As part of their coalition with the Green Party, the Scottish Government have pledged to introduce gender self-identification within the first year of the present Parliament.
For the reasons I have previously given, this means that men will legally become women just by saying they are, and women will become men just by saying they are.
This will not be regarded by the Scottish Government – or by the police or Crown or Scottish courts – as a legal fiction, but as the simple expression of reality.
We as a society will be expected to believe that people can literally change sex, and there will be sanctions if we don’t.
If the Scottish people do not rise up against this and stop it, we will all have surrendered to collective insanity.
I have been able to tell a girl from a boy and a man from a woman for the entire period of my living memory, a period now extending to well over fifty years.
The evidence of my own eyes and ears over that same period tells me that everyone else who is not in some way physically or mentally impaired has the ability to do it too.
I am confident that the ability that I know I have is one shared by the entire human species.
I am confident that this is so because being a girl or a boy, a woman or a man, must be one of the most overdetermined realities that there can possibly be for human beings.
It would make no sense if we could not recognise that reality in one another, instinctively, as a trait of being human, and without the need for active thought or any training or education of any kind.
It is as fundamental, and as little requiring of justification or explanation, as the ability to recognise the face of your own mother or father or sister or brother out of every other human being on the whole planet.
I say that the ability is overdetermined because if I search my mind, I can think of myriad factors that must enter into it, and I’ve listed some of the obvious ones previously, but if you ask me for some “theory” of how I am able to do it, I can only shrug my shoulders.
It doesn’t matter at all to me how I am able to do it, just that I can, and that it is one of the most fundamental realities on which I base my life.
If the Scottish Government, or anyone else, have a “theory”, or offer to produce an “expert” to tell me I can’t do this, then I am as sure as I am of anything in my life that I am right and they are wrong.
So when they tell me that what I know is a man is in fact a woman or that what I know is a woman is in fact a man, I know that they will be lying to me, trying to get me to accept as a fact something I know to be a fiction.
If the proposed legislation is allowed to pass and Nicola Sturgeon self-identifies as a man, gets a gender recognition certificate to that effect and uses that to get a birth certificate that says she is of the male sex, I know as surely as I know anything that this will be a lie.
If John Swinney self-identifies as a woman and goes through the same process to legally change to the female sex, I know as surely as I know anything that this too will be a lie.
No more nor less than The Party in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, the Scottish Government will be imposing on me a version of “reality” that I – and they – know to be an utter fiction.
No more nor less than The Party in Nineteen Eighty-Four, they will be seeking to punish me, and everyone else who knows what reality is, by charging us with “hate crimes”.
It is completely irrelevant to me what their motives are for doing this.
There is no motive in the world worth surrendering reality for, and this is for a simple reason, one that Orwell and his protagonist Winston Smith understood all too well.
If even just once you are prepared to surrender reality and choose to believe in something you know to be false – for any reason, and with any motive – you have lost yourself, and you’ll never find yourself again.
I desperately hope that my fellow Scottish citizens, men and women both, will rise up in defence of reality and kill this insanity stone dead.
But if they don’t, let me use the privilege I have of putting something on the public record, here and now, for the many thousands of readers of this blog.
Boys are not girls, and girls are not boys, no matter how much they think or say they are.
Men are not women, and women are not men, no matter how much they think or say they are.
Males are not females and females are not males, no matter how much they think or say they are.
“Gender identity” is not real.
Sex is not a choice.
I’ll defend reality till the day I die, and they can lock me up if they want to.
Gordon Dangerfield 
Nope, Robert. I actually made a similar request once myself on behalf of a client (the accused), and the clerks gave me short shrift!
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Thank you. I used to think justice should be seen to be done, and I remember the court stenographers from the movies. Perhaps if AS hold a fundraiser, there will be change left over to put out a few details. Enough perhaps to indicate the level of objectivity of the MSM.
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I don’t have any tattoos. That’s because in all my seventy years I have never been certain enough of anything to have it permanently inked on my body. I very slightly and very rarely regret not having a tattoo. That’s got to be better than having a tattoo that you regret. I fear the reforms being sought in the area of gender recognition are the equivalent of giving society a very regrettable tattoo.
t.ly/TxPG
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When I was about nine I so wanted to be a lumberjack. Fortunately –
No-one bought me an axe
There were no chainsaws in those days.
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Yes, I’ve personally never for a millisecond regretted not having a tattoo so I’m very glad not to have lived in an era where it might have been all but obligatory for a young leftie like myself to have one.
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And to continue the analogy along Bruce’s lines, I did get my ear pierced but haven’t worn an earring for forty years and have only the tiniest wee hard lump in my earlobe to show for that decision that I changed my mind about.
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Hi Gordon. I’m glad you are taking up the challenge here. I’ll trust your judgment regarding my post.
I don’t know who the complainants are and have no interest out-with where this affects all us. I do support anonymity although whether that is proportionate when someone claims her hair was pinged or a knee was touched Is another matter.
What bothers me is that Lady Dorian has judged this to be strict liability i.e no defence, but then gone on to invent a previously unknown defence of being an ‘acredited’ journalist, whatever that means. Otherwise of course, many well known journalists would be in the same position.
There also appear to be free speech connotations. It is simply impossible to allege, whether true or not, that there is an element of conspiracy without first establishing that the complainants were known to each other.
This law, as interpreted by lady Dorian, seems to be a licence to restrict reporting on a case of great public interest. And to leave the prosecutor to decide who will be subject to proceedings and who won’t. I honestly can’t think of anything which could have a more chilling effect on free speech and the reporting of trials. I’m not for a moment saying that we are the level of the reporting of state show trials in the Soviet Union, but we are a dammed sight closer to it than we were before Sturgeon entered the scene.
I dread to think what will happen to the reputation of Scots Law if Lady Dorian gets her reward. However, I’m a natural optimist and with good men like you taking up the fight…,,
Good luck! Cheers Scottie
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Hi Scottie, I had to look back on the subject of your post you reference – the Times articles publishing information from David Clegg et al propaganda book reavealing identities, in case anyone else was curious – it’s hard keeping threads going with such a large number of comments (a new article, ahem, would be useful so we can start afresh,,, *looks hopefully over to the authoring department*).
You bring up some interesting points. I also think there should be anonymity for alleged victims, but also the accused should be given anonymity. That is, if one party is granted anonymity, all others should be too. The police appear to have plenty of resources to scour every part of an accused’ history, so there shouldn’t be any reason for publishing their name to trawl for complainants, surely?
I’m trying to think if there are good reasons that any sexual assault trials should not be reported on at all until after its conclusion? Reporting on them while they happen seems just for sensationalising, to sell papers, because it produces lots of gossip. But then, if there is no reporting at all during the trial, is that a free speech infringement? We would also rely on a judge’s good judgement to clarify what could be reported, or not, afterwards – though as long as reporters were allowed to attend the trial, there shouldn’t be any major problems? It might mean any reporting would be done through the prism of the final verdict, and so any bias against the verdict in reporting would be seen to contradict court findings.
Lady Dorrian didn’t order anonymity until after the trial started – apparently, in Scotland, it isn’t an automatic thing, and just ‘expected'(?) that no reporting on identities of alleged victims will take place – but then the Crown Office and the accusers took this to the nth degree and abused the system – even going as far as ordering NO mention anywhere about anything to do with one (or two?) of the accusers – well after the trial was over, meanwhile the accusers snipe from the sidelines. Alongside not even an investigation into possible perjury, they all have a lot to answer for for wrecking faith in the justice system. The granting of lifelong anonymity, but allowing David Clegg to (apparently) reveal more identities with no penalties – including publishing some of the reduced Evans decision report, while everyone else is meant to pretend they don’t know who they are – is really just our so-called justice system taking the piss, as far as I can see.
