Author: Mick Hartley

  • The worst scandal ever to hit the BBC

    Charlie Walsham, a pseudonymous BBC News employee, on the Beeb's capture by the gender lobby. At the Spectator:

    I hesitate to say it, but I believe this could be the worst scandal ever to hit the BBC, and that – I realise – is saying something.

    Why? Because unlike the horrors of the Jimmy Savile revelations or, more recently, Huw Edwards’s appalling conduct, the BBC has, in effect, made all its journalists complicit in the mainstreaming of a dangerous social media contagion that has caused real-world harms.

    The BBC has kneeled at the altar of trans activism, putting virtue-signalling progressivism ahead of hard-headed realism and impartiality. In doing so, it has amplified the calumny that anyone who believes women’s sex-based rights matter, and that being a woman is more than a costume or a set of behaviours, is a bigot who must be condemned, cancelled and ostracised. More damningly, it has played a part in convincing an entire generation of children who are experiencing entirely normal growing pains, or discovering their true sexuality, that they may have been ‘born in the wrong body’.

    Time for Director General Tim Davie to go.

  • Persian Bella Ciao

    With a mention of the antifascist song featuring in the tiresome bullet casing talk, here's a version of Bella Ciao to inspire, from Iranian sisters Samin and Behin Bolouri.

    [youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBMcUvWffMk&w=550&h=309]

    From 2022, linked to the widespread anti-regime protests that were taking place in Iran after the death of Jina (Mahsa) Amini at the hands of Iran's morality police for not wearing her hijab properly. In this version, the sisters sing: "The cluster of our anger is thirsty for rain. Our rights are not petty… Finally, the chains of oppression will be broken by our hands."

    The MEMRI link I posted back then is no longer working.

  • After the Beijing summit

    ding-left: 40px”>North Korean authorities have dramatically intensified surveillance of the population following Kim Jong Un’s visit to China and the regime’s founding anniversary on Sept. 9, with citizens reporting extreme fatigue and pressure from constant monitoring.

    A Daily NK source in South Pyongan province said recently that “these days, even leaving home for just a few hours means being hounded by everyone from the neighborhood watch unit leader to security officers and state security agents to report your destination — people don’t even have room to breathe.”

    The source added that “quite a few people have gotten into trouble after leaving home thinking ‘a few hours should be fine’ only to be caught unexpectedly.”

    According to the source, neighborhood watch unit leaders visit each household in their districts, asking who is leaving home and when, recording expected return times, then actually returning during those time slots to verify whether people have come back — tracking people’s every movement.

    People are voicing their frustration with this behavior, often using sarcasm to express their feelings. Comments like “it’s surprising they don’t make us report going to the bathroom” and “we even have to watch ourselves breathe” highlight their sense of suffocation under the authorities’ excessive surveillance.

    On China:

    Chinese police investigating online criticism of a military parade celebrating the 80th anniversary of “Victory Day” are targeting North Korean female defectors—who are illegal aliens in China—confiscating phones and bringing them in for questioning.

    Multiple sources in China told Daily NK recently that Chinese police have been cracking down on online criticism of the Chinese Communist Party, the People’s Liberation Army and the leaders of Russia and North Korea who attended the military parade at Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

    “Posts that criticize Chinese President Xi Jinping for standing beside Kim Jong Un and Vladimir Putin at Tiananmen Square—a sacred historical site infused with the spirit of the Cultural Revolution—were spreading on Weibo,” the source said, referring to China’s popular microblogging platform.

    “Remarks about Kim Jong Un have led investigators to consider female defectors as being potentially implicated in the posts and to bring them in for questioning,” the source said.

    It was once an article of faith that as China liberalised, so too would North Korea. It seems like a long time ago. It was a long time ago. In fact it seems to be working the other way round: North Korea becomes more and more suffocatingly Orwellian, and China follows.

  • Trans roommate

    e roleplay culture, largely used in an ironic and demeaning way.

    Social media users were quick to share the news of the inscription, finding it both absurd and shocking. Some have taken this to mean that Robinson was a furry, while others are hypothesizing that it's just a dark joke.

    The other, unfired bullet casings were also inscribed with phrases, including, "O Bella Ciao, Bella Ciao" (an Italian song dedicated to the Italian resistance fighting against the occupying troops of Germany), "If you read this you are gay lmao" and "Hey fascist! Catch! up arrow, right arrow, three down arrows," which is a reference to the Eagle 500kg Bomb from the video game Helldivers 2.

    Not everyone agrees about that "Notices bulges, OwO what's this?".

    "notices bulge OWO" means that Tyler Robinson is a chaser (also known as GAMP). He is a man who is sexually attracted to transgenders.

    I'm out of my depth. Will slowly walk away…

  • Gender Expression Funds

    Grants can also be used towards travel to medical or therapy/counselling appointments, but we are not able to provide funding for treatment or other medical procedures.

    Manchester:

    The Students’ Union recognises that widespread transphobia and cisgenderism can lead to feelings of distress among trans and gender-diverse students.

