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When I came out as trans, I joked that I did it because I wanted to get yelled at in the street by people in vans. But until last night on the way to the pub, it had never actually happened to me. [more]
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The Onion has had to publish its article again: This week’s school shooting is in Texas where – surprise! – the shooter is a straight white man who hates women. The Texas school shooter killed a girl who turned down his advances and rejected him in front of class before massacring seven more classmates and… [more]
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Brian Beacom caused online outrage recently when he wrote a column in the (Glasgow) Herald dismissing Kendrick Lamar’s Pulitzer win in the music category. To paraphrase: black people’s music isn’t proper music. Today, he’s marking mental health awareness week by saying that the cure for mental illness is to “grow a pair”. If you need… [more]
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The writer Tess Stenson posted something to Twitter earlier that really resonated with me. When I first joined Twitter, many moons ago, I pointedly decided not to turn my feed into a trans feed. I joined so I could promote my upcoming book, and franky, I didn’t want to bore people with those issues. As… [more]
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There’s a completely manufactured controversy brewing over the term “gammon”, which was first used to describe the angry, red-faced, right-wing men in the Question Time audience and has since become a catch-all term for the kind of people who wear MAGA hats, complain about immigrants and rant about Political Correctness Gone Mad in the comments… [more]
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The death of Scott Hutchison has lead to a lot of discussion about mental health on social media, which is good and important. But what talking doesn’t do is fix an underfunded, overwhelmed health service. So you’re sad, and you talk to your friends, and you make an appointment with your GP. That’s all good.… [more]
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I started re-reading The Salmon of Doubt, a posthumous collection of Douglas Adams’ bits and bobs, a few days ago; I didn’t realise it was so close to the anniversary of his death (May 11, today). I can’t overstate how much of an influence he was on me. Chances are if I make a joke,… [more]
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I wrote about Channel 4’s Genderquake debate a few days ago, and it’s safe to say the programme has caused a lot of controversy. The people who refused to take part were proved right: Channel 4 was trying to start a fight. Here’s a piece by Pink News on how the audience were told to… [more]
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Pretty much every well known trans/NB person I can think of has signed an open letter to Channel 4 over the Genderquake “debate”, which airs tonight. The inclusion of Caitlyn Jenner and Germaine Greer suggests it’s a stunt rather than a sensible discussion. On a related note, pretty much every well known trans/NB person I… [more]
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I’m doing a comedy writing class at the moment, and one of the pieces we’ve studied is this bit of standup about austerity by Frankie Boyle. “It was the fucking banks! They showed you them doing it on the fucking news!” It’s a great bit, and I’m reminded of it every time there’s an article… [more]
Read me in books
My debut memoir, Carrie Kills A Man, was a Scotsman book of the year and Damian Barr’s Literary Salon book of the week, and it was shortlisted for the 2023 British Book Awards book of the year in the Discover category.
My latest book, Small Town Joy, is a celebration of queer influences on and queer artists in Scots music and is out now.
I’m also a contributor to the excellent anthology Fierce Salvage, which is also out now.
