We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
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“He who rides a tiger is afraid to dismount” – Chinese proverb.
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China’s decision-makers face a quandary after maintaining an open-ended “zero Covid” policy with doomsday predictions of the alternative, said Huang. “What if they eased controls and nothing significant happened? Then people would question why Beijing imposed such harsh measures for so long.”
– Philip Sherwell, in a (paywalled) piece for the Sunday Times called “Millions under lockdown to stop Covid spoiling Xi Jinping’s party congress”.
Meanwhile, in an interview broadcast on Sunday, President Biden declared that the pandemic was over. Then someone noticed that would mean that the “Covid emergency” justification for his student loan payoff was also over, along with the justification for mask mandates. So the White House undeclared the president’s declaration:
A day later, an administration official told CNN that the President’s comments do not mark a change in policy toward the administration’s handling of the virus, and there are no plans to lift the Public Health Emergency, which has been in place since January 2020 and is currently extended through October 13.
I am not sure why “the administration” trumps “the president”, unless it is to give him practice in getting Trumped.
“The kids here most definitely don’t think [it’s] normal…but realistically we can’t say anything,” said a person on Twitter who claims to be a student at Oakville Trafalgar. “Last year, the teacher was a man. I don’t think the school can fire him.”
Canada’s Post Millennial reports, “Canadian biologically male teacher wears massive prosthetic breasts to school”
The teacher is Kayla Lemieux and the school is Oakland Trafalgar High School in Ontario. Please note that there exist several other people with the same name, some of whom have been in the news recently.
The Daily Mail picked up the story: “Canadian high school defends transgender teacher who wore enormous prosthetic breasts underneath tight T-shirt to class”, and has plenty more pictures if you need to be convinced that this is not a joke.
Even after I was convinced that it was not a joke, I originally had plenty of jokes to make. But upon reflection I edited them out. This is not a funny story.
Kayla Lemieux’s motivations bear no relation to the motivations of a transwoman who was born male but simply wants to be female. Nor does Ms Lemieux want to be accepted as having an ambiguous gender identity. She does not want to be accepted at all. Kayla Lemieux wants to shock. She also wants the pleasure of knowing that the people she shocks dare not say anything. Better yet, she wants to have the pleasure of thinking that some of the people seeing her are secretly, even unwillingly, sexually aroused by her fetish costume. She is a teacher, so when I say “people” I mean “children she teaches”.
Imagine the sexes/genders were reversed, and a female-to-male transgender teacher turned up at school to teach the children while wearing an enormous prosthetic penis. Imagine – but the imaginary scenario scarcely differs from what is actually happening.
Let me be clear that I believe that adults should be free to alter their appearance in any way that pleases them. I would go further than most in defending people’s right to have body modifications that are designed to shock, though I would also defend the right of others to exclude such people from their premises, and that is one of the reasons why I would like to see less public space (which is open to absolutely everyone by definition) and more private space that is open to the public so long as they adhere to rules of behaviour. I would also, though more reluctantly, defend the right of a private school to employ a person with deliberately shocking body modifications as a teacher, and the right of parents to send their children there.
However, Oakland Trafalgar High School is a public school in the North American sense, a state school. Most of the families whose children attend have no other option. Even if that were not so, the pupil quoted at the beginning was correct to say, “I don’t think the school can fire him.” As the statement from the school says, “Gender identity and gender expression are protected grounds under the Ontario Human Rights Code”.
And Kayla Lemieux knows it.
Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian Kurdish woman, was arrested by the morality police for having an improperly adjusted hijab. Witnesses say that she was beaten in the police van. Her relatives published pictures of her lying in a coma in intensive care. They wanted the world to know what had been done to her. She never woke from that coma.
Anything a social media company might do pales in comparison to the evil of beating a woman to death because she did not cover her hair in the approved way – but what Twitter did next is still worth noting.
Vahid Yücesoy reports,
I’ve just spoken to @AlinejadMasih. @Twitter chose to suspend her account because she shared the picture of #MahsaAmini, 22-year-old Iranian girl in coma after she was severely beaten by the hijab police and later died.