    We also acknowledge that expressing and embodying your gender in ways that feel good can be financially challenging, especially in light of the present cost of living.

    We’ve created the Gender Expression Fund in the hope of reducing financial barriers to gender affirmation and improving the wellbeing of our students.

    LSE:

    We have created the Gender Expression Fund to alleviate financial strains for trans, non-binary, intersex, and any gender non-conforming students to break down some of the barriers they face in their daily lives. While the fund cannot assist with medical or legal costs, we hope this financial assistance can contribute to students’ wellbeing and make resources for gender expression more accessible.

    A little cash to help these poor gender-distressed individuals to buy their second-hand bras from the local charity shops. How lovely.

  • Gender critical women as “neo-Nazis”

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    Only in academia.

  • Spain’s animosity to Jews

    ecause my dad’s diplomatic career kept us moving, I hadn’t grown up with much of a Jewish community, and I had very few Jewish friends. I had also never personally experienced antisemitism.

    So when I casually mentioned to a new friend at school that I was Jewish, I was completely unprepared for her reaction. She was stunned, genuinely shocked. She had never met a Jew before, let alone had a Jewish friend.

    Spain’s Jewish population is small, around 50,000, but nearly 20 per cent of Spaniards are believed to have Jewish ancestry. Yet ignorance and prejudice about Jews runs deep. When classmates learned I was Jewish, their questions drew on centuries of antisemitism – from medieval myths (“Do you have horns?” “Didn’t you kill Jesus?”) to the gutter caricatures of Der Stürmer (‘Do all Jews have big noses?’).”

    High school brought a new group of boys whose antisemitism escalated. For three years, they threw Nazi salutes, yelled “Heil Hitler,” scrawled swastikas, and told me to go gas myself – all while denying the Holocaust.

    When I tried to explain that members of my family had been killed in the Holocaust, they laughed and called me a liar. Nobody defended me – not friends, not teachers. Once, after I complained to the director, he brought one of the perpetrators into his office with me and told us to “talk it out”. I was stunned. How do you “talk it out” with someone who wants you dead?…

  • A whole new level of insanity

    l.

    Mr Miller had been the victim of a sustained campaign of harassment by Lynsay Watson, a transgender constable with the Leicestershire force who was the complainant behind the arrest last week of Graham Linehan, the comedy writer.

    Watson was sacked for gross misconduct in October 2023 after being found guilty of sending more than 1,200 messages to Mr Miller over an 18-month period, branding him a “Nazi”, a “bigot” and “wife beater”.

    Yet the police, for reasons still to be explained, always do his bidding.

    Mr Miller was also accused of misgendering Watson in an article he had written about his stalking ordeal for The Critic magazine.

    He was informed he was being questioned on suspicion of a breach of the Online Safety Act, which makes it a criminal offence to send a message knowing it to be false and intending it cause non-trivial psychological or physical harm without a reasonable excuse.

    The Online Safety Act gained Royal Assent on Oct 26, 2023, the day before Mr Miller posted the tweet, but did not become law until Jan 31 last year, so could not have been applied in this case.

    Mr Miller was subsequently released with no further action.

    However, earlier this year, he submitted a formal request to Lincolnshire Police to establish how the force had recorded the incident.

    He said he was alarmed to discover it had been officially recorded as a stalking offence and a hate crime, which could show up on any enhanced DBS check.

    The letter he received stated: “The occurrence … in which you were interviewed in relation to on 20 November 2024 has been recorded as a hate crime. The crime (stalking involving serious alarm or distress) has prejudice flags attached.”

    Mr Miller said that the whole sequence of events was extremely sinister and that he had now instructed lawyers to begin legal action to have the record expunged.

    He told the Telegraph: “This incident has revealed a whole new level of insanity. I was coerced into attending an interview under caution by Lincolnshire CID under threat of arrest, and questioned about breaking a law that did not exist.

    “Additionally, without charge, caution, referral to the CPS, or bothering to tell me, the police then gave me a criminal record for the imprisonable offence of stalking, adding for good measure the additional element of hate. Imagine that coming up in an enhanced DBS check.

    “Lincolnshire Police are criminally negligent. Every officer involved in this case needs bringing before a disciplinary tribunal, and the Chief Constable must personally apologise. It won’t stop me suing them, but it will be a start.”

  • The Flanders Festival Ghent

    From the Flemish nationalist Belgian Prime Minister:

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    Full text:

    I have understandably received many questions from abroad regarding the recent decision of the Flanders Festival Ghent to ban the Munich Philharmonic on the basis of the conductor’s nationality. This decision has rightfully provoked great consternation and has been characterized as antisemitic. To impose a professional ban on someone solely because of their origin is both reckless and irresponsible. Equally troubling is the unprecedented requirement that artists provide written statements of their political views. This runs directly counter to the very essence of artistic freedom. I deeply regret the festival’s decision, which has inflicted severe damage on the reputation of our country.