Notices by RolloTreadway (rollotreadway@beige.party)

Do you ever open someone's profile, look at their posts, and then forget you're looking at someone's profile and wonder why your timeline is full of one person and some other people you don't know?

@skinnylatte I always find this extraordinary. Britain is hardly a country that treats homelessness decently, far from it - but the American approach seems completely unhinged. I don't understand it.

It's twenty past nine at night and someone is using an angle grinder. What kind of angle needs grinding at this time of night? Leave those angles be until morning!

@afewbugs I have a suspicion, completely unsupported by evidence, that racist gardeners are probably very committed to ensuring that nothing in their garden is wild and free, and that everything is strictly controlled with weedkillers and slug pellets and that sort of thing.

@RickiTarr Only by being drug free can one show true ctlrfchrp.

@skinnylatte Despite being from Wales, I really struggle with gloomy days (and it's getting worse as I get older, for some reason). I can imagine how much harder it must be if you're not from an island in the north Atlantic.

@RickiTarr I'm in a terraced house, so if the stairs don't go to my attic then they must go to the neighbour's attic. I'll go around and ask them if they're aware of this.

I went for a walk in the woods. And saw a deer! Right in front of me, I rounded a corner and there it was, grazing at the side of the path. It bounced away as soon as it noticed me, of course, I am a large clumsy human.

Today's #TuneTuesday theme is #LegendaryGuitarWork. Not generally my kind of topic. Still I can suggest something: Maggot Brain by Funkadelic, ten minutes of brilliance recorded in a single take.

George Clinton asked Eddie to play as if he'd just been told that his mother had died. Whatever the rationale - and I don't imagine George was entirely sober at the time - it certainly had an effect.

Friends, the great Eddie Hazel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOKn33-q4Ao

@RickiTarr Nihilists can find joy in big sandwich.
Hedonists can find joy in big sandwich.
Anarchists can find joy in big sandwich.
Satanists can find joy in big sandwich.

Big sandwich unites us all.

Went to the library! Walked out with some books!

Also, the pride display in the library has Trans Britain: Our Long Journey from the Shadows by @christineburns placed very prominently, which was nice to see.

This amendment has PASSED. 379 votes to 137.

The further amendment with wider reforms will not now be voted on (the two were contradictory, so one passing means the other must fall).

The result of this will not be immediate, the Crime and Policing Bill still has stages to go through, but it will pass in due course. Possibly before the summer recess. As the Bill (which covers many many things, not just abortion) is important Government legislation, it will not be delayed any more than is strictly necessary within the normal Parliamentary processes.

This is a big day. No more will people who have had miscarriages be harassed by police and forced to prove that they didn't have an illegal abortion. No more will people who had legal abortions be harassed and forced to prove that it was indeed legal. No more will people who believed they were having legal abortions, who broke a technical rule through no fault of their own, be harassed, investigated, prosecuted, convicted.

I hope that we can go on from this and have the wholesale reform of abortion law that is needed. But for right now, the persecution of people who are or have recently been pregnant will end, and that is to be welcomed greatly.

#UKPol #abortion

The house has divided to vote on the first of the amendments, which simply removes all threat of prosecution (and by extension, investigation, police harassment etc) from all people who are/have been pregnant, on any matter relating to their pregnancy.

This would not affect anything else in relation to abortion. It would only ensure that the pregnant person cannot face any criminal charge if they have failed (or are suspected to have failed, accused of having failed, etc) to stay within the strict regulatory bounds of our abortion law.

In practice, no more prosecution or police investigations for people who were attempting to have a wholly legal abortion, who believed they were having a wholly legal abortion, who broke one of those rules through no fault of their own. It also would mean no more prosecution and harassment of people who have miscarried, and who are accused by police of having an illegal abortion.



There are arguments in favour of both this amendment and the other one that may come later (which would introduce much more sweeping reforms in addition to the core principle). Whichever is the ideal amendment, I'm very nervous that neither will pass.

#UKPol #abortion

Morning. Woke in the middle of the night certain that someone was in my house, they were supposed to be here, I was supposed to be doing... something? with them. I panicked and yelled my apologies and hurriedly got dressed and went downstairs. At which point I realised that, no, nobody is here, why would they be? What would they be doing? But it seemed so certain and clear that they, whoever they were, were waiting for me and I'd rudely gone to bed.

Anyway, hope you're all well.

@skinnylatte Is that making screensavers of fish, or making screensavers for fish? It's both, isn't it?

This week's #ThursdayFiveList theme is #HighCamp. So here are five fabulous songs - and I've resisted the temptation to just go 100% Eurovision. I've only gone 40% Eurovision. Which I feel is quite restrained.

I. Jordan ft. Felix Mufti - Real Hot n Naughty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2P0UGqsItlA

Conchita Wurst - Rise Like a Phoenix
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaolVEJEjV4

The Magnetic Fields - Long Forgotten Fairytale
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dX2mca5whac

Little Richard - Tutti Frutti
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SlOj_-_rTI

Cezar - It's My Life
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV3xp5ZXSYA


I realise that there are many videos of Little Richard significantly more camp than that one. But I still wanted to include it, partly because it's Little Richard and even in a suit and tie, Little Richard was relentlessly fabulous. And partly because the original lyrics to Tutti Frutti (which Little Richard used to play live, but were toned down somewhat for commercial release), went:

Tutti Frutti, good booty
If it don't fit, don't force it
You can grease it, make it easy

and I think we can toast Little Richard as the true pioneer of being wildly gay in pop music.

