Mick Hartley

Politics and Culture

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  • Just out of the bathroom

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  • Indistinguishable

    Jesus, the New York Times. Their latest, a hit piece on men-out-0f-women's-sport campaigner Riley Gaines, archived here. 

    With caps covering their hair, goggles over their eyes, and sleek suits down to their knees, the eight swimmers on the pool deck looked indistinguishable from one another. They crouched in identical poses: One foot back, head down, rear up, hands dropped forward on the starting block. Together, they waited for the starting signal….

    Indistinguishable from one another?? The guy racing against the women – Lia Thomas – is well over 6ft.

    First of all, they make you deny the evidence of your senses…

  • In Minneapolis

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    When we hear all about trans heroes – and when we don't.

  • The AMA and “gender-affirming care”

    Leor Sapir on The Broken Chain of Trust in Pediatric Gender Medicine:

    The American Medical Association (AMA) is the largest and most powerful doctors’ organization in the United States. It has also consistently supported pediatric medical transition, or “gender-affirming care,” which includes puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries administered to minors. The AMA has passed a resolution promising to protect these procedures, joined an amicus brief in a lawsuit challenging a state age-restriction law, and written a letter urging state governors to veto similar legislation.

    The AMA has done all this despite the findings from systematic reviews—the gold standard of evidence-based medicine (EBM)—of weak evidence for these treatments’ mental health benefits, and despite the corresponding health risks. In 2021, AMA board member Michael Suk publicly called pediatric transition “medically-necessary, evidence-based care.” He did so after health authorities in several European countries, including progressive Sweden and Finland, had already begun to change course and prioritize psychotherapy for pediatric gender dysphoria cases.

    Skeptics of the AMA’s position have wondered how a professional medical organization could have ignored systematic reviews. New videos, one of which was published by the Daily Wire, provide a possible answer. The videos reveal the AMA’s president, the Michigan-based otolaryngologist Bobby Mukkamala, making false claims about pediatric gender medicine and demonstrating ignorance of basic concepts in EBM. Mukkamala appears to believe that only doctors involved in medical practice can be trusted to evaluate the evidence for the treatments they perform. Where EBM sees a potential conflict of interest, the president of the AMA sees a credible source of expertise….

    Rotting from the top down.

  • Flogged in public for going to the shop

    A woman in Afghanistan – from the Times:

    Having run out of stitching supplies, Hira, a 23-year-old embroiderer, went to her local market in northern Afghanistan to buy some more.

    But what started as a routine errand led to her being punished in public by flogging, as a crowd of men jeered and loudly counted out every blow of the whip.

    Upon entering a shop, Hira was approached by Taliban soldiers who accused her of being in the market without a male guardian.

    They asked why she was speaking to a man who was not her “mahram”, or male family member, and questioned if she was there to date the shopkeeper.

    She was allowed to go home, but she and her family struggled to sleep that night, concerned about the repercussions of her encounter and the accusation of adultery.

    “I felt that this could be the end of my life and I will be stoned to death in front of hundreds of men cheering the punishment,” she told The Times.

    Since the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan in August 2021, public floggings have drastically risen, with hundreds occurring each year….

    The next morning, Hira, whose real name is being withheld, was arrested and taken to a jail. There, she was questioned by two women wearing veils and was directly accused of being a woman in public without a mahram, of interacting with a man and having an affair with him.

    She remained in jail for a week, before being brought before a Taliban court without any legal representation.

    Her denials of an improper relationship with the shopkeeper persuaded the judge not to impose a death sentence by stoning, which is among the Taliban’s penalties for adultery.

    However, Hira was convicted of appearing in the market without a male guardian and of interacting with a stranger. She was sentenced to 39 lashes.

    A crowd of men then gathered to watch her punishment, she said. “After the court’s verdict, I was taken to a public area filled with dozens of men. My face and head were covered, and I endured immense suffering and humiliation as I was whipped in front of the crowd, who loudly counted each lash,” she said.

