Tag Archives: julie burchill

Caron Lindsay

Liberals need to stand up against hate speech and prejudice. If we don’t, we condone it.

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 22nd March 2014 - 11:06 am

Over the last couple of weeks, several events have proved, as if we needed it to be proved, that hate speech and prejudice is alive and well in 21st century Britain.

Last week, Pink News reported  a disturbing, angry and hate-filled transphobic rant by Julie Burchill which appeared as a comment on an article by Paris Lees. Paris had written of her delight in being catcalled and wolf-whistled while on holiday in Ibiza and asked if that made her a bad feminist. Burchill’s reply seemed to be trying to make out that she was a bad human being.

I don’t …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | 23 Comments
Stephen Tall

The welfare debate and the age of the trollemic

By Stephen Tall | Thu 4th April 2013 - 9:25 am

I decided to invent a new word yesterday:

It’s the welfare debate that’s prompted it, but it could be any other topic on a given week.

daily mail philpott front pageYesterday saw the Daily Mail publish a typically sensationalist front page blaming the welfare state for the tragedy of six children being killed by their parents. On Monday the Mirror shouted ‘Shameful’, with a cartoon showing Thatcher, Cameron, Osorne and Clegg banging in the final nail of a coffin marked ‘RIP Welfare’.

Each is exaggerating to make their own point. Both are gross over-statements: trollemics.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , , , , , and | 26 Comments
Stephen Tall

Nick Cohen: Labour members are “in despair” of trying to unseat Lynne Featherstone

By Stephen Tall | Tue 22nd January 2013 - 9:30 pm

Lynne FeatherstoneThe Observer’s Nick Cohen isn’t Lynne Featherstone’s biggest fan: “I cannot tell you how much I dislike this stupid, two-faced and dangerous politician,” he writes affectionately in The Spectator.

He later labels her a “menace”, a “hypocrite”, and curses her “wittering” (I wonder if that’s a verb he’s ever applied to a male politician, by the way?).

All of which means poor Nick is in despair. Why? Because, he laments, Labour is completely failing to get its act together in Hornsey and Wood Green, allegedly one …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , and | 13 Comments
Zoe O’Connell

Opinion: The Burchill controversy – a mixed blessing for the trans community

By Zoe O’Connell | Tue 15th January 2013 - 12:44 pm

I have followed recent mainstream media events unfolding around the transgender community with a mixture of excitement, anxiety and sadness.

Excitement, because it is rare that trans issues get coverage that isn’t designed to portray us as perpetrators of some hideous evil. Even though the stories started with biased coverage in the Guardian about a doctor under investigation by the General Medical Council, it turned into something more positive when the #TransDocFail hashtag lead to LibDem Councillor Sarah Brown discussing the issue on BBC Radio. Even the continuation of bad reporting had a silver lining, when Julie Burchill’s

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | 2 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Lynne Featherstone calls for Julie Burchill to be sacked for post attacking transgender people

By Caron Lindsay | Mon 14th January 2013 - 9:25 am

As Equalities Minister, Liberal Democrat Lynne Featherstone put into place the Government’s Transgender Action Plan. She will be acutely aware of the issues facing transgender people, particularly in relation to violence and discrimination. Hate crime towards that community has been rising as the Independent reported.

Yesterday, the Observer published a piece by controversial writer Julie Burchill which was peppered with hate filled language. Had the target of Burchill’s invective been a particular ethnic group, and she had used similar language, then her piece would have found its way onto the editor’s spike and she would most likely have been …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , and | 34 Comments
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