I don’t trust them. They would change in an instant if the electoral wind blew in a different direction. No principles. No integrity. No genuine concern for women and children or the future of of our society. The very worst political behaviour I have witnessed in many decades.
100% Labour have be SO heavily invested in the gender bollocks that it's difficult to believe this U turn is real. Don't trust them. Reckon self ID is still the agenda and they'll turn back after the election.
Yes- all smoke and mirrors. And don't forget they have been 'grooming' Eddie Izzard to be the first Transgender candidate- he was around London as a woman, Sheffield I'm not sure but they decided not not try it there. Then later he was campaigning in Swansea, all blokey with short hair and a goatee, no make up obvs. I think they'll look for a 'safe' Lab seat for him/(it!).
1. Ali- what a superb thumbnail! 2. Will Brighton and Hove be a new constituency? There are three at the moment- Hove and something (Peter Kyle, Lab)/ Brighton Pavilion (Caroline Lucas, Green- but standing down. New candidate Sian Berry) / Brighton Kemptown. (Lloyd Russell Moyle- Lab) ...
Sorry, my mistake (I was referring to the area, not the constituency). The constituency he’s standing in is Brighton Pavilion. It’s the Commons or nothing as far as Eddie’s political ambitions go: https://www.eddieizzard.uk/. And presumably a seat in the Lords after that as a nice retirement gig.
We should never let them forget what it was they stood for and we should keep reminding them of this at every opportunity until they repent.
EDIT: There is a difference between apologizing and repenting - I don't want to forgive any of these people, I want their word they will Never.Do.This.Again.
I bet it's only because Labour MPs keep hearing the phrase "politically homeless" from GC former Labour members and voters, that they've started to estimate the scale of losses created by their commitment to capture the trans-indoctrinated youth vote.
It might have helped them to remember television images of Nicola Sturgeon squirming to avoid calling a male rapist a "woman", shortly before she resigned. And the estimated 60% of the Scottish public against the SNP's Gender Recogniton Reform Act: before it was stopped by the Tory government issuing a Section 38 kibosh on devolved legislation that conflicted with Westminster legislation.
Labour's current retreat from all-out gender self-ID seems much more token than real, given dropping the requirements both for two years living "as the opposite gender" and for an anonymous panel to check the verdict of a single transactivist GP.
Labour is sitting on the fence: trying to please everyone... Can't be done. (Shades of Corbyn and Brexit)
Labour hasn't yet got my vote back. And with only the offensively transactivist Lloyd Russell-Moyle to vote for locally, my vote is lost anyway until & unless he's replaced.
Honestly I don't trust Labours U-turn on this issue one bit. Imo they'll walk it back to self ID once they're in office again and just say they changed their mind after listening to feed back from the LGBTQ+ community.
But on the other hand, as more of the public gets what's really going on behind the false claims and violent misogyny of transactivists, Labour might find it increasingly convenient that the Tories have not caved in to all the nonsense and lies. And find reasons, as a new government, NOT to reverse Tory legislation (like invoking Section 38 to block the Scots Gender Recognition Reform Act) -- either quickly, or at all.
Starmer's sudden U-turn on this issue must be viewed through the prisms of suspicion and scepticism. The entire leadership and almost all MPS have not only been anti-women, but vitriolic in their froth-spewing condemnation of a debate on sex -based rights. It follows that they have been equally and wilfully blind to the child butchery. They smell an election loser. That said, if Starmer is negating the existence of the lady dique, then it does make it more difficult for the rest of his sheep to continue in this worship and adulation of the female penis. I see that Andrew Neil and Richard Dawkins have joined the TERF party, too, albeit rather late. This all helps wake up the ideologically anaesthetised.
Miss JemimaGC, when i read your name Miss JemimaGC, my brain always reads…. Miss JemimaQC which makes me think you’re some sort of lead character in a court room drama. Off topic and completely irrelevant.
I do too. And I always think of the TV programme when I see Dennis Kavanagh :-). I'd like to remind them that KC stands for King's Counsel not Kinky Crap. It's often said that good senior NHS management used to walk through the front door of their own hospital (through A&E) and then look around and listen, talk to people and their own staff. Pay attention. How do we get senior people to realise, to listen and be aware of what's happening under their noses? Who the hell would want to take counsel from this lot? They don't appear to be very bright no matter their qualifications and other jobs. They have very publicly got this very wrong, then doubled down and refused to listen as their own MPs have been abused and bullied by their senior ranks and backbench halfwits. So they've been clearing the decks before the election.
But our "binary bias" (dismissed by a pink-haired transactivist surgeon as an obstacle to glorious bodily self-actualisation via "non-binary affirming surgery") seems (for most of us) to be an involuntary cognitive event: almost as if it were innate, evolutionary biology. That's now old hat, of course, with 73 genders and gender fluidity and new non-binary expressions of pink and blue haired uniqueness every day. For those who can pay, especially.
Oh I know, I know, it's clownfish isn't it - all those sciencey people say that so it must be true. Poor man is so thoroughly embedded and enmeshed in his own lies.
Disappointing: I thought he'd actually been heard to utter the full three magic words "Adult Human Female".
But if he's managed to get even two thirds of the TERF party's incantation right, it suggests he's LISTENING at last... not just to his gender-intoxicated Shadow Cabinet halfwits, trying to look cool for the youth vote. He's clearly trying to ingratiate himself with TERFs after his regrettable women-with-penises lapse: he might even get "Adult Human Female" right, in time.
It's been in-yer-face Trans Pride time: he's probably been having nightmares about trans rapists and Nicola Sturgeon's sudden fall from grace.
and anyway 'adult female' can be intended to include male transsexuals if you give them the right to declare themselves 'female'. A friend said the UK Rowing body now says only 'AFAB' can compete in Women's category, but he thought it was insulting to use that terminology- but I thought at least it was a definition that trans creeps could not sneak past. 'Adult female' is weasel words
I have been thinking along the same lines as you JL. Thank you for setting out the extent of Trans capture in the Labour party. Given how weak a leader Starmer is, how are we to believe that he can take the rest of the party with him? Assuming that he has actually come to realise that "Trans rights" impinge on those of women and children. Let him decide to repeal the GRA, banish the teaching of gender identities in school, forbid the mutilation and poisoning called "gender affirmative care" and to rid all public institutions of DEI roles. Then I will vote for Labour. Until then, I can recognise when I am being strung along. I have read Emmeline Pankhurst's story and the shameful way they strung the suffragettes along. The lessons are there for anyone who wants to read "My Own Story"
and also, how much personal power does Starmer actually have? Is he just a figurehead, who could be replaced anytime it suited the puppet-masters behind him...? just thinking aloud...
Exactly. Labour’s plans will herald self-id by the back door and it’ll all be cloaked in secrecy. Shame on them for Dodds’ bleating about how vulnerable trans people are. They don’t look too vulnerable when they’re threatening to throat punch us.
I reckon the only way to vote in the GE is Tory or to spoil your ballot paper.
I am still surprised their crack election advisors think this will work and they still seem to have underestimated the level of anger, hurt and resentment in lifelong Labour voters. I have no clue who to vote for either and have told them this. There have been a few vote swapping sites set up in the past - to try to deal with our pork barrelled voting system but I'm wondering if so many spoil their ballots, what effect could that have? What will push this change? It's been discussed here in local elections, but I'm concerned that Labour will risk votes through this and some other really facepalming decisions.
Sadly, tactical vote swapping can't work when Lab, LibDem, Green, Scot Nat are all TRA-stooges. So if we want to avoid Tories, we need to vote for Independents (or Reform). Spoiling ballots is a waste of time- it has no effect, and woud be ignored- and probably unreported anyway. (I wish we had a "ReOpen Nominations" option- if that won, the election would be called again, with different candidates. But even that would be so slow... tho send a clear message, I guess)
Candidates (plus Agent & spouse if any) always attend The Count to look over the shoulders of tellers at piles of ballot papers. Organised spoiling of ballot papers by lavender, green & white (Suffragette colours) stickers from outfits like Sex-Matters.org would make far more impression on candidates & agents -- and reporters for the media -- in terms of growing piles of lost votes for Labour, Greens & LibDems, than random "None of the above" scribblings and insults.
And even better would be a TERF party candidate to vote for. This would require nominees, and £500 for an election deposit (lost if a candidate polls less than 5% of the overall vote), but would involve personal risk of assault from transactivists.
General election candidates benefit from free postage for election leaflets sent to every person on the Electoral Register, but have to cover design & printing costs of any such leaflets.
Most small parties start out by standing in local elections to make themselves known. If too short of funds for printing leaflets (delivered by volunteers) just standing a candidate will usually get some votes. Or complaints if there is no candidate to vote for -- even with no chance of being elected.
I speak from six years of experience in the late 1980s - early 90s in writing, designing & producing Green party campaigning materials (and standing in a couple of local elections) in Brighton Pavilion: which elected first Green Councillors, then in 2010 the first & still only Green MP for England & Wales.
But standing a TERF party candidate in the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK would undoubtedly be asking for a LOT of trouble.
And whether Sian Berry would actually be elected MP is doubtful: given that in the last local B&H election seven Green Councillors lost their seats. There has also been a constituency boundary change, shifting Kemptown (a seafront ward) from Brighton Pavilion to Brighton Kemptown (where I now live): with what effects on voting, I don't know. The Kemptown area of the city is very gay.
ah- i just asked whether Brighton area will have new boundaries. Labour have always desperately wanted to get Caroline Lucas out. Eddie Izzard could hope to get TRA, and some Green, and any trad Labour votes. I really hope he doesn't become the first brave and stunning fetishist MP...
