Lifted from the comments, Mr Burkett ponders crime and its apologists:

A thread ensues.

Regarding the consequent conflictedness and anxiety, all that progressive wrongness, these three posts include some fairly vivid illustrations of the phenomenon.

Among which, a claim that more theatre for schoolchildren would somehow deter the kinds of creatures who repeatedly and gleefully sucker-punch elderly ladies for being the wrong race, and a chap who insists that women should allow themselves to be mugged at bus stops lest their mugger, out on probation, come to harm.

Oh, and the belief, expressed tearfully and at length by a Guardian columnist, that when you find your home being burgled in the middle of the night, the real victims, the people deserving of sympathy and indulgence, are the ones breaking into your home while brandishing carving knives and then driving off with your valuables in your car.

In the examples featured in the posts above, the perpetrator is typically black and the apologist white. This recurring racial hang-up is often made explicit – as when the activist and lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, mentioned here, dismissed objections to being burgled as, and I quote, “idiotic attitudes,” while telling Guardian readers that the wellbeing of burglars is more important than the wellbeing of their victims, especially if the burglar is a “young black person.”

Mr Stafford Smith went on to chide and insult the victims of burglary, and the law-abiding generally, while offering implausible excuses for those who break into strangers’ homes and steal their belongings, and who do this over and over again with ever greater boldness. And none of these claims were challenged, at all, in the Guardian‘s fawning interview. Apparently, among many progressives, such contrivance is not only congenial, but terribly high-status.

Perversity as piety.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

Or, Return of the Honesty Box.

With domain renewal looming, along with umpteen other behind-the-scenes expenses, now seems a good time to remind patrons that where you are right now is made possible by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to ensure this place exists a while longer, and remains ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted.

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It’s what keeps this place here.

For newcomers wishing to know more about what’s been going on here for close to nineteen years, in over 3,500 posts and hundreds of thousands of comments, the Reheated series is a pretty good place to start – in particular, the end-of-year summaries, which convey the fullest flavour of what it is we do. A sort of blog concentrate. If you like what you find there… well, there’s lots more of that.

Do take a moment to poke through the discussion threads too. The posts are intended as starting points, not full stops, and the comments are where much of the good stuff is waiting to be found. And do please join in.

As always, thanks for the support, the comments, and the company.

Oh, and consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

From the comments, scenes from Smith College, Massachusetts:

A woman reacted to a banner stating “Women are adult human females” by calling the group holding it “fascists.”pic.twitter.com/8w8oikJX76

— Thomas Sowell Quotes (@ThomasSowell) October 6, 2025

It turns out that when you try to pretend away fundamental realities, as if wishing made it so, any reminder of those realities has to be repressed or erased, or at least shouted at quite loudly.

I believe this was the scene that prompted the meltdown.

Update, via the comments:

Mike D adds,

Well, it does seem to be an illustration of the fact that if you require continual, universal affirmation – i.e., deference – if you need everyone else to pretend something vividly untrue – then you’re unlikely to be happy. The best you could hope for is to surround yourself with people who are willing to lie to you.

It’s worth mentioning, I think, that the trans-identified people I’ve spoken with or seen who seem most content are the ones who can concede the reality of the situation, and who can juggle that reality with their preference to live as if they were the opposite sex, while knowing that they aren’t.

They don’t seem prone to the bedlamite outbursts seen above.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

In discussions of Net Zero, I’ve previously mentioned the pleasingly hard-nosed energy analyst Kathryn Porter.

Here she is being interviewed by the chaps at Triggernometry:

This Isn’t Science, It’s Ideology – Kathryn Porter

Watch the full episode with @KathrynPorter26, right here on X. pic.twitter.com/SLQB9l9Evb

— TRIGGERnometry (@triggerpod) September 28, 2025

It’s ninety minutes, but time well spent and dense with information. Much of it of an eye-widening kind.

Ms Porter’s YouTube channel can be found here.

And from Australia, more thing-that-never-happens news:

And for some, validation trumps all else.

Because of our thrillingly modern sensitivities, Mr Harper – who favours the name Autumn Tulip Harper – is currently being held in a prison for women.

The details of the case are, I should add, particularly vile.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.