The journal Science, promoting athletic competition between trans women and biological women, abjures science and distorts data

May 14, 2023 • 11:30 am

Under Science‘s editor-in-chief Holden Thorp, who regularly writes authoritarian “progressive” pieces in his bully pulpit, the entire journal has become woke. (Fortunately, the science articles themselves generally remain untainted by ideology.) But who dares to object to this editorial trend given that every scientist wants their papers published in one of the world’s two premier science journals? (The other is the British journal Nature.).  And, as in Scientific American, the editor tends to display op-ed pieces catering to a woke mentality.

The report at hand is especially bad because author Rodrigo Ortega actually leaves out relevant data and distorts other data—all in the cause of promoting transgender women (most who have transitioned after puberty) being allowed to compete in women’s sports against biological women. The title question, asking whether transgender women should be banned from competing with biological women, refers to this recent ruling (excerpts from article are indented):

World Athletics (WA), the governing body for track and field and other running competitions, announced last month that transgender women who went through male puberty can no longer compete in women’s events at international competitions. The policy took effect on 31 March.

And it’s clear for two reasons that the author (and probably Science magazine itself) thinks that trangender women should not be banned.

a.) The article quotes only critics of the ban, not advocates. More important:

b.) The article quotes only one piece of science, based on a tiny sample size, that long-distance runners who transition from biological male to trans female don’t lose their relative position in competing against either members of the pre-transition versus post-transition sex. But they leave out two pieces of more extensive peer-reviewed data that biological males who transition to the female gender retain substantial advantages in athletic-informed traits retain their athletic advantages despite lowered testosterone. Further, the author distorts one study to make it look like transwomen attain athletic par with biological women, when in fact the study shows the opposite.

The clear answer to the question in the title below is NO. But the real answer is, if you go by the data themselves, is “yes.” I conclude that the Science article below is not only biased (probably by ideology), but also misleading, perhaps deliberately so.

Click the screenshot to read.

Two quotes against the WA ban, one from a grad student, the other from a geneticist. There are no quotes from people like Emma Hilton, who would undoubtedly say that the WA ban is the right decision. (I think it was, too.) They are biasing the article simply by using a subset of relevant people. Here’s one quote:

But Joanna Harper, a Ph.D. student at Loughborough University who studies transgender athletes’ performance, questions whether the WA fully considered the scientific evidence. “I was disappointed with the decision,” says Harper, who is transgender. “The idea that it was necessary to ban trans women to protect the female category seems so far-fetched.”

and, in response to the header, “Is there evidence that transgender women athletes have a physiological advantage?,” they quote a geneticist:

Not according to Eric Vilain, a geneticist at the University of California, Irvine, who specializes in gender-based biology. Very little research has been published on transgender athletes, and what has been published didn’t provide enough results to create evidence-based policies, says Vilain, who does not identify as transgender. “It’s not black and white.”

Then the magazine quotes two papers that supposedly show that becoming a trans woman gives you no biological advantage in sport over biological women. Here’s one quote:

For example, a 2021 review found trans women’s muscle mass remains high after transitioning, but their levels of hemoglobin—the oxygen-carrying protein in blood—were comparable to cisgender women’s. Increased levels of hemoglobin facilitate more oxygen transport to muscles when active, and men tend to have higher hemoglobin than women.

Well, click on the link and go to the paper by Joanna Harper et al. What you will find is that yes, Hb levels were comparable to those of cisgender women, but of course Hb levels are not the only factor involved in sport. The Harper et al. paper also says this: (my bolding):

Twenty-four studies were identified and reviewed. Transwomen experienced significant decreases in all parameters measured, with different time courses noted. After 4 months of hormone therapy, transwomen have Hgb/HCT levels equivalent to those of cisgender women. After 12 months of hormone therapy, significant decreases in measures of strength, LBM [lean body mass] and muscle area are observed. The effects of longer duration therapy (36 months) in eliciting further decrements in these measures are unclear due to paucity of data. Notwithstanding, values for strength, LBM and muscle area in transwomen remain above those of cisgender women, even after 36 months of hormone therapy.

Conclusion: In transwomen, hormone therapy rapidly reduces Hgb to levels seen in cisgender women. In contrast, hormone therapy decreases strength, LBM and muscle area, yet values remain above that observed in cisgender women, even after 36 months. These findings suggest that strength may be well preserved in transwomen during the first 3 years of hormone therapy.