Izzard would almost certainly split the Labour vote! But one ward in Brighton Pavilion has elected the first B&H trans Councillor (a ?19 year-old TiM) in May, so you never know.
Yes, 'the political-party-activist cliques' would know about spoilt votes. But I still think that overall it doesn't make much of an impression. The binary (to coin a phrase) 2-party system focusses on the big two, and even the established alternatives (LD, Nats) are usually overlooked by the media, as are the Greens ofc. The big-two won't care if the overall turnout was only 5% of eligible voters- as long as they are the First Past The Post. Kellie-Jay Keen standing as 'The Other Party' in Starmer's seat, will be good, to raise awareness, and get into the media. Though as you say, I would worry about violence from GI zealots. (And BTW, with your local knowledge, will Sian Berry have a chance to win B Pavilion for the Greens? Labour have always been ruthless in trying to oppose her, and get the seat. Caroline may have had tactical vote support from Con and LibDems trying to keep Lab out- but that was before she said she believes transwomen are women- which Sian Berry has always said. TRAs can choose between Lab, LibDem and Green- could there even be a chance of splitting the vote, and letting a Tory in?
PS. re your speculations about how the vote might split, Brighton & Hove Labour disagrees (or used to) with the central party's ruthlessly exclusive line: in expelling any member found to be guilty of cooperating with other parties against the Tories. In the 2015 general election, I was told (by a Labour activist friend) that in Brighton Pavilion, Labour volunteers were discreetly delivering Green leaflets and posters, while in Brighton Kemptown Green volunteers were delivering Labour leaflets and posters: it was a deal.of mutual benefit.
I personally had a huge 2m × 1m poster in my seafront / coastal road window saying KEMPTOWN GREENS VOTING LABOUR, as the Kemptown Green candidate had stepped down to avoid splitting the vote against a very lazy Tory MP. Because after a previous official "Alliance" of LibDems & Greens only -- rejected by Labour -- against the Tories, local parties had decided privately it was stupid to damage Caroline's chances in Brighton Pavilion, and to let a Tory in again in Brighton Kemptown. So that sadly got Russell-Moyle elected: even though we were quite pleased at the time. He actually acknowledged his debt to the Greens' "borrowed vote".
Whether this amicable relationship still exists is doubtful, however: as the new Labour majority on Brighton & Hove City Council has been saying horrible things about the previous Green minority administration (mainly accusations of wasting money on the seafront "i360" tower). And Starmer is pretty ruthless about anyone stepping out of line. So the People's Republic of Brighton & Hove might have lost its nerve or will to be different, especially by December 2024. And in the end it's the voters' choice anyway.
Yes spoilt votes come a poor last after standing even a token election candidate to represent our disaffection with the so-called "progressive" parties. But making the most of vote-spoiling might at least be better than doing nothing at all: unless KJK's "The Other Party" takes off beyond Starmer's seat. Sounds like an updated version of the proposed "Party of Women"?
I guess Sian Berry probably has the best chance of winning the nomination as next Green Parliamentary candidate for Brighton Pavilion, given how well her name is known as a party co-leader, as well as being prominent in London. Parachuting people into seats is totally against party principles of "localness": but that's how Caroline arrived too in 2010 -- displacing local Keith Taylor who was pretty put out about it. But she'd been a Euro-MP for 10 years and he replaced her. So it was an equitable arrangement on a personal level as well as an amazing breakthrough for the party locally and nationally that Caroline was elected MP.
Re the nominations for PPC as Caroline is standing down, I don't like Sian Berry for her pro-trans views. But in the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK it would be difficult for any party's candidate NOT to have positive views.
I voted for a woman who used to live in Brighton and is currently a Councillor in Lewes, who called for more dialogue between transactivists and women's groups: about the most she could say in the situation, but very welcome. And am hoping other disaffected Greens might have voted for her too.
The third candidate, a ? 19 year-old male who had failed to be elected as a Councillor, was just such a ridiculous option that I called for reopening nominations.
Sorry if it sounded I was against vote-spoiling- if there is no alternative, well of course. And as everyone here is saying, there are few candidates that GC people would really want to vote for.
forgot the grotesque 'Womens Equality Party' - err it isn't women, or for equality. The only hope is 'The Other Party', which Kellie-Jay K is launching soon, to stand against Keir Starmer. If she won, and got into into Parliament, that would be incredible...!
I mean more targeting areas that stand a chance of change. At least spoiling ballots is counted and we would still be taking part in the process others fought and died for us to have the right to do. It is reported by the way - it's listed in every UK election and online these days. It happened locally to me - I noticed in our last round of local elections that the amount of spoiled ballots was more than the difference between the person who won and who came second. So if all those people have another option, they may have been able to vote for that and we'd have had a different result. Labour have let this totally dominate their policy platform and now for years. And Lib Dems. They both lost as a result. Conservatives have had a few fairly surprise successes. Now the others are very grudging slightly changing their tune.
Unfortunately other parties have totally loony suggestions in their manifestos, which I cannot support, or are so deliberately vague I can't trust them, so it's like choosing to be a frog boiled at a slightly faster or slower simmer.
Yes the responsibility to vote even if you hate everyone on the ballot paper makes spoiled votes significant. And much more responsible than the numbers who don't bother to turn out at all.
The significance of the total number of spoiled votes being greater than the difference between first and second candidates in your area would depend rather a lot on the number: which could be as small as one.
Short of standing actual GC candidates with a probable £500 lost deposit for each, I'd propose a GC Spoilt Vote campaign done in style for half the cost: maybe printing election stickers and badges for the Missing Progressive GC Candidate. I've always wanted a badge-making machine and this would be a great excuse for getting one!
And posters: Remember to Spoil Your Vote -- make your GC opinion count!
It was more than one, now I can't remember, it's hard to explain here, but looking at the potential switches it was statistically significant. This is very hard to explain here and briefly! It was not minor and a few votes it was substantial as a proportion of the total votes and winning margins. Hundreds. If you can get a few % from other parties that add up or a big thwack of one, say 10% or 20% to make a direct switch maybe after a targeted local campaign. And also was an unexpected in increase from a usual low amount spoiled. Which suggests it was a deliberate move, and outside of the normal 'protest' spoiling of ballots which you always get. General discontent or single issues. Are all parties losing to spoiling, or is one and why. Would voters be convinced by 'challenger' candidates in their area.
I have tried to speak to voting types about this being where we could focus our efforts, but they are either paid by the parties or refuse to be drawn to remain 'neutral'.
Heard the dire news that Eddie Izzard also known as Fetish Izzard is now standing to replace Caroline Lucas. I wondered what nasty politicking he was wasting all our time with next and where he would pop up next after Sheffield told him where to go. He floats about making waves, grabbing attention, earning money, and doing fuck all to improve anything for anyone. How are so many narcissists attracted to the glory of being MPs? Seeing how LRM can get away with what he does. They really will go down with the ship and drag as many of us down as they can won't they.
Thanks, a large number of spoiled votes makes it interesting enough to pursue: would you mind divulging your constituency?
I subscribe to various outfits which do polling and/ or analyse voting patterns (eg Electoral Calculus) or operate tactical voting websites, or vote-swapping websites: which are becoming more important as tactical voting increases. (But never trust a tactical voting site associated with LibDems, who cheat shamelessly.)
Website(s) for organised GC vote-spoiling might be the next step! And been thinking that I have a so far unused YouTube channel which could be useful (it comes with a hefty monthly payment to be free of ads -- worth it as I watch so much stuff on YouTube.)
And starting a Substack for GC vote-spoiling might help too: to round up ideas & possible volunteers for making &/or distributing campaign stuff. You can't start too soon when elections are concerned, and anyway it ends up being exhausting.
I didn't know Eddie Izzard was hoping to replace Caroline Lucas: he must be competing for the Labour nomination in Brighton Pavilion? If he wins the nomination, that's sure to polarise a lot of Labour voters, especially women. I wonder if anyone is organising resistance. Will ask my Labour activist friend if he knows anything.
One great bit of news today from Green Feminists UK: 150 Green party (of Eng. & Wales) members have just launched a Green Women's Declaration demanding that the GPEW constitution be changed, to restore the sex-based rights and protections of women, and an end to silencing of GC views in the party. Sarah Phillimore is one of the 150 signatories: and probably wrote most if it. I didn't know she was a GPEW member.
So a big row is now brewing in the Green party: and about time. Shahrar Ali's case against GPEW for harrassment and discrimination for expressing GC views, and unlawful suspension, will also be heard in court on 24 August. Perfect timing!
What's guessing some hugely ugly, hairy, wonky-wigged bloke kicks up a fuss then does a report, then a selfie or 500, clutching his beret, victorious from behind the battle lines of the women's toilets at a meeting? Or gets venues to refuse bookings? Let me count the ways they try to silence us...then some daft female Labour MP calls it a nazi far right bigoted genocide?
That would feel good to make a statement- but only the vote tellers would see it, as they put it into the bin marked 'spoilt votes'. They are ignored, hardly mentioned- and probably not even reported by the media....
If I were Labour-inclined & lived in Canterbury I’d vote for Rosie Duffield like a shot. There are other Labour MPs as well as brave Rosie who have stood out for women’s rights: Tonia Antoniazzi in Gower being one of them. We should make a list of all these brave Labour MPs and support them. Alex Sobell, David Lammy, Nadia Whittome - not so much.
