Mick Hartley

Politics and Culture

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  • A tale of two reports

    More from Kathleen Stock on the latest Sullivan Report:

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    It's interesting that we've had two reports in the past week or so on a couple of professions where, more than any others perhaps, you'd expect the best of our lovely liberal graduates to gravitate, keen to help spread their enlightened ideas for the benefit of the rest of us. That is, publishing last week, and academia today. Both reports have revealed the the foulest and most vicious abuse aimed at those who've refused to accept the gender ideology that's come to rule in progressive circles. Comparisons with Stalin's Russia and show trials don't seem misplaced to me. No, no one's been led out to be shot, but this is as near as it gets in modern Britain.

    I made the comparison to Lysenko a few months back. It's a grim lesson in the power of ideology – and the sheer unashamed glee with which people seize the chance to bully and persecute "outsider" others when given the chance.

  • Pride in Surrey speak out

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  • “We want to live”

    Moumen al-Natour at the JC – If a ceasefire leaves Hamas in power, they’ll kill Gazans like me:

    The prospects of a permanent ceasefire drift through the shattered windows of my home in Gaza City. But for tens of thousands of Gazans like me – who have long protested against Hamas and called for their removal from power – the chance of a fragile peace comes with a sense of looming danger.

    I was 11 when Hamas seized control of Gaza in 2007. At 23, I co-organised my first protest under the slogan “We Want to Live”. For that “crime”, I was imprisoned and tortured multiple times. Today, at 29, after speaking out once again during Hamas’s war with Israel, I know there will be no leniency if the ceasefire takes effect.

    Hamas’s crackdown on dissent is intensifying. Over a dozen people have been killed in recent weeks – one of them a dear friend. Others have had their limbs broken in brutal acts of intimidation. As soon as the ceasefire is announced, Hamas militants will rise from their tunnels, hungry for revenge. Hit lists are already circulating on Telegram.

    This is not a cry for pity – it is a warning. If Hamas is allowed to keep paying its fighters and civil servants in Gaza from the comfort of Doha, then the countdown to another October 7 has already begun. The only way to truly defeat Hamas is to build a civil alternative – a government for and by the people of Gaza, firmly opposed to Hamas’s rule. In the shadow of Yahya Sinwar’s suicidal war, a growing number of us believe this tragic cycle can finally be broken.

    Our grassroots movement wants a real and lasting peace with Israel, not just a ceasefire. We want the Israeli hostages to go home to their families. We want to end the corruption and repression of Hamas, just as we want freedom from Israeli control. We want jobs. We want education. We want to live.

    Not if Palestine Action and all the associated Hamas fan boys have their way. 

    The urgency of addressing Gaza’s aid problem relates, in turn, to the reason the GHF was established to begin with: the bitter legacy of Hamas’s theft and exploitation of humanitarian aid. Since the war began, I have been forced to purchase on the black market, at exorbitant prices, food from donor nations in boxes marked explicitly “not for sale”. Hamas bears responsibility for this tragedy: it diverted aid to fuel its war machine and feed its loyalists, such that it did not reach the people who needed it most. Hamas is desperate to regain control over aid distribution in order to maintain this unjust system which perpetuates Gazan suffering….

    After the war, in a “safe zone”, we must begin to rebuild a society that believes in peace. We need a new curriculum, one that eliminates extremist ideologies. We need a new intellectual revolution before we can even begin to talk about long-term political solutions.

    So that's goodbye to all those UNRWA schools, then. Goodbye to UNRWA altogether.

    Well, good luck. It's not just Hamas you have to overcome, it's much of world opinion – from the UN on down.

  • Boosting their sense of responsibility

    One consequence of the recent disastrous launch of a North Korean warship: unpaid overtime:

    Workers at Sinpo Shipyard have been forced to work unpaid overtime to “boost their sense of responsibility.” This follows North Korea’s failed destroyer launch at Chongjin Shipyard and the arrest of several people blamed for the disaster.

    Workers are complaining that the new policy is unnecessary and hurts their ability to make a living.

