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Labour Heartlands ☭ Written by Paul Knaggs. Recommended by Gearoid O’Loingsigh.

 -December 7, 2025

Socialism or Ultra-Liberalism? The Left’s Defining Choice

The entire trans debate is coming to a head, and the left is fracturing along predictable lines. The Girl Guides have reversed their 2017 policy and banned males who identify as women from their ranks. The Women’s Institute, which has welcomed women since the 1970s, has followed suit. Meanwhile, Your Party, the newly formed outfit claiming to be a socialist alternative, has overwhelmingly voted to enshrine “trans liberation” in its founding documents. These demands, backed enthusiastically by Zarah Sultana, come from the Trans Liberation Group, an extremist faction that wants to defy the Supreme Court, unwind women’s rights, and rewrite the Equality Act itself.

Here is what you are left with: socialism or ultra-liberalism. You cannot have both.

Let us be clear about what the Supreme Court actually ruled. In April 2025, the UK’s highest court delivered a unanimous judgment in For Women Scotland v The Scottish Ministers. It confirmed what most people already knew: that “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 means biological sex. A woman is an adult human female. A man is an adult human male. A Gender Recognition Certificate does not change this legal reality. The ruling did not strip trans people of protections. They remain protected under the characteristic of gender reassignment. What it did was clarify that women’s sex-based rights, fought for over generations, cannot simply be wished away by ministerial guidance or ideological capture.The Vitruvian Woman.

Continue @ Labour Heartlands.

The Trans Liberation Group’s response? Overturn it. Their demands are explicit: amend the Equality Act to make “sex” mean “current lived sex”, ban “gender-critical” beliefs from protection, allow self-identification for all purposes including prisons, abolish the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and legally enshrine the right not to disclose one’s trans status to sexual partners. They want children to access cross-sex hormones without parental consent, puberty blockers for minors, and hormone replacement therapy available over the counter. They want gender ideology taught in schools as fact, not debate.

Trans Liberation Or Socialism 🪶 You Can’t Have Both

Friendly Atheist ★ She turned in a Bible sermon instead of an essay and failed. Now conservatives say she’s the victim.

Samantha Fulnecky, a conservative student at the University of Oklahoma, insists that she’s a victim of religious discrimination after receiving a failing grade on a homework assignment for which she didn’t produce anything of value but referenced the Bible a whole bunch of times.

And now the educator on the other end of this false claim has been placed on administrative leave.

The assignment was for a psychology course and required students to read and respond to a decade-old article on “Gender Typicality, Peer Relations, and Mental Health.” The paper in question basically showed that students who are gender typical tend to be perceived as more popular, and that boys who are gender atypical suffer worse mental health outcomes.

Students were asked to respond to that paper in a essay. They could talk about whether the issue was worth studying, how they connected (or didn’t!) to the research, how the study related to other areas of interest, alternative interpretations of what the researchers found, etc.

Continue @ Friendly Atheist.

Christian Idiot

Right Wing Watch 👀 Written by Kyle Mantyla.


During his Monday night livestream, Trump-loving Christian nationalist pseudo-historian Rick Green announced his intention to get Operation Wetback, a military-style deportation campaign carried out by the Eisenhower administration in the 1950s, taught positively in Texas schools.

During the stream, Green voiced his support for Trump's vow to "permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries" and "remove anyone who is not a net asset to the United States, or is incapable of loving our Country." Green pointed to Eisenhower's deportation campaign as evidence that it can be done.

"I think that it will be incredibly popular for President Trump to do what he said he was going to do," Green said. "They're going to start deporting people, even the ones that came here legally."

"I don't care if you came here legally," Green continued.

If we decide you're not good for America, absolutely the American government has the right to end our stay and deport you. And that's what needs to happen with any group that is not good for America, that does not line up with American values. And yes, I'm referring to a lot of the Muslim community . . .

Working To Ensure 'Operation Wetback' Is Taught In Texas Schools

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Nine Eight Hundred And Ten

 

A Morning Thought @ 2991

Anthony McIntyre    In the month of Christmas we find that the only spirit haunting Gaza is the ghost of Genocide Past.

Like a vampire, driven by bloodlust, it stalks the bombed out buildings and war-made wastelands in search of victims. The post world war 2 edict of Never Again has been exposed for being as hollow as the hearts and as shallow as the minds of those who swore fidelity to the concept and have borne false witness to it since. For them Never Again really amounts to Never Again will we move to prevent genocide if it is being perpetrated by our allies rather than our enemies.

Mondoweiss has put its finger on the type of peace Gazans are now enduring.