Does the anonymity order extend to the people it applies to too, though? That is, are they (the accusers) disallowed, by order of court, to reveal their own identities? And if not, why not?
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What has always struck me, Contrary, if I may come in here, and this has brought hubris down on my head on several occasions, is that most of the women were contacted by the police, not the other way round. From what I can gather, none of them, including the two original women, wanted this to go to the police, to a trial, or anything else. In those circumstances, I can understand why they are very angry and might be tempted to snipe from the sidelines when so many people are having a go at them. It doesn’t make it right, but it does make it more understandable when they are all being called liars and accused of trying to bring a good man down when they actually were forced into being witnesses. I’m not excusing their behaviour at all, but it is not black-and-white. Few things ever are.
If this was, indeed, the case, then these women – or most of them – were caught up in an attempt to bring down a political figure that so many in the SNP and Scottish government, and crucially, Westminster government feared, not for the allegations against him at the trial, but for the very reason that he was probably the only person who could have turned the tide on independence and made the Scottish government look to be treading water on the independence front.
He is still a threat to their inertia, so it is not hard to imagine that the book might have been encouraged and information might have been leaked. I think the whole case has to move away from the lurid allegations and counter-allegations, and start to examine the possibility that the women – or most of them – were used as pawns in the way that powerful men always use women to destroy other powerful men. We might be tempted to see Nicola Sturgeon as the antagonist, but I wonder. This whole episode has always smelled to me like a male power play, with the women being caught in the centre.
I’ll probably get a good kicking again for this, and, of course, I may well be totally wrong.
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Haha, of course you’ll get a good kicking for what you say Lorncal! I’m screwing up my face and squinting at what you write, trying to fit the things that are known into your take of it…
Yes the women, as far as I can tell, had absolutely no desire to report anything to the police – but what you describe is a situation where those women were coerced, or at least pressurised – and the evidence does point to this for some of them – into making the complaints. I don’t know how the law treats that kind of coercion (in this case it did nothing) but I would imagine if the women complained about that, it would have to be investigated. Hmm, maybe.
Now, this case went to criminal trail, and they nearly all went through with that; one person dropped out (realising the enormity of what they were doing? Or was the allegation even shakier than the rest? I can’t envision what that could be); and one made her allegations and exaggerated (and lied, lets face it) with relish in the court – being told to stop leading the jury and such like by a friendly judge, doesn’t indicate a delicate shrinking violet.
If the complainers were angry at being used by people, including the police and the crown office, and being coerced into going through with it – why didn’t they, under the cloak of anonymity, make that accusation? If any of them truly believed their complaint warranted a person to go to jail for sexual assault, for the alleged offences – that’s what they are saying in their sniping from the sidelines – why haven’t they appealed the verdict, or brought civil action? They aren’t short a bob or two, this isn’t a group of vulnerable poverty stricken women with no options.
They aren’t a homogeneous group, all of the one mind, of course, and it could be just a couple of enthusiastic complainers keeping things going – but we don’t know because they’ve all chosen to stay within that anonymous group. That they colluded before and during the trial is known – their support group they named ‘Vietnam’ – when I think of of Vietnam, I have a tendency to think ‘napalm’ and ‘burnt dead bodies of innocent civilians’ which won’t be a universal impression, but as a name for a support group,,, it doesn’t imply poor vulnerable dears. It implies ruthless career-oriented women willing to to see everything and anyone around them burn to the ground just so they get what they want. When collusion was revealed in court, I wonder at why those complaints were allowed to stand,,, though some charges were dropped so maybe they weren’t?
Some women fully embrace the patriarchy and have no qualms about using the system for their own ends, with no consideration for anyone around them – it has always been thus. Women can also maintain the patriarchy if they get benefit from it ,,, Margerat Thatcher, for example, our first woman PM, was hardly the upholder of women’s rights and seeing women progress in our institutions ,,, indeed, her cabinet; I’m not sure now, did it ever have another woman in it? She stomped out all female competition ruthlessly.
Women are just people, some good, some bad, just human beings – the same as men. That our SYSTEM is biased and discriminates against women in general, doesn’t mean that all women suffer, or that all men don’t suffer. I will NOT assume that just because a person is a woman, they are an automatic victim – and if they work to undermine the case for all other women’s equal rights, then they can be categorised as the opposite of victim.
We don’t know, absolutely, in the case of these women, of course, so there is always the slim chance of what you suppose being true, very slim – and not each of the women are in the same situation. If, say, some of the women were rewarded with bigger pay, or better positions with more power, one might be very generous and say ‘willing stooges’ – but pawns? Nah. Male power play? An elitist power play I think (that’ll be male dominated, but I wouldnt say exclusively, it’s just the unfair system).
This is continuing on and on and on, the retrial of Alex Salmond, because the people that wanted this in the first place are keeping it going, and the complainers themselves are in the thick of it; you don’t snipe from the sidelines and expect it all to go away!
If those women were being used as pawns, then they are still being used, and until they come out and say so, instead of reinforcing the attacks on Alex Salmond, we can’t assume any of them are. They have done so much harm to to society and women’s rights – we have lost faith in our legal system, and their bourgeois-entitled whining has divided society and pitted many opinions to not believe any accusations from women, while real live serious assaults go unanswered, not investigated and not prosecuted.
I find it near impossible to assign the label ‘victim’ to any of the complainers, and you’ll need to present some evidence for it if you want me to. We all do some amount of compromising – women more than men – to keep our jobs, or to get promotions. Rarely would we have the moral dilemma of ‘fit this man up for reputational ruin and imprisonment’ or lose your job: if someone needed the job to feed their children and had no other choices,,, you could have some sympathy. If someone did it just to get ahead in their career – no sympathy. If someone went along with it just to get the Intel to later whistleblow – some respect – but I think we are beyond the stage of that ever happening.
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Lorna, I have no desire to give you a good kicking just point out how your words come across AT TIMES.
Initially you were sure Salmond was guilty. You find it hard even now to accept the fact he is innocent and there was a conspiracy against him. You continually try to mitigate what these women did in your posts. You do come across as someone who starts from a position that men are horrible and guilty until proven otherwise and then you are still not sure. You have consistently conflated other “normal ” sexual assault cases with this Salmond case which clearly is political. There is no doubt that men were involved in the conspiracy but you seem to think that they coerced ALL the women. You provide no evidence for this. Evidence from the trial indicates that one of the alphabetties was indentified as doing a bit of coercing. Another alphabetty also doing a bit of “coordinating”. So whilst I do not rule out some men doing some coercing I do not jump to your “it’s all the men’s fault”. You have been like a stuck record on this from some time back posting on Craig Murrays blog. Time for you to move on Lorna.
Also where is your evidence ALL the women were coerced in to the criminal trial by the police and/or the Scotgov. It is reported the first two complainers said that was the case. Did they tell the truth? If one thing the Inquiry and the criminal trial showed is all these people were more than happy to lie and lie a lot . What about the others – you consistently make out that the complainers are victims in one way or the other. They are not. They are grown adults and they made their decisions. They are NOT silly wee girls. “Caught up in” – nonsense. Clearly you do not have a clue who these people are.
So yes you are wrong.
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Lorncal, contrary, these are really good points. Ultimately there probably isn’t any adult in the country that hasn’t arguably broken a law. There are supposed to be guidelines about when it is in the public interest to prosecute given the resources and scarce court time.
That appears to have gone out of the window in this case and that has to be political pressure brought to bare. It’s dispiriting to say the least.