Note that although author Ortega talks only about Hb levels, he omits the conclusions about strength, lean body mass, and muscle area, which after transitioning are NOT comparable to those of biological women, but HIGHER—even after three years of testosterone therapy. The last sentence of the Harper et al. paper, “These findings suggest that strength may be well preserved in transwomen during the first 3 years of hormone therapy” is not even mentioned by Ortego, but conflicts completely with what he is trying to show with Hb levels.  This cannot be an error—not if Ortega read the paper—but seems to me an example of intellectual dishonesty. The dishonesty is compounded by Ortega’s failure to cite two papers that are far more relevant to judging whether trans women who go through male puberty keep an athletic advantage over biological women.

Here is the other evidence cited in the article.

A rare performance study on trans athletes, a 2015 study by Harper of eight women, found their race times slowed after transitioning from male to female, while their performance relative to sex-matched runners stayed the same. The results suggest they have no advantage over cisgender women.

It’s the same Harper, and in the paper itself (second link), the authors report that using adjusted measures of running ability in trans women relative to biological men before they transitioned, and then to biological women after they had transitioned, there was no significant change. Note that the sample size was eight, that more than half of the data were self-reported times, that these were not elite runners, and that the running abilities were measured via an algorithm rather than by placement in actual races.  The data might be all right, but I’m betting that trans women who actually run at these distances (5K and marathons) would perform much better against biological women than against men.

But what’s really almost duplicitous in this article, which came out last month, is its arrant neglect of much more extensive data that has accumulated in the last several years, in particular two reviews of athletic-connected traits in trans women measured before versus after transitioning after puberty. They’re cited in this thread by Emma Hilton, who was an author of one of the papers:

The reference:

Both of these papers came out after the ones cited by Ortega in Science, and I wrote about both of them in January of last year.  You should look at the original paper, and also read the summary article by Pike et al. But the papers tell the tale, and what’s below is from the summary of both papers quoted in my post (authors’ words). Don’t take my word for it; read the two scientific papers and the summary:

There have been two high-quality, high-impact academic reviews, both in leading sports journals, of muscle and skeletal physiology in transwomen who have, post-puberty, suppressed testosterone as part of their transition. The reviews cover longitudinal studies; that is, they contain pre-transition metrics such as thigh muscle area and grip strength, and matched data from at least 12 months, occasionally longer, into transition. All transwomen studied had been successfully suppressing testosterone to less than 10 nmol/l for at least one year, and would therefore qualify for inclusion in female sports categories under the regulations specified by the IOC and most sports federations. Collectively, the studies captured by these reviews cover over 800 transwomen in 10 original studies, with data acquired as a routine aspect of ongoing general health assessments within clinical care teams.

To summarize: In transwomen successfully suppressing testosterone for 12 months, skeletal metrics—height, limb/digit length, and shoulder/pelvic width—do not change, and the extent of muscle/strength loss is approximately -5 percent after 12 months, a modest change that is insufficient to bridge the baseline muscular differences between males and females.

Regarding musculoskeletal parameters, Hilton and Lundberg concluded: “The biological advantage, most notably in terms of muscle mass and strength, conferred by male puberty and thus enjoyed by most transgender women is only minimally reduced when testosterone is suppressed as per current sporting guidelines for transgender athletes.”

This conclusion was subsequently confirmed by Joanna Harper and her fellow researchers, who added: “Hormone therapy decreases strength, lean body mass and muscle area, yet values remain above [those] observed in cisgender women, even after 36 months.”

Note that the “subsequent confirmation” was written in 2021 by the same Harper who’s cited six years earlier as supporting transgender women’s “right” to compete in sports, but the author of the Science piece doesn’t mention that paper!

These results match the increasingly numerous examples of trans women taking top honors in various women’s sports.

So what we see is a very biased and distorted new article in Science that, I’m sad to say, looks as if it deliberately neglected highly relevant data showing that trans women retain significant phenotypic traits that would give them athletic advantages in sports competitions against biological women. Now you can say that perhaps the author didn’t dig deeply into the literature (though there isn’t much), but to me it looks like intellectual dishonesty in the service of the ideology Science has promoted in recent years.

