Enjoy.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

Our thanks to Elizabeth Hobson for this piece by Meredith Bennett-Smith for Huffpo:

Male Jurors More Likely To Find Fat Women Guilty, Study Says

Researchers at the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity have found the presence of a significant fat bias against female defendants in the courtroom, according to a recent study published in the International Journal of Obesity.

Yale psychologists created a mock jury scenario involving 471 study participants of various weights, according to the abstract of the study. While reviewing “a vignette describing a case of check fraud,” the jurors evaluated images of one of four alleged defendants: a lean male, a lean female, an obese male or an obese female. After looking at the shots, the participants were asked to rate how guilty they thought the defendant was on a 5-point Likert scale.

The results (via a Yale news release):

Male participants rated the obese female defendant guiltier than the lean female defendant, whereas female respondents judged the two female defendants equally regardless of weight. Among all participants, there were no differences in assessment of guilt between the obese male and lean male defendants.

The study’s lead author Natasha Schvey said that weight-based discrimination is at a level rivaling the current rate of racial discrimination.

“It’s important to look at weight stigma not only as a public health priority but also as a source of sweeping social injustice,” Schvey told Reuters.

While not particularly encouraging, Live Science notes that discrimination based on body mass index (BMI) has been documented before.

In 2011, researcher Alexandra Brewis, an anthropologist at Arizona State University, told the site that “moralizing ideas about what it means to be fat seem to have spread very quickly … It’s this moral judgment that creates prejudice and discrimination.”

Furthermore, in 2008, a different study found that men were more likely to be accepting of weight-based discrimination, according to Live Science.

Slate’s Katy Waldman hypothesized that there could be several related reasons for the revealed bias:

Perhaps we lean men suspect that larger women, given their history of stigmatization by people like us, are generally unhappier with their lot in life and thus more likely to engage in deviant behavior.

Perhaps we lean men are especially susceptible to the proven bias jurors hold toward physically attractive defendants (one that, it’s worth noting, declines when we engage in simulated deliberation, aka use our brains to assess the facts of a case).

In order to help alleviate the bias, the study suggests “voir dire and juror screening questionnaires,” the American Bar Association Journal notes, adding that “judicial instruction” may also be part of the solution.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to Jack for this.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to Douglas for this:

Does the rot never stop? I was once a proud and active member of the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA). I can look at the range of proper draught beers in pubs today and know that I played my part in keeping the market there and encouraging choice for consumers.

But CAMRA is no longer about choice. Now they are banning beers which “feature sexist names or imagery.” Whose standards are they employing to determine what is sexist or offensive? Obviously not the consumer’s. Even a name as innocuous as Dizzy Blonde for a light, strong bitter is outlawed as CAMRA convert into the campaign to limit consumer choice.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/sexist-alcohol-drink-names-great-british-beer-festival-2019-camra-a9043676.html

Abigail Newton, national organiser at CAMRA, said that each of the 1,000 beers, ciders and perries on sale at the Great British Beer Festival had been checked to ensure they adhered to CAMRA’s “charter and code of conduct, which details its commitment to inclusivity and diversity”.

I’m so glad that I am already no longer a member!

Perhaps this is something that Philip Davies, in his new role as beer champion, can help sort out. Consumer choice is about letting consumers choose, not about dictating to them how they are permitted to think while they try to enjoy a drink.

As the editor of Continental Telegraph says:

Banning something that appeals to some slice of that market is thus defeating the point and object of that very market’s existence. Sure, lots of women won’t buy a sexist beer. Some will, as will some men. The aim and art of the whole exercise being to allow those who won’t not to, those who will to.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Daisy Cousens is a delightful young Australian lady, who I had the pleasure of meeting at the Gold Coast conference in 2018. She always looks like she’s just stepped off the set of Gone With the Wind. It must be exhausting looking that good all the time, we thank her for making the effort. Her YouTube channel is here, an example of her videos is one with 100,000+ views in the past 11 months, Why pretty women should NEVER be feminists… (video, 10:02).

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to Tim for this.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to Mike P for this. Jo Swinson, leaderene of the Lib Dems, has said on a number of occasions that even if a second referendum on EU membership delivered the same result as the first, she and her colleagues in the Liberal Undemocratic party would make every effort to stop Brexit. Now she wants to stop women being imprisoned. Why would anyone vote for this party when this sexist anti-male harridan is leading it? Vince Cable was a bad enough mangina, but Swinson is beyond ridiculous.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to the estimable Douglas for this. He writes:

Brett Gosper, World Rugby’s chief executive, has announced that from now on women’s Rugby is to be called simply Rugby, just like men’s Rugby is. This is, apparently, a “landmark moment and a statement that we are treating the men’s and women’s games evenly”. Yes, it’s all about making everything equal on the Rugby pitch. Or is it?

Well, no, not really. To really make things equal in any sport – as is done with equestrian sports, for example – is for men and women to compete on an equal basis, on the same competition. That would be true sporting equality. However, it has to be clear that not many women would get to play, just as the Tour de France is open to women cyclists but none ever compete: women have their own version (men are banned) to give them a chance of winning something. [J4MB: The women’s “version” is, of course, far shorter and less onerous.]

Meanwhile, France already calls men’s Rugby ‘XV de France Masculin’, while its women’s Rugby is best known as ‘Les Bleues’ but that’s OK: that’s “reverse sexism”, not sexism, see? It’s OK to call it men’s Rugby, so long as you don’t call it women’s Rugby any more.

The comments stream is well worth catching, more so than the article. “Tom HJ” writes:

Just a step on the road to allowing those who self-identify as women to compete professionally and then *abracadabra* women disappear from international rugby.

The Law of Unintended Consequences strikes again.

You can subscribe to The Telegraph here.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

Our thanks to Lars for this piece in The Guardian. An extract:

19% of men would be reluctant to hire an attractive woman.

No figure is provided for the percentage of men who’d be reluctant to hire an unattractive woman.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.

A piece published on the website of Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them), the political party of which I’m the chairman, in August 2019:

At the Chicago conference I joined Karen Straughan for a glass or two of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, and she kindly gave me one of the last 10 remaining campaign leaflets of the Patriarchy Party, led by Nick Reading in 2013. A PDF of the two-sided leaflet is here. It was mainly written by Alison Tieman, with Karen’s help.

In 2013 Nick Reading gave a speech (audio, 5:57) in Sir Winston Churchill Square in Edmonton (Karen’s home town). It was mainly written by Karen, with Alison’s help. Nick was taking a big risk by speaking out in public.

Please support Mike Buchanan’s work on Patreon. Thank you.