference wasn’t the right thing to do.
This was described as “disgusting” and “vindictive”. The reference was provided.
This is what I call the New Upper 10,000
Funny, I call them a word that contains N, U and T as well.
Just not in that order and you See from the start...
I am a little torn to be frank. And I have to check my own prejudices a little.
I think I am coming down on the view that it may well be that the police deserve criticism here. This may hinge on intel none of us are privy to, or it might be that they unjustifiably used a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Either way it deserves to be investigated.
I think the criticism from some quarters is hyperbolic and if some of the writers think this is particularly sinister or the hallmarks of a police state I would respectfully suggest that they take a look at how the situation would be handled in many other places around the world before forming judgement on that front.
I support the right of protest but it does need to be balanced with the protection of the protestors from supporters of the event and the gravity of the occasion. It’s not an easy one. I would also say that a right to protest does not equal a right to disrupt particularly given the high profile figures involved - in many ways avoiding protestors breaching the procession is for their safety as well. My understanding is that there was an area in Trafalgar Square set aside for protestors and that appears to be reasonable to me. However if people were just arrested because the police were worried they were going to play up at the event without any evidence this would be the case, then they deserve criticism for that decision.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
DeSantis seems like a Trumpian version of Marco Rubio in that he formulaically appeals to a certain constituency within the GOP but doesn't have the substance or gravitas to build a larger coalition.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
Oh please, that's just trying so hard to be edgy it fails. Who the US President is makes a big difference to the world in general, because the US is so powerful (as you are right to remind us frequently, when it comes to their military leadership), and Biden and Trump would act differently and so there would be difference for the UK.
As for how they would treat the UK specifically, the 'Biden clearly doesn't like the place' appears to be little more than an internet meme extrapolating from his claiming of Irish ancestry, when US Presidents can be pretty coldly realistic in foreign affairs.
Though i suspect like you Biden himself is surprised every day he is alive.
I am a little torn to be frank. And I have to check my own prejudices a little.
I think I am coming down on the view that it may well be that the police deserve criticism here. This may hinge on intel none of us are privy to, or it might be that they unjustifiably used a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Either way it deserves to be investigated.
I think the criticism from some quarters is hyperbolic and if some of the writers think this is particularly sinister or the hallmarks of a police state I would respectfully suggest that they take a look at how the situation would be handled in many other places around the world before forming judgement on that front.
I support the right of protest but it does need to be balanced with the protection of the protestors from supporters of the event and the gravity of the occasion. It’s not an easy one. I would also say that a right to protest does not equal a right to disrupt particularly given the high profile figures involved - in many ways avoiding protestors breaching the procession is for their safety as well. My understanding is that there was an area in Trafalgar Square set aside for protestors and that appears to be reasonable to me. However if people were just arrested because the police were worried they were going to play up at the event without any evidence this would be the case, then they deserve criticism for that decision.
As a supporter of civil liberties and the right to protest it seems like this is a good opportunity to simply take the British approach of pretending it never happened, and fighting the good fight at a more suitable time.
This scandal is like Hillsborough, the authorities protect their own and not the victims.
No one will serve time for this shocking miscarriage of justice.
Perhaps, but unlike Liverpool we don't have a planet-sized chip on our shoulder and wallow in mawkish sentimentality and ugly self-pity, so we'll focus our efforts on change not bile.
You really are a twat when it comes to Liverpool.
At least 41 lives could have been saved that day if the authorities hadn’t screwed up and then covered it up.
Nothing has changed, nobody has served time for the deaths of 97 people.
I'd have stopped at word five.
Hmm. I'll save this one for the next time you complain about anyone getting personal at you.
Thanks for my first ever "flag". A badge of honour knowing it was awarded by you.
Liverpool should be nuked and levelled. Maybe we evacuate a few musicians first.
We can then start again. It hasn't worked.
Why do PB allow you to write such prejudicial nonsense without sanction? You wouldn't stereotype a specific race or creed, so why is it acceptable for the citizens of a city you don't like to be slandered by you?
Anyway off to polish my "flag".
I am describing the culture of the city. And I have said not all are like that, but many are.
