Our friends at the Good Law Project

Love Small Faces
Thanks for the earworm

This board is where so called 'feminists' wanted all the threads discussing 'men who think they are women' to be shoved and then other 'feminists' moan that they can't use this board when there is a whole 'feminism' board that is totally empty just waiting for you/them to go and discuss things that you want to discuss. So crack on.

But no, men do not have the right to use female spaces just because they say so. Also if they could stop turning up to work dressed in their fetish gear that would be grand.

"I am certain that the stats will tell you that the harmful impact of this rhetoric is greater than the actual harm to women by transwomen"

@avilsdedvocate Please give us those stats then, if you are sure.
We'll read your stats, if you read ours. But you already said you don't want to read our stats. That's hardly fair.

To be fair the people making it about men are the men who just cannot control their fetishes and boundary crossing.

Trans Activism is a men's sexual rights movement.

The girls and young women caught up in it are the ones trying to escape that.

The TERFs are the ones standing at the door saying 'No'.

Why any self respecting 'feminist' goes into battle for these men is beyond me.

But whilst you are here, if you could explain it that would be great.

No argument about feminism being trans inclusive.

It's just whether you want to include women who identify as trans and also depend on e.g single sex sport and sex specific health care and reproductive rights, or whether you want to exclude them and prioritise men.

I can explain what characteristics women have in common with other women because I can define sex, but I can't explain what women would necessarily have in common with a man who identities as trans that they couldn't have in common with any other man. That's not to say that a woman can't have more in common with a man than she does with another women, but that is a function of their shared humanity. Until 10 years ago this was bog standard feminism.

Im not interested in hearing the stats you will now come at me with relating to crimes committed by transwomen in womens spaces.

This comment just suggests that you haven't been paying attention. It's odd that so many people express confusion, but perhaps the problem is information silos. Anyway, I will try to explain.

If you read the exceptions that allow single sex spaces in the Equality Act, they apply to both sexes equally and don't refer to crimes against women.

The most common exceptions are prompted by the desire for privacy from the opposite sex when in a state of undress and these apply to women and men. You can argue over the situations when this should apply, but you can't argue that a space should be single sex because it is reasonable for a woman to object to the presence of a man and then allow men to use the space if they would prefer. It just doesn't make sense.

It is also undeniable that some single sex provision e.g. prisons, rape crisis centres, exists because MEN are a threat to women. You might wish to argue that only men who identify as men are a threat to women, but gender is not objectively classifiable, (as the police and prison services have demonstrated) so that doesn't really get us anywhere.

The Good Law Project has suggested segregation by 'lived gender', but I have no idea how this makes anyone's life less precarious and I thought I gained the right to stop 'living in a gender' around 1975.

This is quite a long post, and you may not have bothered to read it, but if you have, I hope you are less baffled by the SC decision and the EHRC guidance.

Arday is gone GLP has lost again.

Confirming the trend again as soon as GLP comes on your side you are pretty much doomed long term.

I find it cheering that in this case a complaint was made to the police who refused to pursue it. (Arday complained to the Met about Harris's polite letters questioning some of the issues raised; they passed the complaint to Devon and Cornwall, who declined to act.)(Though it would be more cheering if the complaint had come from a trans person and the police had refused to pursue it - prominent examples of that would be good to read! Or indeed if the Met had directly declined to act.)

afcomm.org.uk/2026/08/05/jason-arday-reported-academic-critic-to-police/

It would be more cheering if the complaint had come from a trans person and the police had refused to pursue it

Come on! Let's keep it in the real world, that's fantasy stuff!

I know this is derailing the thread, but am I alone in finding that Itchycoo Park song really sinister nowadays? It's sung from the perspective of a man seeking to persuade a girl to play truant from school and instead come with him to a park where she will be plied with recreational drugs. This is grooming gang territory, surely?

I wondered how long it would be before Dave galumphed in with a misjudged opinion

How bloody offensive to black academics to suggest that they shouldn’t be held to the same standards - that lends itself to people thinking “Oh, so-and-so must have got their doctorate/professorship because they were a DEI hire and the standards were lowered for them”. If you’ve worked your balls off to get to that position, how bloody awful to have it degraded in that way. Arday and his supporters are responsible for that, and arguably I’d say it’s his supporters at fault more than him.

