How so very Guardian

This is bollocks. He’s an Iraqi. Britain’s ‘culture of intolerance’ is having some nutter scream at him on a bus. His home country has a bit more of a culture of intolerance, that would see him stoned to death.

I believe the appropriate acronym is IYDLIFO.

For instance, in the three months following the hate-fuelled Leave campaign, attacks on LGBT people rose by a startling 147%

Lol.

Looks to me like the nutter on the bus met another nutter on the bus.

Not sure why we should care though.

For instance, in the three months following the hate-fuelled Leave campaign, attacks on LGBT people rose by a startling 147%.

Does The Groan not have an editor (he asked rhetorically)?

Reports of hate crime (all sorts) to a specially set-up ‘helpline’ went up. Actual attacks – in the sense of reports to police, arrests, charges & court cases – not so much, if at all.

This has been pointed out on their own pages many times. I guess not even their own ‘reporters’ actually read The Groan.

“Tim, there’s something on the BBC news web site titled “period poverty made me homeless”. I didn’t click.”

I preferred the one where the Army is having to pay the extra taxes of those posted to Scotland. Apparently not everyone is happy to pay higher taxes.

Steve–it seems that the “hate crime” surge was created by no less than that O2 thief CPS Saunders. In addition to trying to fit up innocent men for rape. By encouraging her tame common-purpose-in-uniform pals to withhold exonerating evidence from the defence/court etc. It also transpires she was also into helping remainiac liars.

She was recommended for the job at the CPS by Grieve . She was described by the media as a “protégé” of his. When you say Grieve of course you are saying Treason May.

There will be no action taken against the Saunders creature over fiddling figures . In the same way she has been allowed to buggeroff quietly and the well deserved raft of “Conspiracy to Pervert the Course of Justice” charges will also be indefinitely delayed.

To agree with jgh:
Working societies are not the libertarian ideal of a street of separate houses, where individuals do what they wish behind close doors. They’re a big shared house where the members try to get along. They’re consensual & dynamic. And they need their extremes because the extremes help produce a society that isn’t too confining, so all the members have sufficient leeway to live their lives close to the way they wish.
So the tranny on the bus & its abuser are two sides of the same thing. Maybe the majority on the bus aren’t comfortable with sharing it with a geezer in a frock. They don’t seem to have done much to defend his self assumed right to do so, as long as it was restricted to verbal abuse. If it had escalated to physical violence & still no-one intervened or they participated, that might be an indicator of a different society. Likewise if the abuser had been suppressed, verbally or physically.
It’s the playing out of these sorts of confrontations produce a society its members are comfortable living in. Free enough that they can live close enough to their personal ideal. Restrained enough that they can feel part of it.

“Looks to me like the nutter on the bus met another nutter on the bus.”

I don’t think either of them was a “nutter” in the mental illness sense – although I’d agree they both follow ‘crazy’ varieties of politics.

“Not sure why we should care though.”

Quite. Mainly I suspect because the last LGBT discussion has nearly dropped off the front page and Tim thought we’d feel all sad and deprived if we didn’t have one to argue about…

But I think the main point of the article, if you ignore all the lefty garbage politics, is Niemoller’s complaint. Someone got assaulted by an angry bigot in front of dozens of people, in London, and they did nothing to intervene. I don’t think it matters that the victim was TG. They’d do the same for anyone.

If a young girl got visciously gang-raped on a bus, the other passengers would avert their eyes, and turn the music on their headphones up. If a white kid got knifed by a black gang, nobody would have seen anything. If an old lady got mugged and her bag snatched, well, that’s nothing to do with us. Why should we take risks to help others? Why, when it’s us being attacked, should any of those others take risks to help us?

It’s London. Everyone is always on their own.

Someone shouts at someone else on a bus in London. Other passengers ignore it.

News at Ten.

Perhaps more chilling than that scene is the sheer triumphalism of this most irritating of columnists. Sadly the sentiment is very real – they know where you live, what you have put online and will be coming for you in due course.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/15/trans-backlash-anti-gay-zealotry-section-28-homophobia

Van_Patten – Tomorrow Belongs To Xe?

