[chrishoney]

Don't see the 'left-winger' part either (with regard to Brendan O'Neill) but then I might mean something different by that than you. What you seem to miss is the utter audacity to claim the Mail and Littlejohn are victims in all this, and as one commenter pointed out:

When Richard Littlejohn wrote about Lucy Meadows (someone who had not sought fame or media attention or to 'sell her story', but who was just getting on with her life) he meant her harm. He actively called for her to be driven out of her job and shunned by her community. There was no good reason for him to go after her apart from prurience and spite.That's why people are calling for him to be held accountable.

There's a difference in exercising free speech by stating a political belief or desire, and deliberately trying to cause harm. Littlejohn crossed that line, and it's time he puts on his big-boy panties and accepts the consequences of his deliberate actions. After all, I seriously doubt he was coerced into writing that column.

[bryony]

Bryony. Hate speech is always a bad thing. Period. It doesn't matter if it is enabled, empowered, and propagated by the press. Even if the press outlet is recognized to be a hate speech panderer.

sfem, have you read the original article? Quite tricky since it seems to have been removed. I didn't see hate speech there. I don't support necessarily what he says, but I do think free speech is important.

There is an archive of it here.

It's important to understand that he wrote that 3 months ago. He did not initiate the reporters constant harrassment - it was the local newspaper who broke the story. If the unpleasant guy Littlejohn had not written a word, the main cause of stress, the constant intrusive reporters, would still have occurred. I'm all for laws preventing such harassment, but I fear for our future liberties if the knee-jerk reaction to anything that stirs up a twitter storm is to fire someone. If he had not written that article, who would they have fired then?

Please don't take my support for freedom of speech to mean that I agree with all that harassment - I dont. I do think, knowing what it is like here, that she was ill-advised to carry on at the same school.

Spinning things so the victim is at fault is also never a good thing. Identifying ways for them to avoid being victims is misdirection, and I'm a little surprised to see it coming from you. That is usually a tactic of those who believe might makes right.

I don't believe that the victim is at fault, but I do think that the situation would have occurred without the article petitioned against.

I think it is as unfair to accuse me of spinning as it is for you and everyone supporting a petition somebody losing their job as a scapegoat for something which was arguably not their fault. He wrote that article 3 months ago, and did not mention it again thereafter. If you google the period just before the tragedy, you see hundreds of hits in foreign newspapers. Who would you fire in Reuters?

I can't believe you think that because the health service isn't very enlightened that she should have stayed in hiding.

You shouldn't believe it because I did not say that... it's a gross paraphrase. I did say that it would have been a better idea to have left and quietly took up a new position with new kids. The outcome couldn't have been worse, could it?

This goes to the core of what our group is about. The right to decide for ourselves who and what we will be without fear of reprisal unless we do something to harm others.

Unfortunately, many of the parents believed that it was harmful to their very young kids to see their male teacher suddenly dressed up as a woman. I'm not saying I agree with that, but why is the taking of offense only a one-way street? Several parents found the concept offensive, but you understandably dismiss that as bigotry.

This is the problem with freedom. If it means anything, it means the freedom to offend. The law as it is now in the UK allows people to transition in the workplace - all well and good. However, if the workplace involves young kids, and the parents find it offensive, the law gives the transitioner the freedom to offend.

The event is newsworthy, as current social mores are, so the reporters investigate and conservative commentators exercise their freedom to offend. That's the way it works. Once you start clamping down on certain kinds of speech, apart from clear breaches of the law, such as incitement to commit violence, you need some kind of arbiter as to what _is_ unacceptable. Who do we use for that? Twitter? Facebook?

The ones you are exonerating are the ones who are using that "freedom" to harm others for their own personal and corporate gain.

I take real exception to you supporting the hate mongers and denigrating someone who I'm sure was a wonderful person with every right to a safe and happy life.

Equally, I take exception to that accusation. It's only one step away from an ad hom. Supporting free speech is not supporting hate mongers. You might want to consider that is the very freedoms that I support that enables us to do what we are doing here. When I was a kid we would all have been locked up for it, at least where I live.

