Harry Millar aka FairCop is going to be on Jeremy Vine R2 show today!

[Appalonia]

Just heard. This will be interesting... Show starts at 12.

Wow, that is interesting. What's the subject under discussion?

It's about his tweet, the police checking his thinking and his subsequent legal battle about non crime hate incidents.

Thanks OP, will listen.

JV sees himself as the champion of the underdog and I feel he will assume his disappointed voice and use the words 'most marginalised' and 'be kind' but am hoping to be proved wrong

Harry will be on after 1pm according to intro blurb.

Introduced as 'a guy who sent a load of anti-trans tweets'. I think we know how this will go...

Oooo this could be very interesting.

I wonder if JV will treat Harry differently cos he's a man? I 'd like to think Harry will wipe the floor with him!

No question, Harry will wipe the floor with Vine.

JV is a misogynist of the old fashioned kind. He will treat Harry differently from a woman because his innate sense of male superiority would mean he would feel he had to go easier on a woman. (Though not as easy as on a trans woman, for whom he has a special, soft, compassionate voice.) He won't feel bound by the same sexist chivalry when it comes to Harry.

But JV is one of the BBC's highest paid presenters. He is absolutely in control of that show at all times - who is on, what they get to say. He often sets people up to enable him to reveal his own 'good guy' credentials. I imagine he's invited Harry on to get a bit of a conversation going about free speech, whilst allowing him to be the benevolent modern guy, protecting the vulnerable against Harry's offensive, outdated views.

Should have made that clear - that's how I think it will be framed, not what I think is the truth!

On now.

Must admit, I'm cautiously hopeful about being wrong in my prediction.

Seems pretty even-handed so far. Joshua Rosenberg, legal expert, is going to participate too.

Harry is so straight talking and articulate!

Bloody hell is that it?

Well intentioned MacPherson initiative being misused by individual forces, at the behest of the College of Policing, who consider themselves above the law.

Fair enough. Why has no one mentioned Stonewall?

Not quite over yet - there will now be phone callers.

Brace yourself for the TRAs

Comments carefully cherry picked unsurprisingly.

Yes - cherry picked indeed. Especially the one regarding the 11 year old that identifies as trans.

Will be interesting to hear the callers.

Lovely bit of Kate Bush 😊

Actually, your mention of Stonewall made me remember the Nolan podcast Awkwardy

I know that JV listened to it and tweeted that he thought it was astonishing. I wonder if it's made him look into all this a bit more deeply.
Credit to JV for being less of a tosser than I thought

I really hope that someone rings up regarding the abuse women get on twitter - rape, death threats etc.

I think the segment is over now - the 2hr show is divided into half hour slots.

Harry did a great job and JV was good. It's really hard to discuss properly without the background though - the woman who phoned in to say that offensive tweets are often a precursor to real life action had a point, but that doesn't take into account the political and ideological nature of this particular issue and the fathomless harm it does to women. This is because it was framed purely as 'anti-trans' rather than including its crucial pro-women's rights context.

I thought it was excellent. JV waking up to the implications of "Be kind". Well done @HazzaTheOwl.

The 'anti-trans' slant was really irritating as if isn't about that, but much broader issues. How far does the right of freedom of expression extend? Person 'A' may find Harry's comments unpleasant but do they realise even-handed application of the law (ha!) would mean they wouldn't be able to express their thoughts either if I were offended by them? Or are we back to sacred castes again?

Harry was good, Joshua R was and even JV was bearable, but the phone- in comments ... gah, had to turn off.

All in all, more balanced than I'd hoped. Reckon someone's going to pop by soon and tell us Jeremy Vine has clearly turned into a raging terf...

Feels like JV and the BBC are dipping toes into the waters of a reverse. Being impartial (ha! Finally as they should have been all along) and airing twaw etc. comments looks enough like support to the people pushing the agenda. However, it'll be easy to uncouple their cart from the trans train and claim impartial reporting.

Also if it gets even worse and the ideology captures even more, they can claim they only invited in the horrible transphobe for a broader point on freedom of speech.