Maryam Namazie A video is circulating of Aisan Eslami, an ‘Influencer’ who lives in the USA with millions of followers, promoting the ‘honour’-killing of an Iranian women Simin Pourmehr on social media for her saying that one could go on holiday with the money it costs to go out for one night in Dubai.


It’s a masterclass in misogyny, racism and violence against women.


He says:

‘If you were my sister, I would behead you, filthy shit… Isn’t there a man in your family to come and pull your hair, and bring you to Iran and tie you up in a room, you filth. Girl, you are my namoos (honour), my countryman, my sister. Oh you filthy, shit, dog… I was just looking at explorer, [and you say], ‘we live in Dubai and with the money of one night recreation, one can go on holiday.’ Spit on your face. You shit. At least, don’t speak Farsi, speak another language… Isn’t there a mother, father, male, cousin who can come and pull your hair and hit you in the head, you filth? Why are you going to an Arab Emirate?… We go with the photo of Reza Khan, the Shah of 50, 60, 70 years ago; our history was Kourosh the great… you’re doing exactly what the Islamic regime of Iran wants – to make everyone ‘dis-honourable’, to make everyone dishonourable. Brother, ‘Binamoosy’, lack of honour is the red line of all Iranians across the world. Are we Mexicans, El Salvadorans, where the brother has sex with the mother, the mother has sex with the sister…? In Iran if this happens, there is a homicide…. Wherever you see this video [of her saying you can go on holiday for money it costs for one night in Dubai], erase the video, this will reach the hands of a few Arabs. In another 2 days they will sit together, with the fat stomachs and they will say this is an Iranian girl. I will have a heart attack to see such scenes. Then you go to Turkey and you see Iranian girls and they ask, ‘How much does she take?’ to one’s mother and sister and it leads to murder. You made me ill, girl. And it upset me that I cursed at you, you filthy shit. If I had my hands on you, I would hit your head with this [shows something] so that your head explodes.‘

He has since ‘apologised’ saying he spouted the murder of women because he ‘got caught up in the moment’ and ‘became emotional.’

Even in his ‘apology,’ Eslami places the blame on the woman who invoked his violent rage. It’s the usual shaming of women who don’t behave ‘appropriately;’ in effect she is the whore who has no one to blame but herself for any ensuing male violence.

His bogus apology shows, at the very least, the pushback that exists as a result of the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution. It also shows, though, that it is not just the Islamic regime of Iran that is being challenged by the women’s revolution.

The misogyny and violence against women is deep, including amongst the monarchist opposition abroad to which Eslami belongs. Look at the comments in his feed defending him and vilifying her to get a small flavour of this toxic masculinity and ‘honour’ culture which removes male accountability for violence. In this world, women are to be either protected or raped/beheaded depending on how well they guard the honour of men.

This violence and threat of violence spills beyond the pages of social media.

Just one case in point. At a rally against the farce of a presidential election in Iran in London, monarchists chant ‘Maryam Namazie, hurry up and get naked’ and ‘Filthy Feminists’ in first video and ‘Ripped, Ripped Maryam, Fuck your Sister’s Cunt’ in the second video whilst calling myself and other women ‘whores.’



Threats from monarchists and the regime’s agents are full of violent misogynist language similar to that used by Eslami. See some here and here.

Eslami parades topless spouting misogyny and violence against women and is enabled by social media companies to garner millions of followers. Women’s rights defenders on the other hand are often suspended and barred for defending women’s bodily autonomy and rights.

See for example:

Instagram has been restricting my account without informing me. I only found out inadvertently.

Maryam Namazie is an Iranian-born activist and Spokesperson of the
Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain and One Law for All.

Aisan Eslami ✊ Not Your Fucking Honour

A Digest of News ✊ from Ukrainian Sources ⚔ 14-October-2024.

