Triggering

[Pale Rider]

This may not be the thread for you, shep, so why not take your chewy toy out into the garden?

Are pack animals aware they're in a pack, I wonder? Meaning, can they even conceive of a life outside of it?

The Naughty Corner Gang tend to growl when invited outside their comfort zone.

[Pale Rider]

The qualification, "a former student activist" is added to his name after every mention on the BBC. Why?

Quote for NACA members: "staying in the comfort zone of speaking only with those who think the same as you can be satisfying, but it does not help make change."

<ahem.>

You are largely full of sh*t
But it doesn't bother me one bit

Could this be the beginning of a Pale Rider Ode to TheClaud or something. A few iambic pentameters and the poet laureate's job is yours.

Time to fill my coffee cup
Now that I have stirred things up

The game's about opinions, innit?

That's the dance for joint posts of the day, in a controversial split decision.

Context, as ever. There are various liberal and rationalist reasons for favouring gender neutral language, especially for describing things or for generic usages, which are sometimes persuasive and sometimes not, and there is the usual hysterical* backlash whenever language change aimed at some form of equality is advocated. But much more interesting is the fact that we can choose our words, and therefore we have the power to make interventions in meaning, especially by choosing words that draw attention to themselves. Shep intuitively grasps this with her use of 'bird' above.

* Fortunately no longer recognized by authorities as a medical disorder.

[Pale Rider]

We've got to talk about mudsticks.

Thoughtful, yes.

"Salt of the earth" even as she sows the crops to feed a hungry nation.

And yet.

As you read every sentence, formatted for best effect, you begin to discern an ego supposedly lacking in the female sex.

For really, does it not take the opposite of a soupçon of ego to assume that your "curiosity… ignited by a desire for greater knowing" is not matched by your antagonists?

Hmmm?


Word of the day: rubicund

[Pale Rider]

[something that doesn't matter here. The reply has been alighted upon because fozy chose a word that a search tells me has never before been used in the history of CycleChat. See if you can spot it.]

And this isn't much better when, with the merest smidgen of creative jouissance you could have replaced the text with something like "Can we leave the Northern Ireland protocol to another time, Boris? I've a long drive to Barnard Castle tomorrow, and can't seem to shake this bastard cold?"

Let’s Talk About Jouissance, Baby!
Wrong fork in the road, but let's go anyway.

to think, elsewhere we were discussing people learning and possibly changing their view point. They can’t even smile together.

POTD

[Pale Rider]

This thread is a good reminder that I must decide soon who to add to my ignore list for 2022....

The best that can be said about this is he’s not letting an algorithm do the work for him.

[Pale Rider]

You people find this comical?

Fish puns that is. Fish aren't intrinsically comical, unlike say monkeys

Fleeing yet more puns

so it takes a concerted effort. Puns are people tricks. Just like that monkey was probably tortured for our edification, so is the language mangled for a laff. Then again, language was built for mangling. That's how we get words like laff.

Shep is either a fish out of water or a large fish in a small barrel, take your pick.

[Pale Rider]

Can a woman have a penis?

Yes but it's none of your damn business for most purposes. Is there a potential conflict in some areas of life including the competitive sport that is the subject of this thread? Yes, but it’s not based on penis possession.

What is the conflict based on, in your opinion

Fear, I think. I’m not dismissive of that - if you feel it, you feel it - but I do tend to take a steer from the women I’m closest to. They’re not particularly bothered by the bathroom thing so I find I’m not either.

Nothing to see, move along.

I cannot imagine a trans woman who does not conform to standard female anatomy standing around blatantly naked in front of others.

No need to imagine when reality is staring us in the face.

it's pointless to the point of downright harmful to attempt these kinds of discussions on the internet…

"These kinds" of discussions on the internet are pointless, even harmful, got it? Doubtless because they only serve to

amplify fear, division, and stoke up the 'culture war’.

I know actual real life transwomen and they would never do anything this.

So hush. Because acquaintances. Suck it up, buttercups.

If I may be so bold as to imagine mudsticks' take on this story: Rape is the problem, not trans women housed with female prisoners.

There's always someone making deliberately juvenile attempts to bring it down to 'Hee hee a woman with a willy' [You rang?] discussions.

But then women suffer enough 'body policing' as it is, so I guess it's just another element of that.

Are we talking about policing women's bodies here? Honestly?

Anyway, I'm a fool for joining in.

Half right.

It's not just in elite cycling that this is an issue. Here's yesterday's results from the Tweedlove Enjoyro comp in Peebles. The E bike Women's category race was won by a biological male:

Nobody’s interested in this little non-issue, AS.

