An impressive update from HEqual.

Our thanks to A Voice for Men for this. We plan to protest outset the Thornhill Clinic, Luton, soon. Apart from ethical and physical/mental harm considerations, non-therapeutic circumcision of male minors – Male Genital Mutilation – is unquestionably illegal in the UK, as explained by a barrister speaking at a conference in 2013.

Please join me in signing this. Thank you.

Whilst enjoying a late lunch, I happened to catch 15 minutes of the ladies’ darts competition, staged at the Lakeside Country Club in Frimley Green, and broadcast on BBC2.

Somewhere around 14:05 – 14:15, the commentator made the following remark about one of the contestants, echoing the same point made by Bobby George around 13:55:

Her game’s really good, apart from the doubles.

Can you imagine a commentator making the same point about a male darts player? Of course not. He’d be laughed out of the venue. The remark was like saying of a football striker:

His game’s really good, apart from not scoring any goals.

Shortly after, a commentator made the following remark after a contestant scored a lowly 26 (single 20, two triple 1s – for non-followers of darts, the 1 is next to the 20):

She came very close to scoring 140 there.

At last, some quality comedy from the BBC. The only reason to watch women’s darts is for such comic moments. Why else would anyone watch women’s darts, other than for ideological reasons? The general quality level is well below the men’s game, despite there being no strength / stamina considerations to talk of. Likewise in snooker, and other activities, including some solely intellectual ones. Women’s chess – really, what’s the point?

The only women-only sports competitions I watch are ladies’ tennis – especially if Maria Sharapova is playing, and then of course only if the sound is muted, a man can take only so much lady grunting – and ladies’ beach volleyball. Now the latter is a sport the BBC should feature far more often than it does. I must write to them on the matter.

Shocking.

Our thanks to John for this (video, 00:17).

Rarely has one of our awards been as well deserved as this:

Appalling. Cultural vandalism, no less. In Shakespeare’s play, Cymbeline was a King of Britain, Imogen his daughter.

Emma Rice is the new artistic director of Shakespeare’s Globe theatre. An interview with her was published in today’s Guardian – here. An extract:

The fact that just 16% of Shakespeare’s characters are women – and that most of the memorable lines are spoken by men – will not stop Emma Rice’s mission to get a gender-balanced stage at Shakespeare’s Globe.

“There is no reason why Gloucester can’t be a woman,” said Rice, who succeeds Dominic Dromgoole as the venue’s artistic director in April. “If anybody bended gender it was Shakespeare, so I think it just takes a change of mindset.”

On Tuesday, Rice announced her inaugural season, which will open with a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and end with a version of Cymbeline “renamed and reclaimed” as Imogen.

Earlier this afternoon I had an email from Spiked, the content of which is here. It relates to a conference they’re hosting on 17 February in London, ‘The New Intolerance on Campus’. Tickets are just £3.49 – a bargain for a five-hour-long conference – and lunch is included. I’ve bought a ticket, and invite you to do likewise. Just click on the link in the PDF to access the ticket booking site.

A remarkable piece by HEqual. The role in the scandal played by Elaine Snaith, the lesbian feminist Chief Executive of the Police and Crime Commissioner’s office – her salary is £75,000 p.a. – is extraordinary.