Women Have Had Enough!
Update 420 Women's Sport and Free Speech Special #BeMore Porcupine
I am continuing the pause on the Heroes season ( it will return for the next update 😊) to continue with the new XX campaign. Thanks again to my friend for this image via @UTOTALBELLEND. The message is ‘Women Have Had Enough’. ‘FuXXake’ 😊
Thanks as ever to three wonderful readers for suggested pieces.
The Woolympics
I will be trying to put together a summary of my posts on the women’s boxing farce in due course.
Ben Bloom and Rob Bagchi in The Telegraph ( Gender-row boxer Lin Yu-ting wins gold 10 August) report:
Lin Yu-ting won gold for Chinese Taipei - Richard Pelham/Getty Images
Lin Yu-ting became the second woman [MAN!] previously banned for failing gender eligibility tests to claim Olympic gold as the boxing competition in Paris ended in yet more controversy.
A day after Algeria’s Imane Khelif won 66kg gold, Chinese Taipei fighter Lin comprehensively defeated Poland’s Julia Szeremeta, whose face was left smeared in blood after the 57kg final.
The result will do little to quell the storm that overshadowed the entire Olympic boxing competition after it emerged that Lin and Khelif had both been kicked out of last year’s World Championships before being allowed to compete in Paris.
A number of high-profile sports figures questioned their involvement, with tennis great Martina Navratilova angrily responding to Khelif’s win on Friday night by saying: “Thanks for nothing IOC [International Olympic Committee]. Shame on you. This is a travesty.”
Khelif admitted her [ HIS!] Olympic gold medal had a “special taste” because of those who had attacked her [HIM!].
Unlike her [HIS!] Algerian counterpart, Lin had largely kept her [HIS!] counsel amid the furore, opting against making bold public statements and quietly continuing on her [HIS!] way to the final. She [HE!] had not lost a round in any of her [HIS!] opening bouts but Szeremeta was expected to provide her [HIS!] toughest task.
Szeremeta could not get close enough consistently to Lin - Mike Egerton/PA
Lin was cheered to the ring by the few pockets of Taiwanese support inside Roland Garros’s showpiece Court Philippe-Chatrier and started the faster of the two fighters, attempting to exploit the long range that her [HIS!] gangly frame provides.
She [HE!] earned a clean sweep of the judges’ scorecards in the opening round, twice pinning her [HIS!] Polish opponent on the ropes, and continued to keep Szeremeta at bay in the second as the Pole struggled to get close enough to launch an attack.
Lin did find herself [HIMSELF!] on her [HIS!] knees at one point in the final round, but the incident was deemed a slip and victory came without a blemish on all five judges’ scorecards.
The full article is here:
So two larping men have - surprise, surprise - won Gold Medals that should have gone to women. And they have done so with ease - of course! The IOC is a farce!
Free Speech
Following on from our discussion about this in the last update, if you want a good example of two-tier policing, check out this interview on Talk TV.
EDI Jester deals with the threat to free speech here:
https://edijester.substack.com/p/hiding-the-truth
Dennis Kavanagh has stood down from the Queens’ Speech podcast to concentrate on his other work and Clive Simpson has now set up a new podcast with Jack David called Two Poofs and a Podcast. On their latest episode there is a very interesting discussion about the riots and also about the NHS and Dr Cass’s letter about adult gender services - they also report that 900 doctors have sent a public letter opposing the proposals from the BMA to oppose and carry out their own review of Cass ( see further below regarding the NHS). This is currently behind a paywall.
https://twopoofspod.substack.com/p/episode-3-cruel-summer-special
The dreaded phrase ‘legal but harmful’ has returned!!
Amy Gibbons, Dominic Penna and Cameron Henderson in The Telegraph (Tech giants will be forced to ban fake news under Labour plans 09 August) report:
Sir Keir Starmer suggested on Friday that the Government would review social media laws - Getty/Toby Melville
Tech companies will be forced to ban fake news from their platforms under plans being considered by the Government in the wake of the riots.
Sir Keir Starmer suggested on Friday that the Government would review social media laws as part of efforts to prevent further disorder.
The Telegraph understands that ministers are looking at introducing a duty on social media companies to restrict “legal but harmful” content.
It could mean that firms are required to remove or suppress posts spreading fake news about asylum seekers or other topics such as self-harm, even if they do not meet the threshold for illegality.
However, critics have said the proposals expose “the sinister and authoritarian side” of Sir Keir’s Labour Party, driving “a coach and horses” through the principle of free speech.
The plans come after a row between Elon Musk who owns X, formerly known as Twitter, and the Prime Minister over his handling of the riots.
The potential crackdown on tech companies would likely form part of a review of the Online Safety Act, which was passed last year.
The Act requires platforms to take “robust action” against illegal content and activity and will be implemented gradually.
A “legal but harmful” clause, requiring firms to take down or restrict the visibility of content deemed to be dangerous but not against the law, was included in the original Bill brought forward by the Tories in 2022.