In this week’s bulletin

⬤ the killing of journalist Victoria Roshchyna.
⬤ new UN report on human rights.
⬤  miscarriages of justice, including against Crimean Tatars.
⬤ execution of Ukrainian POWs.
⬤ complicity of Belarus in Russian crimes

News from the territories occupied by Russia


Another Russian ‘trial’ by Crimean Tatar family echoing Stalin era persecution (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 11th)

Russia sentences Crimean to 14 years on indictment copy-pasted from countless FSB political trials (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 10th)

Dramatic increase in sentence against two Ukrainian Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russian-occupied Crimea (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 9th)

Iryna Navalna abducted from occupied Mariupol, tortured and sentenced in Russia to 8 years ‘because of her name’ (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 8th)

Denying the existence of Ukraine exacerbates calls for genocide (Crimea Human Rights Group, 7 October)

Melitopol businesswoman dead after being abducted by the Russian invaders (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 7th)

Ukraine/Russia: Teachers in Russian-occupied territories coerced to teach Russian curriculum through threats and violence (Amnesty International, October 4th)

The situation at the front

Russians execute 9 Ukrainian POWs in Kursk region (Ukrainska Pravda, October 13th)

Drones vs. Depots: Ukraine’s new strategy targets ammo caches — and Russia has no response (The Insider, October 11th)

Russia launches counterattack in Kursk region (Meduza, 11 October)

Russia’s Toretsk offensive: Another Donbas town could fall as West delays weapons talks (Kyiv Independent, October 11th)

Kherson is a living NIGHTMARE (Twitter, October 8th)

News from Ukraine – general

Ukraine lodges war crime probe over killing of journalist Victoria Roshchyna in Russian captivity (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 11th)

Why Russian attacks on power plants are so dangerous (Greenpeace / Ukrainska Pravda, 9 October)

Ukrainska Pravda faces systematic pressure from president’s office (Ukrainska Pravda, 9 October)

Renowned Russian civic activist Ildar Dadin killed defending Ukraine (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 7th)

Analysis and comment

The Kursk Anomaly: Why Russia chooses to ignore the occupation of its own territory (The Insider, October 11th)

If Putin comes to Mexico, the country’s law enforcement agencies should arrest him. Oleksandra Matviichuk speaks at HAY Festival (Centre for Civil Liberties, October 9th)

Research of human rights abuses

Ukrainians in Russian captivity, ‘trials’ of ‘terrorists,’ and forcibly displaced children — what the report on human rights in Russia says (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, October 12th)

Belarus took at least 2,219 Ukrainian children from their homes: it re-educates, militarizes and uses them in propaganda (Zmina, October 10th)

Torture and persecution of Ukrainians by Russia should be investigated as crimes against humanity – Human Rights Defenders (Zmina, October 9th)

UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances publishes findings on Morocco, Norway and Ukraine (UNHCR, October 9th)

How Belarus helps transform Ukrainian children into Russian children: ZMINA and partners presented a report at the OSCE (Zmina, October 5th)

Treatment of POWs and Update on Human Rights Situation in Ukraine (UNHCR, August 2024)

International solidarity

Russian state targets Ukraine solidarity campaign (Ukraine Solidarity Campaign, October 11th)

Support anti-war protester Vladimir Zolotaryov (Solidarity Zone, 8 October)

Upcoming event

Monday 18 November, 6.0pm: Queen Mary University, London, Centre for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies panel discussion: “Political prisoners in Russia and the Occupied Territories of Ukraine”. Register here.

🔴This bulletin is put together by labour movement activists in solidarity with Ukrainian resistance. More information at Ukraine Information Group.

We are also on twitter. Our aim is to circulate information in English that to the best of our knowledge is reliable. If you have something you think we should include, please send it to 2U022ukrainesolidarity@gmail.com.

We are now on Facebook and Substack! Please subscribe and tell friends. Better still, people can email us at 2022ukrainesolidarity@gmail.com, and we’ll send them the bulletin direct every Monday. The full-scale Russian assault on Ukraine is going into its third year: we’ll keep information and analysis coming, for as long as it takes.

The bulletin is also stored on line here.

To receive the bulletin regularly, send your email to:
2022ukrainesolidarity@gmail.com.
To stop it, please reply with the word “STOP” in the subject field.

News From Ukraine 💣 Bulletin 117

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Three Hundred And Twenty Three

 

A Morning Thought @ 2311

Simon PiraniRepublished from Labour Hub, with thanks.

19-September-2024

Free public transport has been introduced, with striking success, in cities around the world in the past three years. Activists will report on how it was done at an event in London on Sunday 29 September.

Brazil has seen an especially rapid expansion of zero-fares transport. At the latest count, more than 5 million people in 116 municipalities have access to it.