‘To me, his sentiment is the perfect summation of how people with privilege uphold systems of oppression without even doing anything. For such a thought implies it is solely the responsibility of trans bodies to endure the labour of transphobia, and not anyone cisgender. It shares a bed with the belief that only people of colour should be fighting racism. The idea that it would be inconvenient for someone cisgender to intervene in a transphobic attack illustrates the inertia of privilege– “Why should I help you out when things are easy for me right here? It’s too much effort.”’

I wonder how long it is before that bystander being referred to is actually charged with a crime for his non- intervention. I rule out nothing in the utopia being prepared for us by Jez Corbin and Jimmy Mac.

Steve – good to see you back (assuming you are the genuine article) – hope all well, and as always, superb stuff!

VP – Thanks!

I wonder how long it is before that bystander being referred to is actually charged with a crime for his non- intervention.

We’re probably just one Matthew Shepard (pbuh) from some stupid, cack-handed, emotionally-driven statute on this.

Of course, it’ll be missing the point. Sadiq Khan was right when he said that random murders and street attacks are “part n parcel” of living in a big city. He could’ve further clarified: big, multicultural city.

This sort of thing was rare when London was settled by Englishmen. Immigration doesn’t only bring the benefit of new and exciting perspectives on criminal activity, it acts as an acid to dissolve the social bonds which might otherwise have restrained openly antisocial behaviour.

Let’s say you see an Arabian fruitcake in an altercation with an Afro-Caribean gentleman. Who do you side with? If you’re wise, neither of them, or the rozzers’ll have you up in court on racism charges.

You can’t legislate social capital into existence. Multicultural societies are low-trust societies by necessity.

Once the organic bonds of trust between people with a common culture are blasted into smithereens by migration, they’re not coming back just because some incensed MP’s say they should.

The police don’t have a duty to protect you, but you have a duty to protect some arbitrary stranger?

“I partially agree with you but my response to that would be that the latter sentiments about ‘systems of privilege and oppression’ really tend to make him sound like an obnoxious, probably Corbinite bastard whose aggressive celebration of his own minority status might make people naturally suspicious and disinclined to help,”

I agree entirely. But in this case, I doubt the bus passengers got to hear about those Guardianista sentiments (unless he/she was carrying placards from the protest?) and all they saw was a man in a dress, sitting quietly, (which is how it usually is).

That’s just how people behave in big cities, to everyone. So I don’t think we can deduce that either the politics or the clothes had anything to do with how the bystanders behaved.

NiV

‘Uh Huh. So if you really believe that, why do you do what you do?’

Good question – and given the treatment meted out to certain people designated by the powers that be as ‘Trolls’ it could be that I will at some point get mine. It’s a judgement call. I may yet be forced into anodyne pieties, or better still I will convert to the one religion where criticism of The Trans lobby is still permitted, The prospects are endless…

‘I’ve presented no “big talk” or “courageous fantasies”. Those are all in your own head again. All I’ve done is pointed out that in big cities, bystanders *very often* don’t help in cases of assault. It’s not specific to TGs, and it could just as easily be you or your family’

I agree with this – obviously the caveats I would add are similar to the ones the far more eloquent Steve added in his earlier post.

In the case of this altercation, as others have said there is no indication of the assailant’s race, a key element when considering whether to intervene. Assuming He is ‘non- caucasian’ Then if I intervened and the police were called the likelihood is after the last two decades post Macpherson I would be automatically arrested. Any non- White subject should automatically be sided with in any altercation with a white person. That’s the standard guidelines issued to the Met Police and they have been in place for two decades., so it’s possible both the perpetrator and victim could have agreed I was the one at fault and I would have faced arrest with almost no chance of appeal.

Not a prospect I relish but the inevitable consequence of ‘minority politics’ celebrated so aggressively in the Owen Jones article. If you victimise and broadly slander certain groups based purely on their race, gender or sexual orientation as ‘oppressors’ in a ‘system of privilege’ why in God’s name would you expect them to intervene in your oppression? Al Kadhi created this world and expects genuflection, protected status and special treatment under the law. Let him reap the whirlwind.