Free speech enabled all the LBGT marches etc. Russia is the kind of democracy where speech isn't so free. Would you like us to be like that? They presumably have an arbiter as to what is permitted.Russia bans Gay Pride for 100 years

The faith school argument is a red herring. It is at best part of the problem, not the solution.

That's your opinion, not fact. I'm an atheist too, but religious people still exist, and I respect them for it. If you want to ride roughshod over their opinions, isn't that a form of hate speech?

The freedom of the press thing is not applicable, hate speech is not protected and shouldn't be.

Ok now that's a red herring. We have laws in the UK about hate speech, and they are criminal. People are arrested here all the time for it, and if the police had considered what he said to be hate speech he would have been arrested.

What you are talking about is speech that people find insulting. Up until recently we were getting people arrested because they said something that people "might" find insulting, and it took a lot of work to get the government to stop that.

Equally, freedom of the press is not freedom to stalk someone, harass them and people they know, and interfere with anyone's life. Reporting by definition is documenting observation, not an intrusive act to create observation. Their definition of reporting coincides with the military's view that sending in drones, satellites, wiretaps, and spies is just reporting on things.

I've already said that I agree with that - I don't know why you are dressing it as though I don't. I would like to see the harassment laws strengthend.

Saying the school should have tried harder to tell her she was wrong to make the change is barbaric, and just another path to suicide which doesn't help.

Jesus, you are good at twisting what I say! Maybe you ought to write for the newspapers! I said "they might have warned the teacher that the parents may have had a bad reaction." This goes back to the proven fact that it would have been better to find another school, not "she was wrong to make the change".

Either you are not reading what I write properly, or you are seeking to put the worst possible light on it.

Saying there are other hate mongers doesn't excuse one of the worst from responsibility for his own actions.

I'm struggling to interpret this.

The response "fire him!"... Because people who behave like Littlejohn and his supporters at the Daily Mail never act for any purpose but their own greed and require daddy or mommy to make them stop misbehaving.

I refer you to the article on democratic Russia above. All you are about here is punishing people for their opinions. It's not safe.

The suicide note likely didn't point to just one person being at fault because she knew there were many people contributing to the situation. Having more than one person misbehave in the same way doesn't exonerate any of them.

Nevertheless, I don't believe he instigated the harrassment that is the likely cause of the suicide, and I don't believe in scapegoats, however unpleasant they are.

I'm astonished at your continual advocacy for the idea that anyone who isn't "good-looking" should not be seen. Makes me very sad and rather angry. Put the burque over your own head if it bothers you so much.

Misquoting me again. I can see you are angry, but being angry does not justify doing something wrong.

I live in the real world. It's a cruel, unfair world. When people see an obvious male with the brow ridges and the high hairline and the square jaw wearing a dress and cosmetics they find it amusing and tend to jeer. That's your average man in the street. I didn't say they should not be seen, but they should be prepared for the reaction, and if they aren't made of very strong stuff, and this poor teacher clearly wasn't, it is ill-advised to do so. How are you having a problem understanding that?

Compare Lynn Conway Here.

If Lucy Meadows had gone to another school looking like that, and I don't mean attractive, just with feminine proportions, I doubt very much whether anyone would have noticed.

I remember a discussion recently where you showed no inclination to go out in public in a dress - why is that, exactly? I sense some hypocrisy here, inadvertent, hopefully.

The photo link you posted shows to me a beautiful woman. What's your problem? That there might be a woman whose facial structure or hair or skin doesn't meet covergirl standards? I seriously disagree that she looks male, even in the photo you linked.

I'm sorry, sfem, but you must have a very strange idea of male and female features. My "problem" as you call it, is that if you want to be a female, there is more to it than clothing and cosmetics if you want to avoid ridicule.

You need to get over your knee-jerk reaction to what you call "political correctness". Some of it is what enlightened folk call progress.

Political correctness is all about limiting free speech. I'm surpised you don't know that.

Although like everything else, it should be examined on the merits of every instance, not judged by how it looks at first glance.

And who will do that examination? You? The Politburo?