    Overwhelmed with the pain, she cried out. Sobbing, she was then taken back to her jail cell and held there for another day to allow her wounds to heal.

    How kind.

  • Public struggle session

    From the Daily NK:

    A public struggle session was held earlier this month in Mundok county, South Pyongan province, targeting a person caught with South Korean video material.

    “A farm worker in his 50s at Oryong Farm in Mundok county was arrested during an Aug. 2 raid of his home for possessing South Korean video material,” a Daily NK source in South Pyongan province said recently. “They held a roughly two-hour public struggle session in front of all the farm workers in the yard outside the farm’s management committee office.”

    The farm worker was immediately arrested when the raid turned up a storage device containing South Korean films and music. He was then handed over to local police….

    Later, county police organized a public struggle session at the farm before the entire workforce.

    A police official revealed the farm worker’s actions and declared, “South Korea isn’t just a foreign country, but an enemy trying to plunder our nation. The cultural materials they’re trying to spread are ideological poison, and this reactionary act of poisoning even one’s own children can never be tolerated.”

    The farm workers then took turns condemning their colleague. Throughout the entire struggle session, the farm worker just stood with his head down and remained silent.

    Ring any bells?

  • Another starving child

    And again. Turkey this time:

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    The JC:

    TRT World, Turkey’s public English-language broadcaster, has used a photo of a starving Yemeni child for an article about hunger in Gaza, despite the image being almost a decade old.

    Writing on X, the network posted a link to a story under the headline "Hungry Palestinians react to UN famine declaration as Gaza crisis deepens".

    …it has emerged that it was taken in 2016 in a hospital in Hodeida, Yemen, during the famine brought about by the long-running civil war there.

    A Reuters article from September of that year, seen by the JC, features exactly the same picture under the headline “Starving children of Yemen”.

    In that piece, it was accompanied by the caption: “A malnourished boy lies on a bed at a hospital in the Red Sea port city of Houdieda, Yemen" and was credited to photographer Abduljabbar Zeyad.

    TRT’s post is still online and no public correction has yet been issued.

    It comes after a number of photos of apparently malnourished children in Gaza were published by international media, only for it to be revealed subsequently that the children in question suffered from pre-existing medical conditions.

    Any lies to blacken Israel….

  • How philosophy works

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    Full interview here.

    Background:

    Nasty open letter from philosophers to Byrne accusing him of gender wrong-think.

    Byrne's response.

    And this February essay is worth revisiting.

  • Egypt’s Gaza border

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    See here – Leaving Egypt out of the Gaza conversation.

  • The BBC defence

    The usual smug BBC response:

    The BBC has defended its use of female pronouns to describe a transgender killer who stabbed their partner to death with a samurai sword.

    Joanna Rowland-Stuart, who was born male and was known as John Stuart, attacked Andrew Rowland-Stuart at their Brighton home in 2024, in what a jury found was an unlawful killing.

    He stabbed and sliced his partner more than 50 times before replacing the sword in its sheath on a stand. Women don't, on the whole, do this kind of stuff. Men do, though.

    In a written response, the broadcaster’s Executive Complaints Unit (ECU) said: “The BBC recognises the debate around sex and gender identity involves deeply held and sometimes conflicting views. The BBC’s approach, therefore, is to use terminology which is clear and appropriate to the context.”

    By calling a man a woman. Very clear and appropriate to the context.

    The ECU said the language had been appropriate because Rowland-Stuart was referred to as a woman throughout the trial.

    Some complainants said that the BBC’s choice of language was evidence of its “clear deference to gender identity ideology”. However, it said: “Respecting an individual’s chosen gender identity does not mean the BBC is endorsing or supporting any side of the debate around transgender rights.”

    Respecting an individual’s chosen gender identity somehow loses its "be kind" power when you're reporting on a brutal murder.