Category: Academics

Shaz was there at the beginning of it all, i.e. the 2004 Gender Recognition Act (GRA). There had been a Telegraph article titled: Gender is no substitute for sex. (In fact, the article is no such thing, rather a jokey piece written by the Telegraph’s sketch writer, worth reading, especially for a dig at a young David Lammy, being unsure about sexual reproductive anatomy.) Anyway, Shaz appeared to think it a monumental article on the GRA, and although it’s true that the proposed bill slipped under the radar at the time, surely she could have a found a more serious (?feminist) critique to direct law students to?

Stood behind the lectern draped with her own keffiyeh, Lewis spoke about the need to fight fascism. I must admit I didn’t actually notice the keffiyeh until she muttered the word ‘inshallah’ much later, which I’ll explain when we get to it. But just to highlight up front how clueless Lewis and academia generally is towards an ideology which would happily vaporise them in an instant.

Two hours. Two hours of Del LaGrace Volcano (formerly Della Grace but Deborah Diane Wood originally) talking non-stop. You would expect an artist looking back over her massive oeuvre to spend at least some time speaking eloquently of her interest in portraiture and composition but no, all we got were anecdotes about all the people she had known.

Setting the scene, Gust told us that day had been a day of action for Palestine against genocidal violence (aka Hamas refusing to release further hostages with no sign of the Bibas kids), puberty blockers had been banned for trans kids, there was an athletics ban for trans women, etc. All of this was ‘boring’ and ‘depressing’ and so Gust turned to history of trans people to cheer herself up. Namely, mermaids (or merfolk, as she mostly failed to remember to call them).