Can we debate about how remote the desert island debate bros should be abandoned on should be?

“Great!” I thought, a new ContraPoints video. “Oh no,” I thought, it’s almost two hours long. I put off listening to it until last night (you don’t have to actually watch it, it’s a good audio stream, too), and now I can say: it’s excellent. Partly I’m saying that because I 100% agree with her on everything in the video.

It’s all good, but my favorite part was in the middle, at about the 58 minute mark, where she rips into the debate bros.

…valuing dispassionate intellectualism above all else can cause problems, especially where topics of social justice are concerned. Because it can lead you to this kind of toxic centrism that asks, why are marginalized people so unwilling to have calm, philosophical debates about whether they should have rights? Are they afraid of dangerous ideas?

As examples, she then talks about Sam Harris (he’s on the wrong side, again) and Ben Shapiro and Joe Rogan. It’s a calm, philosophical discussion that exposes those wankers as absolute dickheads.

It’s a good listen, take some time to tune in.

The only reason to pay attention to the haters is to shame them

A borough in the UK posted an innocuous tweet, suggesting that people should go in for cervical screening. They had to take it down because a small minority of haters complained that the words “anyone with a cervix” was offensive to women.

The wording was just fine! It was inclusive and was a message to an appropriate audience. In fact, if you look at the thread, there’s a deluge of support for it, with swarms of people, cis and trans, chiming in to see that the message was good and they appreciated it. There were also, of course, a few indignant assholes whining that only women have cervices, and they were the ones they had to listen to, because Calderdale deleted the tweet.

Those few vicious, mocking tweets are the modern equivalent of this, an ugliness that will stain us all for years to come:

Meanwhile, in the science world, the journal Nature is updating their policies. Language matters.

It is regrettable but true that researchers have used and abused science to justify racist beliefs and practices. As previous editorials have acknowledged, Nature has played its part in perpetuating racism — and has now pledged to play its part in tackling it, together with colleagues in the research community.

As part of this pledge, Nature and the Nature Portfolio journals are updating our advice to authors on reporting research that involves race, ethnicity and other socially constructed characteristics. Specifically, we’re asking that authors exercise care and consideration so that the highest standards of rigour are applied where these attributes are found to be an explanation for an outcome or conclusion. This is part of our ongoing updates to guidance asking authors to describe how demographic characteristics, including sex and gender, are considered in the design of studies — and, more broadly, to consider the research’s potential to cause harm.

They aren’t asking a lot. This is what Nature expects now, and I was a little surprised…shouldn’t this have been standing, routine policy all along?

So, what are we asking authors to do, if their research describes people according to race, ethnicity or other socially constructed categories? Essentially, three things. First, specify the categories used and explain why such classification is needed. Second, explain the methods used to describe people in this way — for example, did study participants self-report, or did the information come from a census, social media or administrative data? Third, we would like authors to describe how they controlled for confounding variables, such as socio-economic status. These requests will be added to a paper’s reporting checklist so it is a part of the usual editorial and publishing workflow.

I’m not going to publish in Nature, and the kind of work I do isn’t going to touch on issues of race and sex (although some will try to force it!), but I would have thought that if you were doing work in those areas of sufficient prestige that it would be published in top-tier journals, those rules would have been already incorporated. You can never underestimate the devious efforts of bigots, though!

Time is fleeting…madness takes its toll

The Red Scare was mostly over before I was born — Joseph Welch squelched McCarthy with his question, “Have you no decency?” in 1954 — but we still see echoes of that paranoia today. I did survive the great Dungeons & Dragons panic of the 1980s, and I followed the insane McMartin preschool case which destroyed lives over hysterical claims of child sacrifice in tunnels that didn’t exist under a preschool. Then we got the “pizzagate” conspiracy theory in 2016, and all the QAnon craziness. It’s total madness.

Now — right now, today, all around us — Republicans are leading the charge under the banner of homophobia and transphobia. They’re freaking out over drag shows.

Florida Republicans are pushing forward a bill that seeks to ban drag shows from allowing someone under the age of 18 to be in attendance.

But the bill is so vaguely worded, using the term “adult live performance,” that even Republican lawmakers have admitted it would prevent a high school kid from watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show or even the musical Hair.

The puckered sphincters who get elected as Republicans also want to shut down all Pride celebrations.

The bill also explicitly targets Pride parades and celebrations, by preventing a government entity from issuing permits to an organization that may put on such a performance. If a violation occurs, say in a city like St. Petersburg, which hosts the largest Pride celebration in the state, the person who issued the permit could be charged with a misdemeanor.

In addition, any establishment that violates the law would be subject to license suspension or revocation and liable to large fines and a misdemeanor charge. One violation would spur a $5,000 fine; subsequent incidents would spur $10,000 fines.

