JK Rowling will be remembered for her books, not for incurring the wrath of the trans brigade (Image: Yui Mok/PA Wire)
The world is a frightening place: could the growing realisation of this be the reason that we seem to be seeing a return to common sense? While we are still in the extraordinary position of seeing people in all seriousness debate “what is a woman?” (someone with two X chromosomes, mate, my bill is in the post), there are increasing signs that the world has had enough of this nonsense.
HBO has just defended the right of the utterly admirable JK Rowling to express her opinions, which just happen to concur with those of about 95 per cent of humanity. After signing her up as an executive producer on the forthcoming Harry Potter TV series there was a predictable backlash from the keyboard warriors over her views on the fact that a man cannot become a woman: in the very politest of corporate language, HBO has essentially told these people to get stuffed.
Elsewhere, those ghastly “gender neutral” loos are falling out of fashion, the recent Transgender Day of Remembrance (me neither) went largely unremarked and senior politicians across the pond are declining to use “she/her” pronouns at the end of messages. Glory be.
It has always struck me that a society that is in some confusion as to what a woman is, is managing to encompass two extremes: the really serious attack on the rights of biological women, combined with the utterly frivolous belief that wearing lipstick and high heels can alter your gender. And it was only ever a tiny minority who took this stuff seriously.
But now we seem to have a few other things to worry about, namely China, Russia and North Korea, to say nothing of a government that seems happy to allow pensioners to freeze to death, while attacking farmers – the people who put the food on our plates.
It all seems to be putting things into perspective. There’s nothing like sabre rattling from the Russian president to make us realise what we should be really worrying about – and it’s not the rights of a man in a dress to use the ladies’ changing rooms.
Fads come and go. It is almost completely forgotten that about a century ago, seances were so fashionable as to be incredibly commonplace. One hundred years from now, will anyone remember that JK Rowling incurred the wrath of the trans brigade because of her views on gender? Almost certainly not. But they’ll still be reading her books.
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What a terrible tragedy for those six backpackers who died in Laos and their families: my heart goes out to them. But it highlights the dangers of travel in a poor country. I was lucky enough to visit Laos some years ago and developed a severe case of dysentery. The cause was an omelette, which was cooked in fat that must have been standing in the intense heat for a very long time. If breakfast can do that to you, it’s no wonder that moonshine can have such terrible consequences. Please, travellers of the world, beware.
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Earl Spencer, who is currently in the process of divorcing his third wife while romancing yet someone else, has described himself as an erstwhile “people pleaser”. There’s only one person Earl Spencer, below, gives the impression of wanting to please and he sees him every time he looks in the mirror.
There’s only one person Earl Spencer wants to please – himself (Image: Chris Jackson/Getty Images for Invictus Games Foundation)
Ethiopia’s not a charity case
It would take a heart of stone not to laugh.
The latest to pour cold water on the charity single Do They Know It’s Christmas is none other than Abiy Ahmed, the prime minister of Ethiopia.
The song was “well meaning” he said, but “it is frustrating to see our nation’s ancient history, culture, diversity and beauty reduced to doom and gloom”.
That’ll teach those celebs!
Meanwhile, there is a puzzling silence from Sir Lenny Henry on this one. What does he make of it? I think we should be told.
Unrealistic to have Kate expectations
The only way anyone on the planet will look like Kate Moss is if they are Kate Moss. (Image: Mert & Marcus)
Model Kate Moss’s new collection for Zara looks lovely, albeit strictly for those who are young and lithe.
But with the best will in the world, the only way anyone on the planet will look like Kate Moss is if they are Kate Moss.
Ain’t no clothing range going to give you cheekbones like that.
Laughable Labour is a sick joke
So the economy is collapsing: no surprise there after the Budget by Rachel from Accounts.
But as if that were not enough, Labour is performing equally disastrously on the international stage.
Our laughable Foreign Secretary David Lammy is on the record as insulting Donald Trump and the party has managed to fall out with the visionary and increasingly powerful Elon Musk.
Labour has now let it be known that if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived in the UK, he could be arrested following proceedings issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
The US has announced that any country that abets this ICC farce could face reprisals; Israel is also our only real ally in the Middle East.
Well done, Keir. How long before this absurd group of jumped-up student activists is finally shown the door?
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Is there a more irritating phrase in the English language than “what I call”? Namely, someone talking about some extremely common phenomenon and then pretending a widely used phrase is their own? As in, “The weather’s terrible and it’s raining what I call cats and dogs”. Please. Enough.
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Merkel’s ‘tone deaf’ migrant denial
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel has a new memoir out and the publicity she is doing for it shows her to be as much in denial about her legacy as Tony Blair is about his.
In 2015 she took the disastrous decision to allow one million asylum seekers into Germany: this has patently obviously fuelled the rise of the German far-right. Not according to Frau Merkel, however, who goes distinctly cool when questioned about it and merely says she was doing what she had to. Shame the German people didn’t agree.
It’s just the same with Blair. He opened the door to mass immigration with the result that great swathes of the UK became so horrified by it that they ended up voting for Brexit.
In a recent interview he claimed New Labour initially allowed many workers in because we needed them, but that had he been PM when it got out of control he’d have been all over it. No he wouldn’t: it was what he signed us up to. If the Tories don’t get their act together soon, we’re going to see a threat from the far-right here too. Well done, Tone.