The therapists and counselors are highly unlikely to be able to advise them what will happen as they go through this. They don't know. I very much doubt that she and her family did no investigation of the possible consequences of this path. And I also seriously doubt that anyone would have predicted this kind of criminal behaviour on the part of the press. Are you really suggesting this is normal and expected when anyone does anything to deviate from the social norms?

We don't all live in Utopia, sfem. If you live here and you read the news you find sensationalist exposures like this all the time.

And last, but far from least, how dare you try to stir up controversy and derision about her family life? Do you know anything about her family? How they actually felt? What it was like for them to deal with the changes to their world, before the hate mongers got involved and made the situation 10,000 times more difficult and genuinely harmful? Do you plan to supply the Daily Mail and their ilk with ideas for who to harass to the point of suicide next? It's outrageous to blame the victim for things you don't know even exist, just to support a view that hate mongers should be free to destroy anything they like for fun and profit.

I don't think conjecture is "stirring up controversy and derision" and I think you need to calm down.

As someone who has suffered their fair share of very real depression and anxiety to the point of being almost unable to function, I would still yet never do anything to harm my wife and children. I have said many times, that transition is a brilliant idea for young, unattached people, but a bad one for older people with families. I think it is a form of selfishness to do this unless the partner has signed up for it before an innocent child is involved.

My sympathies will always be with the wife and children.

Those are my opinions.

You need to understand that you are doing exactly what worries me about today's society. You are trying to close down debate about something you feel strongly about, using emotive language, twisting my words and demonising me.

There are a lot of people around who feel like they aren't allowed to discuss certain topics, e.g. people who question climate change theory are called "deniers", and frankly it pisses me off.

I'm entitled to have my opinions as much as anyone, and I don't see why I should see something discussed and keep quiet when I don't agree with it for fear of someone ranting at me.

If it is ok to be an advocate for something whipped up by an activist group, then it should be ok to make people aware of details that are not in the original post and I'm not going to be bullied so that I am afraid to put over my point of view.

Bryony

[bryony]

My reference to "left-wing" means that the person that everyone wants to fire is a conservative, generally referred to as right-wing. Brendan O'Neill comes from the opposite side of the political spectrum, so my point was he would not have been biased in favour of Littlejohn.

[chrishoney]

people who question climate change theory are called "deniers", and frankly it pisses me off.

WARNING: ad hominem attack in the next three paragraphs. Read no further if it upsets your delicate sensibilities.

I think the correct term for those folks is "idiots" but deniers will do since they are clearly in denial of reality. There is copious, strong and compelling scientific evidence to support human caused global warming. The deniers cannot make the same claim.

Perhaps you missed this story on a study recently published:

http://www.newsleader.com/article/201303...ing-faster

Oh, but wait...that's right, I forgot, all the scientists around the world studying this are obviously in collusion on the grandest of all conspiracy theories. (just think of the millions each of them is supposedly making promulgating this theory. Oh my, it boggles the mind!) Honestly, can you really call yourself intelligent and maintain the 'denier' position? Even that bastion of right wing-nuttiness, Forbes.com believes the evidence supporting global warming (http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/...300-years/), so where does that leave you? Out in the cold? No, wait, I guess that's out in the heat now, right?

So, am I advocating you shouldn't be able to have your say? Not on your life! At this point, denying global warming is pretty much equal to saying creationism is 'science' or that the earth is flat, perched on the back of a giant tortoise, or that the sun revolves around the earth (but you KNOW that's true, because you can see the sun going around us daily! I swear!) I defend your right to promulgate your own brand of wing nuttiness, be it denying global warming or defending a right wingnut's hate speech. The same way I and anyone else have a right to heap approbation on you for those same bizarre viewpoints.

The petition to have Littlejohn removed from his public pulpit IS free speech being expressed by those outraged by his column. Is the petition binding? Will it compel the Mail to do anything? Of course not, so why do you want to curtail the free speech of those that find his moronic ideology morally offensive, and yet let him off the hook? Don't they have the right to ask/petition him to be removed from such a position? Do you seriously think he will not be able to make a living even if the Mail bows to public opinion and fires him? Give me friggin' a break. Even if he does get sacked, is it like he will never again in his life write another word and get paid WAY too much for what, pseudo-intellectual drool?

