I’m in a pub in London, working on the paperback edition of Feminism: the ugly truth, and awaiting the arrival of Angry Harry for a pie and a pint. The pub’s very busy, and a couple of men just asked if they could sit at my table, and of course I agreed.

It soon became evident (they had to talk loudly, given the ambient noise) they were talking enthusiastically about the late British musician Marc Bolan. I was a fan in my mid-teens, and recall my friends finding that a bit naff. Brian (70) is concerned with the Marc Bolan School project in Sierra Leone, while Michael (55) is the driving force behind The Marc Bolan London Music Project.

Sometimes you meet the most intriguing people in pubs. Sometimes you don’t. It’s a bit of a lottery.

Our thanks to PL for this. Excerpts:

Holloway Prison is to close, Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said this afternoon. Mr Osborne announced the women’s prison, in Parkhurst Road, will shut in his spending review and autumn statement. Though he wasn’t specific about the Holloway site, he appeared to suggest the building will make way for housing.

Mr Osborne said: “I can tell the House that Holloway Prison, the biggest women’s jail in western Europe, will close. In the future, women prisoners will serve their sentences in more humane conditions, better designed to keep them away from crime.”

Hmm, could George not apply the same logic to 95% of prisoners, close Wormwood Scrubs, and announce this?

In the future, men prisoners will serve their sentences in more humane conditions, better designed to keep them away from crime.

This would seem as good a time as any to post yet again the piece by William Collins, in which he showed that if male criminals were sentenced with the same leniency as female criminals, five out of six men in British prisons wouldn’t be there. Gender equality would solve the perennial prison overcrowding crisis, and save vast sums of money. The Chancellor of the Exchequer should be interested in this, but we have to assume he’s as disinterested as Michael Gove, Justice Secretary, proved to be, when we wrote to him.

Excellent. Another piece prompted by the case of George Lawlor, the estimable Warwick University student who refused to attend a sexual consent course.

In common with all JB’s blog pieces, interesting. I’m looking forward to her speech at ICMI16, in London – ‘How Feminism Infantilizes Women’.

Details of the conference are here. If you want to be sure of attending, you’ll need to pay a pre-registration fee of £22 by 22:00 GMT, 6 December, and then pay for your ticket (or pay the first of four monthly instalments) by 22:oo GMT, 31 December. Tickets will go on sale to the general public 1 January, and we’re not planning to sell tickets at the door.

Lucian Valsan, a Romanian MHRA, will be speaking at ICMI16. Enjoy.

Excellent. A piece prompted by the George Lawlor case at Warwick University.

We originally had a technical issue with this video (5:17), but it’s been resolved, and just published on our YouTube channel.

Well deserved:

Appalling. Predictably, much of the problem can be attributed to white knights. Extracts:

Mr Lawlor added: ‘There was one guy messaging me on Facebook for over a week, calling me names like racist, rapist … I’ve stopped going to lectures and seminars because of the perceived threat.’

He said he was driven out of a bar in Leamington after some students overheard his friend mention his name. ‘These six guys just crowded round me and started shouting at me … calling me a rapist, a misogynist, and threatening me … I had to get out of there,’ he said.

A tip of the hat to George Lawlor, 19, a fine young man.

Another excellent piece from Mr Collins.