I was hesitant for the same reason. Not understanding the unsaid and context that looks pretty bad, despite that statement being exactly what Alan 'SJ' Baker was encouraging people to do. I'd like to see Beth Rigby interview David Lammy and ask him how he might feel to have that statement directed at him and his beliefs, then his non-reply with hoarding rights, bigots and both sides bullshit bingo. Then asking him again until he gave an answer.
Funny how Dodds knew exactly what a woman was when she whined about Alison Rose being 'bullied' out of her role, the first woman who blah blah custard. Those poor, vulnerable trans people, yadda, yadda, yadda. Still drinking her koolaid religiously evey day.
Angela Raynor is an embarrassment to women. How can she support the Madigan loony in preference to actual women in her own party. If Raynor had a brain cell she would be very dangerous indeed. Starmer is a snake, David Lammy is a Buffoon, Thornberry, Nandy, Sobel, Nichols, Barringer, Dodds, Russel-Moyles, all too thick or stupid to be brave enough to challenge the trans madness so not one of them deserves a single vote. Imagine these thick or stupid people who do not support actual women running the country.
Starmer has backtracked on everything he promised during the leadership election. Whatever your opinions on Brexit , it was the biggest democratic vote in our history which Starmer tried his best to block. In doing so he tied the country up in endless debate which distracted us all from what was happening insidiously….. the tentacles of gender ideology were spreading quietly. He has proudly proclaimed that some women have penises and that he will bring in self ID, which he’s said on numerous occasions. The man is a snake oil salesman and I will not be voting Labour despite being a member for decades (no longer). They are a disgrace.
I despise SNP and Greens. Doesn’t leave much to vote for does it.? The Lib Dems are beyond the Pale and Labour are a bunch of untrustworthy charlatans.
The Greens have already done it. At least three suspended GC ex- party Officers are currently sueing the Green party (of England & Wales) for harassment and discrimination for expressing GC views.
As a Remainer I think Starmer acted very responsibly in pushing for a second Referendum following the 2016 Advisory referendum as oresented to Parliament, and in line with the international good practice agreement to which the UK was signed up (but I won't recount all the other reasons).
It's Starmer's behaviour since becoming Labour leader that I find hugely disappointing and sometimes objectionable.
It was always intended as a binding referendum, only when the establishment didn’t get the result it wanted did they start finding excuses to overturn it. Had the result gone the other way, most Brexit voters would have accepted the result as democratic because that’s what we were fighting for….democracy. Tony Benn… “if you can’t vote out the people who govern you, you don’t live in a democracy.”
But thanks for your reply and I hope we can still be online friends against gender 😁
And PS I agree with you that it was Cameron's hubristic assumption that the government's "Remain" policy would win the Advisory referendum, that caused him to rashly misinform the electorate that the government would "act on" the referendum result -- which he had no Parliamentary remit to promise. Blindsided by the 52% majority, instead of apologising and explaining his mistake, he decided to brazen it out: also with no Parliamentary mandate. And even though the turnout had been high, the very small 52% majority meant a decision to leave had been taken by only a third of the electorate, with another third against it (and a third whose opinion was unknown). This is the one of the reasons why "supermajorities" are needed for binding referendums: to achieve at least half the electorate behind big decisions.
And that's without all the campaign shenanigans, lies, foreign interference by US billionaires & Putin's state-employed online trolls. Cameron royally screwed it all up, and divided the country too. What a mess.
Thanks for this JL, there’s quite a lot of nobheads in labour which is ashame because i can’t stand the tories. Dusty had educated me eariler on how its basically self id re branded. They better sort it out. That Lloyd guys a nob head and Emily sounds ljke she’s in a radio 4 panel show- and also a nob head bless her.
"That Lloyd guy" is MY MP. Who, last seen sitting on a wall outside the local polling station, swept off with a local Councillor (we had been discussing trans issues) to AVOID any discussion of them with me.
That was before I saw (on the Parliament channel) his angry vilification of Miriam Cates MP in the Commons: and later the unhinged verbal attack by a senior woman on his office staff, on a man with a baby at a "Let Women Speak" event in Brighton, organised by Kellie-Jay Keen.
I understand she's the one who writes answers to my letters to him. So I have become very reluctant to contact him about anything to do with trans issues: scared of potential repercussions by local activists who know where I live. Brighton is the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK.
It's really good to hear about how this is for people and in our real lives - I would not suggest or pressure you to do anything other that what you already do. It is truthfully too dangerous, yes, I mean dangerous, to do the standard ways of protesting. If not a total waste of time. Keep your powder dry there I guess. I was very surprised angry-shouting-at-baby-lady kept her job and it shows how once you're in, you're in. I get a bit annoyed when people casually say 'oh write to your MP' when maybe you already have, and maybe you know exactly what will happen. It's often luck. And another form of the dreaded signposting. It's very tricky to know how to almost play our current political system to be heard - it seems even dying in our hundreds of thousands gets a shrug or performative shroud waving.
Some experiences and often images stick in my mind. The countless times I've seen your MP in some visibly frothing rant stack up and are unfortunately memorable. If I ever came face to face with him I would remember his sighing, eye-rolling tutting and barely concealed contempt masking his stoked male rage. I never want to be anywhere near him. If these 'activists' could put together a cohesive argument I am prepared to listen. Still waiting.
Thanks for your support. I do feel like a coward for not treating LRM to plenty of rants -- until I remember I live alone, plus his letter-answerer frothing with rage and knowing my address, and all those TRAs swathed in black (including masks) attacking women at Terfy demos. And decide to lie low. But try to make up for it by supporting outfits like Sex-Matters.org which have real political clout...
I really don't think you're a coward, far from it. We don't have to get bruised and battered in the literal fight for our rights every day - you do a great deal in supporting others and on here. Sometimes we have to ca'canny :-)
She does! Ha ha. Somehow Emily must have been through a lot of media training to work so hard at dripping in disgust and being as awfully patronising as one can muster to all the little people. She oozes boredom at explaining things to thickos yet again. It's like her voice and frustration that we're not all nodding along is an aural version of her white van man flag tweet debacle. That caused her to resign, so why is she still at it? Resign, float about for a bit and long enough, hang on, kaboom, back at the tippity top!
Sadly even when she is sometimes making a good point I find her itching to tell us all how stupid we are really puts me off.
I think this is an example of a compromise pleasing no one - too much for the TA's, too little for the GC people. No one can square this circle: either you can change your sex, or you can't. We say you can't obviously. I don't see it as relevant that 'trans people are so vulnerable.' You don't make policy based solely on whether or not one group is vulnerable, there are plenty of vulnerable people in our society including women and children. You make policy on the basis of what is fair to all concerned and then deal with the shouting from those who are pissed off about it.
It's been an interesting reminder of how laws or policies are made or reformed - and who was fighting tooth and nail and their reasons for doing so. Much of safety legislation is so taken for granted in 2023 but it was a fight to get things through, with the craziest of excuses for opposition and some odd grandstanding in the Houses. Proponents pilloried. Then so much of this was accepted, it underpins all our lives but is totally unknown or assumed to always be the way. It's not thought about. Not to wind anyone up, but I'm watching the London ULEZ debate/no debate/what debate with this in mind. There's also a lot of total rot written online and I have to keep checking facts and 'trans' facts which are in fact lies. Written with such astonishing confidence.
It seems that if it's about public safety it's the most drawn-out and feisty wrangling. Which leads me to think everyone does deep down know this recent genderology stuff is about public safety. So police areas trying the 'no comment' tactic about strange men playing dress up in tiny school uniforms outside schools and spotted on public transport exposing their genitals, then clamping down and threatening those who talk about it and want to protect their children and wider communities wasn't going to work.
I wouldn't trust a Labour politician further than I could throw one. Starmer has shown himself to be spineless. He will cede to the gender lobby before the door to No. 10 closes behind him.
You are brilliant JL, that was excoriating! Superb analysis and all the links and evidence if only Labour would listen. Are they intending 'gender recognition reform' being a man to say 'I'm a woman' three times and his wish is granted? It would be so distressing to make any man wear glittery red heels and insist he click them together, so we'll let them off that. They must only wear dress up if they want to. It's a silly list of 'reforms' and reading them is shocking. It's oh and this, oh and this, and yes, they can choose their friend, I mean 'doctor', I mean ahem doctor. It's a 'trans' wish list not serious legal reform. Simplification, cutting red tape (remember Tories liked that) aka giving into the 'trans' lobby. The Webberleys will be even busier. How many 'patients' do they have now? I want to ask Rayner, Starmer, Thornberry, Lammy, Whitless, the lot of them, what are you thinking? Can you explain to me, without exaggeration or lying what the hell you've been parroting and pushing?
I've raised this a few times and it's been a dance for a few years now, but it's vaguely finally filtered through to the legal types propagating this nonsense that it falls flat and we won't vote for it. But for many it's far too late. On the doorstep a few Labour staff have struggled and waffled, panicked and apologised. No, you go back and explain to them, to their faces, whoever is pushing this. It's very simple.
I said exactly this to a Labour canvasser on my doorstep - told him I had cancelled my membership because Labour cannot say what a woman is - respect my sex if you want my X
Yes, I did and I was as calm and polite as I could be and was direct. Only Labour ever door knock where I live. They seriously wriggled and looked baffled. But then months go by, then years and the wheels move very slowly and another sap knocks and we do the same dance again. They feign surprise. Then the last few over the past 18 months have feigned it less well and agreed with me. It's like helping a friend who is making some very silly mistakes and being unable to stop them. Seriously maaate. Baaabe.
