The Lies They Tell

Announced just four days prior to the event taking place, Dawn Butler, most famous for saying (in terf society at least) that babies are born without sex, was to be platformed by the British Politics Centre at Birkbeck.  As a long time subscriber to their newsletter, the normal lead up is several weeks in advance, especially if it’s a biggish name.  Therefore I suspect the approach was made by Butler herself.

Wynter began by telling us that the whole conversation was going to be held around the ideology of abolition.  This basically means one is anti-prison, anti-state and pro-anarchy.  Much prettier words were used obviously, but this is the bones of it.  Wynter believes in the revolution and that post-revolution black-, trans- and working class people would finally be centred.  Needless to say Wynter herself is white, trans – only in the sense that anyone is -, and massively massively middle class, even if she did try her best to drop her aitches.  The door to Oscar Wilde’s cell at Reading Gaol was on display in the museum, supposedly a timely reminder of today’s ‘totalitarian government disguised as a liberal one’ (you know, the one who just paid us all during the pandemic to sit around doing fuck all for months on end, that government).  There was also the ‘rising threat of terf ideology’ to contend with.  

The session was called WHAT DOES A GENDERQUEER MUSEUM LOOK LIKE? and part of a day-long festival called Queer and Now held at the Tate Britain. For the very full programme see here. You will note that themes of transness and intersex dominate and the acronym honoured is LGBTQIA+. ‘Tate members of staff wearing Vibe Checker lanyards will be on hand to help you enjoy the day,’ we are told.