Alinejad Masih’s post was mass-reported by supporters and hirelings of the Iranian regime. The grounds for suspension of her account were that she had included an image of “graphic violence” in her tweet. The fact that it was a true image of Iranian government brutality that Mahsa Amini’s family wanted the world to see was ignored. This is how a system of pre-emptive censorship inevitably works.
(Via Jim Treacher.)
From the White House website:
President Biden often summarizes his vision for America in one word: Possibilities. A “digital dollar” may seem far-fetched, but modern technology could make it a real possibility.
A United States central bank digital currency (CBDC) would be a digital form of the U.S. dollar. While the U.S. has not yet decided whether it will pursue a CBDC, the U.S. has been closely examining the implications of, and options for, issuing a CBDC. If the U.S. pursued a CBDC, there could be many possible benefits, such as facilitating efficient and low-cost transactions, fostering greater access to the financial system, boosting economic growth, and supporting the continued centrality of the U.S. within the international financial system. However, a U.S. CBDC could also introduce a variety of risks, as it might affect everything ranging from the stability of the financial system to the protection of sensitive data.
To be fair, these remarks by Dr. Alondra Nelson, head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Alexander Macgillivray, Principal Deputy United States Chief Technology Officer, and Nik Marda, Policy Advisor do acknowledge the existence of risks:
For example, these objectives state that a U.S. CBDC system should expand equitable access to the financial system, preserve the role of physical cash, and only collect data that is strictly necessary.
Given the record of the FBI, the CIA and the NSA, I would put very little faith in their definition of “strictly necessary” as a shield against the US government spying on its citizens.
Pollsters talk about “the lizardman constant”. It was given that name in this “Slate Star Codex” post by Scott Alexander:
So first we get the people who think “Wait, was 1 the one for if I did believe in lizardmen, or if I didn’t? I’ll just press 1 and move on to the next question.”
Then we get the people who are like “I never heard it before, but if this nice pollster thinks it’s true, I might as well go along with them.”
Then we get the people who are all “F#&k you, polling company, I don’t want people calling me when I’m at dinner. You screw with me, I tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to tell you I believe lizard people are running the planet.”
Alexander put the lizardman constant at about 4%. Keep that figure in your mind.
A month ago, the polling company YouGov did a survey on “period poverty” (Tabs here.) The survey found that:
Period poverty looks likely to increase as the cost of living crisis bites
6% who currently have periods have been unable to afford period products in the last 12 months
13% are likely to be unable to afford period products in the next 12 months
The final line really ought to refer to “13% think they are likely”. The percentage of British wom… of British people who currently have periods who claim they have actually experienced being unable to afford period products is 6%. That’s the Lizardmen plus two percent.
Why so small? Because, though it is a real problem in the Third World, in developed countries period poverty no longer exists except in the minds of earnest sixth formers, publicity-hungry politicians and progressives seeking a government sinecure. The problem was solved years ago. As I said in a post from 2017 called “The Bleeding Obvious”, capitalism solved it. At Boots, tampons cost 4p each. Aldi’s tampons cost 4p each. Tesco’s tampons have been hard hit by inflation; at the time of the previous post they used to cost 4p each but now it’s 5p. As you can see if you click the links, tampons are usually sold in boxes of 20 to 24. I no longer have periods, but when I did, I used a little under one box per period. I usually picked up tampons in Tescos at £1 a packet. At nights I sometimes used sanitary towels instead or as well. 70p for ten. Some women might require more; so double that, no, triple it – you are still only looking at just over £5 per month.
So, market competition has developed period products that are far more hygienic, comfortable and discreet than the bloody rags of yesteryear, has evolved a distribution network to put them in every village shop, and has carried the price down almost to nothing. But not quite all the way, the evil bastards: four pence per tampon is not zero. That last 4p is an opportunity for some. Like a mediocre footballer who pushes forward to nudge the ball last and hence get the glory for a goal that others set up, the State can still swoop in at the last moment and get applauded for making them FREE.
In theory, there ought to be no need for this. In the UK, Universal Credit or other welfare payments ought to be enough, but sometimes the welfare system fails, and even if a woman’s problems are partly self-caused by drink or drugs or poor budgeting, I think most people would say, for pity’s sake, just help her anyway.