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Thanks Scottie, and true – you put it succinctly. It’s very dispiriting, but similar to what you say above, it’s good to have Gordon there willing to fight against what’s been happening, and it’s heartening to think he has ideas on how to repair some of the damage done.
I also hope that Craig Murray’s appeal to the ECHR will be successful & shine a light on the dire state of our justice system – I suspect even a successful appeal will just be like a slap on the wrist for the crown office and maybe Lady Dorrian, and it will be too late for shortening his sentence. But it might be of more use than that (to trigger the parliament demanding a separation of powers?).
[I still can’t think why the SNP haven’t stopped Craig’s membership, it is such a strange thing – he was publicly standing for office as part of AFI, then he joined Alba, and now he’s in prison, and he hasn’t been writing too much pro-SNP stuff for a while now, yet still his SNP membership persists. It’s just a thing that doesn’t ‘fit’ anywhere, to my mind anyway. Even Iain Lawson, who knows some of the internal SNP workings, couldn’t speculate why. Maybe it’s simply because Craig is a ‘trans ally’, and that’s the only thing that matters to the SNP now? (sorry, my mind is wandering again!)]
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Contrary:
“… Now, this case went to criminal trail, and they nearly all went through with that; one person dropped out (realising the enormity of what they were doing?… ”
I rather think it was because she never wanted to be a witness in the first place, and others felt the same.
I’m not some naive wee lassie. I know perfectly well that some women are wee besoms, and some a lot worse than that. I do think, though, that they were, if not coerced, encouraged, most of them, once the charges had been brought. That is how the legal system works. The police have little choice once the ball starts rolling on a case like this.
It is not the witness who decides whether he/she will appear, and a non-appearance or a refusal to appear can lead to being cited as a hostile witness. The witness who dropped out must have made it perfectly clear to the prosecution that she would use the stand to tell her side of the coercion and break ranks, as it were, before they were willing to drop her.
She must have had guts because she would have been under tremendous pressure. Had she broken ranks, there would probably have been no case to answer, so the prosecution couldn’t risk it. Yes, it’s a pity more of them didn’t break ranks. Yes, it certainly looks as if it was an all-woman thing, but I sense the male hand in this. It was a classic power play between men. I’m not claiming that NS and other highly-placed females did not play their part, but, somewhere in there, a man, or men, was/were involved, using the original accusations as the springboard, and the imperative to bring down the former FM was the real point of the power play, that and, possibly, revenge, and it all spiralled out of control – from the moment that the procedure was deemed to be unfit for purpose to the desperation to make it all fit together. They probably thought they had him at the beginning, but, when it all fell apart, the whole thing ran away from them. If anything, I think it was an opportunistic use of selective evidence that went awry.
Women can throw off or refuse the shield of anonymity. A few have, but not for the reasons you suggest here. It can often be a prelude to a civil case where the hurdle of proof is not so high, but the women here, I’d imagine, have been so vilified that they would not risk it, and the lack of strong evidence in the criminal case would militate against a civil case. Anyway, no lawyer in his/her right mind, unless there were overwhelming reasons, advise the client on such a risky venture.
Anyway, I have little doubt that it will all emerge one day. What prompted this latest tirade was not from any of women sniping, but the arrest and incarceration of a blogger and human rights activist who was arrested for contempt of court and not jigsaw identification per se. It doesn’t help anyone to misstate the facts or even to misinterpret them. I’m not accusing you of that, by the way, but lots of shades of grey do not equate to black-and-white.
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You make some good points here Lorncal – once you are in the system and the authorities decide they want to go ahead (see Scottie’s comment above), it’s not an easy one to back out of. You have to wonder how they got to that stage in the first place too, though.
The first two complainers, who went through the government procedure, were both keen to speak directly to the head honchos – Evans and Sturgeon – rather than the HR underlings about their initial ‘concerns’. They were blocked from doing so, supposedly. Perhaps they just wanted reassurance.
I hadn’t realised I was making it all sound black and white! I’ve maybe spent to much time looking at the detail and now being a bit decided on various issues, but I do have an open mind (though a bit sceptical). The fact is, neither of us can really tell what the situation is, with current information.
I’m not that sure it WILL all emerge one day – I’ve seen a few comments recently of that kind, that it’ll somehow all be revealed in the future. I think it needs some kind of driving force to get anything revealed, and some things may never be known if they’re buried deep enough. We are at an impasse at the moment, and as time wears on it looks less and less likely anything will get cleared up. I hope I’m wrong though.
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There a row going on about “conversion therapy”, which does seem to be a bad thing, and not to work. However, there’s a bit I don’t understand; is anyone “made” to attend conversion therapy? Surely not adults – you have to consent to any medical intervention? Are children forced into it?
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I think the problem in the gender ideology context is that ‘conversion therapy’ includes exploring the person’s feelings around dysphoria and replacing evidence-based therapeutic practise with unquestioning ‘affirmation’ of the feelings.
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Robert, I’m really not sure the context this is meant in,,,
Conversion therapy is usually a term used when there is an attempt convert gay people to heterosexual, because of whatever mad ideology that culture or person has – you hear some stories of psychotherapists deciding it is all in the mind, and so using techniques to ‘convince’ gay people they’re really heterosexual – and do you remember controversy a few years back when geneticists in America were trying to find a ‘gay gene’ (then they could use gene therapy? Who knows) – some countries that still have homosexuality as illegal, like Iran – which uses transitioning to the opposite sex ,,, ahem,,, as conversion therapy – you can’t be gay, so the only way you won’t be hanged for the crime is to become the opposite sex. It’s so extreme, it’s hard to imagine it’s happening right now.
I have heard some talk of ‘conversion therapy’ with regards to trans, but I haven’t been able to understand the meaning – whether it’s just jumping on a term already used against gay people to show how victimised they are, or if they genuinely think any questioning of their identity is that? I’ll pay attention next time I read anything about it (I can only do it in small doses otherwise insanity looms too close). Rather ironic that Iran uses transitioning ‘sex’ as a conversion ‘therapy’ for gay people, though.
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I wasn’t asking what convesion therapy is. I’ll refer to it as CT below.
I’d noticed a furore about banning CT and saying how deadful it was that people were being forced into it – and then in the same breath demanding puberty blockers for children. There’s a contradiction there – if you demand (as you should) that any therapy needs to be based on peer-reviewed research, you probably need to ban both.
Banning CT for consenting informed adults is an intersting idea … but those who propose a ban need to find language which distinguishes CT from attempts help people after trauma, or convert them to a religion.
Don’t get me wrong here – I’d require those offering CT to demonstrate good outcomes before offering it, and I doubt thety would succeed. Maybe there is existing quack medicine regulation which would cover this?
I do worry about restricting the freedom of consenting adults to talk to anyone they wish to, listening to whoever they want to, and believing any nonsese they wish.
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I think some of the confusion about “conversion therapy” has been deliberately caused by the trans activists. When I first heard of it being raised, I immediately thought of the controversial “conversion therapy” practiced by fundamentalist religious groups in the US ( I think southern Baptists were particularly keen.) This was directed at gay young people in their congregations since their religious belief was that homosexuality was an abomination in the sight of the Lord. These fundamentalists believed that those attracted to their own sex could be persuaded to recognise their error and choose the right path while being subjected to a course of religious instruction, prayer and indoctrination.