It’s been nearly two months since the ceasefire was reached in Gaza. Hopes were high among the 2 million Palestinians in the besieged Strip that not only would the Israeli bombings stop, but that everything they had been deprived of for the past two years – food, clean water, adequate medicine and healthcare – would flood into Gaza to ease their struggles. The hopes of regaining a fragment of the life they knew before the war, have dissipated, as the reality of a “new genocide” sets in . . . Though some aid has come into Gaza, and people have tried to restore some semblance of normalcy, the reality in Gaza is far from peacetime. Israeli bombs are still falling, people cannot return to their home, and sufficient food aid and medicines are still in short supply.

On November 6 a Deputy UN Spokesperson, Farhan Haq, told journalists in New York that:

Our partners report that since the ceasefire, the Israeli authorities have rejected 107 requests for the entry of relief materials, including blankets, winter clothes, and tools and material to maintain and operate water, sanitation and hygiene services.

Add to this the joint statement by Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates warning that the Israeli decision to open the Rafah crossing so that traumatised Palestinian citizens could make their way to Egypt, is to enable the expulsion of Gazans. The eight nations stated their 'absolute rejection of any attempts to expel the Palestinian people from their land,' and have demanded that the crossing be opened both ways. We know only too well the Israeli attitude to the right of return.

This combination of Israeli tactical manoeuvres to secure t the strategic of population displacement has led to a spokesperson for the health ministry in Gaza claiming:

This is a new form of genocide. The policy of refusing to allow in what is necessary for people’s survival mirrors what happened earlier, when food was withheld, and malnutrition was deliberately created.

Against such a sombre backdrop, it is animating to again gather alongside all those who make up Drogheda Stands With Palestine, particularly in the wake of last week's intensified efforts both in the town and in Dublin to force the issue in front of the noses of the Michael Lowry-made coalition that governs this country. That Lowry had such a prominent role as kingmaker tells us that the heartbeat of the governing class is not an ethical one, while allowing us to better grasp the anger that fuses Alan Kelly - our own Alan Kelly, the good one, not the Labour Party guy - when he calls for someone to shout out the names Micheal Martin, Simon Harris, Helen McEntee and call them spineless lying bastards over their inertia on the Occupied Territories Bill. 

Sadly, the people of Ireland are not alone in trying to compel Western governments to do what they should be doing. The German opposition has slated the country's Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, over his upcoming visit to Israel, where he is scheduled to meet a man wanted by the International Criminal Court on suspicion of war crimes, Beelzebub Netanyahu. Such nauseating contempt for universal human rights and global justice.

On a lighter note, a friend in Belfast, Marty Flynn, baked what he called a Bailies based cake. He sent it through the post and it arrived yesterday, neatly packaged in a Quality Street tub. I am hoping that is not on the boycott list but if it is then I can console myself with the knowledge that we only got the tub and not the contents. It was hardly opened before four of us ate halfway through it. Sated, I came up with the suggestion to share the rest of it with those who I have been honoured to stand alongside for the past two years protesting Israel, a country that has already stolen the Palestinian cake and commits genocide in pursuit of more.

⏩Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

Ghost Of Genocide Past

Raw Story ★ Written by Alexander Willis. Recommended by Christy Walsh.

The Trump administration is facing a wave of condemnation after new reporting has revealed details about the systemic “torture” migrants were subjected to after being deported to El Salvador’s notoriously dangerous CECOT prison.

The Trump administration has sent around 250 migrants to El Salvador’s CECOT prison as part of its broader mass deportation policy. And, while the prison’s tortuous conditions have been well documented, The New York Times recently spoke with 40 former inmates whose testimony, forensic experts say, indicated “the existence of an institutional policy and practice of torture,” the outlet reported Sunday.

Speaking with the Times, the former inmates said they were beaten repeatedly, subjected to waterboarding-like torture, stripped naked and forced to perform sexual acts, and denied lifesaving medication. Of the 40 men interviewed, only three had criminal histories beyond immigration and traffic offenses, despite Trump’s pledge to only deport the “worst of the worst.”

The detailed account of the torturous conditions left many critics stunned, including former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan, who called for Democrats – should they regain control of Congress and the White House – to not forget what the Trump administration had subjected migrants to and to hold them to account.

Continue @ Raw Story.

'This Is On Them' 🪶 Trump Admin Scorched After Systemic 'Torture' Of Deportees Exposed

Free Betty Campaign Coordination Team ✊ As we enter the global 16 Days of Activism against sex-based violence, the Free Betty Coalition is calling on the public to help secure the release of Ibtissame Betty Lachgar, a Moroccan feminist and human rights defender imprisoned for a peaceful act of expression. 

The coalition represents hundreds of organisations representing hundreds of thousands of people.