I refuse to be tribally much of anything, I want a functioning state and services and while we are stuck unable to vote that's a dim prospect. Gender lobby with further removal of rights vs maybe Tories being a smidge less captured is the current choice.
Given the speed of the Labor about face, GCs best be suspicious. How committed is Labor to anything? If the Dems decide on such a course reversal after 2024, we should be mighty suspicious here, too.
The UK's Labour party under Sir Keir Starmer is committed only to winning power independently, rejecting any possible alliances. But they haven't yet figured out how to do it. And with over a year to go before the next general election, there may be many promises to backtrack on, shifting voter preferences, and new party factions to take into account (or to expel from the party). So their current policy is to avoid having policies, so far as possible. The gender issue is probably their latest most embarassing mistake to withdraw from without being seen to shift their stance...
Ah ha! That would explain it. SW: "you pretend to do a U-turn, but when you get into gov, you let us do what we want..." Keir: "Yes Sir." SW: "That's Madam!" K: "Oh, I'm so sorry..."
It is very telling indeed that Labour propose getting rid of the spousal veto. No thought at all for the women, and it is usually women, who will not be able to end their marriage when their husband suddenly decides he is a woman. I can only imagine their trauma. Shows you whose side Labour is really on. It is not, and never has been, women and children. As for Raynor, Nandy and co, surrender monkey feminists. I despise them utterly.
And it all reminds me of a conversation I had over 30 years ago with a female Labour activist. I was complaining how, as a female Green activist, I was sick of being either ignored or shouted down by men, in Green party meetings (they had mostly come from Labour).
She said Oh -- you should be PLEASED when they shout you down! Because that means they're listening!
It's foul isn't it? I have a sneaky suspicion they eat cheese too! Down with them! (I love cheese). It's so seriously awful it's becoming a bit tragicomic. I am struggling to try to take any of them seriously. I mean, come on, they think we're very stupid and have two second memories.
They keep introducing elements of this to wider public view - like the spousal veto that they are yet again dressing up as the opposite of what it is. And thinking we won't notice. You enter into a contract and future life, perhaps with kids, and your partner then decides his/her fetish and mental disturbance is so much more important so he/she changes his/her 'sex' and therefore pretends he/she is a 'lesbian' or 'gay' man so forces you to change your sexuality and entire relationship in doing so. Erm? No, I think that's a resounding no. I mean, seriously WTAF Labour and Dodds sent out to fly that flag. Forced gender and sexuality conformity? Erm, aren't there rules against that - big nasty laws that Stonewall once upon a time were pushing for? Changed their minds have they?
Same-sex couples, where one unilaterally decides they are now a heterosexual couple. Then the really spesh attention-sucking heterosexual couples who wish to claim to each be the other sex, then ALSO claim the victimhood points of a being a same-sex trans couple. We want it all! We want it now!
Thanks for the link. It's so depressing that the top tier of a so-called "progressive" party has been so completely captured by transgender nonsense masquerading as "human rights" (but who cares about women's rights? -- not these prominent Labour handmaidens).
Transactivists have clearly had a big hand in Labour's "re-fram[ing] debate as hate and biology as bigotry".
Sadly summed up in this last para:
"Whether you agree with our tactics in interrupting the hustings in such a manner there are important questions that need to be asked but the Labour party has re-framed debate as hate and biology as bigotry. They have created a hostile environment for feminists, as our concerns are ignored and shouted down with violent rhetoric and threats of expulsion. Nevertheless women will not remain silent on this matter. To quote another Manchester firebrand, Emmeline Pankhurst, "I know that women, once convinced that they are doing what is right, that their rebellion is just, will go on, no matter what the difficulties, no matter what the dangers, so long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion."
Ever since they let Liam 'Lily' Madigan in as 'Women's officer' who bullied long standing women in Labour out (during Corbyn), and no body cared to stand up for those women within the party, I knew they'd gone to the dogs. That article/event is the product of what letting the TRAs in to take over did. Good ol' 'Invasion of the body snatchers' style...
I think we may need to revisit some of these older cases and publicise them again. Egregiously allowing that man to become the 'women's officer' then use that position and power to encourage then to openly bully and harass women and some men to the point they totally leave and in disgrace. It was incredibly clever using our own identities against us. Our own histories, political affiliations and beliefs. All that under Corbyn. It was senior management at the time who munificently bestowed their seal of approval on all this. Now new old senior management still seem to be a bit unaware of their own actions. Or weirdly trying to play both sides. Same in the Lib Dems, SNP, Plaid and Greens. Tories seem to be excluded for being overtly racist, but not this? Not the same regime.
Imagine replaying the Nandy farce event with Julia illegally asking questions about good ole Adam or 'Katie' Dolatowski in which prison. That's Adam who led to Nicola resigning Adam. Oops, naughty Adam.
These are all forming into a few types and methods - some are in a few and it seems to be mostly male 'trans' for some mystical reason. Another starter for ten:
1) the 'just admin' political types - like Madigan, those who are 'voted' or appointed to be women's officers then lay waste to all the women in the organisation and change national policy and voting rules from then on. How many so far? Must be 30+ now?
2) the civil society types - those who access their chosen vulnerable population of women or children by 'identifying' as female
3) the community types - who roam around committing acts of indecency until they are eventually caught/released/caught/released in real life. But can be online to do this and attack and harass, sending death threats to women.
4) the organisational types - clinical/medical regulators, professional body and govt types. To secretly lobby and rewrite policy then law. Just admin again, but they 'win' awards and get featured in magazines as 'groundbreaking'. Mridul Wadhwa., but he can sit in a few types.
5) the mostly activist types - Alan Baker and 'Katie' Montgomerie. Online groups and firmly offline, in real life, 'protesting' and again violent ones. This somehow merges into the academic/student types and the legal or fetishes are hooomun roights types and also the charity 'I'm just doing this for the kids' types. Then back to the political 'admin' types. Then the Ashton Challenor IT porny messed up types, which neatly cycles back yet again to the political admin types.
6) the rent a crowd types - violent men and lost unhinged women who can be relied upon to turn up anywhere for some reason. Mainly young with a host of disorders who need help and direction.
7) the insisting on healthcare for the other sex but not types (see activists again).
8) the useful idiot types - see Lloyd Russell-Moyle and all bar about 6 Labour MPs or Lords. Many in Tory Party too. All parties. Often hoodwinked into believing this is about gay rights.
9) the familial and personally invested types - Susie Green and many others secreted away at the tops of government departments, publishers and banks.
10) the accidental trans activist types – those who are trying to be ‘nice’ and ‘fair’ and have no real idea of the detail of what they are pushing or supporting. See also useful idiots.
Then those who have fought this - the whistleblowers and how they have often taken cases to court and used crowdfunding and alternate means to get heard. Those in specific jobs that have been hounded out to send a lesson to that profession - publishing, mental health, social work, education, politics.
It's actually quite incredible that in 2023, any political party should elect or appoint a male as Women's Officer, trans-identified or not. And especially one so young and inexperienced, and whose major concerns are to get GC women out of their posts. And to look after trans young people.
A big slap in the face for women. Why the hell wasn't he appointed as a Trans Officer, if it's so important? And why wasn't the post of Women's Officer protected for females?
Absurd and scandalous.
A trans-identified male also created a lot of trouble in Green Party Women: wanting the post of Chair. He didn't get it: but the women who opposed him were suspended from the party for expressing GC views. They are now sueing the party for harrassment and discrimination.
Thanks for the link. I have read it before but it's awful to read again. Entertainingly written but awful. One after the other with their empty soundbites as the UK is in havoc. Are they hoping the magic glitter dust will make this all disappear? Whoohoo for DJ Lippy.
They are always concerned about elections. But I doubt they see their chances as "grim" while Electoral Calculus predicts a landslide victory of well over 400 seats on its current opinion polling, were an election held tomorrow.
I don’t trust them. They would change in an instant if the electoral wind blew in a different direction. No principles. No integrity. No genuine concern for women and children or the future of of our society. The very worst political behaviour I have witnessed in many decades.
100% Labour have be SO heavily invested in the gender bollocks that it's difficult to believe this U turn is real. Don't trust them. Reckon self ID is still the agenda and they'll turn back after the election.
This is them figuring out which way the wind is blowing.
Absolutely agree they are not to be trusted one inch.
Yes- all smoke and mirrors. And don't forget they have been 'grooming' Eddie Izzard to be the first Transgender candidate- he was around London as a woman, Sheffield I'm not sure but they decided not not try it there. Then later he was campaigning in Swansea, all blokey with short hair and a goatee, no make up obvs. I think they'll look for a 'safe' Lab seat for him/(it!).
It’s just been announced, he’s standing in Brighton and Hove.
1. Ali- what a superb thumbnail! 2. Will Brighton and Hove be a new constituency? There are three at the moment- Hove and something (Peter Kyle, Lab)/ Brighton Pavilion (Caroline Lucas, Green- but standing down. New candidate Sian Berry) / Brighton Kemptown. (Lloyd Russell Moyle- Lab) ...
Sorry, my mistake (I was referring to the area, not the constituency). The constituency he’s standing in is Brighton Pavilion. It’s the Commons or nothing as far as Eddie’s political ambitions go: https://www.eddieizzard.uk/. And presumably a seat in the Lords after that as a nice retirement gig.
Suddenly, Labour realizes there's an election on.
We should never let them forget what it was they stood for and we should keep reminding them of this at every opportunity until they repent.
EDIT: There is a difference between apologizing and repenting - I don't want to forgive any of these people, I want their word they will Never.Do.This.Again.