Of course, outside fundamentalist circles most people now accept that being gay is not a lifestyle choice and with puberty, people without any choice in the matter, as part of an ancient evolutionary system become sexually mature and, without any conscious choice, become either attracted to the opposite sex or their own sex. It is a natural process to prepare the individual for procreation but people like the ultra-religious believe that being homosexual does not fit that “norm” and must be against God’s plan for humanity to go forth and multiply. Evolution does not care about the individual, only the reproduction of the species, so it does not upset that implacable biological imperative if there are individuals who are not attracted to the opposite sex, a requirement in most cases for reproductive mating. ( Just as, unfortunately, there are individuals who wish to be parents but are infertile for a variety of reasons but again that does not affect the reproduction of the species, which goes inexorably on.)
However, regarding young people who felt unhappy with their sex and were referred for counselling previously, apparently the usual practice that was followed was ” wait and see” since experience had often shown that these young people had other underlying issues which had to be addressed and by helping with these underlying issues through therapy, the unhappiness of ” being in the wrong body” often resolved itself. Trans activists have conflated this humane listening therapy and counselling as being exactly like the “conversion therapy” of the bible belt. So just as gay people would be subjected to religious teaching aiming to “convert” them into being heterosexual, then transactivists have condemned the counselling therapy as having the same goals of ignoring the true nature of their clients and forcing them to accept society’s norms. It’s what caused splits at the Tavistock.
This false conflation is often used by transactivists in their arguments, so that questioning of their ideas is called “abuse”, peaceful protestors are called “fascists”, aggressive bullies are “victims”. We are all familiar with this approach.
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Apologies Robert, I just meant I was making a comment without knowing much about it, not that I thought you were asking about it or wanted an explanation, I didn’t word that well.
Jgedd, good explanation, and your conclusion sounds like it’s spot on; just more of the same behaviour that we’ve come to expect. It’s really quite distressing they way they carry out ‘civilised’ discussion, the language is horrific, yet our government and officials think it acceptable,,, there does seem to be a huge division in society – in ethical standards, between elitist public officials and the general public.
Why on earth won’t they let us debate the issue and discuss all of it in a reasonable and calm manner (and maybe with a few sense-checks)? How can screaming insults at people be thought of as a good way to convince people, or to gain sympathy? Oh for some rational discourse! And what’s with the people that say it’s ‘both sides’? Eh, how can “women have sex based rights” be equated in any shape or form with “you’re a bigot and transphobe and deserve [unmentionable things in polite society]” – the first is a statement of fact, and the second is an accusatory personal attack and an unpleasant threat. I must have been brought up wrong, I hadn’t realised the way to deal with any disagreement was to shout “fascist” at people until they back down. There are just so many things wrong with this whole thing, on so many levels,,,
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To change the subject slightly.
I could be wrong but it is definitely a debating point.
With effect from todays date, is singing our own Scottish National Anthem a criminal offence?
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Cotrary, in response to your 9 Septemer post, I agree. Some have turned the whole issue into a cult or religion (as an aside, is a religion a cult with an army?). Which is fine if it’s just them – you can believe in transubstantiation of communion wine if you choose. But they’re trying to make it a State-sponsored, compulsory religion, which is scary.
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Aye, which is interesting in itself – they separated out Christian law from our legal system didn’t they – not sure when, a while ago – to make all legislation secular, which makes it fairer (obviously) to all other religious groups. Now the Scottish Government is putting what amounts to a belief into legislation – without taking into consideration other beliefs (and are effectively saying ‘no other beliefs are allowed’). Christian law I suppose allowed for things like burning witches – what is a witch though? Someone in league with the devil, an imaginary beast: who decides if someone is or isn’t? How can you test for a belief, or if someone is ‘in league with’ an imaginary being,,,
As more people become aware of what will actually happen if self-ID becomes law, rather than the happy-clappy ‘it’s just to make things easier on the poor dears, nothing else to see here’, I think the outcry might become loud enough for parliament to reject it,,, unfortunately the zealots have a majority, and relying on any SNP MSPs having a conscience is a bit shoogly (SGreens have none). Scary indeed. If only we had a citizen’s assembly second House that could reject harmful, or nonsense, legislation. If only we had independence and proper political etc infrastructure. Sigh.
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To be fair, Christian civic thought has occasionally risen above witch-burning. And Nicola Sturgeon’s administration itself demonstrates that even secular humanism can find itself careering towards the odd ditch. The roots of the latter can be historically traced. For example, Christian philosopher of law Herman Dooyeweerd (1894-1977) wrote concerning the friend of Kant and translator of Hume into German, Johann Georg Hamann (1730-1788), as follows:
“This irrational philosophy of feeling, predominating especially in Hamann, the young Herder and Jacobi, and of which Goethe makes his Faust the mouth-piece in the utterance: ‘Gefühl ist alles’, is the true Humanistic counter-pole of the rationalistic line of thought characteristic of the ‘Enlightenment’ […] Rationalism and irrationalism in their modern sense are merely polar contrasts in the basic structure of the Humanistic Law Idea. The tension, the inner antinomy that originates for the irrationalist types between absolutized subjective individuality and law, led Hamann and early Romanticism to a dialectical conception of reality which ascribed the character of absolute reality to logical contradiction.” (A New Critique of Theoretical Thought, Vol 1, pp 412, 510)
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Fearghas, I only used witch burning as an example, other forms of certain death could also be employed.
Joking aside, my point was that the witch finder general had free rein to find whoever he wanted guilty, and in whatever way – up to finding the person guilty just because they survived the first murder attempt – and this is what happens when you produce very vague legislation (based on belief). Take the hate crime act – by excluding women, it targets women, so anyone can charge a woman with a hate crime, and women can’t complain back (we can only assume that this law really does state that transwoment are, in fact, NOT women) – but what is a hate crime? Saying something that offends someone else – that covers just about anything and everyone – so in rolls the witch finder general: “look! She denies it! She MUST be guilty then”. Why is Marion Miller being charged with anything, when it should be an obvious no case to answer?
I admit you lost me at “Dooyeweerd” – that must be the most hilarious name I’ve ever heard though 😀
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https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/19571909.nicola-sturgeon-dismisses-concerns-gender-reforms-not-valid/
Oh well, our concerns are “not valid”. Sturgeon says so. Her arrogance knows no bounds.
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And demonstrating at Holyrood to make your feelings known looks increasingly unlikely.
https://archive.is/mfoxc
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Well well, Alex Cole-Hamilton apparently says he was providing support to one of the complainers during the Fabiani Whitewash, just seen it on a tweet from Joanna Cherry (I’ll have to see if I can find an archive version of the article)
https://nitter.42l.fr/joannaccherry/status/1437073538540769283#m
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Thanks for posting this, Contrary. If I get time I might do a post on it since, as we’ve both noted previously, the complainers were not asked any of the questions they should have been asked — at least if the published report is anything to go by — and this goes some way to explaining why.
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That would be very very interesting Gordon, please do – I’ve just seen comments of the like: he was meant to be impartial – which is the obvious case – but I’m still trying to fit this into context of the whole – including, why does he mention this now? Because he’s not the brightest of sparks? (And why would anyone in their right minds go to Alex C-H for ‘support’?!). The whole thing really stinks,,, and certainly supports the case of the inquiry being a complete Whitewash – or a staged farce even.
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I’ve found an archive version of the Scotsman article:
https://archive.md/Jxbdh
It sounds like he’s just being thick as mince, no awareness whatsoever as he tries to get sympathy points for the tewible emotional toll the inquiry took on him. He’s such an arsehole. Really.
Despite all the things that were brought up during the inquiry, you’d have thought – considering the original two complainers claimed to have made their complaints merely for the purpose of ensuring it didn’t happen to anyone else – they’d have welcomed the inquiry. And considering it was only inquiring into the government procedure, it had nothing to do with any of the other complainers who didn’t go through the procedure, so shouldn’t have been upsetting.