How is that best done?
The Scottish government’s form of help was this: (1) Pass a law called the Period Products (Free Provision) (Scotland) Act. The procedure for passing a bill in the Scottish Parliament is described here. I have no idea what it all costs, but no doubt it was less than most bills because no MSP was brave enough to oppose it. (2) Appoint a Period Dignity Regional Lead Officer (salary of £33,153 – £36,126 per annum) for each Scottish region, and a bunch of lesser Period Dignity Regional Officers to serve under the Lead ones. The salary and other employment costs of these new local government posts would depend on how many of these regions there are. I hope a region is more than just one Local Authority, because Scotland has 32 of those. (3) Just for fun, appoint a bloke as your first ever Period Dignity Regional Lead Officer, then scrap the role because of the controversy, and wait ’til he sues for sex discrimination. The costs of that argy-bargy remain to be seen, but the services of barristers, sorry, advocates since it’s Scotland, do not come cheap. (4) After the Members of the Scottish Parliament, assorted Parliamentary researchers and support staff, recruitment consultants, HR managers, Period Dignity Regional Lead Officers, Period Dignity Officers and the lawyers have all had their cut, use whatever is left over to buy some tampons to give away. Good thing tampons are cheap.
Let no one say that the police response to anti-monarchist protests is without precedent:
Nizhny Novgorod, 12 March 2022: Russian police arrest demonstrator for protesting with a BLANK SIGN
London, 13 September 2022: Man threatened with arrest if he wrote ‘not my King’ on blank sheet of paper
It is true that I am tempted to sarcasm when I see all the outrage about this from people who were silent about such things as the police telling someone to take down a tweet because it contained the term “illegal alien” a few days ago, or about five coppers being sent to arrest a man for posting an image of four “LGBTQ+ Progress Pride” flags arranged so the triangular bits formed a swastika.
Still, new recruits to the great cause of free speech are always welcome. Better late than never!
Daniel Hannan had a good response:
So we’re all agreed then? Hate speech laws are wrong? Provided you stop short of incitement to violence, you can insult King Charles, Jesus Christ, the Prophet Muhammad or George Floyd? Because that’s the thing about free speech: it’s an indivisible principle.
Have you sung it yet? Here’s the second least worst known verse:
Thy choicest gifts in store,
On her him be pleased to pour,
Long may she he reign!
May she he defend our laws,
And ever give us cause,
To sing with heart and voice,
God save the Queen! King!
After Charles was proclaimed king at St James’s Palace, the same ceremony has been repeated up and down the country. They also told the royal bees.
However the Scotsman reports that a spot of bother broke out while the new king was being proclaimed in Edinburgh:
Moments before the ceremony on Sunday afternoon (September 11), a demonstrator appeared in the crowd opposite the Mercat Cross. She held a sign saying “f*** imperialism, abolish monarchy”.
Officers appeared behind her and took her away, prompting the crowd to applaud.
One man shouted: “Let her go, it’s free speech,” while others yelled: “Have some respect.”
A police spokesman said a 22-year-old woman was arrested “in connection with a breach of the peace”.
I would like to think there are still some people left who would say both “Let her go, it’s free speech” and “Have some respect.”
To be sure, such suppression of “Progressive” speech, routine a few decades ago, is now rare. These days the boot is more often on the Progressive foot. Courtesy of the Bad Law Project:
Listen to the @swpolice [South Wales Police] tell a citizen journalist to take down a post because he uses the term ‘illegal alien’. Being offensive is not an offence. Yet again, the police are grossly misrepresenting the law in order to intimidate the public.
As I have often said, once the principle of free speech is gone, what speech is censored is merely a matter of who happens to be momentarily on top at that time and place. Notice how far removed both the recent examples are from the true rule of law. In Scotland the woman was arrested under the vague catch-all charge of “breach of the peace”. In Wales the threats against the man by an officer of the law had no legal basis at all. (England is just as bad. Trust me.)