I bet it's only because Labour MPs keep hearing the phrase "politically homeless" from GC former Labour members and voters, that they've started to estimate the scale of losses created by their commitment to capture the trans-indoctrinated youth vote.
It might have helped them to remember television images of Nicola Sturgeon squirming to avoid calling a male rapist a "woman", shortly before she resigned. And the estimated 60% of the Scottish public against the SNP's Gender Recogniton Reform Act: before it was stopped by the Tory government issuing a Section 38 kibosh on devolved legislation that conflicted with Westminster legislation.
Labour's current retreat from all-out gender self-ID seems much more token than real, given dropping the requirements both for two years living "as the opposite gender" and for an anonymous panel to check the verdict of a single transactivist GP.
Labour is sitting on the fence: trying to please everyone... Can't be done. (Shades of Corbyn and Brexit)
Labour hasn't yet got my vote back. And with only the offensively transactivist Lloyd Russell-Moyle to vote for locally, my vote is lost anyway until & unless he's replaced.
Honestly I don't trust Labours U-turn on this issue one bit. Imo they'll walk it back to self ID once they're in office again and just say they changed their mind after listening to feed back from the LGBTQ+ community.
Many of us in the LGB community - to the extent that there is one - want nothing to do with the Ts.
But on the other hand, as more of the public gets what's really going on behind the false claims and violent misogyny of transactivists, Labour might find it increasingly convenient that the Tories have not caved in to all the nonsense and lies. And find reasons, as a new government, NOT to reverse Tory legislation (like invoking Section 38 to block the Scots Gender Recognition Reform Act) -- either quickly, or at all.
Yes, i'd like to hope so too. But problem is, that so many TRAs are embedded in Labour...
Starmer's sudden U-turn on this issue must be viewed through the prisms of suspicion and scepticism. The entire leadership and almost all MPS have not only been anti-women, but vitriolic in their froth-spewing condemnation of a debate on sex -based rights. It follows that they have been equally and wilfully blind to the child butchery. They smell an election loser. That said, if Starmer is negating the existence of the lady dique, then it does make it more difficult for the rest of his sheep to continue in this worship and adulation of the female penis. I see that Andrew Neil and Richard Dawkins have joined the TERF party, too, albeit rather late. This all helps wake up the ideologically anaesthetised.
it must have been difficult to practice law when such confusing terminology such as ‘man’ and ‘woman’ was being used
One can only wonder how he managed.
Miss JemimaGC, when i read your name Miss JemimaGC, my brain always reads…. Miss JemimaQC which makes me think you’re some sort of lead character in a court room drama. Off topic and completely irrelevant.
I do too. And I always think of the TV programme when I see Dennis Kavanagh :-). I'd like to remind them that KC stands for King's Counsel not Kinky Crap. It's often said that good senior NHS management used to walk through the front door of their own hospital (through A&E) and then look around and listen, talk to people and their own staff. Pay attention. How do we get senior people to realise, to listen and be aware of what's happening under their noses? Who the hell would want to take counsel from this lot? They don't appear to be very bright no matter their qualifications and other jobs. They have very publicly got this very wrong, then doubled down and refused to listen as their own MPs have been abused and bullied by their senior ranks and backbench halfwits. So they've been clearing the decks before the election.
😆I like the sound of that image. Alas, not the case.
Objection!
Overruled!
But our "binary bias" (dismissed by a pink-haired transactivist surgeon as an obstacle to glorious bodily self-actualisation via "non-binary affirming surgery") seems (for most of us) to be an involuntary cognitive event: almost as if it were innate, evolutionary biology. That's now old hat, of course, with 73 genders and gender fluidity and new non-binary expressions of pink and blue haired uniqueness every day. For those who can pay, especially.
Starmer hasn’t yet commented on the 0.1% of women who have penises!
No, he wisely hasn't. He got as far as saying a woman is 'an adult female '. Adult WHAT female, cat, gerbil, plattapus??
Oh I know, I know, it's clownfish isn't it - all those sciencey people say that so it must be true. Poor man is so thoroughly embedded and enmeshed in his own lies.
Disappointing: I thought he'd actually been heard to utter the full three magic words "Adult Human Female".
But if he's managed to get even two thirds of the TERF party's incantation right, it suggests he's LISTENING at last... not just to his gender-intoxicated Shadow Cabinet halfwits, trying to look cool for the youth vote. He's clearly trying to ingratiate himself with TERFs after his regrettable women-with-penises lapse: he might even get "Adult Human Female" right, in time.
It's been in-yer-face Trans Pride time: he's probably been having nightmares about trans rapists and Nicola Sturgeon's sudden fall from grace.
and anyway 'adult female' can be intended to include male transsexuals if you give them the right to declare themselves 'female'. A friend said the UK Rowing body now says only 'AFAB' can compete in Women's category, but he thought it was insulting to use that terminology- but I thought at least it was a definition that trans creeps could not sneak past. 'Adult female' is weasel words
I have been thinking along the same lines as you JL. Thank you for setting out the extent of Trans capture in the Labour party. Given how weak a leader Starmer is, how are we to believe that he can take the rest of the party with him? Assuming that he has actually come to realise that "Trans rights" impinge on those of women and children. Let him decide to repeal the GRA, banish the teaching of gender identities in school, forbid the mutilation and poisoning called "gender affirmative care" and to rid all public institutions of DEI roles. Then I will vote for Labour. Until then, I can recognise when I am being strung along. I have read Emmeline Pankhurst's story and the shameful way they strung the suffragettes along. The lessons are there for anyone who wants to read "My Own Story"
Hear hear
and also, how much personal power does Starmer actually have? Is he just a figurehead, who could be replaced anytime it suited the puppet-masters behind him...? just thinking aloud...
Exactly. Labour’s plans will herald self-id by the back door and it’ll all be cloaked in secrecy. Shame on them for Dodds’ bleating about how vulnerable trans people are. They don’t look too vulnerable when they’re threatening to throat punch us.
I reckon the only way to vote in the GE is Tory or to spoil your ballot paper.
I am still surprised their crack election advisors think this will work and they still seem to have underestimated the level of anger, hurt and resentment in lifelong Labour voters. I have no clue who to vote for either and have told them this. There have been a few vote swapping sites set up in the past - to try to deal with our pork barrelled voting system but I'm wondering if so many spoil their ballots, what effect could that have? What will push this change? It's been discussed here in local elections, but I'm concerned that Labour will risk votes through this and some other really facepalming decisions.
Sadly, tactical vote swapping can't work when Lab, LibDem, Green, Scot Nat are all TRA-stooges. So if we want to avoid Tories, we need to vote for Independents (or Reform). Spoiling ballots is a waste of time- it has no effect, and woud be ignored- and probably unreported anyway. (I wish we had a "ReOpen Nominations" option- if that won, the election would be called again, with different candidates. But even that would be so slow... tho send a clear message, I guess)
Candidates (plus Agent & spouse if any) always attend The Count to look over the shoulders of tellers at piles of ballot papers. Organised spoiling of ballot papers by lavender, green & white (Suffragette colours) stickers from outfits like Sex-Matters.org would make far more impression on candidates & agents -- and reporters for the media -- in terms of growing piles of lost votes for Labour, Greens & LibDems, than random "None of the above" scribblings and insults.
And even better would be a TERF party candidate to vote for. This would require nominees, and £500 for an election deposit (lost if a candidate polls less than 5% of the overall vote), but would involve personal risk of assault from transactivists.
General election candidates benefit from free postage for election leaflets sent to every person on the Electoral Register, but have to cover design & printing costs of any such leaflets.
Most small parties start out by standing in local elections to make themselves known. If too short of funds for printing leaflets (delivered by volunteers) just standing a candidate will usually get some votes. Or complaints if there is no candidate to vote for -- even with no chance of being elected.
I speak from six years of experience in the late 1980s - early 90s in writing, designing & producing Green party campaigning materials (and standing in a couple of local elections) in Brighton Pavilion: which elected first Green Councillors, then in 2010 the first & still only Green MP for England & Wales.
But standing a TERF party candidate in the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK would undoubtedly be asking for a LOT of trouble.
And whether Sian Berry would actually be elected MP is doubtful: given that in the last local B&H election seven Green Councillors lost their seats. There has also been a constituency boundary change, shifting Kemptown (a seafront ward) from Brighton Pavilion to Brighton Kemptown (where I now live): with what effects on voting, I don't know. The Kemptown area of the city is very gay.
ah- i just asked whether Brighton area will have new boundaries. Labour have always desperately wanted to get Caroline Lucas out. Eddie Izzard could hope to get TRA, and some Green, and any trad Labour votes. I really hope he doesn't become the first brave and stunning fetishist MP...
Izzard would almost certainly split the Labour vote! But one ward in Brighton Pavilion has elected the first B&H trans Councillor (a ?19 year-old TiM) in May, so you never know.
well obvs, many MPs are fetishists- it's just they don't usually boast about it lol
Yes, 'the political-party-activist cliques' would know about spoilt votes. But I still think that overall it doesn't make much of an impression. The binary (to coin a phrase) 2-party system focusses on the big two, and even the established alternatives (LD, Nats) are usually overlooked by the media, as are the Greens ofc. The big-two won't care if the overall turnout was only 5% of eligible voters- as long as they are the First Past The Post. Kellie-Jay Keen standing as 'The Other Party' in Starmer's seat, will be good, to raise awareness, and get into the media. Though as you say, I would worry about violence from GI zealots. (And BTW, with your local knowledge, will Sian Berry have a chance to win B Pavilion for the Greens? Labour have always been ruthless in trying to oppose her, and get the seat. Caroline may have had tactical vote support from Con and LibDems trying to keep Lab out- but that was before she said she believes transwomen are women- which Sian Berry has always said. TRAs can choose between Lab, LibDem and Green- could there even be a chance of splitting the vote, and letting a Tory in?