He’s quoted as saying many arseholey things on other subjects through the rest of the article, it isn’t worth reading after the first couple of paragraphs.
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Thanks, Contrary. Interesting that the interview is by Gina Davidson who is excellent on the gender stuff but just part of the mainstream unionist hackery on Salmond and most other stuff. This is how wokery is redrawing the battle lines and it’s going to continue to be an odd experience for veteran lefties like myself (and, no doubt, for hacks like Davidson too).
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Ohhh, I was wondering who the reporter was – I’m not up on who’s who in that world – interesting what you say about her being good on gender stuff when she just straight quoted Mr Cole-Hamilton on his wokery – dribbling some nonsense about kind of accepting there are concerns (yeah, well, how about they don’t write obvious flaws into the legislation in the first place, instead of going “ooo, I can’t imagine criminals and predators taking advantage of this chasm of a ‘loophole’, whatever next, hohoho”, Mr Cole-arsehole-Hamilton, hm?). I shouldn’t have read the whole article!
As more people become aware of the gender ideology, I’ve noticed rational arguments against (various aspects of) it are becoming more sophisticated, and responses more clear cut – so I’m hoping the battle lines will drawn well-beyond the casual virtue-signallers and deep into the loony-ideology territory soon, making it as unpalatable as flat-earth theories. Chances are you and Gina also agree re: flat-earthers,,, or similar; it’s just that normally we don’t have to mention any agreement (or otherwise) on it! Until that time though, it will be odd. Not as odd as the SNP aligning with unionists on all their policies though, and creating the gender-wars in the first place for that matter.
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I also note, via Joanna Cherry’s Twitter retweeting someone else, that the CPS has dumped Stonewall now too:
https://nitter.42l.fr/JohnMcM1/status/1437353855457665024#m
I’m probably reading too much into it, but interesting that the CPS spokesperson talks of LGBT+ while the Stonewall spokesperson consistently talks of LGBTQ+ : obviously the + can include anything, but evading the Q might indicate one reason for dumping stonewall? It’s a queer thing to use the term Queer. Anyway, neither are pleasant institutions, but at least Stonewall is losing its state sponsorship bit by bit.
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Was there anyone impartial on the Fabiani Inquiry? Andy Wightman at the end possibly and that’s about it in my opinion. And I’m not even sure about Wightman. The whole Inquiry brought the Scottish Parliament in to disrepute.
What has been implemented from James Hamiltons redacted report and the Fabiani Inquiry Report? The public don’t care. Sad to say Scots will get the government they deserve. And it’s getting worse each day.
Cole – Hamilton as I am pretty sure I posted previously on Gordon’s blog is just an idiot who should not be an MSP. When the two women amazingly turned up at the end of the Inquiry I was pretty some of the members were friendly enough with them to get them to do that interview. I never thought any of them would be daft enough to just state their relationship with one of them in public. But hey if Sturgeon can go on the tellly and tell the people of Scotland that a lot of the alphabetties are her friends then it is clear their are no ramifications for any of this. What sort of Inquiry just records their views in their final report. Unbelievable.
An Inquiry into a waste of public funds by the Scotgov just wasted a lot more public funds.
5 more years of Sturgeon – what a horrendous thought.
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Huh, 5 more years of Sturgeon is a dystopian nightmare brought to the present. I dread every moment of it!
Interesting point about impartiality, Cubby; I suppose none of us are ever truly impartial, and those within the political establishment trying to ‘impartially’ report on a political thing isn’t ever going to happen – there were so many different angles during the Whitewash, the unionist vs the ‘independents’, then the personal aligning and backstabbing etc – it was all too fraught with the political. Definitely needed an independent judicial review to get anywhere. Even then, if it had been politically appointed,,,
Yes, a maybe on Wightman…
And we could do with an inquiry into how much all the inquiries cost – particularly considering none have produced anything that has been usefully acted upon – but then, that inquiry will likely need investigated too because it’s just added to the cost! And on it goes – definitely, we need a new tack.
Our politics is broken.
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Yes indeed Contrary. I wonder if Linda Fabiani is feeling proud about her last contribution to Scottish political life. She probably doesn’t care. I suspect she sees it as job done – ran down the clock to the election – report filed away – Sturgeon off the hook. The public forget about it.
Holyrood is now just like Westminster. It only took 20 years.
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Hmph, I’m pretty sure Fabiani will be proud of her performance, from the perspective of her middle class comfortable bubble and very comfortable retirement, sure that she protected her ‘own’. Certainly the grinding poverty that many see in Scotland, and starving children, will not be something that affects her, and by protecting her wee darling Sturgeon she’s maintained the status quo so nothing will ever be done about it – it’s like we are in suspended animation – or like The Prisoner; as soon as we make any kind of progress, that white bouncy ball returns us to the start,,, into some weird freaky altered reality.
It’s remarkable how quickly things have degenerated into the poor second-cousin of Westminster politics – I’m not sure if that means devolution has failed, it was always a bit of a wet blanket anyway, and looking back now, it was only really Alex Salmond that made it work in Scotland’s favour – and if a system depends solely on who the person is that is in charge, then it’s a shit system. There is only one solution – what can we do about anything while part of this Union, I mean, Westminster makes sure England is *in competition* with us, for contracts and business, they make sure there are not enough jobs and opportunities here in Scotland. And now we have a devolved fucking government, again, that *wants* that situation.
What a waste of money building that fancy Holyrood building – they should have stuck the parliament in some dirty big warehouse in Bellshill and told to get on with it – if they can’t govern from there, they can’t govern at all. Anyone that needs frippery and finery to make them feel important, isn’t important at all.
Ah, I see you’ve managed to get yourself suspended from this blog; you’re like a bull in a china shop at times, honestly, ,,, I was going to say it wasn’t fair me commenting when you didn’t have a right to reply, and now I’ve just made it worse 😀 – I usually always check out comments on Iain’s blog too, you can tell me to f-off (nicely) there 🙂
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Lorna Campbell
“I sense the male hand in this” I sense some one whose default position is it’s always a mans fault. If you want to read more of my thoughts on your comments upstream about the Salmond persecution please scroll up
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Really? Thats not what I’ve read into Lorna’s comments unless I’ve missed something. On the contrary, she is a breath of fresh air, a thoughtful, nuanced analyst and I am grateful to her for articulating many of the thoughts I share on the underlying sexual politics and reactions to this whole sorry episode.
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Annie, Aye really but she is Contrary.
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Thank you, Annie. Cubby does not do nuance: everything is black and white.
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Cubby: contrary, perhaps, but not Contrary. Sorry to spoil your wee conspiracy.
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Lorna you have lost the plot by bringing the poster Contrary in to this. Not for once did I ever think you were the poster Contrary. It was the system that put a capital on contrary not me as it just did there again but this time I was looking out for it. So once again your sense (of a conspiracy) fails you spectacularly.
So you are contrary without a doubt. With regards to your nuance comment a jury verdict is not nuanced and unlike you I do not do smears.
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Annie, Lorna does receiving praise very well and a lot of the time it is well justified but critical comments seem to be contrary to what she expects and her ego gets the better of her.
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No idea what Lorna’s personality is like as I’m not psychic, but you’re coming over as a bit of a dick heid if thats any help and this is getting tedious. Its ok not to have the last word, so on you go.
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Annie, a very unpleasant comment that shows a distinct lack of manners combined with a lack of any argument for that conclusion. But hey you are entitled to your opinion – well if you think a gratuitous insult is an opinion.
There are no “underlying sexual politics” other than in Lorna’s sense of smell. If you and Lorna share that same smell well fine but it is not evidence or fact based.
