Get smart

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

Steph and Multitool are in charge of both mis- and disinformation at YACF and CycleChat respectively.

It’s hard to win an argument with a smart person but it’s impossible to win one with an idiot.

- An Ovarit improvement on a Bill Murray quote.

Plenty of people are kind of stupid



when it comes to gendermentalism. To be uninformed is one thing: to be wilfully blind to the destruction of women's rights and liberal values makes you truly worthy of the epithet.

It appears that anyone sensible has bailed from the YACF discussion, rendering it affirmation-only, which is to say, moribund. Actually I don't know how many sensible contributors there ever were. Must have been a few.

CycleChat also settled into a single huge thread. There's more deviation from the 'progressive' line, but it recently lost its beacon of sanity in the form of AuroraSaab. I've covered it far more extensively than it deserves.

Why do I care about this so much?

It's pretty much the proxy for a large set of ideological battles and if you engage on any one of them you end up mired in trans stuff.

Genderism (the realityphobic belief that how you present or feel determines your sex), particularly the way it has poisoned discourse, is why I'm shy about contributing to political discussions at Yet Another Captured Forum. One of its key tenets is censorship: what's the point of posting if your post can be deleted without explanation? Doubtless I'm considered a troll on this subject in addition to being a useful idiot for the far right. As it also got me banned at CycleChat and CyclingUK (technically my crime was posting about them elsewhere), it turns out to be a hill I'm willing to die on.

[Confederacy of Dunces] refers to an epigram from Jonathan Swift's essay Thoughts on Various Subjects, Moral and Diverting: "When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."

Epic jokes aside, sometimes it really does feel as if there's a plot against those willing to think through the ramifications of swallowing one lie after another. "Educate yourself!" goes the cry from the other side, but like so many other words, this too has been redefined. What they mean is, fill your head with some of the stupidest stuff imaginable.

'Come on over' is also kind of a joke. Still, I've left the light on.



Calling people stupid isn't exactly building that golden bridge, which is why I'm only doing it here at home, safe in the knowledge that I'm talking to someone who knows perfectly well he doesn't hurl childish abuse in a debate. And now I've slipped into illeism, my word for the day.

I don't gain satisfaction from insults. I do want to be able to use words that fit. It can be a struggle.

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

It's open season on trans people women

Magnificent response today from my man Beau to the challenge "tell me I'm wrong without calling me a bigot.'

Wow.
Thanks for sharing. That was awesome

Yes, thanks for sharing.

He's a dodgy bloke with a messy personal history.

Why is she calling Beau a dodgy bloke? I wondered, not bothered about a messy personal history, which strikes me as the human condition. After reading this and associated links, the mystery was solved. Perhaps I could find it in my heart to overlook the human trafficking if what he was saying was truly wow-worthy in a good way, but it really isn't.

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

Clicky for lectiophiles.

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

I'll be abandoning the Nazi count begun here and adding 'em here as they pop up.



This thread exists because it's open season on rational people at Yacf.

Terfs unable to fill in paperwork correctly for forming political party ...

https://www.thepinknews.com/2023/09/29/posie-parker-party-of-women-rejected-electoral-commission/

Probably for the same reason that Britain First were rejected, viz. the Electoral Commission doesn’t like forms filled in with a crayon.

Well, I know who I'm not voting for.


As for PrickNews as a news source...

On the subject of political parties:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66935750

The Greens are being sued into poverty by a leadership candidate who says he was forced out for being gender-critical.

Are the Greens still courting the non-male vote?

I am amused that a grifter flogging tat and directly funded from abroad by far right groups...

Good old reliable Steph:

micro-Nuremberg x1
Avon Braun x1

On the subject of grifters you've got your majors, like drug companies, and your entrepreneurs:

“Men Trapped in Men’s Bodies”

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

Cycling forums aren't the best use of my time. They only ever let me down. Yet I persist. Cue famous saying by anonymous drunk.

