XLCChelt Long Form

On October 1st, I posted a message to my followers on Twitter and Mastodon, asking my trans and LGBTQ+ followers if anyone has ever written to Ofcom - the regulator for TV and radio in the UK - asking them for justification for allowing our right-wing 'news' channels - GB News and TalkTV - to get away with their constant agitprop against groups protected under the Equality Act 2010, and how they are acting in any way 'balanced', and not 'targeting' these groups? You can find a few in-depth blogs I've written related to this, with fuller context. Having received some favourable responses, later that day I put my money where my mouth is (without ever saying so online) and spent quite a long time typing out a 'complaint' off the top of my head on the Ofcom website. I didn't actually want to complain, as I know Ofcom are protecting these channels and their output, either for fear of their audiences, or because they like it, or someone above is tellin...

A belated Happy New Year to anyone who reads this. It's going to be enough bad one for most of us, and especially those outside the majoritarian group, as the ruling class will continue to abuse minority communities as the distraction they need for the masses to not notice their quality of life continue to go downwards, along with the continuing economic and environmental collapse, steadfastly driven by those in power to extract even more wealth out of and away from the majority of us. In that light, I wanted to belatedly respond to Patrick Strudwick's piece in the i , published on December 31st, 2023, titled "Inside the 2023 Tory war on LGBT rights". If you know from my previous blogs, and posts on Twitter/X (urgh), Mastodon and now Bluesky, you can probably already guess that after reading it, I have some opinions on it. The article interviews both politicians and also political strategists. And I will highlight some parts I dispute below. Please go ahead and read t...

On November 17th, the Russian state petitioned the Supreme Court to ban the "international LGBT public movement" , due to its purported "extremist activity". In the least unsurprising outcome in a country where what the state wants (and especially the man in the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin), it gets, only 13 days later, the Court agreed and outlawed this 'organisation' and its activities . What does this all mean? Who knows, and that's the point. It can then be used in any circumstance for any reason, and against anyone usually for internal distraction, and given the history of state (and even vigilante) repression and violence against LGBTQ+ people in the country, it likely will. It will chill any societal expression, leaving LGBTQ+ interactions either in private homes or driven underground. A day later, Western media reported that even that wasn't safe, as bars were being raided, however this itself is not anything new. And Russia have gone after LGBTQ...

CW: This blog contains my belief of what is coming down the track regarding climate change and the fate of human society as we know it. If you are someone who has negative thoughts, especially on catastrophising, on this topic, you may want to stop reading now. This week (on Thursday 5th October), the Copernicus Climate Change service announced that September 2023 had on a global basis broken the all-time monthly temperature record - not by a small margin, but by 0.5C (0.9F). That is after both July 2023 and August 2023 had broken their monthly records by 0.3C (0.5F). That should be effectively impossible in a non-influenced climate statistically. Yet it happened. And you should be thinking whether as seems clear, we've already gone past a 'tipping point', and the system has been irretrievably broken. And you almost certainly didn't hear about any of it. That is deliberate and by design. Talk TV's James Max asked on his eponymous show on Friday 6th , why it was tha...

  On Sunday 19th June 2022, world swimming organisation FINA (now World Aquatics) became one of the first to give in to the anti-trans hysteria, and ban trans women from ever competing in women's (which have now become 'female') races. At the time I believed this would either never happen, or would maybe happen once for publicity. From Erin Reed (@ErinInTheMorn) on Twitter, June 19 2022: "This is essentially a ban of trans women from swimming entirely, unless they start transitioning under the age of 12. No Olympics. They'll create a "separate category" which will basically have a single swimmer per race by themselves. This is terrible." With my reply: "Doubt that 'open' category will ever see the light of day. Or maybe they'll do one event for publicity, before shelving it over the optics, competitiveness & the inevitable backlash. But in the end they can ban who they want from their events - maybe it's time to set-up ou...

This is another of my adapted Twitter/Mastodon threads to be reposted for posterity to the blog. The original title of this was "An anti-capitalism wail into the ether" . One day I am certain that historians will unanimously call out capitalism as being the most destructive ideology in human history. From it consuming the earth, which led to imperialism and colonialism over many centuries, through the required expansion of states to sate capital demand, and the ensuing enslavement and murder of those not deemed 'useful' in a pure profit sense - both within their land, and more explicitly and openly, abroad. Then the continuing wealth disparities, both within countries and between them, with this being a necessity of the system for it to even exist, to allow the ruling class to continue to accrue ever more capital. The monopoly of those few over the rest of humanity, both in terms of the wealth and power they've captured and controlled, and the oppression and viole...

CW: usage of anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, language and discourse So a few months ago, I wrote a blog on how right-wing media deliberately employ gay pundits to push anti-trans talking points, and eventually anti-LGBTQ+ discourse as the former is a Trojan horse for the Right's eventual goal, as a way of convincing normies that they are 'moderate' 'centrist' positions, so it brings many more people in - many who would think of themselves as being 'friendly' 'allies' - and they can then slowly move them over towards the eventual end goal of returning LGBTQ+ people back to the closet and out of sight of 'normal' 'natural' society (at the least, with some on the far-Right arguing for much more oppression than that). The seemingly never-ending anti-trans hysteria pushed deliberately by the Right - crafted in American 'think tanks' - as a distraction to their 'policies' that are deliberately chosen to fuck over the lives and future...