A tram in Montpellier, France, where public transport is now free for residents

Many smaller Brazilian cities introduced free public transport, in response to a decade of motorisation, policy support for private cars and decline of public systems, Daniel Santini, a researcher at the university of Sao Paulo, points out.

At the 29 September event, organised by Fare Free London, Santini will give an update (on a video link).

Zero-fares policies always and everywhere win support as a social justice measure.

In June last year, the state government of Karnataka, India, introduced free public transport for women, in the teeth of right-wing opposition – and recently registered the 2 billionth free journey.

An activist from Karnataka will also speak at the London event (by video).

Closer to home, in France, 2 million people have access to 38 zero-fares schemes counted by the Observatory of Cities with Free Transport. Montpellier, with a population of half a million, became the largest fare-free city in December last year.

Jerome Serodio of the National Coordination of Collectives for Free Public Transport in France – which sees public transport as “a common good, fighting isolation and individualism” – will address the London event, too.

That is not all. Fares have also been abolished in two European capital cities (Tallinn, Estonia, and Luxemburg), and cities in the USA, China and elsewhere.

In 2021, researchers at the Rapid Transition Alliance attributed the international shift towards free public transport, in part, to a bounce-back from the Covid-19 pandemic, when health authorities had advised against using public transport.

Politically, free public transport is embraced by community groups and environmentalists who oppose the intensification of car use on social, health and climate grounds.

We launched Fare Free London in February, with the support of groups such as the Stop the Silvertown Tunnel coalition, Greener Jobs Alliance and Tipping Point, who have campaigned against road-building and for public transport investment, as a way to tackle climate change.

Once we started campaigning, we found common cause with people who are already demanding action to cut the exceptionally high cost of public transport in London (e.g. £15.90 for a Zone 1-4 day travelcard).

Citizens UK, for example, are calling on City Hall to grant free bus travel to asylum seekers. In meetings with refugees, Citizens UK asked what their priority needs were: free transport came second to food for families.

“Mothers and young children have to walk long distances to go to primary school”, as children travel free by bus but their parents do not, the group reports. “People who are unwell have to walk long distances to access healthcare because of the cost of travel”, and English language classes have become inaccessible for some.

Extortionate fares are also an issue for students: a survey conducted last year by the student union at the University of the Arts in London found that the high cost of accommodation has driven students to live outside the city and commute – which costs £71-100 a week.

As part of its cost of living campaign, the union has called on the university to fund 16-25 railcards for new students.

Unemployed people and other claimants are also trapped by high fares, a representative of Haringey Claimant Justice told a public meeting on the zero fares campaign, organised in July by the Haringey Solidarity Group.

Fare Free London has won the backing of trade union bodies representing workers on London Underground. The Rail Maritime and Transport (RMT) union’s London transport regional council voted in May to support the campaign for free public transport; so did RMT branches covering the Bakerloo line and the eastern section of the Central line.

Not only would free public transport open the city to all, regardless of income. Combined with effective policies to reduce car travel, it could strengthen London’s efforts to tackle air pollution and reverse its setbacks in tackling greenhouse gas emissions from transport.

In 2022, London’s Labour mayor Sadiq Khan announced that the volume of traffic, measured by vehicle-kilometres driven, needs to fall by at least 27% to meet climate targets.

Climate scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change research and Imperial College argue that this reduction is clearly insufficient, even if it is a step in the right direction.

Transport researchers have long insisted that, to decarbonise transport, free public services are the logical complement to measures that discourage excessive driving.

Fare Free London hopes to popularise that argument. And we hope to continue building links with campaigners elsewhere in the UK, which lag behind London in terms of investment in public transport and the level of services.

Since launching our campaign in February, amid the overwhelmingly positive responses, we often get asked: “how would you pay for that?”

Our short answer is: if the political will is there, the money can be found. After all, most of the world’s big cities rely far less on fare income than London does, to fund public transport: they use corporate taxes and levies to make businesses pay for systems that effectively subsidise them.

The longer answer, set out in our campaign briefing, is that there are sources of funding (i) that could be raised now by the London mayor, if he so decided, and (ii) that could be added with the support of national government.

Potential sources of funding in London listed in the briefing are: road user charging; land value capture (e.g. the Community Infrastructure Levy used to finance the Elizabeth line); other property taxes; and a payroll tax similar to the one that provides about half of the Paris transport system’s revenue.

