Maya Forstater has challenged Adam Rutherford and Ben Goldacre to set Bragg straight about Cass and systematic reviews

This may also be worth noting:

https://twitter.com/rivkahbrown/status/1779878392805945428

Anything JKR says will be wilfully misinterpreted. She has realised that, and sensibly decided to say what she wants.

The trans attempt to appropriate the Nazi persecution of gay people is grotesque, and I am delighted that JKR had the guts to call them out on it.

It's this:

https://twitter.com/billybragg/status/1779942549391921185

I'm not sure of the cause but it might relate to this:

https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/1767912990366388735

which I think was an ill-advised tweet open to all kinds of misinterpretations, most of them extremely uncharitable.

Don't want to start a whole new thread, but sorry to write slightly irrelevant post on this one... about Bragg. Can't keep up with his fast-moving, unbounded idiocy. What is he saying about JKR and the Streisand effect??? TIA

Remember Billy Bragg attempting to debate Julie Bindel and Ayan Hirsi Ali?
The man has no shame and no ability for critical self reflection. He's nailed his colours to the mast - and has chosen to live or die by them.

Exactly. Implied in their performative scepticism (more so Rutherford, than Goldacre) is, "How could so many idiots have believed in religion for so long? I would never be that stupid."

It's quite hard to hold that line convincingly, when you have fallen head first into a new cult.

I disagree with Richard Dawkins' approach to atheism, despite not being a believer myself, but at least the man has the guts to be consistent. He shows up Rutherford for the snivelling coward and intellectual minnow that he is.

Speaking of, Suranne Jones posted an image of her self reading hags the other day.

Indeed, and his background in critiquing both new age woo and big pharma would have given him some powerful tools here.

As for Rutherford, no respect for him at all. All Maya was asking him to do was to explain clinical studies to Billy, not to take a side, but he was so craven he wouldn’t even do that. Science communicator my foot.

Sceptical so long as it's safe to be so.

Someone got to all those Skepto Lads (and Roberts) early on, in the same way the Lib Dems were captured.

It makes me completely unable to take them and their "skeptic" schtick seriously. No of course god doesn't exist, what sort of idiot believes in that, but do you know liking spinny dresses and being crap at maths means you have a female soul in your male body.

I'd always assumed Lauren Laverne was sensible on this. She has the brilliant Sophie Scott on her R6 programme regularly.

She asked this after TwiX took action on Emma Hilton/Fond of Beetles' account so her explanation wasn't available.

What happened there?

There was a fairly long, and useful, thread back in 2019 about the sceptic community’s inability to criticise gender identity ideology.

I have (female) family member who is deeply into the UK sceptic scene and she says this topic is studiously avoided.
Good to see high profile proponents having their feet held to the fire a little. Hopefully will encourage others to question more too.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/3613657-The-Skeptic-Communitys-Blind-Spot-for-Gender-Theory

Yes. Ben Goldacre used to be one of my heroes. Now it seems he’s fearless against easy targets such as new-agey dimwits, but scared to tackle the much more seriously harmful proponents of gender woo.

Disappointing. He could have done so much good.

Didn't know that re Wakefield/Cass review. Of all the people you wouldn't want on your side eh? Not that Cass would give a shit what he thought. Fucking charlatan that he is.

Fry is on 6 Music every week talking to Lauren Laverne. 6 Music who refused to platform Roisin Murphy after she spoke out against medicalising kids with hormones... Lauren Laverne who had Marina Abramovic on Dezzy Island Discs and couldn't wait to correct her for referring to 'Anoni' as 'he'. Practically whined like a primary school kid with their hand up, desperate to get in there with the correct pronoun. (Still annoys me when I think about it, particularly as a fellow Northerner.) I really hope Hannah hasn't bought into it either but if she hasn't, she's probably being very quiet.

Good point. But we now know how saying 'gender' renders normally very opinionated Reasonable Men into coy refusals to state facts.

So a man writing a book about "gender" in sport has not followed the puberty blockers debate at all, including the Cass Report, despite the importance of puberty in shaping our bodies and thus our adult sporting capabilities? Despite various sports organisations across the world mentioning going through male puberty as a criterion for exclusion from the female category?

Pull the other one.

🙈

They don't look at it as a scientific question. To them it's part of the lgbtq+ movement.

Many people who are big into allyship are not any more interested either in the biology of sexuality, and the fact is we don't know much about it. The idea that sexuality is inborn and unchangable isn't a scientific statement, it's a moral position taken by certain people because they believe it supports their political views. Maybe it's true, or true for some, but science doesn't really know.

These same people would likely resist scientific evidence they felt undermined that particular talking point as well.

I'm not all that surprised they are secular humanists - their faith in human possibilities, without any underlying support structures in terms of first principles, fits right in.

To be fair, if you aren’t engaged with this issue, it probably sounds a bit mad to care about Billy Bragg’s views on this kind of review.

That Rutherford is such a disappointment should be no surprise after the godawful Inside Science podcast episode he presented following the Caster Semenya case. His sanctimonious manner was starting to grate before that anyhow, but to hear him present such a misleading report whilst he holds himself out as so rational & ethical was infuriating. That man doesn't give a flying feathered fuck about women.

episode here

Don't believe for a minute that either Rutherford or Goldacre believe in gender woo.