Chelsea Manning article in Graun

[ShotsFired]

This article is all kinds of messed up. It rewrites actual historical facts to turn the convicted criminal male Bradley Manning into a she at the time he committed his crimes, and then goes one step further to suggest he was only wearing "man" as some kind of costume and his female presentation, Chelsea, was always the reality.

Then there are super-disingenuous comments like "Later, she plunged herself into one of the most hyper-macho environments imaginable – an army unit in a war zone", like some kind of glass-ceiling-smasher...

Although in an interesting note, Chelsea explicitly and repeatedly refers to themselves as "trans" (not TW, not woman, just "trans")

Also of note is that Chelsea co-incidentally announced their intention to transition on the day they were sentenced (to USDB - "the U.S. military's only maximum-security facility...for males"). But 2 months later submitted a "Petition for Commutation of Sentence" in the name of Bradley Manning, male, with male pronouns (

I consider what Manning did - exposing war crimes in Iraq - a service for humanity. We need to know what is done in our name, that war is never a clean, surgical Operation, but an enterprise that always slaughters civilians en Masse, and regularly without any care for all the ‚collateral damage‘. This and that wars are rarely if ever waged for the states reasons is something we, the people, need to understand. After all these wars are waged in our name and paid for with our money and blood.

If Manning calls themselves trans and not ‚woman‘, all the better. I am as enraged about the TRA agenda as anyone, but if a trans-identifying individual risks prison to tell the truth about war or campaigns regarding the dangers of AI, instead of barshit TWAW stuff, more power to them.

The phrasing of the article is batshittery (and the new normal if TRAs get their way) but regards to Manning themself, I agree with Deepwaters.

Yes. Chelsea Manning did the world a service. I do wonder if, having seen the worst men can do, women were seen as a safe psychological space?

According to Zucker, Gender Dysphoria arises from autism, anxiety or childhood trauma. Transitioning may not be the answer to the turmoil and unhappiness. You have to wonder whether Manning's abusive, chaotic and hellish child and teenage years - together with the feminine personality, small stature and nerdish interests that isolated Manning from peers - led her to a very dark place.

The message exchange withe the person who (eventually) exposed her is just pitiful. (It's in a linked article). The interview showed me that Manning is in desperate need of help rather than a world tour and media circus. She admits that she hasn't processed or had time to think about what has happened because she has blocked out, mis-remembered and prefers to make no comment when pressed.

It's difficult to imagine that her woes can be solved by living as a woman.

I wasn't really posting to debate the morality of what Manning did or didn't do. The facts of it are they committed a criminal act (whether the much famed "court of public opinion" agrees or not), and were tried and convicted of that.

The attempt to then try and rewrite things in this manner is what really annoyed me.

Agree with shots but won't give the Graun a click.

I wasn't really posting to debate the morality of what Manning did or didn't do. The facts of it are they committed a criminal act (whether the much famed "court of public opinion" agrees or not), and were tried and convicted of that.

So, if the politically influential #nodebate clowns get their wish and all those criminal convictions for 'misgendering' and 'deadnaming' roll in, you will also just drily note that, say, 'Glinner committed a criminal act, whether the much famed "court of public opinion" agrees or not, and was tried and convicted of that.' ? Okay.

Really? That's where you want to go with this?
Have I said I agree with the conviction?

There is a saying that the justice system we've got is the worst one possible...except for all the others.

There is another one saying the law is an ass.

Both can be true. But again, that isn't the point so I'm not entirely sure why you are being so goady about it?

My initial point was simply that I think Manning something very important for all of us, and this should not get lost in this. Your response then irritated me enough to spell out what it amounts to.

Do I think it is unacceptable* he punched a female officer and called her Dyke? Yes (I wasn't aware of that before, actually). Am I annoyed about the Orwellian article? Yes. Do I believe it is disingenuous to insinuate Manning transed just to avoid male prison? Yes (after all he is free now and still visibly trans, not to mention that his long isolation during prison amounted to torture by international standards). Do I believe it is unfair to reduce Manning to a pawn in the battle against the trans madness? Yes. Manning is more than that, and that is what I stated.

*I consider Trump the epitome of unacceptable behaviour 24/7, but if he were to bring about world peace, I would commend him for that (He'll drag us in a war with Iran, though, so that point is mute).

I chose my words carefully so as to avoid falling foul of the rules we have here in discussing the topic of trans people.

It was posted to discuss all the things we seem to agree on.
But you started an argument because you didn't like the statements about him being convicted of a crime you don't agree with. Like I said, I wasn't commenting on the rights and wrongs of that. If I was I would have posted on the relevant (political?) board, not FWR.

So given it is an argument with only one side arguing, how about we just agree on the points we both made about the disingenuity of the article and leave it there?

Oh hang on. I may have misread your post, apologies (genuinely, I was reading and typing while having to "mm-hmm" and "uh-huh" occasionally on a interminable conference call).

Either way, I still maintain my POV and you have yours. But I'm not going to be drawn into an argument about whether he saved the world or destroyed it, because that isn't relevant for this board.

So with that, have a good day... I'm back to "mm-hmm" and "uh-huh"