The alternative could have been that the assailant was armed with a knife and I could have been injured or even killed myself. As a number of news items attest, knife crime is out of control across the capital, fuelled by gangs and other factors. It is easier, if in some people’s eyes deplorable to keep quiet, but if the alternative is my family not seeing me again then I am afraid that is the choice I make. Call it cowardice if you like.

NiV: ’It’s London. Everyone is always on their own.’

You’ve missed the stories of moped thieves being tackled by members of the public then? Just recently, a pair seen off by some builders when they threatened a young lady with a child?

You don’t half talk a lot of rot.

This is the second story like this in as many months. Last time it was a fashion CEO with the quintessentially English name of Tamara Cincik complaining that “white, middle class men” did nothing to save her from the bracing diversity she almost certainly voted for.

I expect she certainly did, just as she almost certainly celebrated the import of several million religious bigots to replace the ones our society had finally managed to mostly get rid of.

Were not SJW scum whinging cos the builders were white and the moped scum not? I suppose even the cops realise they can’t get away with their SJW support function beyond a certain point.

“People are supposed to help one another, but they don’t. And then they feel guilty about it, and make excuses. But you don’t need me to judge you. You can do that for yourself.”

So you weren’t saying the above but now you are?

“Supposed” by whom? The Almighty?

You use quotes ( which refer to much nastier situations than a nutter shouting at a trannie on a bus) and then try to hand out an imaginary white feather to any one who does not feel inclined to intervene in a low level happening which was of consequence to no one save the SJW freakshow.

So if a black, lesbian feminist is screaming at a white trannie on a bus, should I intervene? And if I do, which oppressed minority should I intervene on behalf of?

WhatEVer.

Anyway, I am beyond tired of these two terms: “toxic masculinity” and “unhinged leftists”. My opinion – they have become indelible marks of a dull mind.

After reading the article carefully I’d note that if you put three links (to whatever) in it, it would pass for a post by NiV.

“So if a black, lesbian feminist is screaming at a white trannie on a bus, should I intervene? And if I do, which oppressed minority should I intervene on behalf of?”
Rule 1 – never get caught between intersectional allies. You’ll get no thanks and they might gang up on you.

“The reason you’re getting upset here is that the victim here happened to be an “SJW freakshow” which has completely turned your moral compass off. ”

I don’t get involved in shouting matches between freaks because I –unlike you–am not a sanctimonious cunt who thinks he is some sort of gift to the Universe and is entitled to stick his nose in where it is neither wanted or asked for.

“You want to side with the attacker, because he’s very obviously a member of your political/moral camp,”

The attacker sounds like a nutter–and that’s one of your gang.

The tran was Iraqi but little info was given re nutter. As others have pointed out –MONA/YONA style–that very often means he is not white. So again–not my tribe. As others have also said there is likely a hiding to nothing for a white man getting involved in victim contest between assorted ethnics and/or /victim-whingers.

Had this been a murder or something perhaps I might do something–judging on circs. If a dozen knife artists are on the job I am not such a fool as to try my luck there unless my life be under threat as welll. With a lesser situation– had the trannie had a little dog and the nutter made to kick it or summat I might well have got into that as I like dogs.

“and the bystanders turning a blind eye, ‘passing by on the other side’ narrative casts your position as the villain. Which you don’t like.”

Get this twerp–I don’t care. If freaks verbalise that is not my or my problem fault. I wish their antics weren’t happening or were happening far overseas so as not to offend my senses but mainly I don’t care.

“But that’s not the point I’m making – it’s just an incidental side-note. Of course I consider the bigot who shouted violent threats at someone who was just minding their own business on a bus to be the villain, but that goes without saying, and is a position I know I’ll get no sympathy for around here.”

Sanctimonious bullshit as ever NiV.

“All I’m saying is that there’s no evidence the bystanders’ behaviour was anything other than the normal big-city tendency to look away. Society’s judgement of that is well known, and as I said somewhat hypocritical, but that’s besides the point. It’s a well-known feature of human behaviour that applies to any victim and was already familiar in the time of Jesus – his audience knew exactly what he meant. And no doubt the Priests and Levites didn’t like it one bit, either.”