Remember when these assholes assured everyone that they were only concerned about trans people, they were just dropping the “T” in LGBT, they were still supportive of everyone’s sexual orientation? And everyone else knew what was coming and predicted that they’d be expanding those restrictions until it was criminal to be anything but a straight white man? Those days are here already, and they aren’t shy about saying it.

It’s not just Florida and Texas that are a nexus of Puritanical oppression, Tennessee is definitely joining the crowd. Watch this woman testify against allowing a Pride parade by making up lies.


It started out as Pride coming in and I thought everything would be ok…it ended with a rainbow room where 8-12 y/o kids were given butt plugs and dildos.

You know what else is curious about this phenomenon? In every case, without exception, the justification is rooted in conservative Christianity, America’s curse.

Democratic states are so much nicer than Republican ones

Hey, how about some good news, about people who are making other people’s lives better? All you have to do is go to a Democratically controlled state, you know, like Minnesota. High school kids have been lobbying for free menstrual products, and the state legislature is going to approve it!

Students and their allies have pressed lawmakers for years to address the problem they describe as “period poverty.” They detailed the indignities of struggling with periods at school without the products they need or the means to buy them. They framed it as a public health issue for those who viewed it as just a hassle.

The payoff for that hard work may come soon. Minnesota lawmakers appear poised to pass a bill requiring Minnesota public schools serving students in grades four through 12 to provide free pads, tampons or other menstrual products to students in all restrooms.

Advocates credit students for speaking out publicly and refusing to let the issue be ignored at the Capitol. Elif and other teens say in the fight they’ve learned some real-world lessons on power, persistence and making change.

It makes sense, it gives people dignity, it improves education. It looks like it also teaches students that they have the power to make a difference.

Travis Tritt, so brave

I think he’s one of those country-western singers I turn off the instant I hear them on the radio, but I had no idea he was so courageous. Travis Tritt has taken the bold step of dictating that concert venues must provide him with an alternative brand of free beer, because Budweiser has a trans spokesperson.

The courage! He knows that other artists might be afraid of stating their principles in public for fear of being ridiculed and canceled! But not Travis Tritt! He will boldly be ridiculous without worrying about ridiculed! In that, he shares an attribute with professional clowns. He might not be afraid of being laughed at, but he is terrified of trans women. Oh no! Dylan Mulvaney is laughing at him!

Oh no! They’re going to have to get sober!

Maybe certain Kansans are going to oppose the “woke” by drinking Coors, but I have news for them.

Coors Light has been a sponsor of the Center on Colfax and the Pride Parade and Denver PrideFest for nearly two decades,” said Molson Coors spokesperson Michael Nordman. “Our Pride runs mile high so we are excited to support the Center’s vital programs and services that positively impact the LGBTQ community.”

Thanks to support from companies such as Molson Coors, Denver PrideFest has become the largest celebration of LGBTQ pride in the Rocky Mountain region.

I’m still not going to drink it.

Kansas is for perverts

Kansas has passed a law to ban transgender athletes which has a few incidental consequences.

The legislation, which takes effect July 1, requires children to participate in school activities based on the gender assigned to them at birth. The Kansas Reflector reports that challenges could require a student athlete to undergo genital inspections or require a birth certificate for proof of the child’s gender.

Following the vote, Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach applauded the legislature’s override of the governor’s veto.

“As the father of five daughters who are involved in sports, I care deeply about the fairness in girls’ sports,” Kobach said. “If any group challenges this law in court, I will defend it vigorously. And I am confident that the law will survive any challenge.”

Caring deeply about your daughters means insisting that they be available for genital inspections. I’m not going to look, but this sounds like a scenario you’d find on PornHub.

Now here’s a weird flex.

I believe there might be a small locus of science-belief centered around Lawrence, but the rest of the state is a benighted nest of bible-thumpers, so I disagree with his bigoted claims about “biological women.” Also, I told you conservatives have recently lost what little sanity they had over “woke beer,” that is, Budweiser.

I drink neither Coors nor Bud, and I’m not going to make a choice because of an imagined “woke” connection.

Those dirty, filthy, disgusting rainbows

The puckered sphincters who run Wisconsin schools constricted a little more. They banned a song from a first grade class.

Administrators at a Wisconsin elementary school stopped a first-grade class from performing a Miley Cyrus and Dolly Parton duet promoting LGBTQ acceptance because the song “could be perceived as controversial.”

Students at Heyer Elementary School in Waukesha had prepared a rendition of “Rainbowland” for their spring concert, but school officials struck the song from the lineup last week. Parents in the district say the decision was made because the song encourages LGBTQ acceptance and references rainbows.