Speaking of timesucks:

The people here making all the snide comments saying "You've got a whole thread for that" need to check their privilege.

They find trans people icky.

Trans people are looking at all of their rights as human beings being removed and their ability to exist in public eliminated.

It would be interesting to know the reason for confining THE TRANS to a single thread. Isn't that kind of... othering?

The "icky" comment is par for the course. I'm confident nobody on the forum has said anything like that. It does, however, show some self-awareness.

Spoiler

[close]

That image didn't take any sleuthing to find.

Just finished uploading the manuscript and publishing the latest novel, a bit of a departure for me as it is about a man and written from his point of view… [They say write what you know. - Ed.] The title is "A Longer War" by S.A.A. Calvert

While I think any man should feel free to wear lipstick and something flowery with straps if his heart desires, this particular man says he's a woman and insists on invading women's spaces, which I do find "icky". Any rights he presently has to LARP in inappropriate settings should indeed be eliminated.

I will have to do my best not to get ill again, because I am now banned from the appropriate ward in hospital.

If you want to be informed about this, exit his reality distortion field.

It took a woman being raped for this to even be spoken about. The woman was gaslit for a year as NHS staff told police she couldn’t have been raped as ‘no men on the ward’

~Usual disclaimer that trans identifying men aren't ipso facto rapists~

I've heard that good men stay out so bad men stand out. Sounds about right.

Gender for the 8,622th time

TBH if you are an inpatient in hospital it's likely that the gender of the person helping you is the last thing on your mind.

Meet Ms Steele.

I agree, but that's from a mans perspective. Some patients would much prefer, even insist that only the same sex person does the intimate care. Its not an unreasonable request

I'd say Andy is someone else who's wasting his time, but he's not. The obvious bears repeating to drill through the thickest of skulls.

[She's back!]

Monkers too – Steph's soul<cough>sister.

And around and around we go.

Almost forgot Godwin:

sieg heiling x1

[Librarian]

POTD, please Roger.

If he won't, I will.

I very rarely enter this thread now because I feel I have enough factual knowledge to hold an informed view,

Hit me with your factual knowledge, I can take it!

and to be fair that view hasn't changed hugely and I dont think it is a good use of my time.

Wonder if I'm going to at least rate an "inspired by" credit.

TBH I'm all atingle – nearly washed my {quite clean} hands, but they enjoyed feeling dirty. This will make sense in a minute.

I've researched all points of view

Sounds comprehensive.

including the actual silent majority who just don't think the existence of TW is a sizeable enough threat to cis women to make it even worth discussing.

Tell me, does LALALALA CAN'T HEAR YOU play a part in your research methods?

We know there are outliers, tw who have attacked women in women's spaces, but these are outliers, and as a % of attacks on women in women's spaces they amount to nothing.

Great news for the nothings who have been attacked. Acceptable losses. Gotcha.

The greatest danger to cis women in prisons are other cis women, and so on. 

You know when you say "cis" I just mentally cross it out, as do most people not in your cult.

WRT sport I feel there is a way to go because it looks likely there are retained advantages in some cases,

It's a pity it took sports to garner widespread attention to what's been going on, but we'll take it.

maybe physical but also financial. I don't think it is the most urgent issue in women's sport, but fairness has to extend to everybody, not just the elite.

Just parking this here.

If you're a little short of time, clicking here will give you the general idea.

What I want to talk about today are the utter weirdoes that constitute the anti-trans gender critical brigade.

FTFY. Gender critical is often confused with "anti-trans" by those who regard anything less than 100% compliance with trans rights activist demands as bigotry.

I'm not talking about the professional bigots like Helen Joyce, Kathleen Stock and that swimmer woman,  those deeply cynical people who rely on exposure and have realised that the trans 'debate' is a really easy way to gain exposure and therefore money.

Have you actually read Helen and Kathleen? I don't mean paraphrased tweets. I mean context and everything.

It strikes me I may be going too fast. Can you read? Because I'm starting to have my doubts that you have much more than a child’s grasp and understanding of words.

