Anyone see this in the Guardian today?

[Whyjustwhy123]

Guardian ‘govt fanning fear on free speech’

Interesting that he’s not at all interested in how the history of women’s fight for rights is being eroded.

Also interesting that trans are on the receiving end of misogyny. unless he’s referring to trans men.

Anyone who imagines there is or ever has been any right to free speech in Britain or in Ireland is an idiot who has paid very little attention to the world around them. A key difference with America.

Yes, our libel laws are pretty hardcore, with libel tourism etc - I got interested in it with the Simon Singh case.

I strongly believe that if you print something it should be true, but the costs of proving this if you're accused of libel are crazy (and why people sue as a punishment).

"newly created post", yep, this sums it all up. Another "job for the non-girls".

On Newsnight BBC2 on 9 June the Tory MP set up to talk about Johnson’s resignation against Emily Thornberry on screen was discussing Starmers failings and more or less got the last word in when he said that he Starmer didn’t even know whether women have a Willy. Priceless.

I saw this post had been appointed a few days ago. I’m sure Oxford are hoping he’ll put a stop to anyone like Kathleen stock visiting again

D notices, bans on broadcasting representatives of some groups. It is all pervasive.

Half of the Guardian's front page today is taken up by a photo of American actor Elliot Page. They have previously used Page to convince their readers of the wonders of "top surgery", and this over-long article full of personal detail carries on the good work. Not all the personal detail is trivial - Page's experience of sexual abuse (sex-based of course) is significant.

“Of course there’s protests about certain people speaking and there has been historically, about figures as diverse as David Icke and Enoch Powell, and that’s right,” he said.

“But these people still spoke in university contexts, despite the protests and despite the calls for people not to speak in university forums. It’s only a tiny fraction of cases where people actually don’t speak.

“So my sense is that it’s not a huge problem. I think the issue has been blown out of proportion. I also think there’s some political expediency in this. It’s a way of fanning a culture war. I don’t think we need additional protections for free speech in the university. Free speech is pretty alive and well.”

Only a tiny fraction that don't get to speak! It's not a huge problem

Well that's OK then. I wonder what that tiny fraction of those that don't get to speak have in common these days. And it is a huge problem when free speech starts to get closed down, even a little bit!

@Whyjustwhy123 Also interesting that trans are on the receiving end of misogyny. unless he’s referring to trans men.

I suspect he's referring to transwomen. Even 'misogyny' has been annexed. It's the new 'misandry'.

@BaronMunchausen I guess good old fashioned women’s misogyny is a bit dull.

Yes, we only ever hear about the downsides of American laws here - gun rights and abortion restrictions. But the First Amendment is a thing of beauty. It goes much broader than freedom of speech, as we would think of it.

In fairness I did hear him on R4 saying K Stock should be permitted to speak. Although he sounds like a complete tit in every other respect.

I can't ever enjoy the film Juno as I once did. My heart really goes out to Elliott. And we're still expected to accept trans as benign, positive, risk free, true freedom? It's none of these things.

I haven't seen Juno but I did watch The Umbrella Academy. Page's character was 'transitioned' with her (this consisted of the character having a haircut and saying she was a he) and the other characters duly offered up the standard phrases of affirmation.

It was an odd intrusion through the fourth wall, making a character act out the life of the actor rather than vice-versa. While Page's character was central to the plot, her transition to a him wasn't.

I saw Guardian mentioned and came to see the thread thinking it’d be about Page being on the front page of the Saturday edition and the magazine cover.

Now I hear it had this dick of a misogynistic academic interviewed as well. I’ve held on buying the weekend paper (after stopping my donations) thinking there’d been some slight balancing. Clearly not. So that’s it, no more Guardian for our household. Sad to see it’s loss of journalistic integrity.

My heart would go out to Page except that Page has gone to posting smiling topless photos of themselves post double mastectomy and it’s obvious that Page is now on testosterone.

So instead of campaigning for girls and women’s safety after experiencing sexual abuse, Page is actively contributing to a new generation of young girls and women hating their female bodies and believing that they’ll be special and happy if they cut off body parts. Breathtaking narcissism IMO.

Yes, it's all hugely unsatisfactory. But you can still find sympathy for her personal backstory.

How many people genuinely break systems and years of abuse? Not many.

But you can still find sympathy for her personal backstory

Yes. The exploitation and abuse is sickening. And I’m not asking for Page to break systems. I’m suggesting that they can avoid seeking external validation of their medical choices by not posting those photos on Instagram. Which feels as though Page is perpetuating, if that’s the right word, self hatred in vulnerable autistic girls.

I haven't waded through the interview word for word , but I think Page's conversion from gay to straight goes unremarked. The wording suggests that, rather than 'transing the gay away ', becoming trans was an upgrade on being gay.

Page being a whisker over 5 foot tall is going to make it difficult to get male roles that aren't in some way 'special'. Pity.

Elliot would make a convincing ten year old boy

Since the new professor is so keen on things recycling in history, I hope he notices that PIE is now being recycled as MAP, rather than only taking the bits of history that he (falsely) believes support his case.

And was it really feminists and ordinary women who were objecting to gay rights, back whenever? Or might it be that if he bothered to scratch the surface, he’d know immediately that something very different is happening this time round?

I think ultimately few people will forgo doing something that benefits them, for the sake of a wider societal good. In the article Elliot talks about a never ending quest for love - this (this being rapid transition, seeking a community that only validates, never questions) to me seems like just another stage of that quest.

But yes, the Page article reads like a textbook tale of sexed abuse + homophobia --> transition, with reclassification of innocuous childhood events (standing up to urinate - I did this!) as signposts of a transgender identity.

I saw that too. I couldn’t believe that it merited half of the front page, along with a huge photo, given current world events.

I’ve also just read the article originally mentioned. This stood out…

“Of course there’s protests about certain people speaking and there has been historically, about figures as diverse as David Icke and Enoch Powell, and that’s right,” he said.

It surely not a coincidence that he mentions David Icke and Enoch Powell in an interview where the next immediate comparator is Dr Stock. At the very least planting an association. What an utter asshole.

“There’s a way of thinking historically about cycles of fear and phobias. So it’s very striking to me the way in which gay men in the 1950s and also the 1980s were vilified as a threat to children, as treacherous, as deceitful. We can see the same kind of recycling of fear at the moment, in very, very similar terms. So I think in a way history can help us think through, what is it about these particular moments of fear and why?

Here is the straw man argument that the "febrile issue" is exclusively about accusations of transwomen as threats to children and thus allowing the framing to be one of ‘culture war’, which simultaneously wholly and neatly side steps any safeguard concerns for women’s single sex spaces, the issue of women’s sports, intimate care, short lists etc. So, not only an utter asshole, but a misogynistic one.

From the article:

"I don’t think we need additional protections for free speech in the university. Free speech is pretty alive and well."

...says a man who is allowed to speak out freely against perceived "transphobia" and whose voice has been elevated by this appointment. Of course his free speech is alive and well.

What a spectacular lack of self-awareness.