I was very offended and insulted by the behaviour of Liverpool fans booing the national anthem the day before yesterday. Hillsborough was and is a scandal, that is for sure, and it needs redressing, but (honestly?) I think even if it were this wouldn't go away. No redress would never be enough and/or that legitimate grievance would be replaced by something else in the victim culture: class, snobbery, Fatch etc. There is something profoundly illogical here. The Royal Family had nothing to do with it - they are just a symbol and following through on that by targetting them has made them look disloyal, angry, aggressive and disrespectful and upset a lot of people.
I am now disinclined to lift a finger to help them - unlike I would for Aberfan and the Post Office scandal - which will no doubt reinforce their grievance. So the most likely outcome is that this goes on and on. I think it's important the facts and behaviour are called out so a change can be made.
Think about it.
The people of Liverpool are utterly distraught that you "are disinclined to lift a finger to help them". How will they cope?
By trying to ban me and call me a bigot, it seems.
Banning you would mean we can't ridicule you. Where's the fun in that?
I don't mind a bit of ridicule. It's probably healthy at some level.
I do mind the T and C word a bit though, and being called a bigot. We're better than that.
This subject seems to make otherwise normal people totally irrational.
You are a bit bigoted, though. You hate people who arent ultra monarchists, poor people, Scousers, Vegans, eco-activists, anyone who votes Green. You'd see me arrested and beaten up by the police or event stewards for protesting animal rights or climate change whereas I'd be ashamed if that happened to you. Maybe more than a bit bigoted?
Err, no.
I think you just take yourself, and what I say on here, a little bit too seriously.
Fella, I'd say most people on here feel the same about you. This is the internet, it doesn't do nuance, tone and context so I'm more than willing to believe that that's not the real you, but your posts say otherwise. You sound pretty angry these days.
I use this site to vent a bit, sometimes without much/any of a filter.
It's not representative of what I'm like in real life, as several pb'ers who've met me will attest to, but we're all very interested in politics and issues on here, and it's a passionate and intense subject, and my wife can only take so much.
We all come on here to let off steam (see the Collected Works of Malcomg Esq) don’t worry about it
Tho you do seem a little more dyspeptic than usual, but you have also explained your new job is stressing you out bigtime
I am trying to do something about that.
My review gave me a high performer, and accelerated track to Partner, but at what cost?
I spend all my time working basically.
Shift down to a 4 day week if you can afford to. It will do wonders for your mental state. I work half days on Friday but that's become a company policy rather than specific to me and it's been amazing being able to wrap up the week at around lunch time since we started doing it. Overall I'd say our productivity is up as well because people are properly rested on Monday and Tuesday so we get a lot more out of them and all we've done is turn unofficially clocking off at 3ish (officially when we were in office on Fridays) to officially calling it a half day at 1ish.
Thanks mate
Believe it or not I have periods when I work flat out. 12 hours a day of mental effort. 6/7 days a week And serious mental effort, not just meetings or rote-work
It sometimes leaves me physically ill. It depletes important resources and fucks the immune system. It’s only do-able or sensible in very short bursts
I think it’s happened to me here, a bit. I did 14 days of REALLY hard work with very little downtime. A barman I know here at the hotel actually got concerned - “Mister Leon, you are always working?!”
It’s left me with a mild bug and two days in bed. Shame. But the work is now done 🤷♂️
If I had to maintain that pace for months I’d crack up
I'm trying to work out if this is mega-irony or not.
It must be, 2 weeks of 12 hour days is chickenfeed
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
The law can state what it pleases. For me, it’s not a matter of identification.
So if somebody who was born a man and is now a "woman", would you call them her?
It doesn't matter what you or anyone else thinks.
You call her what she would like to be called, because that is the polite thing to do.
Calling people what they want to be called has never been the issue for most except those wishing to be provocative, since that's just an issue of politeness. Then there's laws around discrimination and equality and all that good stuff. The vicious arguments now appear to be around whether there is universal applicability to be enforced by law or how and where exceptions to legal obligations can and should exist.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You don't identify as male?
What pronouns would you like us to use?
Highness? Imperial Majesty? Your Worship?
Small timer.
The Most Worshipful and High Imperial Majesty.
I insist my staff call me 'Your Excellency.'
My biggest regret in not joining the Foreign Office is that I would have become an Ambassador and had the title 'Your Excellency' for life.
For life? This isn't the USA, you shouldn't get to keep titles long after you step out of the role that granted you the title.
Personally think the Privy Council 'Rt Honourable' should not persist.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The law can state what it pleases. For me, it’s not a matter of identification.