So you are born again now are you NiV?

Hah–born again? He’d take Jesus on as the junior partner.

I will tell you one thing NiV. Had you been there and come in for the trannie I would be happy to step up for the nutter’s side.

“not my fault or my problem”

Thank you Mr Ecks for speaking up.

There was a case locally where a woman on a bus was accused of racist rant etc.
Turns out the two Asian women had been insisting another women got off the bus as her perfume was annoying them and they were glaring and talking loudly in their naive language in a way that was clearly threatening. Another woman asked them not to do that as it was clearly intimidating the other person and she was the one in the news as a racist.
Makes you think twice about intervening in small issues

I’ve just had a thought. Bear with me, I might have been a bit slow on the uptake. But could it be that the reason I, living in London as I have for 27 years, don’t generally want to go out or see anyone is because of, yunno, vibrancy and diversity? I mean, it might be because I’m a misanthropic, workaholic git. But still. It’s just occurred that if I lived in rural Suffolk, I might actually want to speak to people. Oh, nuts to it. Who cares? Just us. No one, that’s who. And what do we say about the demographic here? It’s not the youth of tomorrow, is it?

Senior British Judges have delayed a decision on an appeal by activist Tommy Robinson against a conviction for contempt of court, with his lawyers arguing there have been procedural “deficiencies” giving rise to “prejudice”.
https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/07/18/appeal-against-prejudice-tommy-robinson-jailing-delayed-remains-prison/

.
Breaking Reporting Restrictions Placed On Tommy Robinson’s Appeal Today (18/07/2018)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k89y-JMoxcA

Semi-coherent shouting from an obviously troubled loon is not an “assault”. Had he been trying to punch the trannies face in that is something else. But someone raving–when he likely spends a large proportion of his time doing just that aided by drugs/alcohol or just by reason of a fucked up brain–is no big deal.

You are pissing your pants because the mad sermon of the day was against one of the favoured client groups of your SJW pals. And that just sets your teeth on edge. Shouldn’t be allowed. Leaving aside the fact that the bloke probably couldn’t marshal enough coherent arguments for a Diane Abbott speech–in the grand scheme of things even the Almighty has probably filed the event in the bin with a shrug.

“Semi-coherent shouting from an obviously troubled loon is not an “assault”.”

Ah! Perhaps you don’t know the distinction between “assault” and “assault and battery”? A common misunderstanding.

“But someone raving–when he likely spends a large proportion of his time doing just that aided by drugs/alcohol or just by reason of a fucked up brain–is no big deal.”

Frankly, he reminded me of you, from the description.

I suspect he probably was just a blowhard, but it’s often difficult to be sure. Some people are just venting, some are actually psycho. Drugs/alcohol can turn the former temporarily into the latter, too.

“You are pissing your pants because the mad sermon of the day was against one of the favoured client groups of your SJW pals.”

Where did you get that idea?

It sounds to me like just another day in the life of a TG. He got lulled into a false sense of security by all his pals at the protest showing support, decided to take the bus home on his own (big mistake!), and ran into one of the bigots. Bit scared, and got rather pissed off by the nutter; rather more annoyed at the lack of support. Writes a quick article for the Guardian having a moan about it. So what? Happens every day.

My TG friends don’t go out alone, for this exact reason. They make sure they’ve got people they know with them at all times, because they know they can’t rely on strangers to help. I’ve stood guard duty more times than I can remember, because a bit less than 1% of the population are still neanderthal dickheads out of the 1950s, and it’s not safe.

They’re not interested in politics. They don’t go on protest marches, or write articles for the Guardian telling people what to do. They just try to get on with their lives. And they quietly write the bigots off as idiot defectives that you can’t do anything about. It’s just one of those things you just have to put up with, as a TG.

