**Title edited by MNHHQ** Freedom of speech discussed in Any Questions, Radio 4

[Hearwegoagain]

On now. Specifically referencing the transgender debate.

3 out of 4 of the panel in favour of free speech, and against no platforming. Jordan Peterson and Cambridge referenced.

I thought you were offering to do an ama!

this is good news - off the the iPlayer I go. did the panel manage to stop themselves from criticising the witches' heresey and stick to whether or not someone should lose their job for reasonably stating a mainstream opinion?

Yes sorry, rubbish title!

Would be excellent if some of our more eloquent members could marshall their arguments and phone into any answers tomorrow.

My job would be at risk if my voice was recognised, but I will have a listen and send an anonymous email.

What channel was it on?

Thanks MNHQ for the title edit. On Radio 4, for those who aren't telepathic!

Cheers OP, I'll listen when I go to bed, sounds soothing

My job would be at risk if my voice was recognised
What a world we live in, eh?

What channel was it on?

Any Questions is on Radio 4 at 8pm on Fridays. It has a Question Time type format and gets a lot of notice from the establishment with fairly senior politicians on the panel.

Tomorrow (Saturday) it will be repeated at 1.10pm followed by a phone-in discussion programme about the issues called Any Answers. That was what I was suggesting people may wish to contribute to in my PP.

Thanks. Will try and catch it tomorrow

It's here:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0004slz

Start listen from 35:00. Alternatively it's repeated tomorrow just after 1pm.

There was something very interesting. Dimbleby crafted a sub-question of whether the debate between gender critical women and trans allies should be permitted and launched it only at Richard Burgon (Labour MP). This enabled Burgon to do two things, to say that of course the debate should be permitted but effectively then say it shouldn't and to show himself up as the most authoritarian on the panel by a long way.

It looked planned by Dimbleby and I got the impression it was done to make Burgon give a hostage to fortune particularly over the GC vs trans allies issue.

Perhaps coincidentally, Dimbleby is very soon going to retire from the programme.

When a pp said that three out the four on the panel were in favour of free speech, I just knew that Richard Burgon was going to be the one who wasn't.

Dimbleby knows his stuff around the silencing of GC women doesn’t he! It was very pleasing to hear.

Phone lines open at 12.30 BV I think and one needs to ring in early.

I don't think Burgon came across as very bright tbf

Like a lot of the Labour front bench he appears embarrassingly stupid. I was gobsmacked when I heard that he’d read English at Cambridge.

Burgon: ”I’m a man so it’s my job to listen to women. It’s important that women, whether they be transwomen or ciswomen, can have that debate.”
Not sure how much listening he's done. Ciswomen? Really, Richard?

This just started if anyone wants to listen to the whole programme.

Any Answers starting now.

Although since freedom of speech was introduced as the last topic for the phone-in, I don't expect much useful discussion.

Having listened again Burgon he gives me the impression of someone saying "freedom of speech is find so long as the views are ones we approve of, otherwise suppression and making illegal is perfectly reasonable". The idea of us getting a government having that kind of thinking appalls me.

Yes that was pretty much what he said, wasn’t it.

Well, he was magnanimous enough to say that the views of "cis-women" should be permitted in the debate (although they'd be subject to no-platforming if they deviate from goodthink).

I was talking to my hairdresser (mid 20s) yesterday about Romania and the awful conditions the children who lived in the orphanages were found in in 1990- and she had no idea what I was talking about. I find it really scary that the younger generation of adults have no conception of what life was like for those living under an authoritarian regime - could this perhaps be why they fail to appreciate the dangers?

Burgeon is 38, so he would only have been 10 then - maybe that's his problem too? Not that's any excuse for a modern politician.

I think Dimbleby may be on mumsnet!

A man who says that he'll listen to all women shouldn't be talking about 'ciswomen'. I know it's a pain to come up with increasingly convoluted ways of saying 'woman', but if you want to give the impression of a fence-sitting listening man, you should extend me the same courtesy as you do to those who believe in gender ideology. I don't want to be defined by my non-transness, so please, Richard Burgon, don't call me a ciswoman. I find it really, really offensive.

I find it impossible to believe there were no/not enough calls about this issue for it to be covered on Any Answers. And yet almost the whole programme was taken up with another tedious Brexit debate, something about schools athen a last minute bit about green ideology.

I guess Dimbleby took Auntie Beeb by surprise yesterday and they managed to clamp down in time for today.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00051j5