Category: Hell in a handcart

  • The nasty party has taken its mask off

    As predicted, the UK government has abandoned its plans for gender recognition reform. Not only that, but instead of making life marginally better for trans people it has decided to make life much, much worse. GRA reform isn’t the story here, although it’s worth noting in passing that, as in Scotland, around 70% of respondents…

  • “The messaging does have an effect”

    The Guardian on the Polish presidential election: [The party] has often hit out at gay rights and what it calls “LGBT ideology”, in rhetoric that is popular with parts of its base and the Catholic church. Among other things, Duda’s new charter pledges no support for gay marriage or adoption by gay couples, with Duda describing…

  • “The problem with British transphobia: it sounds so reasonable”

    June Tuesday, writing on Medium: JK Rowling and the Reasonable Bigotry. The UK’s transphobia is many-pronged — our conservatives, religious fundamentalists, alt-right, ‘rational men’, and so all exist here, too. But virulent and aggressive anti-trans feminists have a culture and history specific to Britain, and their views trickle down into the respectable views of those with…

  • Privilege, illustrated

    [via Reddit]

  • Four horsemen

    NYT: The four large countries where coronavirus cases have recently been increasing fastest are Brazil, the United States, Russia and Britain. And they have something in common. They are all run by populist male leaders who cast themselves as anti-elite and anti-establishment.

  • Wedge issues to unite the right

    Laura Bassett, writing for GQ.com, explains how the US Christian Right moved from being largely pro-abortion (in some cases because they were racist and believed abortion would limit the number of black children) to becoming militantly against it. The short version: strategists used abortion as a wedge issue to rally the faithful and grow the…

  • The writers who want your granny to die

    Peter Geoghegan and Mary Fitzgerald in The Guardian on the “lockdown sceptics“: It is no surprise that so many professional contrarians are paid-up lockdown sceptics. They are products of our distorted media ecosystem, which invariably privileges heat over light. For them, the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about –…

  • What was won can be lost

    There’s a famous cartoon by artist KC Green: As Green told The Verge, it’s popular because: it’s a feeling we all have, apparently. It’s a feeling we all get of, just like, “Things are burning down around me, but you got to have smile sometimes.” It’s a basic human [feeling], “Well, what are you going…

  • Doing the devil’s work

    According to STV and Glasgow Live, there are “mass gatherings” planned for Glasgow this weekend to protest against the lockdown. The story is interesting for all the wrong reasons. Reason number one is that it isn’t true. A couple of far-right yahoos [update: their group is a front for the racist Britain First] have shared…

  • If you get coronavirus, don’t blame the Tories

    Jon Alexander, on Medium.com: The immediate response to the government’s new Covid19 messaging has been a mixture of confusion and outrage. Commentators and academics seem bemused, the only possible explanation being that the government is incompetent. But actually, I think it’s very deliberate — and if their ultimate goal is to retain power rather than…