    According to a Daily NK source in South Hamgyong province, Sinpo Shipyard’s party committee held an internal meeting where they told workers to “boost their sense of responsibility” to prevent incidents like the failed destroyer launch. They called the accident at Chongjin Shipyard “a shame on shipyard workers everywhere.”

    The shipyard’s party committee ordered mandatory overtime for all work teams and required workers to carefully document their daily activities in journals.

    “Going home right after work shows you lack revolutionary spirit,” officials said, ordering party cell secretaries to report on workers’ attitudes, what time they leave, and whether they skip work without permission.

    It might all make sense if the shipyard was loaded with work – but there's nothing to do.

    “Sinpo Shipyard workers can’t leave on time anymore and have to stay an extra hour or two every day doing busy work, but they don’t get paid for the overtime and don’t get extra food rations,” the source said. “Officials demand that workers look busy even when there’s nothing to do, which is making everyone more frustrated.”

    “We usually kill time during regular hours doing odd jobs since there’s no real work anyway, and now officials watch us to make sure we stay late,” one Sinpo Shipyard worker said. “It would be fine if there was actual work to do, but I feel awful having to pretend I’m busy just to avoid getting in trouble for leaving when there’s nothing to do.”

    Workers are especially angry about the forced overtime because it directly hurts their families’ income.

    “Everyone’s complaining that they need to help their wives at the market after work, but now they can’t because of the extended hours. Many people are saying workers are suffering just so the party committee can impress their bosses,” the source said.

    In other words, workers who can barely survive on what their wives earn at markets—since shipyard salaries aren’t enough—are openly complaining about overtime policies designed mainly to make party officials look good.

  • The academic hounding of gender-criticals

    From the Times:

    Universities are undermining work by academics on puberty blockers and are failing to tackle harassment against those who hold gender-critical views, according to a new report.

    A review led by Alice Sullivan, a professor of sociology at University College London, found that free speech and academic freedom have come “under attack” at UK universities.

    It claims there is systemic suppression of free speech and academic research in universities, with academics bullied by co-ordinated campaigns. This is exacerbated by university red tape and management in thrall to activist groups, the review said.

    Staff said they had had promotions blocked, been forced to work in a hostile culture and had self-censored because of treatment by colleagues….

    Examples include well-known figures including Kathleen Stock and Jo Phoenix, but also James Caspian, whose research on detransitioning was blocked by Bath Spa University, which suggested he “rethink his thesis”. The university cited reputational concerns about its conclusions.

    Another researcher was criticised for using the term “opposite sex” in their work, saying this is sexist, homophobic, transphobic and biologically incorrect.

    The report heard evidence that abuse included comparing those who believe sex is binary to eugenicists, racists, colonialists or fascists.

    It said: “Toxicity is generated by behaviours rather than by conflicting viewpoints as such. The staff involved in such behaviours constitute a small minority of university staff, yet the effects of tolerating and encouraging these behaviours are serious.”

    The pathetic university authorities just didn't have the courage to confront the trans activists. Ideology won, while science and common sense lost out.

    Another academic, Sallie Baxendale, experienced repeated rejection of her work on the impact of suppressing puberty on neuropsychological function, saying: “I have never encountered the kinds of concerns that some of the reviewers expressed in response to my review of puberty blockers. It wasn’t the methods they objected to, it was the actual findings.”

    The report is here. Note, this is the second part of the Sullivan Review.

    And here's commentary from Sullivan herself:

    In the past decade, British academics have been attacked, vilified and ostracised simply for asserting that sex is real, binary and important. They include Kathleen Stock, compelled to resign from the University of Sussex after a sustained campaign of intimidation, and Michele Moore, abandoned by London South Bank University and forced to use a kitchen annexe for an office after shining a light on abuses at the Tavistock Clinic.

    In a climate where people are frightened to express their views or even to ask questions, universities have a responsibility to act as bastions of critical analysis, where reasoned debate and the pursuit of knowledge thrive. This is not only about protecting individuals but also the integrity of scientific research and scholarship.