B is for bitch. Like "that swimmer woman" (really polishing those researcher credentials), amirite?

I'm talking about thr amateur bigots who try and emulate them. Have you come across these people? Either their youtube channels or their blogs and so on.

I would not let THESE people within 30 feet of my children. 

I wouldn't let you within 30 feet of a goldfish.

I've come to realise that for these people the obsession over TW (it's always TW)

Why do you think men who say they're women are a particular concern? Any theories?

is actually the manifestation of their own mental illness. They have some sort of obsessive disorder.

Shy about us continuing to shine a spotlight on this dribbly madness?

I'll give you this: obsession does appear to be a genuine case of bothsidesism. Anyone who wants to be truly informed rather than just spoken at does so at the risk of making it something of a speciality. Better that than to be an ill-educated fool about an array of topics, I think.

The reality is these are the people with the same borderline characteristics that lead them to any of the internet-driven conspiracy theories (because, make no mistake, the anti-trans movement is a conspiracy theory)

I see you've looked into this with your usual thoroughness.

But, like all people with mental illness/disorder, they may not be able to stop it. It is a compulsion after all.

We get it. You read my candid post about OCD and used it as ammunition.

So I beseech these people: focus your obsessive personality somewhere where it does not cause harm to others. Try train spotting, heavy metal or embroidery.

I suppose I could work on an embroidered codpiece for the emperor's autumn collection.

And if all else fails, you can just get to fuck instead.

Perhaps I've been a bit harsh. I do trust you with my goldfish – at least the one I now own for illustrative purposes.

And that is me signing out of this thread forever.

F is also for flounce.

How to deal with people you disagree with. Practicing what you preach can also be a bitch.

[Librarian]

The comedian taking on transphobia in a new show (that imagines JKR sitting down with trans interviewer)

If a female comedian planned a show about a mock debate with an imaginary [Trans Identified Male], it would be cancelled quicker than one can say "stochastic terrorism".

Anyone willing to step outside their validation chamber and brave enough to explore that site will see that yes, they're the mean girls. I quoted one of them in Publish and be damned last year. Here's a reprint.

I really like to live and let people live their lives as they see fit, so long as they're not actively hurting people in the process. Sometimes this thought creeps into my mind because I want to help people who are so disassociated from their own bodies that they feel like an alien trapped inside of a shell. I especially want to help because I've been there. I've had those thoughts and I've had those feelings. For a long time, being against trans was like being against LGB for me; what place did I have to speak on behalf of other's pain and experience, or to deny them of treatment that they said was required?

What it always comes down to though is that the LGB movement genuinely supported loving yourself as you were, that you could be who you are, in the body that you have, loving the people that you do, and that it was OK, that it was innate, that it was normal. Accepting same-sex attraction requires that everyone change absolutely nothing. A woman dating another woman affects no one but the two people in a relationship, unless you're simply morally outraged.

The trans lobby instead tells you that if your mind doesn't fit a certain criteria, based on literally anything, then you need to change yourself. It pushes that it's normal to hate your body, and that to love your body, you need medication, surgery, and treatment for life. It normalizes self hate in the guise of self acceptance. On top of that, it requires everyone else to capitulate in both language and actions. Changing how words are used and what they mean, and forcing others to be quiet about their discomfort and needs for safety.

I will never feel wrong about opposing a movement that pushes for the normalization of experimental cosmetic surgery on children and teens. I will never feel wrong about opposing a movement that enforces gender stereotypes. I will never feel wrong about opposing a movement that disregards genuine safeguarding concerns. I will never feel wrong for opposing a movement where any critic or call for discussion is met with overt aggression and threats.

[Ignatius J. Reilly]

You can be trans without needing drugs or surgery.

prepare the smelling salts

[close]

We're well aware all that is required is a self-declaration to gain entry to this special protected class, racing through the LGB to get to the T.

Sod it, I'm back.