Measures national government could use, the briefing argues, include: legislation to widen local government’s revenue-raising powers; ending the freezing and cutting of fuel duty (which the Office for Budget Responsibility says cost the Treasury £80 billion in 2010-23); wealth taxes; and a clampdown on corporate tax evasion.

Now we have a Labour government, with a fiscal policy that looks like Austerity Mark Two, our battle over investment in public transport, and the potential to make it free, will merge with other battles about funding public services, and funding effective climate policies.

Let’s unite, and mobilise around these issues.

18 September 2024.

֍ The Winning Free Public Transport event on Sunday 29 September is open to all, and free to attend. 11.0am-4.0pm at the Waterloo Action Centre, 14 Baylis Road, London SE1 7AA, and on zoom. Please register here.

֍ In addition to the international speakers, we will hear from Lisa Hopkinson (Transport for Quality of Life); Daniel Randall (RMT, London underground, in a personal capacity); Ellie Harrison (Get Glasgow Moving); Drew Pearce (co-author of key article in Nature on London transport sector decarbonisation); and activists from Fare Free London, trade unions, community groups and others. Plus plenty of time for discussion.

 People & Nature is now on mastodon, as well as twitterwhatsapp and telegram. Please follow! Or email peoplenature@protonmail.com, and we’ll add you to our circulation list (2-4 messages per month).

From Brazil To India To Europe, Free Public Transport Is Gaining Momentum

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Three Hundred And Twenty Two

Dr John Coulter ✍ A question I’m often challenged with during my decades in journalism is - how can you call yourself a born again Christian and be a journalist; surely the two are Biblically incompatible?

Mind you, when I reflect on the Christian folk who pose this question to me, the vast majority of them are militant fundamentalists who seem to have the perception that working in the media is “off the devil”.

Such militant fundamentalists, whilst entitled to their warped opinions as part of freedom of expression, are a mirror image of the ethos of McCarthyism which swept America during the Fifties and Sixties.

Then the big scare was from communism under the guise of ‘Reds under the bed’; now with the militant fundamentalists of the 2020s it is ‘Satan under the sofa’!

During my time in the tabloid press, I remember a fundamentalist elder challenging me as to how I could call myself a born again Christian, yet write a national newspaper column which was bedecked with scantily clad women. I simply asked this elder - how do you know there are scantily clad women on my column? The conversation ended rapidly with the elder walking away red-faced!

My answer to the militant fundamentalists is that I can show my Christian faith in journalism through a strict adherence to the Biblical ninth commandment - thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

I interpret this practically as ensuring that every article I publish or broadcast adheres 100 per cent to the codes and conventions relating to media law and journalism ethics. Whilst I have covered many controversial stories and written or broadcast in a contentious manner at times, I have - thus far - never received a solicitor’s letter for my work.

There is also the concept of trust. Rule 14 of the Editors’ Code of Practice relates to source protection. It states: “Journalists have a moral obligation to protect confidential sources of information.” If I was to breach this code, either verbally or in writing, who would ever trust me again?

Moreover, given my strong church background, I have no doubt that if I ever fell into the pitfall of breaching Rule 14, people would say - you just can’t trust that Christian Coulter! Any breach will reflect not just on me personally, but on my Christian faith.

This, of course, had led to challenges to me of ‘what if-ery’ What if you found out your source was about to commit a crime; what if your source is involved in paramilitary or terrorist activity. Or, the most challenging ‘what if’ - what if your source was involved in child abuse?

In this respect I am a militant. Once I give my word on anonymity to a confidential source, I will not break that pledge - and I am prepared to suffer the consequences.

This was especially the case when working for a documentary in 1991 for the Channel Four series, Dispatches, investigating allegations of collusion, I was interviewed by police officers about the identity of my police source.

This Rule 14 has not only thrown up challenges in relation to covering the Irish conflict, but also in church life whereby fellow Christians over the years have tipped me off about alleged scandals in churches. Indeed, some of these confidential sources have been clerics themselves.

I often draw the analogy - you see your fellow Christian in church on Sunday mornings when it’s all ‘praise Jesus, hallelujah, God bless you brother and sister!’ But I again see these same people on Monday morning when they are in my office dishing the dirt on their fellow believers!