Betty was arrested on 10 August 2025 in Morocco for posting a photograph, taken in London, in which she wore a T-shirt reading “Allah is Lesbian,” an appropriation of a famous anti-racist feminist slogan. She was sentenced to 30 months in prison under Article 267-5 and fined.By 10 December—International Human Rights Day—Betty will have spent 122 days in prison for a peaceful act of expression carried out outside Morocco. Since her imprisonment, Betty has been held in conditions that pose a grave and escalating threat to her health and safety. A bone cancer survivor with a prosthetic left arm, she urgently requires specialised surgery. Instead, her condition has deteriorated so severely that her humerus bone has now completely detached — a development that significantly increases the risk of amputation. Despite this, she continues to be denied the medical care her doctors consider essential. Betty is also held in prolonged isolation, without a mattress or pillow, forced to sleep on blankets placed directly on concrete in a cold cell with a broken window. Such treatment falls far below the minimum standards required under international law and violates Morocco’s obligations regarding the right to health, humane detention conditions and freedom from cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

1. Sign the Petitions to Free Betty and Publicise her case

Amplify her case across your social media platforms and sign the petitions available on freebetty.org.

2. Letter-Writing Push (Between November 25-December 10)

Write to the Moroccan embassy in your country and to your elected representatives urging Betty’s release and humane treatment. Sample letters which you can adapt or share with members follows below.

You can find contact details of some Moroccan embassies and government officials here.

Moroccan Embassies/Consulates:

Embassies relay concerns directly to Rabat. A coordinated international wave of letters creates diplomatic pressure that is difficult to ignore. Key points to include in your letter:
  • Express concern about the 30-month sentence for peaceful expression.
  • The photo was taken in London, outside Morocco.
  • Betty is a bone cancer survivor whose bone is now completely detached, creating a real risk of amputation.
  • She is being denied essential, specialised medical care.
  • She has no mattress, sleeps on concrete, and is in isolation.
  • Urge Morocco to respect its obligations under the ICCPR and Mandela Rules.
  • Call for her immediate release, end to isolation, urgent access to surgery, and repeal of Article 267-5.

Keep it respectful, factual and firm.

Sample Letter To Moroccan Embassies

Subject: Human Rights Day Appeal – Immediate Action Required for Ibtissame Betty Lachgar

Dear Ambassador

I am writing to express my deep concern regarding the continued imprisonment and deteriorating health of Ibtissame Betty Lachgar, sentenced to 30 months in prison for posting a photograph, taken in London, of herself wearing a T-shirt reading “Allah is Lesbian,” an appropriation of a feminist slogan in defence of human rights.

Ms Lachgar is a bone cancer survivor whose humerus bone is now completely detached, placing her at real risk of amputation. She has been denied specialised medical treatment, including the urgent surgery recommended by her doctors. She is held in isolation, without a mattress, sleeping on blankets laid on concrete.

These conditions are incompatible with Morocco’s obligations under the ICCPR and the UN Mandela Rules, which require access to adequate medical care and humane treatment.

  • I urge your government to:Release Ms Lachgar immediately and unconditionally
  • Apply alternative penalties as available under Moroccan law
  • End her isolation and ensure she has basic bedding and humane conditions
  • Provide urgent, specialised medical care, including surgery
  • Repeal Article 267-5 and all laws restricting peaceful expression

I make this appeal in the hope that Morocco will uphold its international commitments and protect Ms Lachgar’s life and dignity.

Yours sincerely,

[City/Country]

Write To Your Elected Representatives

Your elected representatives can:

  • Request action from the country’s Foreign Minister
  • Raise the case in Parliament / Congress
  • Make direct inquiries to Moroccan authorities
  • Issue public statements
  • Help secure medical monitoring or diplomatic observation

Ask your representative to:Raise Betty’s case with the Foreign Ministry immediately.

  1. Urge diplomatic pressure on Morocco for her immediate and unconditional release.
  2. Press for urgent specialised medical treatment, including surgery.
  3. Seek explanations for the prosecution of an act of expression carried out abroad.
  4. Request monitoring of her detention conditions, including isolation and lack of bedding.
  5. Press Morocco to repeal laws criminalising peaceful expression.


Sample Letter To Your Elected Representatives


Subject: Human Rights Day Appeal – Please Urgently Raise the Case of Ibtissame Betty Lachgar

Dear [Title + Name],

Ahead of Human Rights Day, I am writing to ask for your urgent assistance regarding the case of Ibtissame Betty Lachgar, a Moroccan feminist and human rights defender imprisoned for a peaceful act of expression.

Ms Lachgar was sentenced to 30 months in prison for posting a photograph taken in London wearing a T-shirt reading “Allah is Lesbian,” an appropriation of a feminist slogan in support of human rights.