Many people have said that King Charles III will find it hard to win anything close to the level of public affection given to his late mother. But there is no denying that freedom of speech declined markedly in the final years of her reign. If the new king wants to do something useful, he could do worse than make real the role of the monarch as defender of our laws, like the song says. What better start than to direct one of his famous “black spider memos” to one of our actual rulers saying that the right to free speech of all his subjects is to be respected, including – oh, most certainly including – those who do not wish to be his subjects at all.
All twelve of the firefighters who were working in my husband’s firehouse died on 9/11. The “riding list,” handwritten in chalk, listing all the men who were on duty that day, still hangs on the firehouse wall, forever preserved in glass. Engine 40 Ladder 35 #NeverForget
– Janice Dean
Our ancestors, wiser than we, were not shocked by the idea of praying for a good death for oneself or others. Queen Elizabeth II’s health is clearly failing. I pray that she will have a good death, whenever it comes.
Nobody, least of all a libertarian, would invent the idea of monarchy if designing the world from scratch. But we do not design the world, we inherit it. Constitutional monarchy is like one of those very old houses which started to fall down centuries ago but somehow settled into an unexpectedly beautiful state of wonky stability. Elizabeth has been a very good constitutional monarch.
Update: She has died. May she rest in peace.
Into my heart an air that kills
From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
What spires, what farms are those?
That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.
– Blue Remembered Hills by A.E. Housman, from the collection A Shropshire Lad, published in 1896.
We do blue hills so much better in 2022:
Honestly, I kind of like The Rings of Power. It’s slow, and the evident fact that there must have been an episode of ethnic cleansing in the Shire at some point between the era of TROP and that of The Hobbit is sad to contemplate. But whether the mind-wiped stranger will turn out to be Gandalf, Sauron, or someone new has caught my interest, and oooooh the fabrics. Trust the elves to develop the Jacquard loom early and then not bother with the rest of their industrial revolution.
Oh, and Liz Truss will be the next prime minister.
A retired and now ennobled supreme court judge writes in the Times that the decisions of the government during a crisis were wise and good and that if, perchance, any slight errors were made, fear not, lessons will be learned.
Bzzt. Click. System error. Commence program reset.
A retired and now ennobled supreme court judge – Lord Sumption – writes in the Times that “Little by little the truth of lockdown is being admitted: it was a disaster”.
In a remarkably candid interview with The Spectator, Rishi Sunak has blown the gaff on the sheer superficiality of the decision-making process of which he was himself part. The fundamental rule of good government is not to make radical decisions without understanding the likely consequences. It seems obvious. Yet it is at that most basic level that the Johnson government failed. The tragedy is that this is only now being acknowledged.
Sunak makes three main points. First, the scientific advice was more equivocal and inconsistent than the government let on. Some of it was based on questionable premises that were never properly scrutinised. Some of it fell apart as soon it was challenged from outside the groupthink of the Sage advisory body. Second, to build support, the government stoked fear, embarking on a manipulative advertising campaign and endorsing extravagant graphics pointing to an uncontrolled rise in mortality if we were not locked down. Third, the government not only ignored the catastrophic collateral damage done by the lockdown but actively discouraged discussion of it, both in government and in its public messaging.
Lockdown was a policy conceived in the early days by China and the World Health Organisation as a way of suppressing the virus altogether (so-called zero Covid). The WHO quickly abandoned this unrealistic ambition. But European countries, except Sweden, eagerly embraced lockdown, ripping up a decade of pandemic planning that had been based on concentrating help on vulnerable groups and avoiding coercion.
At first Britain stood up against the stampede. Then Professor Neil Ferguson’s team at Imperial College London published its notorious “Report 9”. Sunak confirms that this was what panicked ministers into a measure that the scientists had previously rejected. If No 10 had studied the assumptions underlying it, it might have been less impressed. Report 9 assumed that in the absence of a lockdown people would do nothing whatever to protect themselves. This was contrary to all experience of human behaviour as well as to data available at the time, which showed that people were voluntarily reducing contacts well before the lockdown was announced.
I find myself in the odd position of being slightly more in sympathy with the government than is a former supreme court judge. Frightened men make mistakes. I also find myself slightly more in sympathy with Rishi Sunak than I was yesterday. However, I have to ask why he did not voice his doubts at the time.
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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