Lorna has been posting the same smears about Salmond for a long long time on multiple sites. I will challenge her if I want and your childish insult will not deter me.
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Cubby:
“… Initially you were sure Salmond was guilty… ”
How you came to that conclusion, I do not know, Cubby. All I have ever tried to do was point out that cases of sexual assault are rarely – very, very rarely – black and white. I have also stated that juries do not decide that someone is lying or telling the truth; they decide on the strength and weight or otherwise of the evidence presented by each side, as our system is adversarial.
I have never said, either, that’s it always men’s fault. I am well aware that some women do lie, but, crucially, as accusers, they lie in the same ratio as those who lie in other types of criminal offences – that is, very rarely – so it makes no sense to say that they are all lying, especially since Mr Salmond himself admitted that his behaviour had not always been exemplary. There were two original complaints, lodged about two years previously, that were dealt with in-house and for which he apologized. To have raised them again was grossly unfair, I believe, and I also believe that the women involved had no intention that they should ever reach the ears of the police; they wanted them dealt with by the new procedure. Even then, they had been dealt with and that should have been an end of the matter.
Many studies have been done on the subject of sexual assault, as studies have been done on the societal prejudices that jury members, who are also members of that society, take into the jury room, such as “she must have been asking for it”, “she’s lying”, “she’s ruining the life of a good man”. The life of a good woman so often is dispensable. The rape figures alone should tell anyone with two brain cells to spark together that the law lets women down badly, then it compounds that initial failure in the courts. Rape/sexual assault is notoriously difficult to prove, however, and the rights f the accused cannot be dispensed with either.
That is not the point here. Mr Salmond was cleared, by a jury of his peers, of all charges – and the fact that it was mostly women on that jury makes no difference. The women were given the shield of anonymity and they have abused it by sniping from behind it.
As I said, I do happen to believe that this was no conspiracy of females. I make that observation because there is precious little evidence to show that women do this routinely, whereas it is a staple of all security services across the globe. Women are used as the means to bring down a man someone somewhere wants rid of. Now, why would anyone want rid of Mr Salmond, whom I happen to like personally, and have had the good fortune to have been on the receiving end of his kindness? His speech at the ALBA conference should tell you the answer to that one.
The women’s evidence was, I believe, en masse, used to try and bring down Alec Salmond. By other women? Yes, on the face of it, it appears that way when you consider who was involved in the procedure, the failure of that procedure, and its aftermath. In reality? At a certain point, the police had to be involved because that is the law, and, from there, they had to try to present the best evidence to the Crown Office, which, in turn, had to present the best case. Witnesses are cited and they are not allowed to say: nah, can’t be bothered.
Taken as a whole, the women’s evidence was very weak, but was the case itself the whole point by that time? If the procedure didn’t destroy his reputation, maybe the trial would? It was either a catalogue of ineptitude and weakness for the Scottish government or it was intended all along to be the means to an end, and did not come off as intended. I did not say the women were coerced by the police or the Crown Office. The law took its course. The whole episode could have been very fortuitous from the point of view of both the Scottish government and the Westminster government, for different, but overlapping reasons. As I have also said many times, the conspiracy, if there is one, lies, usually, in the attempted cover-up afterwards. The ‘conspiracy’ itself was probably nothing more than a catalogue of errors, the trial the inevitable result of that catalogue of errors and the opportunity which that catalogue of errors afforded certain parties to try and bring down someone who was proving to be a thorn in more than one side.
Methinks you doth protest too much, Cubby: it’s all a conspiracy by men-hating women; it’s all the fault of men. I did not say that either. What I did say was that grasping opportunities when they are presented – as they were here – to use sex or allegations of sexual misconduct as the means to bring someone down is as old as humans have existed, and it is – almost – invariably used by men against other men with women as the pawns. The women themselves are not important except as ciphers. That you fail to see the truth in that says a lot more about you than it does about me. Oh, and yes, I do know who they are. Possibly better than you.
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Lorna, I came to that conclusion by reading your posts on Craig Murray’s blog way back. Methinks you protest too much.
Let’s confirm our impartiality on this matter. We wouldn’t want one of us to be like Cole-Hamilton would we?
I have never met or are friends with any of the complainers. Not that I would want to. I have never met Salmond nor am I friend of his. Your turn Lorna. Of course you say Salmond was kind to you once but you are happy to continually smear him. Is that because your behaviour is always exemplary?
You see Lorna all your posts keep going back to generalisations of sexual assault cases and your obviously vast knowledge of them. I try to stick to this specific case because it is a political case not a standard sexual assault case. You obviously cannot see that. That is the key difference between our approach you want to pontificate about studies and all things general about rape cases and court cases and you conflate the actuality of Salmonds case with the generality. It is a subject matter that I have no personal knowledge of or particular interest in unlike you obviously. The evidence proved they lied. You can quote your case studies all you want. And your as old as humans stuff. Just irrelevant The evidence also showed the nature of some of their motivations in lying.
I’ll say it again and again I have always said men are involved in this matter. I said it in my post above but you just seem to ignore that.
You sound more and more like Sandy Brindley the more you post.
“So it makes no sense to say they were all lying.” So just do away with a court case and evidence and base the decision on case studies and generalisations that some of them must be telling the truth. That is not sense that is complete and utter nonsense. That is what they wanted to happen – no smoke without fire – a smear and you have continued to oblige them.
You go on about rape being difficult to prove when there wasn’t even a rape charge.
“This whole episode has always smelled of a male power play to me, with the women being caught in the centre. ”
Lorna you are doing a lot of smelling and sensing to try to justify your views. That I fail to see the truth in your smelling and sensing says that I look at facts and evidence. So stop with your smears Lorna both on me and Salmond it is truly unworthy of you.
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Ah, now it’s getting personal, Cubby. No, like every other human being on the planet, I’m a mix of good and bad. Do you think I’m lying, too? I did not say that I know the women because I don’t. I am sure I’ve met at least one of them, possibly more, but I have a fair idea of who they are. Mr Salmond, I have met on several occasions, spoken to and with, worked with at arms’s length, and not in any capacity with the SNP, and, yes, he was very kind to me. I never forget kindness.
I have never once accused him of anything nor ever would because I wasn’t there. I have read the trial evidence as far as possible and the evidence leading up to the trial, and, frankly, had I been in the Crown Office, it would never have happened at all because the evidence was so weak. Had I been in the civil service before the trial, I would have dropped the whole thing because the shambles that was the procedure should have been a source of embarrassment to those who drew it up, initially, as so much SNP policy is proving to be.
All criminal cases, especially sexual offence ones are both specific and general because that’s how the law works, Cubby. How could it be otherwise? Coercion of a witness is itself illegal, albeit a hostile witness can be persuaded to attend and give evidence. The ‘coercion’ I was alluding to was the whole stressful situation of having to give evidence when you might not have wished to do so. I surmise this is what happened here and that this particular witness, and perhaps others, were unwilling, in varying degrees, to give evidence against Mr Salmond, however you choose to interpret it. Either the witness who was dropped had no real evidence worth the telling and which would not have altered the thread of the evidence for the prosecution, or she might have said something that the prosecution did not want the court and the jury to hear, thereby aiding the defence. I don’t know. That she was dropped is telling in itself, and I was drawing conclusions from that fact.
Previous evidence, before the trial and before the police investigation suggests very powerfully that the two original women did not want to go to the police and had wanted it all to be dealt with in-house because they felt that the two incidents for which Mr Salmond had apologized, had not been dealt with as they wished, shall we say? Would they have even thought of raising the issue again, though, had they not been persuaded to do so? Again, were those two women obliged to go further than they had ever wanted when the police became involved? Before that point, someone with their best interests at heart should have pointed out to the women that they had accepted the apologies and that time had moved on, without any further action having been taken. That they didn’t receive that advice is their tragedy.
