Thursday, June 01, 2023

Vox Pop


I predict that this lady is going to be appearing on telly quite a bit in the near future. It's Professor Kathleen Stock who was hounded out of Sussex University in 2021 after a particularly vicious and unhinged student campaign against her. Her crime was simply stating a Biological fact, i.e. that trans-women aren't Women and a desire to openly debate the issues surrounding Biological men entering Women's spaces (like changing rooms, rape crisis centres, sports etc.) Her views are not at all controversial or bigoted (as her opposition loves to bellow through megaphones) but are entirely reasonable and well considered. Although her academic colleagues at Sussex clearly threw her under the bus (even though over 200 academics signed an open letter in her support), she's never uttered a "transphobic" word as far as I can see and is clearly passionate about Women's rights, a perfectly reasonable position to hold in my view.

On Tuesday CH4 aired the first of a programme on this subject, called "Gender Wars" it covers both sides of the debate (if you can call it a debate, the term "war" is probably more appropriate at the moment!) and was pretty well balanced and calm, although it's generating much traffic in social and news media right now. Much of the hysteria around this subject and the screaming and intimidation from the TRA side wasn't shown, hopefully this important aspect will be exposed in future episodes as I think it's important to understand the ferocity of words and actions (de-platforming, death threats, physical abuse, disruption etc.) being hurled at Women for simply speaking their minds. Clearly the violent faction is a minority but I do feel that at some point the, so far, silent middle in this debate will need to act to marginalise the extremists so that we can progress however I think that the pendulum is slowly swinging back away from the loonies and to the more reasonable voices (like those of Stock) on both sides, something to be welcomed

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