I made it through the day. It was difficult and I'm very done in. But apart from one very small request early this morning, nobody has piled extra work on me.

I do feel unwell again though. It's been far too much. Maybe watching Eurovision tonight can help me.

I want to say a few things, after having read the Supreme Court judgement on the characteristic of sex in the Equality Act.

Firstly, that my heart and all support I have goes to all trans/enby/other people here and elsewhere. No doubt, a great many arseholes will misunderstand this decision, and I am very aware that pointing out that their behaviour remains wrong in law and potentially criminal will not alleviate that pain. Transphobes are always wrong; that they have a new way to be wrong helps nobody, and only causes more pain. I wish I could ease that pain, and know that I stand with all trans/enby/other people in any effort to ease that pain.

It has been the case since time immemorial that two problems dog our judicial system at all levels: that having the money to pay for better lawyers can distort decisions, and that the judiciary - especially at senior levels - is dreadfully lacking in diversity. I felt that latter point especially when reading the claim in the judgement that MPs and Parliamentary drafters could not possibly have been mistaken or ill-informed when considering the rights and needs of trans people; it's clearly the case in 2025 that many MPs and Parliamentary drafters do not much understand trans rights issues, and it would have been even more so a decade and a half ago, when the Equality Act was being drafted and debated in Parliament.

However, many people who might read this - in the UK and elsewhere - will have little or no familiarity with this country's judiciary, and I want to clarify a point the repeatedly comes up in regard to legal rights:

This is not the US, and regardless of the dominance of the US on social media, its constitutional quirks are not widely repeated. The UK Supreme Court is not an activist court. It does not have conservative judges and liberal judges. It does not have judges appointed on the whim of a temporary political leader. Its judges are appointed by representatives of panels which appoint to lower courts (plus two existing members of the Supreme Court), which themselves are a mix of various legal professionals and lay people. I feel it is essential to make clear that this is not, as it would be in the US, a matter of right-wing judges appointed by right-wing politicians to make right-wing decisions.

It is a matter of poorly written law, which Parliament will one day seek to revise and clarify. As I've said, I disagree with a fundamental part of the decision because I disagree with the assumption that Parliament was adequately informed and competent at the time of the Equality Act; without that assumption, I don't believe it would be possible to reach the Court's conclusion. Others may feel it would still be a possible conclusion, I claim no professional expertise.

But it is still a matter of how the law is worded, and how Parliament may seek to amend the law in future.

This is important because it must guide action. MPs are in the decisive position. Parliament could, if it wished, pass an Act tomorrow to guarantee trans rights (unlike other countries, the right of Parliament in the UK to pass and enforce an Act explicitly negating a Supreme Court decision is effectively unlimited, as seen in last year's absurd political actions regarding the safety or otherwise of Rwanda).

But we all know it will not do so, we all know there is not a majority in Parliament in favour of greater and more explicit legal protections for trans people. Activism must focus on changing that balance through persuasion and education. Write to your MP. Protest. Support and/or join groups campaigning for legal recognition of trans rights. If it's relevant and viable where you are (which of course it isn't in many places, but I shan't go on a rant about electoral reform just now), consider how your vote could change the Parliamentary balance. Don't bother with effing online petitions, they do more harm than good.

There will be a time (either at the back end of this Parliament, or - I'd suggest more likely - not long after the next election) when Parliament does seek to amend the Equality Act. Its own commission recommends doing so, and I believe that we can certainly read the later paragraphs of this judgement as further encouragement in that direction. This battle will come. Be ready.

But also remember this, as many will in the coming days weeks and months try to persuade you otherwise:

The decision today affects a very narrow range of circumstances, beyond those covered by existing legal provisions. It is not a wide-ranging judgement, even if transphobic media try to pretend that it is.

The right of all trans people, whatever their circumstances, to be free of discrimination and harassment remains unchanged. Being trans remains a protected characteristic under the Equality Act. Trans people cannot be excluded on a whim (and the status of toilets and changing facilities is not altered by this decision, as - contrary to what transphobes believe - the sign on a toilet has never been a matter of law in the UK, except as regards adequate provision of disabled toilets).

It is also true, and clearly iterated in the judgement, that discrimination on the grounds of sex as a protected characteristic continues to be based on the discriminator's *perception*; if a trans person is discriminated against or harassed based on the discriminator perceiving them as being male or female (regardless of the trans person's identity), that remains an offence.

I say this not to diminish the harm and pain caused by this judgement, both in its specific application, and more significantly, in the cultural impact and effective encouragement of transphobia. I say this as a reminder that those legal protections still exist, and there are far more circumstances in which a trans woman's right to be treated as a woman is guaranteed, than there are circumstances affected by the decision. Transphobes will seek to argue otherwise. They are wrong. Do not believe, as they want you to believe, that trans people are now unprotected from discrimination and harassment.

And believe me when I say that I remain in awe of your strength and humanity, and that I continue to believe that your strength and humanity will win out in the end.

Occasional reminder, seeing as it's #InternationalAsexualityDay, and people sometimes get confused about this:

Asexual people are not necessarily aromantic
Aromantic people are not necessarily asexual

Some asexual people are also aromantic, and some aren't, and some are fluid in one or both regards

Some asexual people enjoy sex in the right circumstances, some don't
Some aromantic people enjoy being in a relationship in the right circumstances, some don't

All these people are valid and cool people!

@icedquinn Most countries manage just fine with having rules that control money in politics and consequences for breaching those rules. I'm sorry that the US has political courts that don't want such rules to exist.