[Premium content for YACF members only]

Right, I really am out of here. Not getting sucked back into forum life beyond wordle and bike tech.

Forza Steph!

The ages weep for the lost wisdom. As for Wordle, not since people started sharing their Strava stats has social media been so... indispensible.

Transgender identity hate crimes rose by 11 per cent in the past year, new figures reveal

Well, you know what they say about statistics. When applied to transgender identity hate crimes they're extra believable.

You say OT, I say hate is hate. Despite not being a member of the cue ball community, I am capable of great compassion towards them.

Seriously. Most of that 11 or whatever percent is going to be 'misgendering' and other fact-based speech that hurts someone's ears. Which stand out more when you're bald.

Speaking to delegates in Manchester, Sunak, who was introduced by his wife, Akshata Murty, said it “shouldn’t be controversial” for parents to want to know what their children “are being taught in school about relationships” and that “patients should know when hospitals are talking about men and women”.

“We shouldn’t get bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be,” he said. “They can’t – a man is a man and a woman is a woman, that’s common sense.”

This is the Prime Minister - our Prime Minister - who is supposed to lead the country.

FUCK

I'd like to think that despair is because we're reduced to stating the obvious.

I'm grateful that the prime minister has the brains for a no-brainer. It's never guaranteed.

We need rid of the Tories. Asap.

Fucking Nazis.

Someone should ask him to please explain this common sense and provide a clear and definitive description of what makes a man a man and a woman a woman.  Please note, these common sense definitions MUST include all of humanity, not just the majority, otherwise they are inaccurate, unhelpful and bigoted.

Humanity has two ingredients: male and female. Despite the infinite flavours that can be made from them in the gender blender, in real life we can almost always tell the difference, because it serves our masters – our genes – to be able to do so. It serves the main plank of the TRA agenda

Forza

Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces.

Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces.

Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. Let men in women's spaces. In women's spaces let men.

[close]

to claim intersex is a huge spanner in the works. Anyone who has been following along will have seen this gotcha! many, many times.

We have been asking them for a definition of 'woman' that includes all women and excludes all men for as long as they have been ranting, and all we get are varieties of the following:
Adult human female
XX chromosomes
Designed (??? By whom?) for the production of large immotile gametes
With a womb, cervix and vagina
Someone who menstruates

Etc.

The first is circular
The second includes Klinefelter and De La Chapelle
The third is creationist tripe
Until I was nearly 11, the fourth included me
That elast excludes an awful lot of cis women

1. TWAW must be circles within circles. Even the definition of circular is circular, so we're screwed.
2. Though videos like the following help, I don't pretend to grasp the science. Steph should stop pretending too.

People with Klinefelter are male btw.
3. No, that's evolution. As featured in credible science.
4. Said the unreliable narrator. In any case, see #2.
5. Nobody says when you stop menstruating you stop being a woman.

Newsflash

What were your favourite announcements [from the Conservative Party Conference]?

...men are men and women are women

It's not a policy. It doesn't even make sense in its own terms without a commitment to rewrite the GRA.

Much better to plot your groups on a Venn diagram if you wish to model it.

Meanwhile, in the real world
https://www.theguardian.com/society...e-wanted-to-couple-mourn-their-trans-daughter

The emotional manipulation continues. They do it because it works. Never has a minority been so successfully testerical.

If that sounds harsh in light of a genuine tragedy, consider that affirmation isn't the magic cure as advertised. Even if it were, where does that end – with a licence to reorient society around your illness? Can people with OCD request sidewalks without cracks?

Is it even possible to debate the trans-narrative outside MN?

Essentially, this board is the place where people who believe the earth is round get away from the people who believe the earth is flat, which is apparently the NHS, the BBC, our ancient universities, our police forces etc.



[Ignatius J. Reilly]

Hard to believe I missed World Octopus Day!

How or Why is an Octopus toy Considered Antisemitic

She's just being jumped on by the usual thugs.

Hold that thought.