Finally, you have the annoying habit of interpreting ANY criticism of your point of view as a personal attack. Free speech does NOT give you the right of objection-free pontificating. If you can't take the heat, don't express what you KNOW will be controversial opinions that garner contempt and derision from many who read them. Sound familiar? Perhaps something like:

"they might have warned the teacher that the parents may have had a bad reaction."

Now, I know you're going to flame me for this, and frankly I say "have at it!" Personally, I wouldn't give a rat's ass (I'm not sure what exactly that means but it sounds righteously inflammatory, doesn't it?) for your opinion of me or what I think, so do your best...errr...worst....ah, whatever......

[bryony]

Hi Chris,

the rat's ass is entirely mutual, I assure you.

1) Climate change: You completely miss the point as usual, which was the use of term "deniers" as a means of shutting down debate, implying a comparable state to holocaust deniers. Scientific sceptics, of which there are many, don't deny that that the climate is changing, nor even that some of the change may be due to human activity. They argue that the empirical evidence, which scientists should be interested in, show that the computer models are faulty, and that the wild predictions of the world overheating past a "tipping point" are just that. Using pejorative dog whistle terms like "denier" or "xxxphobic" is simply a means developed primarily be the Left, to quickly close down and stifle debate.

Criticise my intelligence if you like, but could you be a Sloan Professor of Atmospherics at MIT? I'd love to see you debate with Richard Linzen who is also a sceptic. For someone who likes to quote Google Scholar, you don't seem to keep up with the climate science papers much. There are more and more publications appearing questioning the "accepted" science (if you can call computer models science).

Since there has been no appreciable heating for 17 years, I'd say it's more likely people like you who swallow the orthodoxy hook, line, and sinker who are out in the cold. Time will prove who is right.

2) Petition. Yes, I agree the petition is free speech and wouldn't try to stop it. My intention is to point out that it is simple scapegoating.
Only sheep sign petitions without considering the facts, which in our modern world of celebrity dancing and american idol and Kardashians few people seem to have time for.

I don't think someone should lose their job for criticising anything. Maybe it's my feminine side, or maybe I don't come from a heartless culture that fires people without cause like you do.

(Have you ever considered the irony of a land of the free, home of the brave, that ties medical benefits to employment and allows termination at will? What a way to generate a population of people afraid to speak their minds... I suppose that's why you insult people in discussion forums)

Boy, the invective. Did you actually read what he wrote?

3) the usual ad-homs. Maybe it's because of the harsh upbringing you N. Americans have that teach you how to bully people... did you get stuffed in your locker, or did you stuff some other poor kid in his?

You criticise my apparent lack of intelligence, but you (mainly) and sfem (some) lose no opportunity to be insulting, aggressive and generally exhibit all the nasty masculine traits which make me wonder why the hell you want to grow breasts.

I give dispassionate opinions (or try to) but you give insults.

Even the quotation is completely out of context.

My point, if you could be bothered to follow it, is that this was a tragedy in the making. If Littlejohn had not lifted up his pen, it would still have happened. To fire Littlejohn is to miss the point entirely, and it would do nothing to stop further tragedies.

You know precious little of the culture here, but I do, and I say it was completely predictable that this would hit the newspapers.

The local rag had it before Littlejohn, the hordes of reporters which caused the damage picked it up from there, and that was the point of that quote of mine: "they might have warned the teacher that the parents may have had a bad reaction." which you somehow find controversial (and I don't see the controversy in stating a fact).

If Meadows had been given realistic advice, instead of encouragement from arrogant activists with nothing but contempt for people of the "old morality", she would still be alive now. That's what O'Neill was getting at. That poor person's suicide does wonders for "the cause". Getting her to transition at school, if successful, would have been a real coup for "the cause". The reality is that she was a pawn in a left-wing political game.

Much as you dislike it, I'm more interested in advice that keeps people alive.

Much as you dislike it, if she had moved schools, ironically as Littlejohn suggested, this would have been the better course, not for a life without teaching, but to avoid the "culture shock" on the kids, the event would not have been newsworthy, and it was the newsworthiness that likely killed her.