PS. re your speculations about how the vote might split, Brighton & Hove Labour disagrees (or used to) with the central party's ruthlessly exclusive line: in expelling any member found to be guilty of cooperating with other parties against the Tories. In the 2015 general election, I was told (by a Labour activist friend) that in Brighton Pavilion, Labour volunteers were discreetly delivering Green leaflets and posters, while in Brighton Kemptown Green volunteers were delivering Labour leaflets and posters: it was a deal.of mutual benefit.
I personally had a huge 2m × 1m poster in my seafront / coastal road window saying KEMPTOWN GREENS VOTING LABOUR, as the Kemptown Green candidate had stepped down to avoid splitting the vote against a very lazy Tory MP. Because after a previous official "Alliance" of LibDems & Greens only -- rejected by Labour -- against the Tories, local parties had decided privately it was stupid to damage Caroline's chances in Brighton Pavilion, and to let a Tory in again in Brighton Kemptown. So that sadly got Russell-Moyle elected: even though we were quite pleased at the time. He actually acknowledged his debt to the Greens' "borrowed vote".
Whether this amicable relationship still exists is doubtful, however: as the new Labour majority on Brighton & Hove City Council has been saying horrible things about the previous Green minority administration (mainly accusations of wasting money on the seafront "i360" tower). And Starmer is pretty ruthless about anyone stepping out of line. So the People's Republic of Brighton & Hove might have lost its nerve or will to be different, especially by December 2024. And in the end it's the voters' choice anyway.
Yes spoilt votes come a poor last after standing even a token election candidate to represent our disaffection with the so-called "progressive" parties. But making the most of vote-spoiling might at least be better than doing nothing at all: unless KJK's "The Other Party" takes off beyond Starmer's seat. Sounds like an updated version of the proposed "Party of Women"?
I guess Sian Berry probably has the best chance of winning the nomination as next Green Parliamentary candidate for Brighton Pavilion, given how well her name is known as a party co-leader, as well as being prominent in London. Parachuting people into seats is totally against party principles of "localness": but that's how Caroline arrived too in 2010 -- displacing local Keith Taylor who was pretty put out about it. But she'd been a Euro-MP for 10 years and he replaced her. So it was an equitable arrangement on a personal level as well as an amazing breakthrough for the party locally and nationally that Caroline was elected MP.
Re the nominations for PPC as Caroline is standing down, I don't like Sian Berry for her pro-trans views. But in the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK it would be difficult for any party's candidate NOT to have positive views.
I voted for a woman who used to live in Brighton and is currently a Councillor in Lewes, who called for more dialogue between transactivists and women's groups: about the most she could say in the situation, but very welcome. And am hoping other disaffected Greens might have voted for her too.
The third candidate, a ? 19 year-old male who had failed to be elected as a Councillor, was just such a ridiculous option that I called for reopening nominations.
I guess it will probably be Sian Berry.
Sorry if it sounded I was against vote-spoiling- if there is no alternative, well of course. And as everyone here is saying, there are few candidates that GC people would really want to vote for.
forgot the grotesque 'Womens Equality Party' - err it isn't women, or for equality. The only hope is 'The Other Party', which Kellie-Jay K is launching soon, to stand against Keir Starmer. If she won, and got into into Parliament, that would be incredible...!
Yes the WEP is a total let-down, but I understood (perhaps wrongly) that KJK's proposed party was going to be called "Party of Women".
Great if KJK wins in Starmer's seat!
I mean more targeting areas that stand a chance of change. At least spoiling ballots is counted and we would still be taking part in the process others fought and died for us to have the right to do. It is reported by the way - it's listed in every UK election and online these days. It happened locally to me - I noticed in our last round of local elections that the amount of spoiled ballots was more than the difference between the person who won and who came second. So if all those people have another option, they may have been able to vote for that and we'd have had a different result. Labour have let this totally dominate their policy platform and now for years. And Lib Dems. They both lost as a result. Conservatives have had a few fairly surprise successes. Now the others are very grudging slightly changing their tune.
Unfortunately other parties have totally loony suggestions in their manifestos, which I cannot support, or are so deliberately vague I can't trust them, so it's like choosing to be a frog boiled at a slightly faster or slower simmer.
Yes the responsibility to vote even if you hate everyone on the ballot paper makes spoiled votes significant. And much more responsible than the numbers who don't bother to turn out at all.
The significance of the total number of spoiled votes being greater than the difference between first and second candidates in your area would depend rather a lot on the number: which could be as small as one.
Short of standing actual GC candidates with a probable £500 lost deposit for each, I'd propose a GC Spoilt Vote campaign done in style for half the cost: maybe printing election stickers and badges for the Missing Progressive GC Candidate. I've always wanted a badge-making machine and this would be a great excuse for getting one!
And posters: Remember to Spoil Your Vote -- make your GC opinion count!
It was more than one, now I can't remember, it's hard to explain here, but looking at the potential switches it was statistically significant. This is very hard to explain here and briefly! It was not minor and a few votes it was substantial as a proportion of the total votes and winning margins. Hundreds. If you can get a few % from other parties that add up or a big thwack of one, say 10% or 20% to make a direct switch maybe after a targeted local campaign. And also was an unexpected in increase from a usual low amount spoiled. Which suggests it was a deliberate move, and outside of the normal 'protest' spoiling of ballots which you always get. General discontent or single issues. Are all parties losing to spoiling, or is one and why. Would voters be convinced by 'challenger' candidates in their area.
I have tried to speak to voting types about this being where we could focus our efforts, but they are either paid by the parties or refuse to be drawn to remain 'neutral'.
Heard the dire news that Eddie Izzard also known as Fetish Izzard is now standing to replace Caroline Lucas. I wondered what nasty politicking he was wasting all our time with next and where he would pop up next after Sheffield told him where to go. He floats about making waves, grabbing attention, earning money, and doing fuck all to improve anything for anyone. How are so many narcissists attracted to the glory of being MPs? Seeing how LRM can get away with what he does. They really will go down with the ship and drag as many of us down as they can won't they.
Thanks, a large number of spoiled votes makes it interesting enough to pursue: would you mind divulging your constituency?
I subscribe to various outfits which do polling and/ or analyse voting patterns (eg Electoral Calculus) or operate tactical voting websites, or vote-swapping websites: which are becoming more important as tactical voting increases. (But never trust a tactical voting site associated with LibDems, who cheat shamelessly.)
Website(s) for organised GC vote-spoiling might be the next step! And been thinking that I have a so far unused YouTube channel which could be useful (it comes with a hefty monthly payment to be free of ads -- worth it as I watch so much stuff on YouTube.)
And starting a Substack for GC vote-spoiling might help too: to round up ideas & possible volunteers for making &/or distributing campaign stuff. You can't start too soon when elections are concerned, and anyway it ends up being exhausting.
I didn't know Eddie Izzard was hoping to replace Caroline Lucas: he must be competing for the Labour nomination in Brighton Pavilion? If he wins the nomination, that's sure to polarise a lot of Labour voters, especially women. I wonder if anyone is organising resistance. Will ask my Labour activist friend if he knows anything.
One great bit of news today from Green Feminists UK: 150 Green party (of Eng. & Wales) members have just launched a Green Women's Declaration demanding that the GPEW constitution be changed, to restore the sex-based rights and protections of women, and an end to silencing of GC views in the party. Sarah Phillimore is one of the 150 signatories: and probably wrote most if it. I didn't know she was a GPEW member.
https://greenwomensdeclaration.uk/
So a big row is now brewing in the Green party: and about time. Shahrar Ali's case against GPEW for harrassment and discrimination for expressing GC views, and unlawful suspension, will also be heard in court on 24 August. Perfect timing!
Party of Women 😇
Sadly some women are also captured by this bollox.
But hopefully they won't be part of the POW :)
Dusty
What's guessing some hugely ugly, hairy, wonky-wigged bloke kicks up a fuss then does a report, then a selfie or 500, clutching his beret, victorious from behind the battle lines of the women's toilets at a meeting? Or gets venues to refuse bookings? Let me count the ways they try to silence us...then some daft female Labour MP calls it a nazi far right bigoted genocide?
The best way to spoil a ballot paper has been discussed: and the answer is STICKERS. From outfits like Sex-Matters.org
Exactly. I’m thinking of covering it with ‘Trans women are men and most have a penis’.
That would feel good to make a statement- but only the vote tellers would see it, as they put it into the bin marked 'spoilt votes'. They are ignored, hardly mentioned- and probably not even reported by the media....
If I were Labour-inclined & lived in Canterbury I’d vote for Rosie Duffield like a shot. There are other Labour MPs as well as brave Rosie who have stood out for women’s rights: Tonia Antoniazzi in Gower being one of them. We should make a list of all these brave Labour MPs and support them. Alex Sobell, David Lammy, Nadia Whittome - not so much.
David Lammy should be ‘throat punched’!
I disagree; non-violence should be our maxim. Leave that to the violent Black Pampers,TRAs & fascistic “antifa.”
The exclamation mark indicated irony.
Apologies. I only know the “/s” or "⸮".