But what about those for whom it is? Do you accept that it is for them? Or do you see gender identity as an anti-science nonsense? If the latter how do you view transgender people? - since if gender identity isn't real nor is a transition based on it.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You don't identify as male?
What pronouns would you like us to use?
Highness? Imperial Majesty? Your Worship?
Small timer.
The Most Worshipful and High Imperial Majesty.
I insist my staff call me 'Your Excellency.'
My biggest regret in not joining the Foreign Office is that I would have become an Ambassador and had the title 'Your Excellency' for life.
For life? This isn't the USA, you shouldn't get to keep titles long after you step out of the role that granted you the title.
Personally think the Privy Council 'Rt Honourable' should not persist.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
Oh please, that's just trying so hard to be edgy it fails. Who the US President is makes a big difference to the world in general, because the US is so powerful (as you are right to remind us frequently, when it comes to their military leadership), and Biden and Trump would act differently and so there would be difference for the UK.
As for how they would treat the UK specifically, the 'Biden clearly doesn't like the place' appears to be little more than an internet meme extrapolating from his claiming of Irish ancestry, when US Presidents can be pretty coldly realistic in foreign affairs.
Though i suspect like you Biden himself is surprised every day he is alive.
What specifically would the difference be for the UK?
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
Whilst unnecessary in everyday speech, the word "cis" can be useful in certain contexts: trans being the obvious one, but there are others. One interesting example is the lunar missions (dearMoon, HLS) being planned by SpaceX. At some point they will presumably use terms such as "cis-lunar orbit" and "trans-lunar injection", since they have been used in circumlunar missions for over half a century.
Interesting , still do not see use in humans, if I was a woman and someone called me cis I would deck them.
Biden must know he’s not popular. Even with democrats. He must know he’s probably a bit too old for the job NOW, let alone a whole new term 24-28. He knows his own party wants a younger candidate
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
I suspect he genuinely thinks he's the best democratic candidate to defeat Trump or Desantis.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
If Biden pulls out or dies (I am mildly surprised every day he is still alive) then it would be a coronation (the good kind) for Harris.
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
Oh please, that's just trying so hard to be edgy it fails. Who the US President is makes a big difference to the world in general, because the US is so powerful (as you are right to remind us frequently, when it comes to their military leadership), and Biden and Trump would act differently and so there would be difference for the UK.
As for how they would treat the UK specifically, the 'Biden clearly doesn't like the place' appears to be little more than an internet meme extrapolating from his claiming of Irish ancestry, when US Presidents can be pretty coldly realistic in foreign affairs.
Though i suspect like you Biden himself is surprised every day he is alive.
What specifically would the difference be for the UK?
Their attitudes to and response to global events would likely not be the same, eg on Ukraine, and if different for the world there would be a difference for the UK. It's not my fault if your schtick to always both sides things wants to pretend there's no difference in the world between the two. You could talk about the 'special military operation' to trigger people for a laugh again though. Or since it is the coronation weekend rile up some monarchists by talking about the butcher's apron.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
No, but the term “cis” is about shifting the term of reference. A biological male has the right to say that it is a question of fact, not the result of “identifying” and a gender “assigned” at birth.
The GIC is an alternative path for people who believe that the biological facts don’t align with who they believe themselves to be. It is right that there is an alternative path. But the proponents of “cis” are denying the validity of other beliefs in pursuit of their own ideology.
I get that but I'm making a different point.
The fact is that we (like most countries) provide a legal path to change gender. We have done for a long time. And it isn't linked to surgery.
Therefore when made performatively in the context of the trans debate statements like "women CANNOT have a penis!" either show ignorance of the law OR they imply a desire to change the law so that transgender people are no longer recognized.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
The law can state what it pleases. For me, it’s not a matter of identification.
But what about those for whom it is? Do you accept that it is for them? Or do you see gender identity as an anti-science nonsense? If the latter how do you view transgender people? - since if gender identity isn't real nor is a transition based on it.
I have no issue with humouring people who see things differently, provided this does not impinge upon other peoples’ rights.
What I don’t believe in is that my being male is a matter of identification, rather than it being a matter of fact.
What you are demanding is that I should cease to treat it as a matter of fact.
I'm asking you about the law we have that recognizes gender identity. Ok, it's not relevant to you, I get that. Nor to me for that matter.
But do you accept its validity and importance to (eg) transgender people? Or is it your view that gender id is an anti-scientific nonsense that has no place in the law?
