Month: October 2013

Kat Banyard, UK Feminista, and the poisoning of girls’ and young women’s minds

/ Mike Buchanan / 1 Comment

Kat Banyard is a militant feminist, the founder and driving force behind UK Feminista. She needs no introduction to regular visitors to this site and that of Anti-Feminism League http://fightingfeminism.wordpress.com. Seven months ago we emailed her with respect to a misleading claim she’d made in an interview with Jon Snow on Channel 4 News – predictably he didn’t challenge her – and she has yet to respond. I think it’s fair to say she’ll never admit her claim wasn’t based on independent reliable evidence. Here’s the video file, and our challenge to Ms Banyard:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R3fMxygLXw

I received an update from Feminista UK today – I signed on to receive updates and imagine I’ll shortly be removed from the list. The piece was titled, ‘This Autumn: Kick-start your activism (hone your skills and inspire your community with our Action Toolkit and workshops).’ In the associated photograph there are 15 young women holding up a UK Feminista banner. At a guess, judging by their attire, I’d say nine or ten of them are from traditional Asian backgrounds. Their communities would surely be deeply alarmed about what these young women are getting involved with, if they understood the nature of militant feminism – and with very good reason. The strong families which are the bedrock of those communities would be torn asunder by feminism.

UK Feminista is engaged in a cynical campaign to poison the minds of impressionable girls and young women. Doesn’t ‘help you to organise for a world without sexism’ have an Orwellian ring to it, concealing as it does the true objectives of UK Feminista’s work? It wouldn’t be out of place in Nineteen Eight-Four.

The remainder of this post consists of the content of the email I received today.

At UK Feminista HQ we’ve been busy finding ways to help you to organise for a world without sexism:

Action Toolkit

Want to make change happen but don’t know where to start? We’ve developed an online Action Toolkit, packed with tips on designing and running actions and campaigns. Our latest guides will show you show you how to:

>Plan a winning campaign

>Hit the headlines with traditional media

>Set up a feminist group

>Harness the power of social media

Book a Kick-starter workshop: Birmingham & the Black Country

We are offering unique workshops in Birmingham & the Black Country on feminism and feminist activism. These workshops are perfect to help you launch a new feminist group, revitalise an existing one, or get your local community, faith or women’s group discussing gender equality. And if you’re not part of a group, you can sign up to come along to the next one near you.

>Find out more and book your workshop

Take action in your school or college

If you’re a young feminist and want to tackle sexism in your school or college and beyond, then you’re part of Generation F! We’re offering free workshops to schools and colleges to get you and your friends talking about feminism, as well as training on how to set up a feminist group and start campaigning.

>Email generationf@ukfeminista.org.uk to find out more.

Janet Bloomfield: ‘American women have earned 10 million more degrees than American men since 1982… but in what subjects?’

/ Mike Buchanan / Leave a comment

The latest gem from one of our favourite Honey Badgers (female anti-feminists), the American blogger Janet Bloomfield:

http://judgybitch.com/2013/10/02/holy-smarty-pants-people-women-have-earned-10-million-more-college-degrees-than-men-since-1982-oh-yeah-in-what/

Do at least one important thing today. Subscribe to her channel.

Michel Landel, CEO of Sodexo, is a director of Catalyst Inc., a feminist campaigning organisation. No, seriously, he is!

/ Mike Buchanan / 1 Comment

Now this is definitely one for the ‘You couldn’t make this stuff up!’ file.

My thanks to Ken for forwarding me a couple of Bloomberg links a moment ago. The first is a profile of the French multinational, Sodexo, the second a profile of Michel Landel, the company’s CEO:

http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/people.asp?ticker=SDXOF

http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=327974&ticker=SDXOF

Monsieur Landel’s estimated annual compensation is around £2.7 million – fair enough, Sodexo is a very large company. But the detail in the profile which struck me most forcefully was that he’s also a director of Catalyst Inc. My first thought was, ‘Well, that’s surely not Catalyst, the feminist organisation which campaigns for more women on boards, and whose reports showing a correlation between more women on boards and improved financial performance are still used to this day by people misrepresenting correlation as causation?’

To my utter astonishment, it is the same organisation. Bloomberg’s profile of Catalyst:

http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=24914518

I see Ilene Lang (‘Ms’ Ilene Lang, needless to say) remains the CEO of Catalyst Inc at the age of 69. She has yet to respond to a public challenge we made a year ago:

https://j4mbdotorgdotuk.wordpress.com/2013/09/15/our-public-challenge-of-ilene-lang-president-and-ceo-of-catalyst-an-american-organisation-campaigning-for-increased-female-representation-in-boardrooms/

Does Monsieur Landel, a leading businessman earning £2.7 million p.a., not understand the difference between correlation and causation? Or is he supporting the drive for more women on boards because he’s unaware of the evidence that this policy direction must harm his company’s financial performance in time, at the expense of Sodexo’s shareholders? Our briefing paper on the matter:

http://c4mb.wordpress.com/improving-gender-diversity-on-boards-leads-to-a-decline-in-corporate-performance-the-evidence/

Senior business executives, both men and women, are actively destroying a cornerstone of capitalism – the right of companies to appoint board directors as they see fit. What times we live in. We look forward to the Left finding a wealth-generating system to replace capitalism when the feminists have finally destroyed it, with the keen support of men such as Monsieur Landel, David Cameron, Vince Cable, Sir Roger Carr… too many to name.