I was hesitant for the same reason. Not understanding the unsaid and context that looks pretty bad, despite that statement being exactly what Alan 'SJ' Baker was encouraging people to do. I'd like to see Beth Rigby interview David Lammy and ask him how he might feel to have that statement directed at him and his beliefs, then his non-reply with hoarding rights, bigots and both sides bullshit bingo. Then asking him again until he gave an answer.
Funny how Dodds knew exactly what a woman was when she whined about Alison Rose being 'bullied' out of her role, the first woman who blah blah custard. Those poor, vulnerable trans people, yadda, yadda, yadda. Still drinking her koolaid religiously evey day.
She’s an utter cunt!
Angela Raynor is an embarrassment to women. How can she support the Madigan loony in preference to actual women in her own party. If Raynor had a brain cell she would be very dangerous indeed. Starmer is a snake, David Lammy is a Buffoon, Thornberry, Nandy, Sobel, Nichols, Barringer, Dodds, Russel-Moyles, all too thick or stupid to be brave enough to challenge the trans madness so not one of them deserves a single vote. Imagine these thick or stupid people who do not support actual women running the country.
Susan you have the measure of them precisely.
Spot on.
More hear hear 😎
Starmer has backtracked on everything he promised during the leadership election. Whatever your opinions on Brexit , it was the biggest democratic vote in our history which Starmer tried his best to block. In doing so he tied the country up in endless debate which distracted us all from what was happening insidiously….. the tentacles of gender ideology were spreading quietly. He has proudly proclaimed that some women have penises and that he will bring in self ID, which he’s said on numerous occasions. The man is a snake oil salesman and I will not be voting Labour despite being a member for decades (no longer). They are a disgrace.
Labour needs to lose, continue to lose, and keep losing until they Get The Message.
They haven't gotten the message yet.
Like the SNP and Greens. Theu all just use us. No more.
I despise SNP and Greens. Doesn’t leave much to vote for does it.? The Lib Dems are beyond the Pale and Labour are a bunch of untrustworthy charlatans.
the LibDems even wanted to expel any of their own members who were GC !?
The Greens have already done it. At least three suspended GC ex- party Officers are currently sueing the Green party (of England & Wales) for harassment and discrimination for expressing GC views.
Absolutely this, 💯
Hear hear TT
As a Remainer I think Starmer acted very responsibly in pushing for a second Referendum following the 2016 Advisory referendum as oresented to Parliament, and in line with the international good practice agreement to which the UK was signed up (but I won't recount all the other reasons).
It's Starmer's behaviour since becoming Labour leader that I find hugely disappointing and sometimes objectionable.
It was always intended as a binding referendum, only when the establishment didn’t get the result it wanted did they start finding excuses to overturn it. Had the result gone the other way, most Brexit voters would have accepted the result as democratic because that’s what we were fighting for….democracy. Tony Benn… “if you can’t vote out the people who govern you, you don’t live in a democracy.”
But thanks for your reply and I hope we can still be online friends against gender 😁
Sorry I forgot to add yes, I too hope we can still be online friends against gender madness.
👍
And PS I agree with you that it was Cameron's hubristic assumption that the government's "Remain" policy would win the Advisory referendum, that caused him to rashly misinform the electorate that the government would "act on" the referendum result -- which he had no Parliamentary remit to promise. Blindsided by the 52% majority, instead of apologising and explaining his mistake, he decided to brazen it out: also with no Parliamentary mandate. And even though the turnout had been high, the very small 52% majority meant a decision to leave had been taken by only a third of the electorate, with another third against it (and a third whose opinion was unknown). This is the one of the reasons why "supermajorities" are needed for binding referendums: to achieve at least half the electorate behind big decisions.
And that's without all the campaign shenanigans, lies, foreign interference by US billionaires & Putin's state-employed online trolls. Cameron royally screwed it all up, and divided the country too. What a mess.
I have to agree with you there . 😁
Thanks for this JL, there’s quite a lot of nobheads in labour which is ashame because i can’t stand the tories. Dusty had educated me eariler on how its basically self id re branded. They better sort it out. That Lloyd guys a nob head and Emily sounds ljke she’s in a radio 4 panel show- and also a nob head bless her.
"That Lloyd guy" is MY MP. Who, last seen sitting on a wall outside the local polling station, swept off with a local Councillor (we had been discussing trans issues) to AVOID any discussion of them with me.
That was before I saw (on the Parliament channel) his angry vilification of Miriam Cates MP in the Commons: and later the unhinged verbal attack by a senior woman on his office staff, on a man with a baby at a "Let Women Speak" event in Brighton, organised by Kellie-Jay Keen.
I understand she's the one who writes answers to my letters to him. So I have become very reluctant to contact him about anything to do with trans issues: scared of potential repercussions by local activists who know where I live. Brighton is the LGBTQIA+ capital of the UK.
It's really good to hear about how this is for people and in our real lives - I would not suggest or pressure you to do anything other that what you already do. It is truthfully too dangerous, yes, I mean dangerous, to do the standard ways of protesting. If not a total waste of time. Keep your powder dry there I guess. I was very surprised angry-shouting-at-baby-lady kept her job and it shows how once you're in, you're in. I get a bit annoyed when people casually say 'oh write to your MP' when maybe you already have, and maybe you know exactly what will happen. It's often luck. And another form of the dreaded signposting. It's very tricky to know how to almost play our current political system to be heard - it seems even dying in our hundreds of thousands gets a shrug or performative shroud waving.
Some experiences and often images stick in my mind. The countless times I've seen your MP in some visibly frothing rant stack up and are unfortunately memorable. If I ever came face to face with him I would remember his sighing, eye-rolling tutting and barely concealed contempt masking his stoked male rage. I never want to be anywhere near him. If these 'activists' could put together a cohesive argument I am prepared to listen. Still waiting.
Thanks for your support. I do feel like a coward for not treating LRM to plenty of rants -- until I remember I live alone, plus his letter-answerer frothing with rage and knowing my address, and all those TRAs swathed in black (including masks) attacking women at Terfy demos. And decide to lie low. But try to make up for it by supporting outfits like Sex-Matters.org which have real political clout...
I really don't think you're a coward, far from it. We don't have to get bruised and battered in the literal fight for our rights every day - you do a great deal in supporting others and on here. Sometimes we have to ca'canny :-)
Thank you!
You are not a coward. You can see a possible threat, so it is fair enough to be careful. I'm sure many of us are laying low a bit :-(
Thank you!
Poor you!
She does! Ha ha. Somehow Emily must have been through a lot of media training to work so hard at dripping in disgust and being as awfully patronising as one can muster to all the little people. She oozes boredom at explaining things to thickos yet again. It's like her voice and frustration that we're not all nodding along is an aural version of her white van man flag tweet debacle. That caused her to resign, so why is she still at it? Resign, float about for a bit and long enough, hang on, kaboom, back at the tippity top!
Sadly even when she is sometimes making a good point I find her itching to tell us all how stupid we are really puts me off.
I think this is an example of a compromise pleasing no one - too much for the TA's, too little for the GC people. No one can square this circle: either you can change your sex, or you can't. We say you can't obviously. I don't see it as relevant that 'trans people are so vulnerable.' You don't make policy based solely on whether or not one group is vulnerable, there are plenty of vulnerable people in our society including women and children. You make policy on the basis of what is fair to all concerned and then deal with the shouting from those who are pissed off about it.
It's been an interesting reminder of how laws or policies are made or reformed - and who was fighting tooth and nail and their reasons for doing so. Much of safety legislation is so taken for granted in 2023 but it was a fight to get things through, with the craziest of excuses for opposition and some odd grandstanding in the Houses. Proponents pilloried. Then so much of this was accepted, it underpins all our lives but is totally unknown or assumed to always be the way. It's not thought about. Not to wind anyone up, but I'm watching the London ULEZ debate/no debate/what debate with this in mind. There's also a lot of total rot written online and I have to keep checking facts and 'trans' facts which are in fact lies. Written with such astonishing confidence.
It seems that if it's about public safety it's the most drawn-out and feisty wrangling. Which leads me to think everyone does deep down know this recent genderology stuff is about public safety. So police areas trying the 'no comment' tactic about strange men playing dress up in tiny school uniforms outside schools and spotted on public transport exposing their genitals, then clamping down and threatening those who talk about it and want to protect their children and wider communities wasn't going to work.
I wouldn't trust a Labour politician further than I could throw one. Starmer has shown himself to be spineless. He will cede to the gender lobby before the door to No. 10 closes behind him.
Indeed. Any woman who votes Labour (or Lib Dem or Green) is a 'jockstrap'.
Or SNP
could they be a 'Jock-Jock-Strap' then? ;-)
You are brilliant JL, that was excoriating! Superb analysis and all the links and evidence if only Labour would listen. Are they intending 'gender recognition reform' being a man to say 'I'm a woman' three times and his wish is granted? It would be so distressing to make any man wear glittery red heels and insist he click them together, so we'll let them off that. They must only wear dress up if they want to. It's a silly list of 'reforms' and reading them is shocking. It's oh and this, oh and this, and yes, they can choose their friend, I mean 'doctor', I mean ahem doctor. It's a 'trans' wish list not serious legal reform. Simplification, cutting red tape (remember Tories liked that) aka giving into the 'trans' lobby. The Webberleys will be even busier. How many 'patients' do they have now? I want to ask Rayner, Starmer, Thornberry, Lammy, Whitless, the lot of them, what are you thinking? Can you explain to me, without exaggeration or lying what the hell you've been parroting and pushing?