    Instead, universities have, perhaps unwittingly, institutionalised behaviours which undermine free speech and inquiry. Equality, diversity and inclusion policies and networks have been turned against groups they are supposed to protect, including women and particularly lesbians….

    Sex is a fundamental category in all research concerning humans, from biology to sociology. When certain facts become unspeakable, it doesn’t just hurt individuals, it compromises the integrity of scholarship. This weakens public trust in universities, science and scholarship, and ultimately undermines our democracy. At a time when higher education faces grave financial difficulties, my recommendations provide an opportunity for vice-chancellors to cut bureaucratic bloat and promote research integrity — a win-win for the sector.

    Added:

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    Full text:

    The point is not the harms to us, personally – I for one am very glad I ended up on the right side of history, when the wrong side was sterilising minors and chopping sexual organs out, putting sex-offending men in women's prisons, and pushing women athletes out of competition. The point is the effect of this intensely hostile environment – the research dropped, the talks not given, the lips bitten and the things not said. With Office for Student's new guidance in place, let's hope these poisonous tactics get rooted out of our research institutions, along with (eventually) the senior academics who instigated and facilitated them.

  • UPenn to ban men from women’s sport

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    Article here:

    The US Department of Education announced the agreement, saying the Ivy League institution would apologise and restore to female athletes titles and records that were "misappropriated by male athletes".

    The university said it would update its records set during the 2021–22 season to "indicate who would now hold the records under current eligibility guidelines", but it did not say whether Thomas' records would be erased.

    Thomas became the first trans athlete to win the highest US national college title in March 2022.

    The deal marks the latest development in President Donald Trump's crackdown on transgender athletes participating in sports. He signed an executive order days after coming into office that sought to prevent transgender women from competing in female categories of sports.

    The university was among several that his administration opened investigations into over possible violations of Title IX, a 1972 civil rights law that bans sex-based discrimination in any education programme or activity that receives federal funding.

    Two months later, the Trump administration paused $175m (£127m) in federal funding to the college over its transgender athlete policy.

    Under Tuesday's deal, the university must stick to "biology-based definitions" of male and female, in line with the president's executive orders, said the education department.

    The headline is misleading in a typical BBC slant. Athletes like Lia Thomas aren't being banned just because they're transgender, but because they're men unfairly competing against women  – where they have a huge physical advantage. That's the problem, and that's why anyone not blinded by trans ideology can clearly see how outrageous this whole farce has been. If it took Trump to end it, well….good for Trump.

  • Hamas and the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation

    From the Jerusalem Post:

    Gazans present at humanitarian aid distribution sites testified that Hamas carries out acts of terror, propaganda, and psychological manipulation against civilians at aid sites, COGAT (Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories) said on Tuesday.

    The audio recordings released by COGAT reveal that Hamas seeks to disrupt the distribution of food packages at the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) aid distribution sites.

    Gazans say that Hamas fires at residents near aid distribution sites and spreads false claims about IDF fire, as well as publishes "fabricated data about large numbers of casualties," through fake footage, COGAT said.

    The GHF disclosed on Monday that Hamas had placed bounties on American security workers in the enclave, and that 12 of the organization's local staff members had been murdered by Hamas.

    “Hamas has placed bounties on both our American security personnel and Palestinian aid workers, offering cash rewards to anyone who injures or kills them,” the GHF statement said.

    The aid organization acknowledged the reports that the Hamas terror group has been targeting its personnel, staff, and aid workers.

    It announced that 12 of its local staff have been murdered, and others have been tortured.

    Well this is a huge surprise.

    No doubt the BBC will be covering the story very shortly….

  • Stephen Ireland and Pride in Surrey

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    Jill Foster's Telegraph article here:

    Surrey County Council has, according to a Freedom of Information request, funded Pride in Surrey to the tune of more than £140,000 for various events and projects since 2020, including £24,275 for the year 2024-2025. Earlier this month, weeks after Ireland’s conviction, Guildford Borough Council announced that “Surrey Pride will be returning to Guildford” for a parade in September – the sixth annual Pride event in Surrey, and the second time it has taken place in Guildford. It included a hyperlink to the website of Pride in Surrey.