Since 10 August 2025, she has been held in isolation without a mattress, sleeping on concrete, and denied specialised medical care despite being a bone cancer survivor. Her humerus bone is now completely detached, and doctors warn of imminent risk of amputation without surgery.

Her arrest and imprisonment contravene Morocco’s obligations under the ICCPR and Mandela Rules.

  1. I respectfully request that you:Raise Ms Lachgar’s case with the Foreign Minister as a matter of urgency
  2. Urge diplomatic pressure on Morocco for her immediate and unconditional release
  3. Request that Morocco facilitate urgent surgical and specialised medical care
  4. Seek clarification on the prosecution of an act of expression carried out in London
  5. Encourage monitoring of her health, conditions of detention and safety
  6. Support international calls for Morocco to revise laws criminalising peaceful expression

Your intervention could help save her arm and her life.

Thank you for your attention to this urgent matter.

Yours sincerely,

[Address and Email]

3. Join Mattress Action on December 10 (Human Rights Day)

To highlight that Betty has been forced to sleep on concrete for more than 120 days, we will bring mattresses and bedding to Moroccan embassies/consulates on December 10th. This stark, simple image communicates cruelty and neglect in a way no statement can. If you can participate—or organise an action in your own city—please inform us as soon as possible so we can coordinate, support, and amplify your event. Confirmed actions so far: Paris, London, Los Angeles.

Thank you for standing with Betty during these critical days.

In solidarity,

Siham Lachgar • Haram Doodles • Maryam Namazie • Shelley Segal

The Free Betty Campaign Coordination Team

Help Free Ibtissame Betty Lachgar

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Nine Eight Hundred And Nine

 

Pastords @ 20

 

A Morning Thought @ 2990

Dixie Elliot ✊I'm certain that everyone is well aware that Bobby Sands used the melody of Gordon Lightfoot's 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald' for his own song, 'The Voyage', which Christy Moore retitled, 'I Wish I Was Back Home In Derry' because he already had a song called 'The Voyage.'

But did you know that Gordon Lightfoot was asked why he hadn't sued Christy Moore for using his melody?

Lightfoot admitted that the melody was in fact from an old Irish folk song he had heard as a child and it stuck with him. He said he always intended to use it in a song some day and when he heard of the tragic sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald he used it to write that song.
 
So when Bobby used it, the melody had simply reverted to it's place of origin, Ireland.

There are quite a few instances of old melodies being used in songs which went on to become very popular. One being 'Danny Boy' which used the melody of 'The Derry Air.'
 
The 'Derry Air' was not in fact the original title of this melody. It was actually called 'O'Cahan's Lament' and had been composed by a blind harper called Rory Dall O'Cahan to lament the theft of O'Cahan land during 'The Plantation of Ulster'.
 
He believed that the fairies had played it to him as he slept under a tree near the River Roe.

Many years later Jane Ross, a collector of old melodies, heard a beautiful tune being played in the street outside her home in Limavady on a market day in 1855.
 
She went outside and discovered that it was a blind fiddler called Jimmy McCurry. She paid him the then princely sum of a florin to play the tune over and over until she got it taken down.
 
It is interesting that both the musicians connected to this melody were blind.
 
Jane Ross is remembered for her connection to the famous melody with a blue plaque outside her former home.
 
As for poor Jimmy McCurry, he is buried in an unmarked grave in Tamlaght outside of Ballykelly.
 
Isn't it about time that Jimmy is also remembered for his part in a melody went on to become one of the most played songs in the world, Danny Boy?

Thomas Dixie Elliot is a Derry artist and a former H Block Blanketman.
Follow Dixie Elliot on Twitter @IsMise_Dixie
I

Two Famous Songs Which Were Composed Using Old Irish Melodies

Electronic Intifada  Editor’s note: Teuta “T” Hoxha is one of the “Filton 24” prisoners currently being held on remand in British jails facing charges relating to direct action carried out against Israeli arms firm Elbit near Bristol in August 2024. She is currently on her second hunger strike, but this piece was written between her first and second hunger strikes. Palestine Action is currently banned under British “anti-terror” law.

As a prisoner, you learn three things. First, no one tells you anything. Second, you’re usually the last to find out information pertaining to yourself. And third, requests and complaints are shut down with two words: “security reasons.”

Take the example of my library job, removed without reason on 1 August 2025. I was checking my timetable when I noticed the unemployed marker. At my previous prison, HMP Bronzefield, I was security-cleared to work as a Shannon Trust mentor, a one-to-one role helping other prisoners improve their reading skills. I was working as a peer right until my sudden and immediate transfer to HMP Peterborough. It was not until day eight of my hunger strike that I gained clarity behind the decision.

Letter From A British Political Prisoner For Palestine

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