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
What I don’t believe in is that my being male is a matter of identification, rather than it being a matter of fact.
What you are demanding is that I should cease to treat it as a matter of fact.
I'm asking you about the law we have that recognizes gender identity. Ok, it's not relevant to you, I get that. Nor to me for that matter.
But do you accept its validity and importance to (eg) transgender people? Or is it your view that gender id is an anti-scientific nonsense that has no place in the law?
I think it’s nonsense, but so long as rights to single-sex spaces, sports, clubs etc. are preserved, then the law as it stands doesn’t really bother me.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
Ok I see this now. So the law recognizing transgender identities is a nonsense but you're not that bothered. You'd support its repeal if such a proposal was tabled but you won't be campaigning for it. Otherwise you'll humour trans people's delusions so long as they behave themselves and keep out of single sex spaces. I think this position, which IS transphobic btw, is shared quite widely, inc on here.
The tragedy of Penny Mordaunt's tilt at the Tory Leadership is that she actually appears to have empathy, even her political opponents in Portsmouth North give her credit for being a decent human being. But in the leadership contest she felt forced to deny her own empathy and get on the Culture War Train.
A decent Tory leader needs to come in and say, look I just won't go there, there are other issues. David Cameron and Osborne treaded that line - in my own very biased view - quite well.
I think quite honestly the Labour line of, we should treat people with love and compassion, is a good start. I don't doubt there are many issues of which we have discussed here and I am open to have my mind changed - but too many start from a position of hatred.
Is it a position of hatred to think that women’s sports should be reserved for biological females?
Possibly? Sport is a very wide category and it is clear that in many sports the additional strength of an non transitioned trans woman would be completely unfair. There are other sports like equestrian events where males and females already complete in single category competition so trans athletes in there should be a non-issue, Darts is another one where there's no reason why a trans woman would be at an advantage. For other sports it may be that some form of hormone treatment is required before the playing field is fair, that could be based on length of time or maximum testosterone limits. There are probably other sports where the effect of male puberty means that equal competition can never be achieved and in those cases it would be fair to exclude trans women.
So is it hatred? It would be if the motivation is to exclude trans women because you don't like trans women. It's not if the motivation is fairness to cis women competitors. But I want decisions like that to be made with careful study and science not by placards and chanting from either side of the argument.
Your use of the ugly "cis" word says it all, just say woman, any human can understand that
“Cis” is a loaded term. It means that you *identify* as the gender you were *assigned* at birth.
I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion.
You may not recognize gender identity but the law does. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate marking their transition from F to M or vice versa. No mainstream political party is proposing to repeal this afaik. Not even the Tories for all their pointed virtue-signalling talk about "women can't have a penis lol" etc.
Ok I see this now. So the law recognizing transgender identities is a nonsense but you're not that bothered. You'd support its repeal if such a proposal was tabled but you won't be campaigning for it. Otherwise you'll humour trans people's delusions so long as they behave themselves and keep out of single sex spaces. I think this position, which IS transphobic btw, is shared quite widely, inc on here.
There are plenty of beliefs that others hold that I consider nonsensical. It doesn’t follow that I want to pick a fight with them over it.
Ok I see this now. So the law recognizing transgender identities is a nonsense but you're not that bothered. You'd support its repeal if such a proposal was tabled but you won't be campaigning for it. Otherwise you'll humour trans people's delusions so long as they behave themselves and keep out of single sex spaces. I think this position, which IS transphobic btw, is shared quite widely, inc on here.
You are misusing the term "phobic" which is an irrational strong fear or hatred of something. Eg arachnophobia. It is a form of mental illness. It shouldn't be used lightly.
Ok I see this now. So the law recognizing transgender identities is a nonsense but you're not that bothered. You'd support its repeal if such a proposal was tabled but you won't be campaigning for it. Otherwise you'll humour trans people's delusions so long as they behave themselves and keep out of single sex spaces. I think this position, which IS transphobic btw, is shared quite widely, inc on here.
You are misusing the term "phobic" which is an irrational strong fear or hatred of something. Eg arachnophobia. It is a form of mental illness. It shouldn't be used lightly.