There has been one place of worship where I investigated allegations of promiscuous sexual activity among Christians. Ethically, I was unable to publish the story - not for legal reasons - but because I could not guarantee the anonymity of my source inside that specific place of worship.

In this example, it was a case of ‘too much information’. I showed my source three drafts of the story I wanted to publish and on each occasion, my source told me if I published it in that grammatical manner, folk in the place of worship would most likely be able to work out who had provided me with the information. I was not prepared to sacrifice the source simply to get the story published.

Fellow Christians can, at times, be very quick to judge me about the coverage of scandals in places of worship. Their preferred line of criticism is from the New Testament, St Matthew’s Gospel Chapter 18 when Peter asked Jesus how many times he should forgive his brother. Should it be seven times?

Jesus’ reply in verse 22 is very poignant: “Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, until seven times, but until seventy times seven.”

And here’s the ultimate dilemma for the Christian working in the media. Applying these words of Jesus to my role as a journalist, I should constantly forgive the Christian who can’t make up their mind whose bed they should be in! In this case, I’d never get any story published!

When I operate as a journalist, I leave my Bible outside the newsroom door. I focus purely on observing the ninth commandment. And yes, when I stand before the Lord on judgement day, I will have to answer for that decision to leave my Bible outside the newsroom.

Mind you, as a member of the pressure group Christians In Media, I get alarmed when militant fundamentalist try to brand all of the media with the same satanic brush.

For example, in my honest opinion, the Pentecostalist magazine Elim Life is one of the most professionally produced magazines in Ireland - and I’m not just saying that because I’ve had a few articles published in it!

When militant fundamentalists brand the media as being part of some satanic deception, are they seriously including the staunchly evangelical Elim Life in their criticism?

In terms of Christian ethics versus journalism ethics, I would summarise my own personal situation with the observation that when I die, two coffins will be cremated - one for my earthly remains and the other for the secrets of my sources that I take with me into eternity.

Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
John is a Director for Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. 

Christian Ethics Versus Journalism Ethics 🪶 My 46-Year Debate!

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Three Hundred And Twenty One

 


A Morning Thought @ 2310

Anthony McIntyre  Patrick Kielty has come under fierce attack from Sinn Fein in a bid to muzzle him. 

In an irreverent  comment on the Late Late Show, Kielty referred to Sinn Fein traitors. 

Before the images appeared, Kielty said: “If you haven’t actually seen the show, trust me, you’re in for a treat, folks. It’s so good. It’s full of deception, betrayal, everybody keeps changing their stories. Well, all we have to do is work out who’s telling the truth.”
When the pictures of Ms McDonald and Mr Stanley appeared on screen, he added: “I think that’s the first two contestants there. The Sinn Fein Traitors – the show we’re all wanting to see.”

To my mind it was satire, a barbed reference to a TV show, The Traitors, which he facetiously suggested Sinn Fein should appear on because for much of the past fortnight it has been accused of not telling the truth and changing its story. 

As so often happens satire can be painful for those on the receiving end of it, prompting a smarting and humourless Sinn Fein to behave like the new MOPEs - the Most Offended Politicians Ever. Party figures have piled on Kielty, seeking an apology and demanding that the programme be pulled from the RTE Player website, alleging that the comment was a far right trope.

Memory equipped types will trace the provenance of the T word back long before the far right began slinging it at Sinn Fein. Take it Down From The Mast, composed 101 years ago in the wake of the Irish Civil War, was a much loved rebel song rendered in clubs, pubs and shebeens in the North's republican  heartlands throughout the violent political conflict.

It might be postulated that the far right have appropriated the term and used it as a reverse discourse solely because it was part of the Sinn Fein word armoury employed against its constitutional nationalist opponents. Sinn Fein often referred to the Dublin establishment and its northern rivals in the SDLP as traitors. Republicans opposed to the Treaty mark two in 1998 frequently taunted Sinn Fein as traitors, using its own vocabulary against it. A 'remarkable moment' was reached in 2009 when Martin McGuinness stood alongside the chief of the British police in Ireland to slam physical force republicans as 'traitors to the island of Ireland'. Their supposed treachery lay in their carrying out the same type of killings Martin McGuinness had spent decades ordering before his political career took off.

So there is nothing essentially far right about the term traitor. It is a discursive slap down used by a wide range of actors. 