However, it was removed because of free-speech concerns, with critics warning it could allow a future Labour government to censor controversial material.
Kemi Badenoch, a candidate for the Tory leadership, previously described it as “legislating for hurt feelings”.
The clause was replaced with a new “triple-shield” of protections, including a duty on firms to give users the tools to filter out content that they do not want to see.
The final legislation was passed last year, following years of campaigning by The Telegraph for social media firms to be subject to a statutory “duty of care”.
The full article is here:
The National Health Service
A mix of some very good and some bad news here!
It is somewhat mad that the same NHS which went down the gender affirming care path is now looking at services for detransitioners! However I suppose it is a step forward.
Here is an article about the NHS and detransitioners:
Benjamin Ryan on his substack Hazard Ratio deals with the NHS plans to implement the Cass Review. This sounds good though, as I have said before, I don’t see how the ethical questions regarding a clinical trial can be answered albeit that Barry Wall ( see further below) feels that the Oversight Board will ultimately not allow this to proceed. I hope he is right.
England's National Health Service Issues Ambitious Plan to Implement Cass Review
Even as the British Medical Association has called for a pause on such implementation, NHS England has published a detailed plan to overhaul care of gender-distressed youth over the next two years.
Aug 07, 2024
England’s National Health Service on Wednesday published a detailed outline of its ambitious plan to phase in over the next two years the recommendations of the landmark Cass Review of the care of youth who are distressed about their gender.
Most notably, the NHS has indicated that it hopes to get up and running by early 2025 a clinical trial of puberty blockers to treat gender-related distress in minors. And after the team of pediatrician Dr. Hilary Cass, the author of the Cass Review, was rebuffed by NHS adult gender clinics in their effort to obtain data regarding former patients of the UK’s pediatric gender clinic, the NHS has pledged to get its hands on this information and finally conduct a thorough analysis of the adult outcomes of such former pediatric patients.
Overall, the plan is for the NHS to establish seven regional hubs of clinics that will provide holistic care for gender-distressed youths across England and Wales, prioritizing differential diagnosis of psychiatric conditions and autism and providing psychiatric and psychological care accordingly. Vital to this system will be the recruitment of clinic staff and training them according to a national standard, as well as establishing routine data gathering and analysis that can inform future efforts to care for this vulnerable and growing population of young people.
Meanwhile, in May, Dr. Cass expressed grave concerns in a letter to NHS leadership that the NHS’s adult gender clinics are plagued by many of the same problems that led to the pediatric clinic’s collapse: excessive waiting times, poorly trained staff, patients with myriad psychiatric comorbidities, and an ideological bent that puts pressure on clinicians to approve cross-sex hormone prescriptions quickly and without proper assessment. The NHS announced today that Dr David Levy will launch a review of adult gender services in September.
The full piece is here:
https://benryan.substack.com/p/englands-national-health-service
EDI Jester deals with this here and is optimistic ( as are Clive Simpson and Jack David on their podcast - see above):
https://edijester.substack.com/p/breaking-the-end-of-trans-medicine
Therapist, James Esses on his substack brings bad news regarding new (captured) NHS guidance:
Peas in a Pod: The NHS and Stonewall
Aug 08, 2024
We have had the Cass Review. We have had the previous government’s emergency ban on puberty blockers. And much else besides.
It has genuinely felt as if the tide is turning. Yet, as is often the case, it is one step forward and two steps back.
We know how crucial mental health support is in this arena. Gender dysphoria is a mental health condition and should be treated as such – through ethical, explorative therapy or counselling.
Unfortunately, gender ideology has infected NHS Talking Therapies. The magnitude of this cannot be overstated, given that 650,000 people every year access this service.
This week, I was sent a new NHS policy document entitled ‘NHS Talking Therapies for Anxiety and Depression: LGBTQ+ Positive Practice Guide’. The red flags are present from the covering page of the guide, as we learn that it was produced in collaboration with the LGBT Foundation – a trans activist group. The fact that the Foreword to the guide is written by the NHS’ National Clinical Lead for Psychological Professions, Dr Adrian Whittington, is telling.
Terminology
The guide is beset by language grounded in gender ideology, rather than medicine or biological reality. The NHS state: “we have tried to use terminology that is generally accepted”. This could not be further from the truth, given that they almost immediately defer to Stonewall’s language by linking to their terminology guide. As a result, NHS mental health practitioners are told that “sex is assigned to a person at birth” and “gender is how a person perceives themselves and who they feel they are”.
Clinicians are told to challenge ‘cisgender normativity ideologies’, which is the “assumption that everyone’s gender is congruent with their sex assigned at birth”. This would appear to suggest that mental health practitioners should assume that any patient in front of them might be ‘trans’. This is confirmed when clinicians are instructed to ask every patient “if they would like to discuss gender identity” during an assessment.