I think that the activists that encouraged this ground-breaking move rather than advising caution also have a degree of responsibility for this tragedy, but no one is suggesting that they be punished.

That's my opinion, and if you don't like it, you can have a rat's ass.

Regards

Bryony

[AnnieBL]

Whoa!

This thread was only marginally relevant to this forum in the first place. Now it is completely out of hand, with valued contributors to the forum at each other's throats. However tempting it is to join the fray, it now has nothing to do with our topic, and has become a highly polarised and divisive discussion which is more political than anything else. Another recent thread raised complaints because it merely touched without acrimony on religion, another topic which tends to be destructive of reasonable debate, but there the participants were disclosing religious beliefs only to explain aspects of their positions in an on-topic discussion, which seems to me admissible, not to polarise that discussion by bringing in highly controversial external issues.

I am also never keen on petitions which merely seek support for a single alleged solution to a problem, rather than one that invites votes for or against with at least some admission by the petitioner that alternative action (or none) may be more appropriate.

[sfem]

The part of this which is relevant to this forum is the advice being given to hide your differences from the norm. It is really terrible advice to be given out so blindly. It may well be applicable to some. It most certainly isn't applicable to all. And the advisor is in no position to judge whether it applies. Don't swallow it.
I wrote up a long and very detailed rebuttal to the things I disagreed with in Bryony's postings and Richard Littlejohn's despicable act. But you're right AnnabelP, 90% of it doesn't belong here. So here are the one or two excerpts that might help people on this forum to understand that what they are doing is not harmful to others, and they shouldn't have to hide themselves unless they want to.

Bryony. Hate speech is always a bad thing. Period. It doesn't matter if it is enabled, empowered, and propagated by the press. Even if the press outlet is recognized to be a hate speech panderer.

sfem, have you read the original article? Quite tricky since it seems to have been removed. I didn't see hate speech there. I don't support necessarily what he says, but I do think free speech is important.

Of course I did. I'm not in the habit of judging things of which I am ignorant. Your post actually has some resemblance to what he wrote. He writes that the teacher shouldn't have stayed at their current place of employment, so do you. He writes that the school isn't doing the right thing by following the law and being supportive of her transition, so do you. He writes he isn't against people transitioning and then proceeds to describe it as something which children shouldn't be exposed to. You imply she did harm to her family and you say she shouldn't have transitioned without concealing it.

I don't believe that the victim is at fault, but I do think that the situation would have occurred without the article petitioned against.

Yes we know. Rather oracular. You already wrote they should have tried to stop her and she shouldn't have transitioned and if she did, she should have had it come out prettier and she should have moved somewhere that she could try to hide her dirty little secret and then maybe the bad people wouldn't have been bad with her unless they found her hiding spot. Nice message to put forward in this group.

Unfortunately, many of the parents believed that it was harmful to their very young kids to see their male teacher suddenly dressed up as a woman. I'm not saying I agree with that, but why is the taking of offense only a one-way street? Several parents found the concept offensive, but you understandably dismiss that as bigotry.

Did you catch the part where he suggested parents should think their child is harmed because they drew a picture of the teacher looking like he had a female hair length and style? It is actually a wonderful piece of evidence (meagre though it is without any surrounding detail) that the children had no problem with it at all, and were perhaps even intellectually and emotionally stimulated by learning something new in school.

Stop blaming her. She wasn't a man dressed up as a woman. She was a woman dressed up as a man for a long time. As it happens, that is fine in our society. Talk about your one-way streets.

This is the problem with freedom. If it means anything, it means the freedom to offend.

It means the freedom to express ideas and thoughts. It is not the unbridled freedom to spew unreasoning (he never does identify what is wrong with her actions, just says he doesn't like them), deceitful (he says the children had it forced down their throats and the children are confused implying children are never in need of having anything in life explained by their parents or schools, he says she is making them afraid they'll turn into girls where he is actually one of the people doing that, he says they will be punished if they make a mistake where in fact they earn punishment for bad behaviour around her just like around any other person at the school), hateful (language such as "lifestyle choice", "are you sitting comfortably children","What are you staring at", "devastating effect", "Why should they be forced", "aren't equipped to compute", "her personal problems"), paranoid garbage ("The school shouldn’t be allowed to elevate its ‘commitment to diversity and equality’ above its duty of care to its pupils and their parents."). The school's commitment to diversity and equality *is* part of its duty of care to its pupils and parents. I take exceptions to more that he wrote, but I am hesitant to give it more voice than it has already had.

