A *very* important lesson for the 'legacy' trans orgs/activists in the UK!

Evan Urquhart@evanurquhart.bsky.social · 7h ago

The lesson here isn't that US activists should name doctors, but that breaking social taboos and making right wing actors angry can break the apathy of the mainstream press. These are age old lessons - but recent examples can help us re-learn things we may have forgotten in recent years.

Greens need to fight this HARD. It's a really tough moment for us with the Burnham bounce, if he had waited until next year things would be much easier, but we have to throw our all at this.

Alex Partridge@alexpartridge87.bsky.social · 8h ago

Starmer standing down as an MP: www.camdennewjournal.co.uk/article/excl...

the trans moral panic pushed by the NYT and Atlantic is about transphobia, obviously, but it's also about older wealthy readers believing that as adults they have the right to control their children's identities and futures.

Once in a while I read one of the canonical homophobic texts. Today it was Midge Decter's 'Boys on the Beach'. It is astonishing how many transphobic tropes are just warmed over homophobic tropes that have been forgotten. www.commentary.org/articles/mid...

Here's my latest column for @thenewworldmag.bsky.social, on the Cofnas thing. Hard to keep up with this story, but I think this reflects the latest state of play. www.thenewworld.co.uk/philip-ball-...

Nathan Cofnas and the great free speech con

Those defending Jason Arday’s accuser consider themselves to be politically neutral defenders of academic values. They are deluded

thenewworld.co.uk

Great thread with some fascinating historical parallels drawn between cis and trans women's exclusion from sports.

Crip Dyke@cripdyke.bsky.social · 3d ago

1/x Well, to extend the analysis, the popular absorption of GOP-pushed narrative that there's something wrong with trans sports participation about which we should all be uncomfortable is partly that the Dems aren't countering the msg, but ALSO that even trans ppl accept the framing.

The reality of being trans in the UK is of a brutalisation and a trauma that is forcibly reopened on at best a weekly basis. I think it is difficult for anyone who is not trans to grasp what an overwhelming nightmare it is to spend a single day in this country while trans.

Robot Mel@robotmeile.bsky.social · 3d ago

Wales has stopped ALL gender affirming surgeries! Schools have just declared an end to social transition and inclusion for trans kids. I do not think enough people are paying attention to how utterly and quickly trans rights have been stripped away in the uk!

Reddit user pkunfcj has collated advice on what people in Wales can do to fight back against the trans surgical ban:: - writing to Senedd members and the First Minister (with an example email) - complain through patient advocacy services - complain to the health board - organise protests

pkunfcj's comment on "Welsh Gender Service Review - Cancelled surgeries"

Explore this conversation and more from the transgenderUK community

reddit.com

Excellent analysis along with some hard truths for the legacy trans rights sector in the UK.

Mallory Moore@sexabolition.blog · 3d ago

Worth noting in this context how by 2017 he was doing a debate tour with British TERFs playing their role in cross partisan normalisation of his pedophilic fascist anti feminist freak show. The research and campaign development Milo Y did landed hard and fast in a way people didn't fully understand

Last year, we drew a red line There was no way we would stand by while an anti-human-rights group tried to spread its harmful and abusive rhetoric at the @greenparty.org.uk annual conference Now, that hate group is using the law to attack our decision If you can, please help us take them on 🙏🏼✊🏼

Good Law Project@goodlawproject.org · 5d ago

The Green Party are standing up for their right to make trans people feel safe and welcome, so we're defending them in court Get involved 👇 https://goodlaw.social/yndo

Infuriating and chilling to see editorial bias try to kill an honest account of an issue that makes comfortable elites squirm. I can't help but see the similarities to how trans rights have been covered by mainstream outlets.

Adam Bonica@adambonica.bsky.social · 6d ago

The Democratic Party has let a consulting industry exploit elderly donors in its name, wreck its reputation and finances in the process, and walk away rich whether the party wins or loses. When a mirror is held up, the instinct is to break the glass rather than look. On why the press looks away:

... pation 😭 RIP Tim Curry 👄♥️👄

And for people in striking distance of London, a related in-person panel will be next week on Thursday 3 September 18:00-20:00 on "Deep Time & Global Challenges" Featuring Jay Balamurugan, Emy Moss, Elsa Panciroli, Jamie Perera & Mark Witton More info here: www.poppalaeo.com/deep-time-cu...