I don’t actually care all that much about this particular person writing the article – their politics gets up my nose somewhat. I *do* care about people who get a similar sort of hassle for doing the same sort of thing. But I’m well aware that you guys don’t, and wasn’t even trying to float that particular boat. All I was saying is that bystanders looking the other way is perfectly normal, and probably nothing at all to do with who/what the victim was – it’s a stereotype of human behaviour old enough that even Jesus was able to use it. Why you should get so worked up about it is beyond me – compared to some of the other things I’ve said. Of course it’s widely regarded as reprehensible, but you don’t need me to tell you that. You already *know* how reprehensible society finds you transphobes. It’s not news.

“Our Heroine explicitly acknowledges dressing in drag as being dangerous… Because of the reactions it provokes.”

Yes. But this is precisely the point she’s making – that it shouldn’t be but it is. It’s like pointing out that wandering around Nazi Germany looking like a Jew is dangerous. The moral fault is not in the people provoking, but in the people who consider themselves provoked by such a trivial and harmless thing.

There are prodnoses who get ‘provoked’ by all sorts of behaviours. Smoking in public, noisy kids, eating meat, not recycling, fast food, sugary drinks, being fat, being thin, being rich, being religious, whatever, the list goes on and on. But when somebody gets harangued on a bus, threatened with violence, for being fat or whatever – the proper reaction is for everyone to tell them to fuck off, it’s none of their business! Not to try to justify the prodnosery by saying: “Well, you know that being fat provokes some people. You really shouldn’t go out at all or live a normal life because those people are out there and you might upset them if they are forced to see you, the poor dears.”

Some people here have tried to suggest that they’d be indifferent to TGs if it wasn’t for all the SJW politics and campaigning to change society and so on. But here we have an example of someone simply getting on a bus looking like a guy in a dress, and getting hassled over that, and here we are again with people trying to justify that, calling it a ‘provocation’. You started off quite well, describing the prodnosed bigot as a “nutter”, but the mask has slipped.

So much for “If they didn’t keep banging on about it most people would just shrug and get on with their life.” Most people would, and do. But you guys won’t and never will.

“the moral I took from this was; don’t make yourself a fucking target. For, much as you’d like it to be, the world ain’t fair.”

Very true. But it could be – and has been – a lot worse. And could easily be again. It’s only as fair as it is because people have *fought* for our freedoms.

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” “Better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life.” “Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves.” “If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.” “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” “Better to die on one’s feet than to live on one’s knees.” “Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.” “Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it.” “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” “My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.” etc. etc.

Once you stop doing stuff because it makes you “a fucking target”, the ‘moral’ that authoritarians learn from that is that to get people to do what you want, you make “a fucking target” of anyone who doesn’t. It’s perfectly logical. If people get what they want when they do X, they’ll do more X.

Of course, there are limits to resistance, and in practice the art is to walk the fine line between slavery and non-survival. But you only have the freedoms you have because other people did. Whether future generations are more or less free depends on whether we do.

For, much as we’d like it to be, the world ain’t fair yet.

@ NiV
Quite: I learned to fight when I was five because the sons of lefties were told by their parents to beat me up because I wasn’t a lefty.
And if you fight you have to be willing to be hurt – only those willing to fight and be hurt learn that it hurts less than if you don’t fight back.
I like to think that if I’d been on the bus I should have told the “nutter” to calm down, but I wasn’t: so I don’t know how justified the “nutter”‘s behaviour seemed to the other passengers.

“She sat there and waited for someone else – someone male and physically aggressive, I might to add – to save her from the consequences of the decisions she made.”

It would have made her feel better, I’m sure, if some of the women had supported her, too. It doesn’t necessarily require violence – just the feeling that you’re not alone is often enough.

And it’s not to save her from the consequences of the decision she made, it’s to save her from the consequences of a raving bigot’s decision to make somebody’s life miserable, because they believe they have the right to tell other people what to do.

Everyone has the right to take the bus. Everyone has the right to wear what they like. If we have to accept that exercising your rights, and having some authoritarian nutter stomp on you in an effort to take those rights away, is somehow your fault for not appeasing the authoritarian nutter by giving up your rights, well, there soon won’t *be* any rights.

Because the world certainly has an endless supply of nutters.

When the SJWs win the culture war, and anyone right-wing finds they can’t get a job, go to the toilet, catch a bus, or go out in public unmolested, well, that’s clearly all your own fault for being right-wing and letting people find out about it. Don’t look to anyone else for support, either. Why should we put ourselves in danger to help you, to rescue you from the consequences of your poor decisions?