Having watched the Post Office story unfold in Private Eye for what seems like a decade, I am surprised that there has not been a crimianl investigation in relation to the conduct of the board of directors and senior executives of the Post Office and Horizon. I hasten to add that I am not saying that a crime was committed and it may be that everyone involved were god fearing persons who believed that they were serving the greater good. It just seems odd to me that so many have been wronly imprisoned without some investigation as to whether the amount of wilful blindness needed to avoid admitting that the systems were not fit for purpose involved a criminal level of indifference to the risk of falsely imprisoning people and perhaps even worse in individual cases. Certainly in light of the number of lives ruined a few sleepless months while the position was investigated would have seemed merited.
Comments
"I don’t identify as male. I am male. That’s a fact, not an opinion."
To coin a phrase: me too.
My opinion on the whole gender thing goes like this
1) People get to do their own thing. Not my business
2) However, in a small number of cases - prisons, shelters - there needs to be some system of protection. This system of protection should be specified in law. I would suggest controlled via the courts, rather than the fiat of a political. So subject to openness of decisions, appeals etc.
3) Medical Intervention. Since the medical intervention hasn't gone through classic trials and there are conflicting accounts of efficacy, handle it using the human trials legal and ethical frameworks. No, this does not necessarily mean double blind trials. There are plenty of occasions where that has not been done, for moral and practical reasons. As handled and recognised in the legal and moral framework for medical trials. We can still collect data and do science, even without double blind trials.
Those wanting to keep Putin in place at all costs by continuing to ration military aid to Ukraine need to reckon on the risks of doing that too.
Even after it started to be challenged, you’d think it would be easy to set up a dummy post office and run a batch of trial entries through it to see if it worked properly and provided the expected outputs.
But, like I said, I know little about IT.
It was considered by the "professionals" that backing this would be a bad idea. Since this would take control of the German military from the Corporal and give it to the Generals.
The GIC is an alternative path for people who believe that the biological facts don’t align with who they believe themselves to be. It is right that there is an alternative path. But the proponents of “cis” are denying the validity of other beliefs in pursuit of their own ideology.
Also Vietnam; France bollocksed that so badly that they brought down a US president and kick-started a decades long cultural war in the US.
IF they are carrying out agreed Council policy, Councillors should and in my experience do back Officers even if that means conflicting with local Members from the same Party. The local Member is doing his or her job supporting his or her constituents and that's an accepted part of the process.
The use of Interims is more to do with the recruitment process which means senior posts can be quickly filled instead of waiting for an applicant to work out their notice at their previous employment. Interims are as you say overpaid and are a mixed blessing at best. It's not the specialist contracting you see especially in IT but as insidious in its way. Sometimes the Interim will apply for the post and even accept a pay cut but not that often.
What pronouns would you like us to use?
But hey, we built this system to pick up all the fraud, and it’s picking up loads of fraud, so trebles all round!
What they needed was a test with hundreds of faked up post offices, all entering transactions at the same time. Over flakey internet connections, with payments systems failing etc etc.
A classic of this in the Boeing Starliner space capsule testing, Where they never tested the software for a full, all up mission. Because it was too hard. They still haven't launched a manned mission on it yet, in the real world.
SpaceX took the approach of a massive series of layers of testing - unit testing, functional testing integration testing, failure testing, performance testing etc etc.
A major part of these layers of testing is/was creating problems and seeing the reaction of the system as a whole.
Any code change had to go through all the layers, was incorporated into a final build and then run on an actual spacecraft sitting in a lab for the full duration of a mission.
The response from professional software engineers was
1) Boeing - WTAF?
2) SpaceX - they seem to have implemented a good testing regime. This isn't a new idea, just good practise.
Imperial Majesty?
Your Worship?
Well, they didn't threaten to nuke everyone over Algeria. De Gaulle accepted the end of empire.
Trump 44% Biden 38%. Undecideds lean Trump 49-42.
DeSantis 42%, Biden 37%. Undecideds lean DeSantis 48-41
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-desantis-beat-biden-abcwapo-poll-joes-approval-hits-record-low
Fucksake you selfish old twat, retire and let a younger Democrat win the day
Reminiscent of May's progress in the so-called 'red wall' in 2017, which only came to fruition in GE2019.
https://twitter.com/Beyond_Topline/status/1655520785962762248
Yet still he blunders on. I know many here admire him but to me this seems unforgivably selfish and narcissistic. He’s putting himself ahead of his country
So if somebody who was born a man and is now a "woman", would you call them her?
I’m talking about myself, not others. I’m not going to call myself “cis”, because it’s a piece of ideology that I do not believe in.