This is the kind of event that gets women into racing, rather than just riding for fun. Allowing males to enter the female categories will put off women from bothering to enter at all.

And as easily as that, women are gently ushered out of competitive sport. No aggression, no coercion. Just make it not worth even trying.

[Pale Rider]

Am I behind the times or what? It looks like my co-namesake left months ago.

Hats off for managing to quit, assuming you didn't go and die instead, in which case

It’s hard. Quitting forums, that is. Even getting booted off hasn't done the trick for me.

[Pale Rider]

Twitter under Musk

Will people desert in droves or will it become (as I fear) a magnet for the righteous right?

Heads, the righteous right. Tails, the lofty left.

I might join twitter just so I can flounce-off on principle of something or other….

Oh, so you don't have an account. Just afeared in principle there'll be more opportunities for wrongthink.

He's going to ruin it for everyone isn't he? He's going to put in an edit button, I just know it.

As opposed to just ruining it for those who have to self-edit even before typing to keep from getting banned for not following the company line.

It means that you should be allowed to express your opinion, not that your opinion should make you immune from the consequences.

'Consequences' are particularly beloved of activists who have no great love of freedom of speech.

Marina Hyde is a genius. This quote from the article by her completely summarises, better than I ever could, my own disillusionment with this particular forum.

"If you spend your day caught up in online fighting, it’s preferable to tell yourself you’re involved in consciousness-raising for your cause. An alternative view is that you are simply obsessively polarising your particular debate, to the point where compromise – boring, unfashionable, yet historically always necessary – becomes a more distant possibility."

.....and the Real Tennis analogy.

I'm sure we can all think of examples where compromise isn't possible, but sure, let's be reasonable and keep from getting too het up about anything.

Thanks for sending me on a rabbit hole into tennis though.

Elon Musk is a twat.

Reuters reckon he probably can't be arsed with it anyway.

Twat.

Humour me, why is this so important then?

Isn't free speech a good thing?

There's always the 'off' button don't forget.

I don't accept the premise of the question. The person about to answer you doesn't have a discernable sense of humour (either).

Some less educated people will fall for an easy lie to in place of discovering the more complicated by truth. Eg "taking back control"

Especially if it plays to their already formed prejudices, or unconcious biases.

Guess who just made it onto my shortlist for people I wouldn't want in charge of figuring out who's educated to the required standard for uncensored tweeting.

Twitter, TicTok, if they're all so bad why use them?

Because I can just ignore the misinformation and abuse and read the stuff I am interested in. Like I do with NACA.

Ignore misinformation and abuse? You mean the fun parts?

Every time someone complains about the Independent paywall it makes me feel like some sort of genius hacking savant.

That made me laugh, but more droll is the notion that the Independent still publishes anything worth paying for.

there comes a point at which it starts to feel like playing chess with pigeons

I've got this idea in my head that I'm not really very tech savvy compared with most.

Moments like this make me feel like a modern day Ada Lovelace

Whereas I feel like a modern day Linda Lovelace…

Not sure I follow. Are you saying you're unfulfilled unless a fanciful sexual organ south of your tonsils is nudged? Or do you feel a kinship with the abused adult film star turned born again Christian anti porn crusader? Perhaps I'm being too literal and what you're getting at is technology is constantly shoved down our throats.

Asking why people look at twitter is like asking why people look at the internet, it really is very diverse. It has people from pretty much every imaginable walk of life, you can chose to read what they have to say, and engage with them, or not.

Next you'll be telling me lurking isn't engaging.

[Pale Rider]

The Good News Only thread

Well surprise surprise, the Tory gammonarty and the right wing press are yet again out of step with public opinion.....

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/may/01/four-in-five-people-in-the-uk-believe-in-being-woke-to-race-and-social-justice?

Almost makes you feel errr....proud to be British'ish....

What is interesting in the report is that it uses the word 'elites' 9 times, and yes I have just spent some time reading the whole report, but never once tells us who the 'elites' are.

I assume that is anyone elected to political office or who is qualified as a journalist?

While a lot of people who pick up the Guardian* do lose their critical reading skills, excuse me while I double-check that figure. The report in question was The Centre Holds (why didn't they link to it?). Actually 'elites' was only used 4 or 5 times, if you don't count headings/essentially duplicated language. Judging by context, "anyone elected to political office or who is qualified as a journalist" would be a fair guess.