That should have been the end of it. That it wasn’t, is where it all starts to look iffy and that the initial incidents were then, perhaps, used, shored up by the police investigation for more witnesses (the Moorov Doctrine), for a very different agenda – to bring down Alec Salmond, and not a a sex pest, although that would be the basis and prima facie reason for the trial, but to ruin his reputation and keep him out of front-line politics. Again, these are conclusions that can be drawn from the whole episode, and I would never claim they are 100% spot on, but something is not right. If you look at it like this, the women are as much pawns as was Mr Salmond, caught up in the turning wheel of the law, and, yes, I still believe that a male hand directed that part of it – not as a conspiracy, but as an opportunity to get rid of a thorn in his/their side. All the work was done within SG/Police Scotland/Crown Office circles, and I’m sure that at least some in each of those organizations must have had grave concerns, too, but, at the end of the day, we can see who would have benefited had Mr Salmond fallen, and it would not have been the women.
Now, Alec Salmond gave a stotter of a speech at the ALBA Conference and he is far from being out of the game. He knows, if you don’t, that we need every vote for independence to get to the starting block and to make it work thereafter. Personally, I am glad that he is back in Scottish politics and I think he should concentrate in building ALBA into a fighting force to challenge the SNP hegemony. You may have failed to notice that it is both women and men that have his back in ALBA. Try not to alienate the women with your male prejudices, and try to follow Alec Salmond’s lead. Don’t bother replying to this, as I won’t be answering you again on your daft insinuations, verging into the personal.
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Lorna, your words
“The witness who dropped out must have made it perfectly clear to the prosecution that she would use the stand to tell her side of the coercion and break ranks, as it were, before they were willing to drop her.”
Now in my initial post I stated that there was evidence of an element of coercion during the trial by one of the complainers. Is what was said by a complainer true. I don’t know because if people are liars then it is sensible to take their testimony with some caution.
How exactly do you know what you say about the person dropping out is true. You say ” must have ” – have you got evidence or insider knowledge to back this up or is it just more smelling and sensing.
Hope this post is nuanced enough for you.
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“Don’t bother replying to this” aye very good Lorna you think you can tell me what to do. I’ll leave it to the site owner on any blogger site to decide if my posts are posted not you – such arrogance. You started with the personal stuff.
You lose an argument and don’t like me pointing out your inconsistencies from one post to another and then resort to personal insinuations then turn it back on me.
PS it’s Alex Salmond not Alec – not very good on details/facts/evidence are you Lorna but big on supposition/ smells/senses etc etc.
” The women are as much pawns as was Mr Salmond” more absolute nonsense. You clearly do not know who some of these women are or if you do then you know you are talking nonsense.
” You may have failed to notice that it is both women and men that have his back in Alba.” No I spotted that quite easily Lorna. More nonsense from you.
“Oh and yes I do know who they are. Possibly better than you.” – your earlier post.
” …..but I have a fair idea of who they are.” – your latest post.
So Lorna one minute you know who they are and possibly better than me and the next minute you have a fair idea of who they are. I could go on pointing out your inconsistencies but that will do for now.
Now if you had some evidence that it’s a mans hand behind all this then fine but all you have is smells and senses based on your own prejudices. There were and are men involved in this but for you to say it is a man behind all this and never once mention Sturgeon the FM of Scotland once again shows your slanted view of the world.
Unlike you I will not tell you not to reply to this.
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Cubby, I try to stay out of these things as everyone who comments here is a grown-up (and, for example, it’s clear that neither Annie nor lorncal need my help in dealing with you) but since you’ve specifically invoked the “site owner” with this comment, let me say this.
I’d very much prefer it if you didn’t comment on my blog again.
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No problem Gordon. All the best. But I will continue to read your articles.
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Re Mark Hirst’s malicious prosecution, I just answered Robert’s request for a progress report on the thread for that post, and it occurred to me that more people might see it here:
We’re now in correspondence with COPFS, seeking to clarify some issues before the action is raised. This is something that the court has recommended in previous cases as a means of making the actual litigation as economical and efficient as possible so it’s important to do it.
I’ll try to keep readers updated in the comments until there’s something of sufficient substance for an actual post.
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Thanks for posting the update here – I wouldn’t have thought to look back on that thread right enough.
When you say ‘clarify some issues’ – is that mundane technical legal stuff where you all discuss what you are going to say before you say it? (Yes, I’m still ignorant about the world of legaldom)
Can we assume our new Lord Advocate didn’t answer? (Or are there more updates on this on the Mark Hirst article that I should look back on?)
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Contrary, I can’t say too much for the dreaded “legal reasons” but one issue we’re trying to clarify in correspondence with the Scottish Government’s legal team is whether the Lord Advocate takes responsibility at all for summary prosecutions or whether she claims that we have to sue the individual Procurator Fiscal and staff involved in Mark’s prosecution. It’s going to be a fascinating legal case, quite apart from its very obvious political significance, so I hope everyone will stay tuned.
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Surely it would be anomalous to have a Rule which differed between Solemn and Summary proceedings . I’m not Scot Law qualified Gordon ..I’m trying to figure Scots Gov Legal team mindset on this ..
Is there wider immunity for PF in Summary Prosecution than the LA ?
I will stay tuned 😊🏴 Best Wishes Claire
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Claire, you have to remember that these are people who believe men literally become women just by saying they are and, since I’ve just seen the decision in the Keira Bell case, any confidence I might once have had in the good sense of judges to see through such nonsense is pretty much gone too. It’s honestly like the Enlightenment never happened at this point, in the law every bit as much as elsewhere. My hope remains that, as with McCarthyism, one domino will fall soon and take the rest with it, and, as with McCarthyism, we’ll all shake our heads and wonder how it tryrannised us for so long.
But yes, to any sane lawyer in possession of Enlightenment powers of reason, the position is obvious, and the Lord Advocate is responsible in law for both summary and solemn prosecutions.
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Yes of course Gordon what was I thinking 🤔 Welsh Govt. also through the looking glass .. Stonewall Cymru infiltrated most walks of life, sometimes I feel like I’m still working in Scotland … Re KB case hopefully Cass Review will advance matters ..
I look forward to hearing the progress re MH and AS . I’m finally up to speed with all of your blog ..on to your book next 😊🏴
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I found this quite informative on trans activism, a gay bloke called Duncan talks about how he went from being a TRA to being Gender Critical – it gives some insight into the unthinking cult like brainwashing (though he doesn’t belabour this point), and he talks about how it’s just another form of conversion therapy for homosexuals. He reasons out the issues for women well, and concludes, rightly, it isn’t his place to tell women to accept men into their protected spaces.
He also gives a kind-of definition of ‘non-binary’ – someone that doesn’t conform to a… Gender stereotype? Those people are obsessed with labels! (I detest labels) How are we meant to get away from gender stereotypes, if they’ve just invented a hundred extra to conform to?!
He also mentions how badly worded the GRA is already – it seems like that whole Act needs replaced, not reformed with self-ID to make it worse.
https://uncommongroundmedia.com/how-i-became-a-trans-rights-activist-then-turned-gender-critical/
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It is not only in Scotland that this is bitterly divisive. And the SNP is not the only political party in the world to have taken leave of its senses.
Today, Sunday 19 September, we learn that Labour MP Rosie Duffield has been forced to withdraw from the Labour conference because of threats from “trans activists”. The Speaker of the House of Commons, to his great credit has come out in her support.