If your eyes are red from crying about Dolly Parton passing away, I've got good news for you ...

It is most damaging because, well placed on the BBC homepage, it can attract 1M readers without doing the issue justice Worse, many more will simply see the headline and, without any context or understanding of our community, take away that LGBTQIA+ people are part of a 'backlash' to Pride

Jamie Wareham@jamiewareham.co.uk · 6d ago

This 'in depth' article fails to cover the impact of Trump, the anti-DEI movement in the US, and UK politicians' role in the rise of anti-LGBTQIA+ rhetoric It also relies on Reform's Darren Grimes and an anon 'gender critical lesbian' to claim our community is divided www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Dolly Parton: a lover of pink, a lifelong champion of education and literacy, and a proud union member for more than five decades. An icon in every sense. #dollyparton #dolly Solidarity, always.

Also what our colleagues at Ghent are saying: recognition that there's weaponisation & misconstrual of academic freedom; and that we have a duty of care to people who deserve to be alive and well in academia. > we do not consider it an infringement on academic freedom. Please sign if you can: 20/

Open letter on the suspension of Nathan Cofnas at Ghent University

***Version française en dessous*** We, colleagues of Nathan Cofnas - supported by many colleagues internationally - want to respond to the negative and incorrect framing of Ghent University’s decisio...

docs.google.com

Absolutely. This is the way! Understood, assignment is. RIP Dolly. We all love you!

in a world of JK Rowlings be a Dolly Parton

I'll entertain this suggestion the second its proponents confirm they support mandatory hiring of Marxists on all Fortune 500 Boards of Directors.

Bradford Vivian@bradvivian.bsky.social · last wk.

The Conservative Scholar Paradox: they’re rare…except for the many self-described conservative faculty with distinguished credentials, institutional prominence, and professional success from myriad institutions that the Chronicle and numerous other pubs feature almost daily.

Reposting for the link to Ellis' very good video essay, and to Cross' astute analysis of what Ellis missed out about Rowling.

Katherine Alejandra Cross@quinnae.com · last wk.

This was brilliant, thoughtful, and persuasive. There's one thread I'd like to pull on, though: Ellis contrasts Parton to J.K. Rowling and asks why the latter lost her mind while Dolly became a living saint, saying it's because Rowling couldn't take criticism. You know what I'm going to say...

As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself best friends with the Prime Minister of Japan

Tyron@tyron.bsky.social · last wk.

You had me at 'nothing against the milfs'

flyingrodent@flyingrodent.bsky.social · last wk.

Nothing against the milfs, you understand. Britain would be a far better place to live if each day’s papers were filled with nothing but the sexual acrobatics of yummy mummies, or whatever.

"debate pervert" needs to be much more widely used.

jesse@jesseltaylor.bsky.social · last wk.

It's very bad that we've developed a new dominant breed of debate pervert who spends their entire lifecycle insisting nobody will let them say the things they've said a thousand times and insisting everyone has to have the same debate with them every single time

much as the murder of Brianna Ghey mysteriously stopped being about the climate of transphobia in the UK and became about teen access to social media, the death of Jason Arday is, equally mysteriously, no longer about racism and is becoming about free speech in academia

The tomatoes 🤣🤣🤣

Alan Driscoll@alandriscoll.com · last wk.

Apologies for the delay to those of you who've been holding it in, but the official opiumtea.com guide to the guidance is finally here. Follow us at @opiumtea.com or incentivise this nonsense at patreon.com/terfipedia. (1/6)

The network around JO in Cambridge, for example, develops, conjoins and promotes the following intellectual positions, among others >”Race realism” >”Sex realism” >Christian classical theism (“no God, no powers”) >Transhumanism We will probably see more and more PhDs and postdocs in these areas

Ben Mechen@benmechen.bsky.social · last wk.

Despite letters like this one, C*fnas will ultimately prove expendable. The very well-funded network of far right intellectuals of which he was a protégé are creating spaces at Cambridge and elsewhere where this kind of work will continue to flourish and be celebrated. That’s the bigger game.

As Jonathan Meades once said: "Ethnic cleansers are moral cleansers"

Nate O@nateo.bsky.social · last wk.

Notable how a not-insignificant number of the signatories on the letters supporting a racist signed on to letters supporting anti-trans extremists in 2018 or are high-profile anti-trans extremists themselves, almost as if there’s a connection between ‘everything is gender’ and ‘everything is race’

PSA 1