Jeez, does that man have any functioning active brain cells?

People like him are conflating two issues:

1. he plagiarised his thesis (and apparently many of his subsequent published research) and has lied about many aspects of his career and life. His colour is irrelevant to this because any white, male/female, [insert demographic of choice here] academic caught in this would also have been vilified and ended up being removed/resigning.
2. he was fast tracked into his role as Professor of the most prestigious chair in his field based upon his reputation, activism and public profile over race and autism, and the intersectionality of these. So in this instance, because the appointment was largely made because if his EDI/DEI {?} characteristics and this was lauded in national press by Cambridge, yes, his being black is an essential part of the discussion as to standards and protocols in recruitment, and whether they were lowered in response to a DEI agenda.

If he can’t grasp there are at least two narrative threads to these events, then he really shouldn’t every be considered as a candidate party leadership!

There are many examples of white liars getting unmasked and mocked. Its is not the skin colour, it is the lying, that is being criticised.
Even in white culture there are fictional characters who lie. Walter Mitty as fantasist who lives in a fantasy world in his own head. Baron Munchausen known for his impossibly tall stories. A rather appropriate for the context of this forum metal condition is even named after him, Munchausen's Syndrome By Proxy.
There's a difference between telling an obvious tall story to entertain when everyone knows its not true, they are just enjoying the story, and outright lying to try and deceive another person for personal gain e.g. social standing.
I think this professor is a fantasist, a daydreamer dreaming of greater things, a Walter Mitty, a hero in his own head. The problem is that people in power have encouraged and rewarded the tall tales. The feedback given to a fantasist was "we believe you, great work, keep it up" and so he has. His fantasy became real through the encouragement of others.
His fantasy world has nothing to do with his skin colour. People encouraging him to live this fantasy world as real life is all about his skin colour. Those people encouraging his fantasy world are hurting him not helping him. The amount of national scrutiny he is under because of the "be kind" brigade is huge. I do feel for the poor fellow. It's also a huge example of the soft bigotry of low expectations. I find it very distasteful and virtue signally racist.

Has he actually resigned, or is he just pretending about that as well?

I had a depressing revelation about Jason Arday today. There are all kinds of people coming out and defending him like Zack Polanski, making claims like black academics are held to higher standards than their white equivalents, or that questions of plagiarism are just allegations, and that there's no evidence of wrongdoing. Now, if you have seen the text comparisons, the plagiarism is absolutely and unambiguously clear. It was proven before doubt even before the GLP got involved. And, if so, if it is so obvious, why is there any doubt?

My suspicion is that it isn't obvious to a lot of people weighing in on the issue, because they think that this is how you write essays. The idea is that you copy out bits of other people's work, stick in references, and that's it. So, where people don't see plagiarism, and think Arday is being unfairly treated, it's because they either would or have behaved in exactly the same way.

Meanwhile, over at the Guardian...

The takedown of Jason Arday has overjoyed the right, and must be a wake-up call for the left

There's a line in the article in which the author, Jason Okundaye, states that:

"The mass investigation into Arday’s PhD may be presented as the pursuit of public and intellectual integrity, and yet the origin of this is grievance politics from those who feel diversity has blocked their own advancement."

And yet he misses that this is exactly what Jason Arday has done. He was less qualified for the role than anyone with a non-plagiarised PhD, and arguably less qualified than anyone with a non-plagiarised BA. His various appointments were over a huge number of people infinitely more competent than he was, and it is not grievance politics to see that other people were just not given the same opportunities as Arday, because they lacked the right diversity qualities.

Maybe that’s what she meant to write @TempestTost but that’s not what she wrote. I admire Prof Stock, am grateful for her work in supporting women’s rights to say no to men and she has a point about some ‘midwittery’ faculty promoted or protected (due to DEI?). You’re asking us to read between the lines in the piece that she wrote to see a connection between accommodating faculty with dyslexia and universities misunderstanding access, equity and their role in knowledge generation. I see these as quite different scenarios.

Maybe we’re arguing semantics but, again, words matter. Really, my objection is to the specific use of the term ‘intellectual disability’ in reference to anyone with dyslexia or who is autistic. It generally refers to someone who is less intelligent or has an impairment in intellectual functioning. Obviously not the same as being dyslexic or autistic or making reasonable adjustments accordingly.

