R4 now Tuesday 7.51 am

[somethinginoffensive]

Discussing Stonewall.

@Scrawlit

Oh dear. That was a car crash. Cohen was so bad it made the BBC look biased. The "remove exemptions...such as to single-sex spaces" is still on the SW website - it's the first Google search result for 'stonewall single sex spaces'. I don't understand why he said they weren't campaigning for that.

I think I do, although I could be wrong - if I'm right, though, it's a pity BC didn't get time to spell this out, as it would have been a wake up call for the nation. Isn't the TRA case that transwomen are women, so already allowed in women-only spaces?

Stonewall, as I understand it, would like the Equality Act amended to say 'gender', not 'sex', to make that crystal clear.

Justin pointing out that BC had assumed his gender was a glorious moment. You could almost hear BC biting his tongue before saying 'Oh come on, you're not trans!' - almost as if self-ID might be open to abuse by mischief-makers ...

@nauticant

It really is well worth listening to. The link is:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wrjn

but it won't be available till after 9am. Maybe try half 9 or 10. As the title above says, 7.51am so 1 hours 51 minutes in.

It just worked for me by scrolling back to 7.50.

It was amazing, I only wish they had challenged the lie that Stonewall aren’t trying to abolish single sex spaces. But to be fair there wasn’t much chance to challenge anything!

Cohen was embarrassing and frustrating. He had the opportunity to explain a position for the benefit of any listener unclear about the debate, and just soapboxed and ranted instead. Bit of an own goal I thought.

Vargas

BBC could choose to have Miranda Yardley, Rose of Dawn et al to come on and give their views.

& their opposite counterparts.

I would genuinely like to hear their voices and arguments in this debate, brought to a wider mainstream audience.

I couldn't get past three men discussing women's safe spaces.

Looking at twitter the response seems to be split 3 ways, "debate, yay!", "woke stuff, yawn!", and "I can't believe how transphobic this is, Ben is a hero". For an example of the last of those:

twitter.com/SlauHaus/status/1402160037309693957

God that was wonderful!
BC should get more airtime - he will singlehandedly do our job for us

Gonna listen via bbc sounds now. Sounds good.

I'm going to play it back while unloading the dishwasher, it's put such a spring in my step today !!

Wow thanks, just listened on chasing play catch up on the Sounds app - that was glorious! What a wally BC came across as.

I’ve stopped listening to Today around a year ago due to their refusal to acknowledge any of this. May have to switch back for a while if they’ve suddenly found their guts.

@NellieEllie

Gavin Esler was great. “GC is NOT the polite word for transphobic you know that.”. Simon Fanshawe was flippin’ fantastic, clear, fair, measured, articulate, got the practical points across - self Id, sport, women’s spaces. Excellent. Ben. Well - yes, 3 “Cis” people talking about trans. But then Stonewall turned down offer (wonder why) so they turned down chance of a trans speaker. AND NOT ONE WOMAN EITHER, but Ben didn’t see that as an issue.....

Exactly this! Ben didn’t manage to mention women once, in a discussion about women’s rights!

The interviewer did a great job to remain calm and keep trying to get him back on track.

Surely there’s got to be a women’s hour segment on this coming soon...

@Scrawlit

Oh dear. That was a car crash. Cohen was so bad it made the BBC look biased. The "remove exemptions...such as to single-sex spaces" is still on the SW website - it's the first Google search result for 'stonewall single sex spaces'. I don't understand why he said they weren't campaigning for that.

Then we need to be linking to that on Twitter and FB and anywhere else we can think of. I think that we need a campaign of coolly and forensically refuting the lies with evidence and links and quotes so that people coming new to this can find their way. Is there anyone who properly understands the EA 2010 who would be prepared to go back over what BC said this morning and find three big lies and the evidence required to prove they are lies? I'd do it myself, except that I still, despite all my attempts, don't seem to be able to absorb all the nuances of the EA 2010. Every time I confidently make a statement based on my understanding of the law, someone comes along and corrects me!

Loved it when Ben pointed out there were 3 men discussing a trans issue - just highlighted there were 3 men discussing a women's issue.

Which has been the problem all along, failure to realise this is a women's issue, not just a trans issue.

And when he tried the oppression Olympics by listing all his identities - yep, all of us can play that game too!

THERE'S NO TRANSPEOPLE!

No women, either.

And that might be the problem - perhaps the Beeb could organise to have some trans people and some women in a room together?

Thanks for the link, I'll enjoy this. BC is a nasty person who believes TWAW but he isn't choosing one of them to risk her life to deliver him an an infant. Funny that.

Ah, great minds, Anna!

Benjamin Cohen lied about Stonewall not campaigning to remove the Equality Act exceptions

Yes - it was in the Vision for Change policy document, clear as day.

www.stonewall.org.uk/system/files/a_vision_for_change.pdf

Can someone tell Kathy Burke on twitter that they were discussing women's rights, not trans rights???

Blimey !
Simon F was great.
Ben C was shockingly bad. The opposite of calm rational argument haven’t heard such a bad interviewee for some time (and I’d include all trump interviews in that ffs).

Brilliant!

That was wonderful to listen to. Justin Webb was awesome. The ranty guy was just …. Ranty.

When Justin said “you don’t know anything about me” it was wonderful. Just amazing.

I think a big turning point has been that when GC people have got on the media, they have all had a lot of media training (or look as if they have)

What a horrible thing to say :) On the contrary, they mostly seem quite normal...

It's the other side who would need the media training to cover up how incoherent they are. The politicians supporting it usually have that training and manage to waffle/fudge, but people like Cohen and Butterworth just let the nonsense flow.

Shame for them the Today programme really isn't Twitter. No doubt managed to raise a few more bushy eyebrows across the land.

I was in the car listening, usually I would be at work and would have missed it. It was wonderful! I did a lot of clapping and laughing and then cried for a moment or two. Gave the bloke driving next to me something to look at!!
I've already emailed Justin to thank him and let it know what it means to me.

Not the Kathy Burke??