With continued pressure from elites, we know that the common ground can splinter. We have seen this happen under Trump in the States, and the beginnings of such division in the UK over Brexit.

People want to feel part of a tribe, and Social Identity Theory suggests that people are inclined to view theirs as superior to others. It feeds our self-esteem and sense of belonging in an increasingly turbulent and atomised world. Politicians know they can exploit that for their own ends, as well as the press.

--

Over two thirds of voters believe that elites are undermining unity and amplifying division. We know media outlets have an incentive to sensationalise splits to grow their audiences, whilst politicians can profit from weaponising division against their opponents.

--

However, people believe that political elites are undermining this consensus in Britain, with over two thirds blaming politicians, journalists and social media.

I wouldn't expect much in the way of a discussion.

Protestations to the contrary,

I'm not here on earth to persuade anyone else of my view, prosletise, or convert anyone to my way of thinking.

this thread mostly exists for the OP and friends to feel good about their worldview. Any contributions which threaten this are discouraged, sanctions ranging from a paucity of likes to a heavy stomping of feet.

No, not in heels.

A man has been blocked from competing against women in the Omnium.

She's a trans woman. Get out of here with your misgendering transphobic bullshit. Honestly, on the 'good news' thread? You should be ashamed of yourself.

please don’t debase the issue by calling her a man. She’s not a man.

Whether she should be allowed to complete against biological females is a separate issue which we have discussed numerous times. The conclusion of the discussion tends to be that it’s impossible to square that circle without compromising one group in favour of another.

If you want to discuss it further then start a new thread.

So far we've demonstrated many times over that there isn't sufficient knowledge sensitivity or space on these boards to discuss this matter properly…

No transphobic speech on the 'Good News' thread.

Ta very much

You were quite rightly pulled up for calling her a man. Whether or not she should be allowed to compete against other women is a different, more nuanced issue, calling her a man is just trolling or being ignorant.

Spoiler

please don’t debase the issue by calling her a man. She’s not a man.

I reckon it is impossible to say what he or she is. After all, Biden is nominating a woman (whatever that means) for the Supreme Court who cannot answer the question what a woman is. One assumes Biden must have had some idea what this difficult word means when proposing her. Not easy in this enlightened age.

It's a perfectly legitimate discussion to have, but it should be one that's possible to have without resorting to transphobia.

You need to define transphobia, as the ~phobia suffix is added it seems to me where any criticism, however reasoned, can be safely ignored as 'hate' speech. Emoting triumphs over thinking. You only need to see the verbal abuse and reviling of J K Rowling for an example of this.

I have to agree with PaulB that this is good news for women's sport and I find it extraordinary when women don't agree with this.

Answer came there none.

[close]

Could the transphobes please start their own thread so I can put it on ignore? It would save this one from being polluted any more than it has been.

Thank you.

More good news on the men cycling as women front when a leading female former cyclist gives her views on this topic...

Apologies it's in the Heil but it's all her own work! https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10680099/Olympic-gold-medallist-NICOLE-COOKE-hero-trans-woman-bravely-speaks-out.html

I'm just posting this message as a reminder to myself that this is an unmoderated forum, we'd all like to keep it open, and there's no need to chase a point about which I have already made my feelings unequivocally clear.

I spotted your two deliberate attempts at transphobic controversy there.

Nicole Cooke's article a bit too much for you then?

I think the issue with posting it in this thread is triumphalism over the decision about Bridges. Foodie has started another thread on the topic.

Translated for mudsticks: triumphalism in a Good News thread .

THE TRANS ATHELETE THREAD IS OVER THERE ----->>>>>

The naughty corner of the naughty corner, if you will.

The good news will be if and when they find a way for all athletes, be they cis or trans, male or female, to compete properly at a level and with a degree of fairness and respect that everybody is happy with.

While this is a small crowd pleaser, it is of course ridiculous. The good news is we have already arrived at an equitable system, provided we set aside misdirections like 'cis' and accept that we're not going to be able to please those who believe sports can be a competition between gendered souls rather than physical bodies.

The thread was chiefly worth panning for this nugget:

Perhaps the first philosopher of mutual aid - Mozi. Another carpenter changed by history.



As far as I can make out, the only original words of Jesus preserved intact are 'get up girl' - Michael Jackson's loose translation from the Aramaic - Mark 5.41

There was also amusement to be had in this passage, and what I'm going to interpret from the reactions as some revelation being at hand.


* Excuse the anachronism: click into. As part of a balanced diet it's fine. I count 21 Guardian links as of post #349 - by far the most linked-to source of Good News.