Personally, I have not seen any faculty with an ‘intellectual disability’ given accommodations in my university to the point that they can’t meet the required standards of intellectual functioning. Certainly at a professorial level. Does someone like Butler meet that definition? I think she writes rubbish, but wouldn’t say she’s not intelligent. I have seen faculty promoted beyond their abilities, many times. But not because of accommodating an intellectual disability or because of accommodating someone who’s dyslexic. Instead, because of university politics. Quite often boys club politics.

When pressed by the Guardian on why he presented such claims to the world, Arday offered a telling response: ‘To be honest with you, I thought you’d just believe me.’

That's self-ID in a nutshell.

I think all people have rights to live as they wish

That's not a right anybody has, as everybody's life is constrained by the law and by other people's rights: We only have a right to live our life within the limits of the law - including trans people.

If Arday is wondering what to do now they're casting James Bond for the end of the year.

If he wrote a truthful autobiography I'm sure it would be a fascinating. A PHd about the Fox Mulders who wanted to, were desperate to, believe would also be a useful, possibly original study and a way for him to salvage something useful and even face saving. Like an anthropologist who lives with a foreign, exotic culture.

Kathleen Stock makes her position clear in the most recent Unherd podcast.

She points out that academia is elitist by design and not intended to be inclusive. She talks about the expectation on academics to overlook shortcomings in assignments to the extent of awarding marks as if a coherent argument is made , based on what you think the student would say if they didn’t have difficulties structuring their thoughts. This is absurd when an assignment intends to assess quality of thought.

There is no way academics would have a problem with those who have great academic ability but need extra time to read a paper, or software to correct SPAG. The issue is universities littered with students with poor levels of critical thinking and intellectual rigour who believe that they are entitled to pass assignments because failing them is discriminatory.

Culturally, we are in a place where inclusion is valued above merit by many.

I think Stock points out that what is deemed a ‘reasonable adjustment’ by many is very unreasonable when it comes to the endeavour of academic rigour.

Why didn't you stay away then, are you like a moth drawn to the flame? This discussion is about a so called professor, who has plagiarised his way to a top position at one of our foremost seats of learning.

At the risk of people getting upset about this perk - my DD and friend’s dyslexic were both unequipped with a subsidised laptop via the DSA and thousands of pounds worth of software to help her studies - dictation programmes, software to convert any text into an audio file so they can listen to their textbooks, software to summarise those texts and help identify the relevant chapters for assignments, software to SPAG/sense-check etc. DD doesn’t use much of it because she likes the physicality of books and processes the info better by manually written notes that she can then type in etc - but the resources are all there to ensure that students with these disabilities can produce assignments and reports of the same finished quality as those without.

Having said that, lots of universities are now struggling to fund support due to the increasing number of people seeking support and adopting policies of not requiring proof of diagnosis due to waiting lists and ‘a medical model pathologising difference’.

@Brainworm she’s right in that our disability guidelines say for students with a registered disability, ignore spag and look for the underlying arguments. We still, to my knowledge, require proof of diagnosis. Is that not required at yours?

I don’t have a problem with ignoring spag and looking for the underlying argument myself though it can be time consuming. I’ve had exceptionally bright students with dyspraxia and it’s been a pleasure helping them to learn to organise their writing and make their original arguments clear to their readers. That’s much more satisfying than my students who are exceptionally good at regurgitating others ideas but have none of their own.

The issue is universities littered with students with poor levels of critical thinking and intellectual rigour who believe that they are entitled to pass assignments because failing them is discriminatory. This might well characterise some students (I don’t see this myself), but to me, the much much bigger issue is the commodification of HE and the rush for numbers. Of course we have students who are less motivated, less dedicated, less prepared to put in the work.

Anyhow, with the HE embrace of GenAI, we’ll see much less critical thinking in our students.

I work across 3 universities as a PhD examiner and secondary supervisor. 2 of them refer to autism as an identity and are open in their objection to ‘pathologising difference’.

I think that provision of thinking frames and thinking scaffolds to support individuals to organise their thoughts and writing is great. I am all for these sorts of additional supports and adjustments.

Over the years, I have marked theses and looked forward to vivas based on what I have read, only to be sorely disappointed to the point of doubting they should pass. Conversely, I have struggled to make any kind of sense of a thesis only to be blown away by the student at viva.