And on the Andrew Marr show this morning the LibDem leader, Ed Davey, could/would not answer the question, “What is wrong with this phrase, ‘woman: adult, human female?’” He ducked it three or four times. The reason, of course, is that one of his members, Natalie Bird, has been barred for TEN years for wearing that tautological phrase on a T-shirt.
Arguably, the LibDems’ surrender to trans -fanaticism is the worst of all “TRAHISONS Des CLERCS”. For its Liberal tradition stretches back 200 years to John Stuart Mill whose “On Liberty” is one of Liberalism’s foundational tracts.
Perhaps of greater relevance in this debate is Mill’s “On Subjection of Women.” Their hard won rights over the past two centuries must not be sacrificed to the the fanatics who persecute Rosie Duffield, Natalie Bird and, here in Scotland, Marion Miller.
The absolutely legitimate claims of trans people to fair and equal treatment need not be at the expense of women. Their sex-based rights should be restored to the priority hard won over decades and centuries.
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By way of a coda, Women’s Hour lead on the same issue today with Christine Jardine MP, slithering and sliding all over the place under the presenter’s interrogation.
The LibDems have not only lost their heads but their very soul.
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I’m very encouraged to see a sensible intervention from the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, reported here: https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/shelve-controversial-overhaul-of-gender-recognition-laws-scottish-government-urged/ar-AAOKBIY
After another moment, I realised I felt some surprise at seeing an office-holder in Scottish public life talking sense these days, and was back to being disappointed that I should feelthait to be so rare and surprising! Gaun yersel, Bruce Adamson – the powers that be will probably have you out of your job by Christmas if there’s any more of this dangerous common sense on display.
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Conversion therapy!
Good ol Malcolm Clark, of LGBA (the good guys), has written a thread on it:
https://nitter.42l.fr/TwisterFilm/status/1372667658521415687#r
The trans activists appear to be confusing and confounding the issue (which is why it, as usual, makes no sense), and getting hysterical about religions etc.
They want a law banning conversion therapy – I hadn’t realised this, I thought they were just wanting to play victim – but have not defined conversion therapy. Most of what they describe are illegal practices anyway (violence etc) – so what is it they want banned?
Effectively they want ‘affirmation therapy’ to be the only accepted therapy for transgender people. Affirmation therapy must be the worst thing ever for anyone with mental health issues, like those with gender dysphoria, say. You wouldn’t use it for anyone with anorexia – not if you wanted them to live anyway – so why would it ever work as a therapy at all? I can’t imagine it would.
It’s interesting that gender ideology activists want so many things written into law… Its like the only way to force practices that are not accepted, there is no evidence to support, and make no sense, on society – for whose benefit, and why are politicians on board with this?
Gender ideology is a religion, a belief system, and the legislators have, and are planning more, written it into law, with no regard to the diversity of belief systems in this country. We gave up Christian laws because it can’t be applied fairly at the same time as giving people a degree of freedom (human rights, you know, allow you your own beliefs). Why don’t the legislators understand what they are doing?! They are destroying all of our human rights.
‘trans’ is short for transition – or conversion – it’s a sort of conversion for LGB people. And it seems many of the trans children are actually gay, but find it’s more acceptable to be trans than gay. Are we still so unaccepting and homophobic as a culture? Does our society have to make more effort in welcoming LGB people as a normal part of life? I thought things had improved greatly – but it must still be a massive struggle, and a greater hardship to admit and live life as a homosexual. Why don’t we see homosexual relationships to be equal in status as heterosexual ones? I thought we did – but we can’t be if children are so traumatised they’d prefer to lop parts of their bodies off.
I still can’t believe prison services are putting male convicted sexual offenders – convicted and therefore little doubt to their predatory nature – in women’s prisons. All our governments & institutions have gone mad, they are misogynists.
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Contrary: I have come to the conclusion that they know exactly what they are doing – the politicians, that is – because it is a cheap alternative, they are all receiving donations from pharmaceutical companies, tech companies, Stonewall, etc., and because they know they have a massive men’s sexual/men’s rights movement on their hands and don’t know how to stem it. Essentially, trans women are a subset of men, as trans men are a subset of women, but, basically, what they have done is to validate all trans people as a subset of women, so that women are left to cope or not with the problem. They will try their hardest to push this stuff through no matter how many children are maimed, no matter how many women and girls are raped or sexually assaulted. I would also suspect that some politicians are also adherents of Queer Theory themselves.
The foot soldiers, the trans activists, and the autogynephilics and fetishists also know what they are doing, but it will be worth it to them to be validated as women as the first step on their journey to displace women (the trans men don’t actually matter in all this) and the first step is getting all prohibitive and protective laws overturned to their benefit and the benefit of real, dangerous predators (and no one else’s).
All this has nothing – zilch – to do with compassion or understanding or, indeed, human rights because, although there may well be compassion for women and girls and children in one part of the trans community (and there is) it is woefully missing in the largest part. As for the men’s rights activists – who may also be trans, but, again, may not – they are driven by loathing of women and the rights they have managed to gain. Their whole point is to take away those rights and spaces and push women back into the home as breeders and house slaves. They resent women having jobs that they feel should be theirs, so this trans stuff has been a godsend for them, too. They, with the greater part of the trans women contingent, want to relieve all women of their human rights.
It is a four-pronged alliance of mainly male self-interest: capitalism; the drive for male sexual rights and the drive for male rights; political expedience; and forcing women to cope with the whole thing because men are the ones who resent any deviation from the masculine norm of straight.Even those men who purport to stick up for trans rights still see trans women as not the masculine norm, as they still see (en masse) homosexual men as still not the masculine norm; and, crucially, they (en masse) still see women as inferior to the masculine ideal of humanity and, as such, the cleaner-uppers or the cause, of masculine deviance from the masculine norm. Marry those to the masculine proclivity for violence, and you have the perfect storm, as they say. I’m not having a cheap shot at men because there are many good men out there, but they do have to take a long, hard look at what is masculinity, and, perhaps, what it could be, what it has the potential to be if not twisted to suit a certain narrative. I don’t know about you, but I am oh so sick and tired of having to fight the same fight for female rights every bloody decade or so. Next time, let’s do it properly and establish our humanity alongside that of men’s, our absolute equality within the natural strictures of the biological sexes.
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It’s gone rather too quiet here of late so I thought I’d pass this piece by the rather good ‘calton jock’.
I’d really like to know the legal standing on the validity of this sham of a ‘census’ if possible
https://caltonjock.com/2021/10/26/sturgeon-census-changes-will-ruin-the-wedding-industry-in-scotland-as-scotsmen-abandon-wearing-the-kilt-fearing-catcalls-such-as-doris-wheres-your-troosers-andy-stewart-will-be-birrlin-in-hi/
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‘conversion therapy’ ban currently being considered by uk govt. Here’s a recent legal opinion on such a measure:
https://www.transgendertrend.com/conversion-therapy-legal-opinion/
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Cubby: I don’t mind getting a good kicking if I have stated something properly. My point is that all through the ages, in every country, women have been used by powerful men (and women) to bring down a male who is a threat to them. I do not believe that Alec Salmond was brought down for being a bit handy, if he was; he was brought down because he was a real and immediate threat to those who wanted him gone from frontline politics because people will always say that here is no smoke without fire. Those who brought all of this about, did so because they feared him, not because they believed he was a genuine sex pest. The women were merely the means to an end, even if some of them were not coerced, and, now, they are despised. By the way, Cubby, I met Alec Salmond many times and have always admired him. He was especially kind to me, in my work, when he was FM. I have not forgotten that.
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