Because we all believe in freedom?

“So I guess the moral of the story is that male aggression and violence is just fine when you happen to be the nonbinary drag queen who’d benefit from it.”

No. The moral of the story is that aggression and violence is just fine when it’s applied to defend people’s freedom. Not to take it away. (And if there was none doing the latter, there would be no need for the former.)

Although it’s worth noting, SJWs don’t have a problem with the application of government violence to enforce their own norms on other people. They’re not pacifists or anarchists. The thing about all authoritarians is that they’re perfectly fine with the application of state violence (or mob violence, for that matter) to enforce *their own* norms, the blame for which lies entirely on their victims for not conforming, but they all get upset when *other* people’s norms are enforced on *them*. The problem is not specific to any one group – it’s generic to the basic norm-enforcing authoritarian philosophy.

“I like to think that if I’d been on the bus I should have told the “nutter” to calm down”

You have my respect, for that.

“You can piss right off – Neanderthals are not dickheads.”

That’s the first time I’ve seen anyone upbraid me for racism against neanderthals! 🙂 Point taken. I apologise to the neanderthals.

It would have made her feel better, I’m sure, if some of the women had supported her, too. It doesn’t necessarily require violence – just the feeling that you’re not alone is often enough.

Ah, that patented NiV combination of stupidity and smugness rises again. You wouldn’t know this, as I’m sure you’ve never lifted a finger to protect anyone, but that reality of the matter is that you don’t inject yourself into a potentially violent situation unless you are prepared for violence… Unless you’re absolutely dead set on being a victim.

No. The moral of the story is that aggression and violence is just fine when it’s applied to defend people’s freedom. Not to take it away.

I see. You’re OK with applying violence to suppress the speech of someone you don’t agree with. And as long as it is someone else applying the violence. Can’t get the hands dirty can we? Got it.

The elephant in the room: What if the nutter had be an Iraqi Muslim immigrant and Our Heroine had been whiter than Tim Worstall? Would you be all for pounding Muslims into the pavement for expressing their (religious) beliefs in a manner you find unacceptable?

“You wouldn’t know this, as I’m sure you’ve never lifted a finger to protect anyone,”

Clearly not reading what I just wrote…

“I see. You’re OK with applying violence to suppress the speech of someone you don’t agree with.”

That’s the complete 180-degree opposite of what I just said! What drugs are you on?!

“What if the nutter had be an Iraqi Muslim immigrant and Our Heroine had been whiter than Tim Worstall? Would you be all for pounding Muslims into the pavement for expressing their (religious) beliefs in a manner you find unacceptable?”

Yep!! Absolutely.

Why would that surprise you?

You know, I did think about caveating that particular sentence, for that very reason.

Didn’t feel like taking on the second example then? (about wearing racist /bigoted clothing)
Could you please clarify what clothing you think is acceptable to wear in public and why? Is it acceptable to walk around in an SS uniform? Would you defend someone wearing one from people who wanted to attack them as enthusiastically as you say you defend your TG lot? If not why not?

That’s the complete 180-degree opposite of what I just said!

No, actually it was exactly what you said. You’re all for tolerance when it comes to nonbinary drag queens doing their thing, and all against it when it comes to someone expressing their disapproval (verbally, without physical violence) of nonbinary drag queens.

Yep!! Absolutely. Why would that surprise you?

Oh, it doesn’t. Believe me.

Just trying to figure out NiV’s thinking. Whether he would be as willing to defend someone who is his enemy, as his friends who like to do a bit of gender bending. Since he acts like he’s the bastion of tolerance and we’re all authoritarian Nazis because we don’t approve of some things he likes.

If there’s one thing NiV won’t tolerate, it’s the sort of intolerance he finds intolerable.

We said, “Okay, okay. Do whatever you want to in private.”

Wasn’t good enough. Now you want to do it in public. The public says, “No.”

Get over it, or get yourself a new public.