    The decision astonished those who had been trying to raise the alarm.

    “I contacted Guildford Borough Council after the news about him being arrested and about the level of charges, and they didn’t want to listen,” says Harding.

    “I emailed Zöe Franklin [Lib Dem MP for Guildford] and Julia McShane [Lib Dem leader of the council] asking how they could let this event go ahead. Again, I got a very bland reply from Zöe that what was happening in court had nothing to do with the current Pride in Surrey.

    “It was like they were rubbing salt in the wound, allowing them to have a Pride in Guildford again this year. There’s an awful lot of bad feeling within the community in Guildford and those of us who are Guildford Borough Council taxpayers are thinking: ‘What are you doing?’”

    Franklin and McShane say they were not aware of any concerns about Ireland before his arrest.

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    Very similar dynamic to Jimmy Savile, strikes me.

  • Cowardice and fear

    Why are so many institutions, from the NHS on down, doing their best to ignore the Supreme Court's unequivocal ruling on single-sex spaces? Jo Bartosch:

    What’s behind the mass law breaking isn’t confusion, it’s cowardice and fear. For over a decade, trans ideology has festered in internal staff networks and been funnelled into institutions by external training providers. Backpeddling is not only humiliating for the well-meaning dullards who ushered these changes in, it’s potentially explosive in workplaces where grievance-hoarding zealots have been allowed to dictate policy for years.

    These same activists genuinely believe that being contradicted by reality is discrimination. In such a climate, following the law requires a backbone….

    And there, in a nutshell, is the problem.

  • Crowds

    Howard Jacobson, at UnHerd, on Glastonbury:

    It’s the agglomeration that should worry us more than whether or not the BBC should have pulled the plug or the police should take action. How do you take action against however many thousands were complicit — not by their silence but by their enthusiastic collaboration in Bob Vylan’s call for death to Israeli soldiers? And it’s those complicit thousands we should worry about. Is there any expression of hate they wouldn’t accede to once the festival madness is upon them?

    In their submission to the authority of the performer on the stage, in their arm waving and obedient chanting, are they not reminiscent of the crowds that filled marching squares and beer halls not that many years ago? I say no more than “reminiscent”. I don’t claim that Glastonbury is Munich. And I don’t even say that what crowds will sing about euphorically one day, they will put into murderous effect the next. But music and crowds are a lethal mix, carrying us away, taking us out of our shivering individual selves into the warm arms of comrades who feel and believe as we do. Sacha Baron Cohen’s endearingly racist Borat famously persuaded a group of drinkers in an Arizona bar to join him in singing “Throw the Jews down the well”. For all the bemused discomfort some of the drinkers clearly felt, they were unable to resist Borat’s appeal. Who wants to be a party pooper? History teaches that the impulse toward individuation was a long time coming; it further teaches that it takes no time at all for that impulse to go into reverse.

    Jacobson draws some comfort from the theatre, where the power of art – we hope – overrides the power of the crowd.

    In fact, there is a marvellous play on in London at present — Giant, in which the Jew-obsessed children’s writer Roald Dahl is given enough rope to hang himself 10 times over and manages it even more than that without trying. He delivers far more bitter diatribes against Israel than Bob Vylan and Kneecap manage because he has more words. What makes the play art as opposed to propaganda is its dramatic form, questioning, testing, playing this off against that, weighing all that’s said in the light of the speakers’ psychic compulsion to say it. When Dahl’s self-destruction reaches its apotheosis in a riff of violent Jew mania that makes the Glastonbury lot sound like kindergarten name-callers, the audience audibly gasps. Gasps.

    I take great comfort from that gasp. Somewhere, what is shocking still shocks. Somewhere, the individual heart still refuses the blandishments of the mob. Unfortunately, terrifyingly, that somewhere isn’t Glastonbury.

    Yes, but the theatre is not always such a beacon of the individual conscience against the power of the mob. Take for instance Caryl Churchill's deeply unpleasant little diatribe Seven Jewish Children, which Jacobson himself so eloquently demolished….