You call her what she would like to be called, because that is the polite thing to do.
Enjoy the rest of your Bank Holiday.
And it's hard to argue against that - who do you think would be a better choice for the Dems?
I will also be online in that backstage area between 7pm and 8pm BST on Tuesday March 9th to answer any questions. Please restrain your excitement. IRL I would bring cake, but alas we cannot do that online...
So: if you want access to either the backstage area, or the online Q&A sesh, or both, then please let me know and I'll add you.
Fuck knows. Let him bow out and open up the primaries to everyone. That’s democracy. He’s a sad old git clinging on to power, and risking a Trump victory
https://youtu.be/9ojhtq51Ya8
Regarding the BH - Another 9 hours of rain to come here today according to the Met Office :-(
Now that is a disgrace!
But pronouns and names are simply the way people wish to be addressed.
And as much as possible, I will oblige because that is is simple common courtesy.
My views on trans are entirely irrelavant.
Yet for a time it was a successful project, raising living standards against the odds.
@AaronBastani speaks to @hoyer_kat about Europe’s most successful communist country, the DDR.
https://twitter.com/novaramedia/status/1655256428012240898
These people are unhinged.
https://youtu.be/k299530_RAo
I don't see how Trump or Biden makes any difference at all for the UK. Biden clearly doesn't like the place and Trump doesn’t care.
In Scotland SNP are planning to take out juries so next step is police can imagine you will [rotest , arrest you and a tame judge jail you before you actually do anything , exteremely sinister
No wait, this is a family friendly website.
The Most Worshipful and High Imperial Majesty.
The exceptions would be when doing so would infringe the rights of other people.
My biggest regret in not joining the Foreign Office is that I would have become an Ambassador and had the title 'Your Excellency' for life.
ps in NYC tonight if you have time for a beer
I am a little torn to be frank. And I have to check my own prejudices a little.
I think I am coming down on the view that it may well be that the police deserve criticism here. This may hinge on intel none of us are privy to, or it might be that they unjustifiably used a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Either way it deserves to be investigated.
I think the criticism from some quarters is hyperbolic and if some of the writers think this is particularly sinister or the hallmarks of a police state I would respectfully suggest that they take a look at how the situation would be handled in many other places around the world before forming judgement on that front.
I support the right of protest but it does need to be balanced with the protection of the protestors from supporters of the event and the gravity of the occasion. It’s not an easy one. I would also say that a right to protest does not equal a right to disrupt particularly given the high profile figures involved - in many ways avoiding protestors breaching the procession is for their safety as well. My understanding is that there was an area in Trafalgar Square set aside for protestors and that appears to be reasonable to me. However if people were just arrested because the police were worried they were going to play up at the event without any evidence this would be the case, then they deserve criticism for that decision.
As for how they would treat the UK specifically, the 'Biden clearly doesn't like the place' appears to be little more than an internet meme extrapolating from his claiming of Irish ancestry, when US Presidents can be pretty coldly realistic in foreign affairs.
Though i suspect like you Biden himself is surprised every day he is alive.
Personally think the Privy Council 'Rt Honourable' should not persist.
said something random about Liverpool.
Fine. But the law recognizes transgender and transgender people. Do you want to roll it back so it no longer does?
If no, why not? If yes, how is that not transphobic?
The fact is that we (like most countries) provide a legal path to change gender. We have done for a long time. And it isn't linked to surgery.
Therefore when made performatively in the context of the trans debate statements like "women CANNOT have a penis!" either show ignorance of the law OR they imply a desire to change the law so that transgender people are no longer recognized.
Ignorant or transphobic - take your pick.
What you are demanding is that I should cease to treat it as a matter of fact.
But do you accept its validity and importance to (eg) transgender people? Or is it your view that gender id is an anti-scientific nonsense that has no place in the law?
You can tell me some other time if you'd repeal the GRA 2004. It wasn't a trick question. I'm interested.
I hasten to add that I am not saying that a crime was committed and it may be that everyone involved were god fearing persons who believed that they were serving the greater good. It just seems odd to me that so many have been wronly imprisoned without some investigation as to whether the amount of wilful blindness needed to avoid admitting that the systems were not fit for purpose involved a criminal level of indifference to the risk of falsely imprisoning people and perhaps even worse in individual cases. Certainly in light of the number of lives ruined a few sleepless months while the position was investigated would have seemed merited.