The NHS themselves recognise the issues that this can cause, warning: “if you ask for a person’s sex when you are trying to gain their gender then it can…lead to the incorrect information being stored on the system”. No kidding.
The NHS go on to state that it is important that “topics such as menopause are not only centred on cisgender patients”. Only women experience menopause. This is not a social construct. It is biological reality. That the NHS is suggesting otherwise is troubling.
In fact, the entire concept of sex-based attraction is thrown out of the window. For example, the definition of heterosexual given is “when a person’s romantic and/or sexual orientation is towards the opposite gender”.
Suicidality
It is one thing for an online troll to parrot lies and misinformation. It is another thing entirely for our National Health Service to do so. Yet, that is exactly what they do. Practitioners are told that “transphobia can lead to elevated risk rates for suicide”. To see suicide being weaponised in this manner is a disgrace, particularly after government research has already debunked these claims.
The scaremongering continues, with the NHS claiming that the Covid-19 “pandemic resulted in higher rates of isolation for LGBTQ+ people”.
Conversion Therapy
The NHS go on to entirely misrepresent the position on so-called ‘conversion therapy’, stirring the pot even further. Clinicians are told that such practices include “surgical interventions or ‘corrective’ rape” and that “unfortunately, at time of writing, conversion therapy is still legal in the UK”. Reading this, mental health practitioners could reasonably believe that therapists in the UK are torturing or raping patients. This is simply not true. Torture and rape are already criminal offences. To suggest otherwise is deeply disingenuous. The NHS even link to the now-discredited Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapy, which the UK Council for Psychotherapy recently withdrew from following concerns over child safeguarding.
The full piece is here:
https://www.jamesesses.com/p/peas-in-a-pod-the-nhs-and-stonewall
Though this is not just about the NHS, Feminist Legal Clinic bring us some good news about the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges recommending implementation of the Cass Review. The Academy is the membership body for the UK and Ireland's 23 medical royal colleges and faculties
Academy statement: Implementation of the Cass Review – AOMRC (08 August)
The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges is mindful that some members of the medical profession are questioning the validity of the evidence and consequently the findings of the independent Cass Review of gender identity services for children and young people. Our view is that further speculative work risks greater polarisation on this matter which is not helpful and our focus should be on implementing the recommendations of the Cass Review by providing the most appropriate treatment for children and young people with gender dysphoria or gender related distress. It is important that treatment is holistic and based on strong and up to date medical evidence and the Academy continues to train clinicians on that basis. This means they can provide the best possible care to a group of often vulnerable children with confidence and compassion.
Source: Academy statement: Implementation of the Cass Review – AOMRC
Kamala Harris
Thanks again to Feminist Legal Clinic for bringing us Kara Dansky’s excellent open letter to Kamala Harris. Sorry, Kara, but I bet it doesn’t work!!
An open letter to Kamala Harris from a Democratic woman – Washington Examiner (08 August)
I am a lifelong progressive, a radical feminist, and a Democrat who has followed your career closely. . . .
Just like the vast majority of America, you know that the word “women” means adult humans who are female — and you know that the difference between women and men matters.
So why is it that (apart from your advocacy for abortion rights, which I support enthusiastically) you and other Democrats are leaving it to the GOP to stand up for women’s hard-won and extremely popular sex-based rights? Why allow Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) to be the voice of reason questioning a federal judge who sent a convicted rapist to a women’s prison? Why let former President Donald Trump reap applause at the Republican National Convention by guaranteeing an end to men in women’s sports? . . .
Every day, I hear from rank-and-file Democrats (and, importantly, former Democrats) about how disgusted they are with the party’s complete abandonment of women and girls (including lesbians) at the sexist, regressive, authoritarian, homophobic altar of “gender identity.” We have been begging you to change course. We want to vote for Democrats in November.
To date, our concerns have mostly been ignored.
I cannot tell you the number of people who have told me that they plan to vote for Donald Trump this year because of this issue. . . .
It’s not too late. You can still prove Democrats are reality-based, not ridiculous. Stand up at the Democratic National Convention and say that a woman is an adult human female and a lesbian is a female homosexual. Say that sex is real and that it matters. Say right out loud that sex is immutable and no man is ever a woman — even if he claims to be one, even if he adopts the traditional stereotypes of femininity, and even if he has his penis surgically removed. Apologize to women and girls for that utterly embarrassing letter you sent to “transgender” activist Dylan Mulvaney celebrating his “365 days of girlhood.”
You profess to care about American women and girls. It’s time to walk the talk. Many of us will be watching and hoping you do the right thing.
Source: An open letter to Kamala Harris from a Democratic woman – Washington Examiner
Endpiece by Liz
#BeMorePorcupine
#XX
#SaveWomensSport
Link to archive copy of Telegraph article on NHS and detransitioners.
https://archive.is/yGprk
Love the FUXXAKE. I have found her account on X, and shared the picture.
Hehe - even the name 'X' is now rooting for women, even if inadvertently :-)