Category: LGBTQ+

  • Stay in your lane

    In a study that’s caused much appalled amusement, researchers at Penn State have discovered that men avoid things such as using reusable shopping bags for fear others will perceive them as gay. It’s interesting but not surprising that the policing of this stuff is done by both men and women. In a series of studies,…

  • When stereotypes equal safety

    One of the many things that annoys me about anti-trans activists is that on one hand they accuse trans people of perpetuating gender stereotypes, and on the other they viciously mock trans women who don’t conform to stereotypical ideas of female beauty. As the wonderfully named Tranna Wintour writes in The Walrus, it’s very difficult…

  • “Gender critical” philosophy doesn’t make sense

    The culture wars over trans people have made their way to the philosophers’ community, with some high-profile anti-trans people wrapping their views in philosophical arguments. Unfortunately, Luke Roelofs writes, those arguments don’t make sense. This is a long read, but it’s interesting if you’d like to understand why issues such as policing bathrooms are so…

  • The best of both worlds

    I was having a bad day on Saturday so I went to the pub to cheer myself up. It wasn’t entirely successful. First, a young woman who’d been standing next to me at the bar heard me speak, turned, and stared at me with open disgust. A few minutes later a drunk thirtysomething man put…

  • I’m hacked off with it too

    I’ve written before about the toothless press regulator IPSO, which was set up by the press specifically for the purpose of not regulating the press. To take just one recent example, IPSO found that when The Times makes up quotes, doing so doesn’t breach the rules on accuracy. The ruling was on a story about…

  • Probably not coming to a newspaper near you

    One of the things anti-trans writers like to go on about is the spectre of “detransition” and surgical regret: according to them, trans-related surgeries are acts of mutilation that many people will go on to regret. As ever, the facts tell a very different story. I’ve mentioned previously that the NHS in England reported a…

  • Schools protests to go nationwide

    Back in March, I wrote about the people protesting outside a Birmingham school over inclusive education and noted that while the protests were reported as Muslim, many of them were Christians. Also in March, I wrote that “US money is incoming and these protests will become more widespread.” Yesterday, INews reported that the protests are…

  • What’s being taught in our schools?

    Inviting organisations to talk about issues in schools can be a positive thing: for example, the Time For Inclusive Education campaign helps battle the bullying of LGBT+ kids. But what if the organisation has a track record of falsification and shock tactics? In an article about the tactics of anti-abortion groups, The Overtake notes that the…

  • Who’s paying for hate?

    One of the things that characterises the anti-trans movement in the UK is its use of crowdfunding, essentially an online begging bowl. But unlike many women’s organisations, the anti-trans groups don’t seem to put much effort into promoting their crowdfunders; also unlike many women’s groups, they attract suspiciously large donations. For example, the Transgender Trend…

  • No, acceptance of LGBT+ people isn’t going backwards

    The Guardian, and pretty much every other newspaper, reports today that acceptance of LGBT+ people is in decline. As The Guardian put it in a social media headline: Acceptance of gay sex in decline in UK for first time since AIDS crisis That’s not what the social attitudes survey, which the headline refers to, says…