If you want to allow someone to offend, at least insist they be honest in their statements, and have cause to do so and a goal to achieve by it that is rational and worthwhile to the species. Otherwise, it is just giving offense.

If you live here and you read the news you find sensationalist exposures like this all the time.

Yeah, um, I'm going to go ahead and say that's a bad thing and the point of this whole thread. If you don't feel you have a way to fight it, fine. But don't excuse it.

I'm entitled to have my opinions as much as anyone, and I don't see why I should see something discussed and keep quiet when I don't agree with it for fear of someone ranting at me.

That's pretty much exactly what went through my head when you originally posted. I'm not given to arguing in forums. But there needs to be a response to your position because it is relevant to everyone on this forum, including the GGs who are here trying to modify what nature handed them in order to improve their joy in life.

Oh, and btw, I didn't sign the petition for several reasons not the least of which is that the Daily Mail doesn't give a rat's ass how I feel about them. Did you like how I kept my post in line with the evolving theme involving rodent posteriors?

[beverley.rose]

I did not know Lucy Meadows personally, but several of my friends did - and by friends I mean people who come to my house rather than someone I met on a forum somewhere. People I talk to everyday or at least every week. People whose word I trust.

Lucy was transitioning well. Many parents were supportive of her. The school was supportive of her. Things were going as smoothly as they can do in the early stages of transition.

Then the press decided it was a good story and it turned her life into a living hell. She just wanted an ordinary life and trans-teachers are not that uncommon, there are enough of them (and I know one personally) to prove that you can transition on the job and that parents and teachers have no problem.

The reason that the press in this country are on the verge of regulation is because they have shown themselves over and over again to be out of control. Reporters and those they dealt with are now going to jail for criminal acts. That is how bad it has got. That is why we have just had a huge investigation into the excesses of the press and that investigation barely touched on trans issues at all.

Lucy did nothing illegal - why should she have left her job? She was just living. Breathing, eating, sleeping, working, helping - you know, being a decent person. Nothing criminal unlike many in The Press who are now incarcerated at Her Majesty's Pleasure.

Freedom to offend is one thing, but the freedom to make someone's life a living hell? What happened to responsibility? What happened to decency? What happened to actually giving a d*mn about whether someone in a very-high risk group might be pushed over the edge?

I did sign the petition. The firing of Littlejohn would be a purely symbolic act showing that some remorse might actually exist. In reality he is probably not an employee and so cannot be 'fired' but they certainly could stop using his services.

[bryony]

Whoa!

This thread was only marginally relevant to this forum in the first place. Now it is completely out of hand, with valued contributors to the forum at each other's throats. However tempting it is to join the fray, it now has nothing to do with our topic, and has become a highly polarised and divisive discussion which is more political than anything else. Another recent thread raised complaints because it merely touched without acrimony on religion, another topic which tends to be destructive of reasonable debate, but there the participants were disclosing religious beliefs only to explain aspects of their positions in an on-topic discussion, which seems to me admissible, not to polarise that discussion by bringing in highly controversial external issues.

I am also never keen on petitions which merely seek support for a single alleged solution to a problem, rather than one that invites votes for or against with at least some admission by the petitioner that alternative action (or none) may be more appropriate.

Hi Annabel,

You're right.

Some of us are old enough to remember when global destruction was a very real threat by people who wanted to destroy freedom. Some of us are too young to know what that's like. There will be a void of understanding.

Since then the cultural marxists have found better ways to do it, inch by inch, by infiltrating the culture and implementing political correctness. Slowly but surely, for the best of reasons, Orwell's Newspeak will be implemented, where certain concepts cannot even be thought about.

Meanwhile vulnerable people suffer for other people's principles/activism, instead of taking the safe course.

I won't be contributing any more to this thread - anything further would be a waste of time and space.

B.