I've raised this a few times and it's been a dance for a few years now, but it's vaguely finally filtered through to the legal types propagating this nonsense that it falls flat and we won't vote for it. But for many it's far too late. On the doorstep a few Labour staff have struggled and waffled, panicked and apologised. No, you go back and explain to them, to their faces, whoever is pushing this. It's very simple.
I said exactly this to a Labour canvasser on my doorstep - told him I had cancelled my membership because Labour cannot say what a woman is - respect my sex if you want my X
Yes, I did and I was as calm and polite as I could be and was direct. Only Labour ever door knock where I live. They seriously wriggled and looked baffled. But then months go by, then years and the wheels move very slowly and another sap knocks and we do the same dance again. They feign surprise. Then the last few over the past 18 months have feigned it less well and agreed with me. It's like helping a friend who is making some very silly mistakes and being unable to stop them. Seriously maaate. Baaabe.
I refuse to be tribally much of anything, I want a functioning state and services and while we are stuck unable to vote that's a dim prospect. Gender lobby with further removal of rights vs maybe Tories being a smidge less captured is the current choice.
Very well said.
Given the speed of the Labor about face, GCs best be suspicious. How committed is Labor to anything? If the Dems decide on such a course reversal after 2024, we should be mighty suspicious here, too.
The UK's Labour party under Sir Keir Starmer is committed only to winning power independently, rejecting any possible alliances. But they haven't yet figured out how to do it. And with over a year to go before the next general election, there may be many promises to backtrack on, shifting voter preferences, and new party factions to take into account (or to expel from the party). So their current policy is to avoid having policies, so far as possible. The gender issue is probably their latest most embarassing mistake to withdraw from without being seen to shift their stance...
If they can’t be trusted to say that women don’t have penises, they can’t be trusted on anything.
Agreed, Fred
I am becoming more and more suspicious of that recent meeting with Stonewall. Did they cook this up? Stonewall don't meet with 'enemies'.
Dusty
Ah ha! That would explain it. SW: "you pretend to do a U-turn, but when you get into gov, you let us do what we want..." Keir: "Yes Sir." SW: "That's Madam!" K: "Oh, I'm so sorry..."
Haha nice one - they could even stick with the one letter policy- nice and simple. I smell a rat 😎
Dusty
Ta da!
Indeed, we should!
It is very telling indeed that Labour propose getting rid of the spousal veto. No thought at all for the women, and it is usually women, who will not be able to end their marriage when their husband suddenly decides he is a woman. I can only imagine their trauma. Shows you whose side Labour is really on. It is not, and never has been, women and children. As for Raynor, Nandy and co, surrender monkey feminists. I despise them utterly.
Spousal Exit clause.
And it all reminds me of a conversation I had over 30 years ago with a female Labour activist. I was complaining how, as a female Green activist, I was sick of being either ignored or shouted down by men, in Green party meetings (they had mostly come from Labour).
She said Oh -- you should be PLEASED when they shout you down! Because that means they're listening!
It's foul isn't it? I have a sneaky suspicion they eat cheese too! Down with them! (I love cheese). It's so seriously awful it's becoming a bit tragicomic. I am struggling to try to take any of them seriously. I mean, come on, they think we're very stupid and have two second memories.
They keep introducing elements of this to wider public view - like the spousal veto that they are yet again dressing up as the opposite of what it is. And thinking we won't notice. You enter into a contract and future life, perhaps with kids, and your partner then decides his/her fetish and mental disturbance is so much more important so he/she changes his/her 'sex' and therefore pretends he/she is a 'lesbian' or 'gay' man so forces you to change your sexuality and entire relationship in doing so. Erm? No, I think that's a resounding no. I mean, seriously WTAF Labour and Dodds sent out to fly that flag. Forced gender and sexuality conformity? Erm, aren't there rules against that - big nasty laws that Stonewall once upon a time were pushing for? Changed their minds have they?
Same-sex couples, where one unilaterally decides they are now a heterosexual couple. Then the really spesh attention-sucking heterosexual couples who wish to claim to each be the other sex, then ALSO claim the victimhood points of a being a same-sex trans couple. We want it all! We want it now!
I don't trust them as far as I could throw them! Nothing is real until its iron clad locked in law unchangeable. Till then, I don't believe a word they say. Especially after reading this account of that Pink News hustings in 2020: https://makemorenoisemanc.wixsite.com/mysite/post/culture-war-breaks-out-at-labour-party-leadership-hustings
Thanks for the link. It's so depressing that the top tier of a so-called "progressive" party has been so completely captured by transgender nonsense masquerading as "human rights" (but who cares about women's rights? -- not these prominent Labour handmaidens).
Transactivists have clearly had a big hand in Labour's "re-fram[ing] debate as hate and biology as bigotry".
Sadly summed up in this last para:
"Whether you agree with our tactics in interrupting the hustings in such a manner there are important questions that need to be asked but the Labour party has re-framed debate as hate and biology as bigotry. They have created a hostile environment for feminists, as our concerns are ignored and shouted down with violent rhetoric and threats of expulsion. Nevertheless women will not remain silent on this matter. To quote another Manchester firebrand, Emmeline Pankhurst, "I know that women, once convinced that they are doing what is right, that their rebellion is just, will go on, no matter what the difficulties, no matter what the dangers, so long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion."
DJ Lippy
Ever since they let Liam 'Lily' Madigan in as 'Women's officer' who bullied long standing women in Labour out (during Corbyn), and no body cared to stand up for those women within the party, I knew they'd gone to the dogs. That article/event is the product of what letting the TRAs in to take over did. Good ol' 'Invasion of the body snatchers' style...
I think we may need to revisit some of these older cases and publicise them again. Egregiously allowing that man to become the 'women's officer' then use that position and power to encourage then to openly bully and harass women and some men to the point they totally leave and in disgrace. It was incredibly clever using our own identities against us. Our own histories, political affiliations and beliefs. All that under Corbyn. It was senior management at the time who munificently bestowed their seal of approval on all this. Now new old senior management still seem to be a bit unaware of their own actions. Or weirdly trying to play both sides. Same in the Lib Dems, SNP, Plaid and Greens. Tories seem to be excluded for being overtly racist, but not this? Not the same regime.
Imagine replaying the Nandy farce event with Julia illegally asking questions about good ole Adam or 'Katie' Dolatowski in which prison. That's Adam who led to Nicola resigning Adam. Oops, naughty Adam.
These are all forming into a few types and methods - some are in a few and it seems to be mostly male 'trans' for some mystical reason. Another starter for ten:
1) the 'just admin' political types - like Madigan, those who are 'voted' or appointed to be women's officers then lay waste to all the women in the organisation and change national policy and voting rules from then on. How many so far? Must be 30+ now?
2) the civil society types - those who access their chosen vulnerable population of women or children by 'identifying' as female
3) the community types - who roam around committing acts of indecency until they are eventually caught/released/caught/released in real life. But can be online to do this and attack and harass, sending death threats to women.
4) the organisational types - clinical/medical regulators, professional body and govt types. To secretly lobby and rewrite policy then law. Just admin again, but they 'win' awards and get featured in magazines as 'groundbreaking'. Mridul Wadhwa., but he can sit in a few types.
5) the mostly activist types - Alan Baker and 'Katie' Montgomerie. Online groups and firmly offline, in real life, 'protesting' and again violent ones. This somehow merges into the academic/student types and the legal or fetishes are hooomun roights types and also the charity 'I'm just doing this for the kids' types. Then back to the political 'admin' types. Then the Ashton Challenor IT porny messed up types, which neatly cycles back yet again to the political admin types.
6) the rent a crowd types - violent men and lost unhinged women who can be relied upon to turn up anywhere for some reason. Mainly young with a host of disorders who need help and direction.
7) the insisting on healthcare for the other sex but not types (see activists again).
8) the useful idiot types - see Lloyd Russell-Moyle and all bar about 6 Labour MPs or Lords. Many in Tory Party too. All parties. Often hoodwinked into believing this is about gay rights.
9) the familial and personally invested types - Susie Green and many others secreted away at the tops of government departments, publishers and banks.
10) the accidental trans activist types – those who are trying to be ‘nice’ and ‘fair’ and have no real idea of the detail of what they are pushing or supporting. See also useful idiots.
Then those who have fought this - the whistleblowers and how they have often taken cases to court and used crowdfunding and alternate means to get heard. Those in specific jobs that have been hounded out to send a lesson to that profession - publishing, mental health, social work, education, politics.
It's actually quite incredible that in 2023, any political party should elect or appoint a male as Women's Officer, trans-identified or not. And especially one so young and inexperienced, and whose major concerns are to get GC women out of their posts. And to look after trans young people.
A big slap in the face for women. Why the hell wasn't he appointed as a Trans Officer, if it's so important? And why wasn't the post of Women's Officer protected for females?
Absurd and scandalous.
A trans-identified male also created a lot of trouble in Green Party Women: wanting the post of Chair. He didn't get it: but the women who opposed him were suspended from the party for expressing GC views. They are now sueing the party for harrassment and discrimination.
Thanks for the link. I have read it before but it's awful to read again. Entertainingly written but awful. One after the other with their empty soundbites as the UK is in havoc. Are they hoping the magic glitter dust will make this all disappear? Whoohoo for DJ Lippy.
Baaaabe!! 😎
I'm struggling to see how this is a U turn.
It's only because they see their election chances as grim.
Yes, belatedly they have realized this is a vote loser. It is for any party embracing things s evil madness.
They are always concerned about elections. But I doubt they see their chances as "grim" while Electoral Calculus predicts a landslide victory of well over 400 seats on its current opinion polling, were an election held tomorrow.