Sinn Fein's reaction to the Kielty quip points to an underlying authoritarianism that simply bridles at opinions not approved by it whether in the form of satire, caricature or political columns. Rather than Kielty regurgitating far right tropes, Sinn Fein's SLAPP strategy and censorious culture is quite similar to actions pursued by the far right government of Giorgia Meloni in Italy.

First out of the traps against Kielty and RTE was Mairead Farrell, the new chair of the Dail Public Accounts Committee. Having her front the charge against Kielty might be construed by RTE as a warning to the Authority that it might find itself in the crosshairs of the PAC.

Reinforcing Farrell has been TD Louise O'Reilly who waxed Shakespearian on Twitter that:

when the establishment comes at you they come not in single spies but battalions. Satire my eye. Kielty & RTE knew exactly what they were doing. And they should apologise.

Apart from ignoring then president Gerry Adams' televised boast to Ruairi Quinn, then Labour Party leader, that Sinn Fein was an establishment party, it dives into conspiracy theory with its suggestion that Patrick Kielty too had now joined some grand media plot against the party. 

On RTE today O'Reilly was still on the offensive:

Satire is a core part of freedom of expression, but that wasn’t satire. Using a far right trope, and one, by the way, that was cited in a death threat that was made against my party leader, Mary Lou MacDonald, using a trope like that, I believe, is highly inappropriate. It is miles away from satire, and most definitely is not a joke. I think it is a serious matter. We shouldn’t joke or mess about the far right, or indeed, the language that they use and the tropes that they wheel out.

Ms O'Reilly's insinuation that some political jokes are to be prohibited would seem to be consistent with her declaring herself happy and proud to back the draconian Hate Speech bill which her own party has since performed a volte face on. And this a few mere years after this society had ditched its blasphemy law. There is a pattern in Louise O'Reilly's discourse which lends itself to an authoritarian  suffocation of the unapproved idea. 

Sinn Fein has been labelled traitors by the far right for all the wrong reasons. When Daithi Doolan forcefully lobbies against racism he is dong the right thing, not the wrong thing. Mary Lou McDonald and other party reps have been on the receiving end of death threats from the far right. If forced to choose between Sinn Fein and the far right it would be Sinn Fein all day long. But that can never be a free pass for the censor.

For Sinn Fein to use the existence and threat of the far right as another arm of the SLAPP offensive positions it rather than Kielty on the Meloni side of the fence. 

RTE would be most unwise to either apologise for or withdraw Patrick Kielty's comments in response to pressure arising from an authoritarian impulse. Irish society benefited not at all from Section 31. Close the door firmly on it before it has the chance to close minds. 

Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

The T Word

Ten links to a diverse range of opinion that might be of interest to TPQ readers. They are selected not to invite agreement but curiosity. Readers can submit links to pieces they find thought provoking.


Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Three Hundred And Twenty

Labour Heartlands written by Paul Knaggs.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man stands as a testament to Renaissance ideals – a masterpiece that melds art, science, and philosophy. 

Within its elegant lines, we see humanity perfectly balanced between the divine circle and the earthly square, a microcosm of the universe itself. This vision, grounded in both philosophical reflection and scientific observation, placed humans as integral, rational beings within the cosmic order.

Yet today, in a world increasingly unmoored from such certainties, we find ourselves adrift in a sea of subjective realities. The once-clear lines of biology and identity blur into a haze of individual perception. No longer do we simply state, “I think, therefore I am.” Instead, a new mantra emerges: “I am whatever I think I am.” This shift raises a profound question: Must society – and more pressingly, our laws – bend to accommodate every subjective fantasy, regardless of biological fact?

This is no mere philosophical musing. it is now a pressing legal issue. As we speak, the highest court in the UK prepares to grapple with a question that would never have baffled Leonardo and his contemporaries: “What is a woman?” 

Continue reading @ Labour Heartlands.

Gender And The Law ⍟ The Vitruvian Woman On Trial

Right Wing Watch ðŸ‘€ Somehow, every episode of religious-right activist Janet Porter's "sitcom" is worse than the last.

Kyle Mantyla

Behold as she offers up this brilliant parody of the Village People's "Y.M.C.A" that attacks the ACLU and celebrates MAGA.


When The Religious Right Makes A Sitcom