Panic over. You are now free to worry about important things.
Cycling Related was started by someone else who was kicked out of CycleChat. It appears now to be deserted. Cozy, in other words.

Regulator (who inspired this) is or was a Global Moderator. Oy vey.

Super-Twat

Green Party Councillor

Write me up for Greenphobia at this point. I'm in good company.

Just in time for Hallowe'en

Looking a bit peaked.

[close]

Aren't new fora

Have I missed something?

Just an old forum owner bringing up old posts to show that he's still here.

'Old forum owner', though technically correct, is kinda dickish shorthand when you consider all I put into the old place and by extension new place. Plus my smiley went whoosh down the memory hole as well.

Of Cycling Distractions
Still missing something. Call it a sense of humour.

Life online

I don't think I could survive now without the internet.

Thought I sensed someone walking on my grave.

It's ok not to be ok
Trying out a new forum last year. Waited so long to post again I temporarily lost editing privileges, which is a fate worse than death.

Retro newbie
I'm taking it about a hundred times slower than normal. May as well be back in kindergarten. Clearly not a great fit, but there are pleasures to be had, like this from the big cheese:

Why did you choose your username?

A great search was made involving the children pf the world and a Blue Peter appeal via television and the then burgeoning internet. Bottle tops were collected, then thrown away because it wasnt about the bottletops - although some kid in somewhere unpronounceable and with far too many consonants got to keep the iron lung.

Which was nice.

I don't have a lot of energy to put into yet another forum. Too many contortions necessary. Gotta be free to be me.

We meet again

What point are you trying to invent?

We're getting there.

I feel like we've all been slapped round the face with an octopus this weekend.

And I feel like a wandering Goldilocks in search of free speech, inevitably drawn back to a politics forum that's just about right ~ all the more so for being forbidden.

Btw, is she/her yours, winjim? Probably not, but it's fun to speculate.

Every day's a school day.....

Not a bad post! from our resident dispenser of dotdotdots.

Participating in (or starting) a thread about something does not equate to "being triggered".

These are all pieces of a complicated puzzle. Or splatter art, take your pick.

Starmer's vision quest

moral panic

It's like déjà vu all over again.



Gender. The many-tentacled thing.

[Language in government documents] Mandated by law is a bit weird.

It's really not.

[Woke] is a word appropriated by daffodils* since it's origins are from the events of the past, when slave owners lynched enlightened slaves who began to resist.

[picture of a lynching]

I'm sure we haven't just witnessed a sly forced teaming of the gender critical with the KKK.



* CC converts ‘cunts’ to ‘daffodils’. It's anybody's guess which monkers actually typed.

The NACA Music, Art & General Creativity Thread

47 atoms to the ounce, 12 ounces to the moment and 40 moments to the hour.
[From a 13th c encyclopedia]

I miss the Ian H I knew before I started reading his effluvium on the gender thread.

Pretty quiet on the



front, so this will have to do:

The push putsch for a Natzional Trust

I'm being impressed by the twitterings of Celia the Comms Director.

Close enough

The problem with Celia is that a lot of us are quite over the 'i' word. Make a word too inclusive of other meanings and it becomes meaningless.

Tough crowd

Spoiler

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. It's not allowing people to say what they believe that is the problem.

For my own part, although I think Graham is a talented and frankly a brave man, I’m not in the front row of admirers of his comedies; never mind tweets.

Hello, I'm a TRA - ask me anything

If everyone is free to imagine their own definition, then the word conveys no meaning. It is meaningless. Is this what you are trying to say? That "woman" is literally meaningless? Because if not - give it meaning.

It must be difficult to be a man who dislikes male stereotypes and feels more positive towards and attuned with female stereotypes.

Because those stereotypes seem to have become a rather effective prison for anyone who feels they have to conform to them but don't want to.

It says a lot about how powerful the prison is when some men can't decide to stop conforming, instead they decide to be women. Which they obviously can't be.

