Times reporting the sacking of Angelos Sofocleous

[Igneococcus]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/student-editor-angelos-sofocleous-fired-in-transphobia-row-fww5ds6nj?shareToken=29c4736b2a8d395f6a4d363319baa99f

There is also a Spectator article. Apologies if this is a repost

blogs.spectator.co.uk/2018/09/how-i-was-hounded-off-campus-for-saying-women-dont-have-penises/

There's so much that sounds utterly ridiculous.

He was sacked for retweeting an article where the headline asks “Is it a crime to say women don’t have penises?”. What was he sacked from? His role at a philosophy journal. For retweeting something. By an e-mail saying that his comments left no room for fair discussions.

It's baffling.

I can’t give the whole quote, but:

“ xxxx is an acronym, often used as a term of abuse, meaning “trans-exclusionary radical feminist”.

Open statement that this term is considered abusive. The window of acceptable things to say is shifting fast.

Have just posted a comment but doubt it will be printed....at least they covered the story. It is rediculous that stating the truth is deeemd transphobic. Stories like this will piss off parents who are paying a fortune to have their kids educated at uni, where this BS is playing out.

Stories like this will piss off parents who are paying a fortune to have their kids educated at uni, where this BS is playing out.

It also makes working class youth feel better about their career path, and laugh at those who behave as if they are more intelligent than them.

I’m glad he got to write a spectator blog. Fuck editing uni newsletters. Onwards and upwards, Angelos!

It's important, I think, to remember Critique is the university philosophy society's journal - i.e. run by students for students. It's not a peer-reviewed academic journal like, say, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society. (I know this sounds nit-picky, but it isn't - it's a bit like confusing the "Rummidge" University student science magazine Science with the actual academic journal Science. )

Having done a bit more digging, Sebastián Sánchez-Schilling, the guy who sacked Angelos, looks like he's a postgrad/junior researcher with a genuine and quite informed interest in the virtue ethics theories of Elizabeth Anscombe and Iris Murdoch.

Which is yet another of these conundrums that "woke politics" throws up - this guy has all the ingredients in place to be a genuine feminist ally - knows his stuff about two of the great British women philosophers of the mid-twentieth century, has studied their biographical backgrounds and can place their views in a wider social context as women in academia in a very male-dominated subject (philosophy to this day remains the one subject in the average arts faculty with more men than women studying it, even at undergraduate level) And yet he goes along with an uncritical acceptance of the trans-borg.

So, wanking at your desk, posting pictures of yourself flashing in public, and posting pictures of a paedophilic nature on your blog = suspension.
Liking a tweet that asks whether it’s a crime to say women don’t have penises = the sack.
This is student politics in 2018. Rightio

I get that this has probably been deeply upsetting for Angelos and I'm not trying to trivialise his experience, but I do think there's something quite amazing at being sacked from a magazine called 'Critique' for a failure to uncritically submit to a dominant ideology.

To be fair though, I don’t think the characteristics of reproductive sex is an ideology.

The comments are great- things that might not have been approved in the past are being printed. Things that I don’t think we can even say on here!

It doesn't look like Angelos is going away quietly, and I'm glad! I hope he challenges his sackings and gets the backing of his uni.

The article was in an established, albeit right-leaning, magazine. Putting the actual content to one side, there is a huge free-speech issue.

So time for other media like The Times to stand up and be counted.

Chilling. You state a fact and get punished for it. You ask why and you get removed from your role in a philosophical magazine. It’s surreal.

Angelos writes well and seems to have an air of reasonableness and calm. I’d like to read more of his writing - good to see him write a blog for the spectator. I hope this gives him access and exposure to other media - it’d be wonderful if he got a piece in the times.

Cartimandua is currently peaktransing anyTimes reader that hadn't peaked yet, excellent work.

A younger man with principles and a spine. Bravo Angelos

The Times has been great at getting our voices heard

The only person I've ever spoken to about self-ID , when I wasn't the one who'd raised it, was a male Times reader. I could not have been more surprised. Had a nice chat with him and alerted him to all the nonsense that is going on. He agreed

That’s the thing - that tweet he reshared asked a question, and shared a mainstream article.

How can that be offensive to a philosophy department?

To be fair though, I don’t think the characteristics of reproductive sex is an ideology.

True, but I think it's fair to say that in the current climate acceptance of biology is generally an indication that you're a sceptic of girl brain and lady soul and a whole host of other highly specious claims made by proponents of trans ideology.

In the Daily Mail too. Comments have been moderated and are about free speech. Nothing about stating the obvious that women don't have pansies.

This whole thing makes Durham Uni look quite stupid and very closed-minded. I imagine a lot of the academic there are quite embarrassed by it.

Is that the same Cartimandua that used to patrol the Guardian comments?

It's absolutely absurd that a philosophy publication will not entertain the discussion of a philosophical issue. The whole thing is baffling. I'm glad the Times has picked it up.