“Didn’t feel like taking on the second example then? (about wearing racist /bigoted clothing)”

Didn’t think I needed to. I thought I’d already made my position clear on many previous occasions.

“Is it acceptable to walk around in an SS uniform? Would you defend someone wearing one from people who wanted to attack them as enthusiastically as you say you defend your TG lot?”

Yes. And yes.

“No, actually it was exactly what you said. You’re all for tolerance when it comes to nonbinary drag queens doing their thing, and all against it when it comes to someone expressing their disapproval (verbally, without physical violence) of nonbinary drag queens.”

Expressing their disapproval is fine. Expressing their opinion of the causes and consequences of alternative sexual orientations is also fine – just as it is when I debate the question with you lot. The proper response (if one is needed) is to ask for their evidence, debate their reasoning, and correct their errors.

Where I have an issue (and where it broke the law) is where it moved into threats of immediate violence.

Common assault was an offence under the common law of England, and has been held now to be a statutory offence in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It is committed by a person who causes another person to apprehend the immediate use of unlawful violence by the defendant.

Presenting ideas, debating definitions, expressing opinions – well it may still be morally reprehensible but it’s absolutely your right to do it. Threatening to “mess up” someone – no. Even giving the strong impression that violence is in the offing, even without a specific threat – it’s still the use of force. (Unless you want to argue that making laws is not a ‘use of force’ until the cops actually come round to physically drag you away.)

What I wrote was: “The moral of the story is that aggression and violence is just fine when it’s applied to defend people’s freedom. Not to take it away.” That obviously applies to freedom of expression, too. People have the right to express themselves through the clothes they wear, and people have the right to criticise one another’s outfits (although it is kinda ‘bitchy’). People *don’t* have the right to use violence to take that freedom away – whether that’s to prevent someone wearing a particular outfit, or to stop someone criticising it in a non-threatening way. I had thought that was sufficiently clear, but maybe it wasn’t.

“Just trying to figure out NiV’s thinking. Whether he would be as willing to defend someone who is his enemy, as his friends who like to do a bit of gender bending.”

As quoted above: “If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.”

“Since he acts like he’s the bastion of tolerance and we’re all authoritarian Nazis because we don’t approve of some things he likes.”

Not approving is fine. You can disapprove all you like, of anything you like, just as other people can disapprove of you. I actually approve of your disapproval (a diversity of opinion is good), even if I disapprove of what you say. Where it becomes a problem is when people think they can *enforce* their disapproval on others. You can complain about certain people using the toilets, for example, but you can’t physically stop them doing so, or threaten them with anything if they do.

Oh, and you’re not Nazis – they’re on the same side as you along the authoritarian/libertarian axis, but on the opposite end of the scale on the economic axis. I try to use my terminology precisely! 🙂

“Wasn’t good enough. Now you want to do it in public. The public says, “No.””

As I’ve demonstrated numerous times, the majority of the UK public, as well as their democratically elected representatives, actually said “Yes”!

Only you guys, and a residual rump of nutters on buses said no.

“Get over it, or get yourself a new public.”

I can’t really see you managing either.

So let’s review…

Nonbinary Iraqi drag queen knowingly indulges in high-risk behavior, because, well, Trump or something.

Nonbinary Iraqi drag queen does not prepare for the possibility of being faced with the consequences of his/her/its high-risk behavior.

Nonbinary Iraqi drag queen does indeed face the consequences of his/her/its high-risk behavior.

Nonbinary Iraqi drag queen does nothing to mitigate or terminate the consequences of his/her/its high-risk behavior when said consequences present themselves.

Nonbinary Iraqi drag queen is shocked the persons not indulging in high-risk behavior and are not subject the consequences of same do not risk live and limb to mitigate or terminate said consequences for unprepared, passive and defenseless nonbinary Iraqi drag queen knowingly indulging in high risk behaviors.

When racist, homophobic, heteronormative members of the patriarchy point out that avoiding high-risk behaviors might be in order, our Progressive Hero suggests the best solution to be state sanctioned violence.

So what have we learned?

First and foremost, there’s no cure for stupid.

The second? If you scratch the surface of a progressive, what you find underneath is a fascist.