I'm not including in this the men who are using the current way of things to exert more power over women by deliberately invading their spaces.

Man - I feel unsafe in men's toilets because I have a female brain
Women - Oh no, what happened
Man - Nothing but they might attack me
Women - What can you do about it
Man - I can use your toilets
Women - Our toilets are for women
Man - Yes but I'm wearing a dress so I am a woman
Women - You want to allow men to use women's toilets if they wear a dress?
Man - Well, they don't have to wear a dress to be a woman
Woman - How will they be a woman then?
Man - They will have a female brain
Woman - So you want to let men with female brains in our toilets too?
Man - Yes because we need to be safe from the men with male brains
Woman - How will we know which men have female brains and which ones have male brains
Man - You won't know, there is no way to tell
Woman - So we have to let them all in
Man - Yes
Woman - That would make women feel unsafe in female toilets.
Man - Yes. But let's do it anyway

there is little point engaging with these people other than for entertainment value. They have fundamentally irrational beliefs and they’re good with that

Example of irrational belief: a women can have a pickle.

GF wasn't attracted to me

Your level of femininity doesn't define your gender

Harriet Harman says women are women, or men who are 'certified' women.

Bdaybdilemma: Good on her! Glad they're not doing Sunak's populist move of appeasing to the likes of this board.

PorcelinaV: Yep, Rishi using the right-wing conspiracy theory that men aren't women to appeal to all the crazies that believe in biological reality.

MargotBamborough: If your political opponents are able to make political capital out of saying that humans can't change sex, that's a you problem. It means you're a fucking idiot.

Whomever that shoe may fit, let it be worn by them.

[close]

Jesus Christ you are obnoxious. You're just a really thick, horrible person aren't you?

She's really not.

Good job on the topical avatar. Shame about the never-ending

Does it not get tiresome

Auroraphobia.

As it happens I've also been called horrible (by a truly dreadful person, so it evens out). Winjim has been hysterical and wrong before – it's part of his charm – but this has the sour tang of multitool and/or monkers in the mix: YUCK! Let's get that taste out of our mouth, shall we?

Also yuck, but let's go with it

PS. I like or at least haven't made actual voodoo dolls of most of the NACA crowd that feeds me material. Saying things you'd rather you didn't have to say: this, my friends, is freedom.

[Librarian]

A reminder, if such was needed, that I'm one of the hoi polloi. Fortunately I archived the thread in question before it was whisked away, recognising grist for the mill:

Tour of frog route

Well aren't you a cheerfully polite bundle of fluffy joy. Btw. There's a thread about this in the racing section.

I don't think it's really racing anymore so put it in the pub as realistically it's sh1te

It is so delightful to see this old-fashioned saying get another airing, “Do not feed the troll” I know it won’t work but, it never did.

I thought of posting that, but we (as in this place) tolerates other similar personalities, and as you note, the “do not feed” signs don’t work. I shall do my best though.

They do indeed tolerate similar personalities, as well as dissimilar ones who nevertheless would likely be voted off the island should that ever become an option.

You'd vote for me, wouldn't you Wilson?



YACF is, at its heart, an intensely cliquey place. I know, I say that like it's bad thing. People who aren't me can get along fine even if they're supporting characters.

I'm assuming Paul is still one of the mods, and Jaded, who somebody once told me was a bit of an aggressive fella pre-ACF (it shows more now). The others I 'hired' way back when don't seem to be around anymore. I'd guess Kim was recruited at some point. She's excellent as far as forumming goes, even though I stopped taking her seriously when she made The Declaration.


Time to haul th*s out again

I really do use TWAW as a dealbreaker. We all have our standards.

The bitter truth is I have it pretty good. Notoriety suits me, as does being left mostly alone, speaking of grist. Actually there was this not long ago, which I've left in my Inbox for morale. Identity scrubbed to protect the innocent:



So what's the error? You must not have been listening.

I'm one of the hoi polloi.

Good to get that off my chest.

PS. This pic was going to get posted one way or another.