Superintendent James Sebert, who did not immediately return a call on Monday, confirmed to Fox6 that administrators had removed “Rainbowland” from the first-grade concert because it might not be “appropriate for the age and maturity level of the students.” He also cited a school board policy against raising controversial issues in classrooms.

Sebert has previously prohibited rainbows and pride flags from being displayed in Waukesha classrooms and suspended the school district’s equity and diversity work in 2021.

It’s just hatred all the way down, isn’t it? Mr Sebert must gnash his teeth in frustration when he steps outside after a rain. All these horrible people with sticks up their ass seem to be pretty good at clawing their way into positions of petty power, I must say.

Of course, you know what I must do: I must post the song and help it spread.

Damn. That’s so obscene…to a dirty little mind.

The irony of a creationist moaning about others denying science…

The Republican legislature in Kentucky assembled a set of those inhumane, ignorant anti-trans laws, and handed it to the Democratic governor…who vetoed it. Good work, Governor Andy Beshear!

Kentucky’s Democratic governor issued an election-year veto Friday of a sweeping Republican bill aimed at regulating the lives of transgender youths that includes banning access to gender-affirming health care and restricting the bathrooms they can use.

The bill also bans discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools and allows teachers to refuse to refer to transgender students by the pronouns they use. It easily passed the GOP-dominated legislature with veto-proof margins, and lawmakers will reconvene next week for the final two days of this year’s session, when they could vote to override the veto.

Gov. Andy Beshear said in a written veto message that the bill allows “too much government interference in personal healthcare issues and rips away the freedom of parents to make medical decisions for their children.”

In his one-page message, he warned that the bill’s repercussions would include an increase in youth suicides. The governor said, “My faith teaches me that all children are children of God and Senate Bill 150 will endanger the children of Kentucky.”

Wait a minute…Kentucky? Who do I know who lives in Kentucky?

Right. You can guess how he responded.

Another politician showing blatant disregard for young people, for science, for parents and for God’s Word by Vetoing legislation he claims would harm children, but the opposite is true.

Children and young people do not have the maturity to make life altering decisions (that are destructive regardless) advocated by the LGBTQ movement. So sad many will destroy their lives because politicians deny the obvious, there’s only two genders of humans, male and female. Science confirms it as males have a pair of XY chromosomes and females a pair of XX. And of course, God’s word makes it clear:

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27).

Does anyone else feel stirrings of rage when a know-nothing, superstitious dogmatist like Ken Ham decides to declare what science has determined, and gets it all wrong, while relying on his authority as a preacher to persuade people to accept his views? No? Just me?

I’m not as irritated when he tries to explain what his version of the Bible says, since I don’t give a good goddamn about the book or his interpretation of it. Although I am confused by his Bible quote.

So God created male and female in his image…how does that work, exactly? Do both men and women look like god? If we’re going to get all literal on this, as Ham prefers to do, does that imply that god is a bipedal primate with ambiguous genitalia, or is he some kind of shape-shifter? Does his god have XX chromosomes, or XY, or some other combination? I don’t really care what the answer is, since I think it’s all bullshit, but you know, Ham claims that God’s word makes it clear, and it’s anything but.

Ham goes on to complain about bathrooms, of course.

What a travesty that this Governor would allow males to use women’s restrooms (and vice versa). By allowing young people to use the bathrooms of their choice is certainly a denial of the sin nature of man and what can happen because of that. Governor Beshear refers to his “faith,”—he needs to refer to the clear teaching of the Word of God on gender! The Governor does not own children, they belong to parents and ultimately to God. And they certainly don’t belong to teachers.

It’s been a long time since I read the Bible, but I have to ask: is there a commandment about men’s and women’s restrooms in there? Personally, I think people should be allowed to use the restroom of their choice, because what they’re going to do in there is to privately relieve themselves, and that’s about it. OK, maybe wash their hands, touch up their makeup, that sort of thing. They are not dens of sin.

Also, the idea that parents “own” kids is offensive. Parents have a responsibility for their children, which is not the same as possession, and society can step in when they fail in, or violate those responsibilities.

Actually, contrary to what Gov Beshear claims, what the Kentucky legislature passed have passed are the strongest bills in the nation protecting kids, parents and teachers! Notice how the media always like to portray such legislation as “anti-trans” instead of “pro-children, pro-family, pro-parents” etc. Media like to use words they think will cause people to believe those passing such legislation are full of hate–which is not the truth at all. Yet, I often see hate from people directed at Christians/conservatives because they won’t comply with the LGBT worldview.

Trans kids exist and should have rights. The primary consequence of those bills is to deny trans kids their autonomy (I know, Ham doesn’t believe children should have that) and cause active harm. They also deny parents their right to fulfill their responsibilities and provide appropriate care to their children.

I will concede that the people behind that legislation might not be full of hate. They’re full of stupidity and selfishness, instead.