It is negligent and reprehensible for the nation’s premier science journal to spin scientific data this way. The facts remain the facts, and to me they support the decision of the World Athletics that it’s unfair to biological women to be forced to compete in track and field against trans women.  In this article Science concludes otherwise, but can do so only by twisting previous data and neglecting more comprehensive and relevant data. Anybody who knows anything about this area—even a lowly geneticist like me—knows that data contrary to the author’s (and journal’s) apparent ideology is being omitted or distorted.  There is no excuse for this, and you can pass the buck up to the Editor in Chief, Holden Thorp.

New paper advocating sex-specific language

May 14, 2023 • 9:30 am

Frankly, I’m surprised that this paper, which insists that we be very careful about replacing “sexed” language like “woman” with “desexed” language like “bodies with vaginas” (I’m looking at you, Lancet!) or “cervix havers”— and giving a number of reasons why we should exercise caution—got published at all. Moreover, the authors, a group from Australia, India, the UK, and the US, published it in a respectable journal, Frontiers in Global Women’s Health (February 2022). You can click the screenshot to read it (pdf available at upper right of the article, and I give the full reference at the bottom):

The authors first note the trend to replace “sexed” language with “desexed” language, and give a chart to show the two categories (click to enlarge):

(From paper): TABLE 1. Sexed terms and some of their replacement desexed terms.

Here are the most common replacements (all quotes from the paper are indented, while my comments are flush left):

Avoidance of sexed terms most commonly results in the words “woman” and “women” being replaced with “person”, “people” or “families” and the words “mother” and “mothers” being replaced with “parent”, “parents”, “family” or “families” (51). Sometimes body parts (e.g. “vagina owners”) or processes (e.g. “birthers”) are also used. Terms such as “non-males” or “non-men” may be used to denote women. “Maternity” (52), “maternal” (53), “midwife” (54), and “breastfeeding” (52) have also become contentious terms.

The authors argue that that these changes arose via the postmodern form of Queer Theory:

Gender identity can be described as an individual’s internalized sense of being masculine, feminine or something else, or as an internal understanding of oneself as man, woman, both or neither, and is independent of sex (27, 28). The concept of gender identity originated in the 1960s in the United States of America (USA) (29), was refined in the 1990s through a postmodern philosophy called Queer Theory (30) and continues to evolve. Central to Queer Theory are the twin propositions that both sex and gender are socially constructed (31, 32) and that gender is the more important of the two (3, 33)1. Ideas informed by Queer Theory have spread from the USA to become influential in many other Western countries and beyond (30). The number of children, adolescents, and adults, reporting gender identities in conflict with their sex (described as being “transgender”) has grown dramatically in recent years (35). Alongside this increase, the idea that not everyone who gives birth is a woman has gained prominence.

Let me add that sex is NOT socially constructed; it’s a biological binary or dichotomy in humans and other animals.  The authors add this:

These language changes are intended to avoid distress, are described as inclusive (42), and are encouraged by diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. Desexed language is most common in the English-speaking West, but it is increasingly being applied internationally (43–45).

The authors have no issue with addressing specific people (generally transgender men [biological women]) with the terms they prefer. I agree; this is a matter of simple civility. But they have multiple issues with using in general either the pure replacements, or even using both the sexed and desexed terms (“additive language”):

Contrasting with the either/or of replacing sexed words, it is sometimes proposed to use both/and words. So, rather than referring to “women” or “mothers”, one might say “women and birthing people,” “women and other birthing people,” or “mothers and parents,” a strategy commonly described as “additive language”

They generally disapprove of additive language because it’s confusing, and their general take is that the desexed language is inimical to communication. This is where they begin to tread on dangerous ground:

Desexed language is most common in the English-speaking West, but it is increasingly being applied internationally (43–45). However, there appears to have been little consideration of the ethics of these changes, including the principles of avoiding harm and health maximization (46), or how they may impact on women and children’s rights. The exercise of medical ethics requires balancing “autonomy” and “justice.” In this context, supporting autonomy is a legitimate and ethical goal, but the principles of distributive justice, to respect the equality, and dignity of every individual in the population must also be considered (47). Although the proposed language changes relate to women, they also impact children as the mother and infant form a dyad, whose physiologic functions depend on one another and are intimately interconnected in a unique, vital and transient developmental state (48–50). It behooves us therefore to be certain of how women’s needs and children’s developmental prerequisites may be affected by these changes in language and how they might impact advocacy for maternal and child health and human rights.

The striking thing about this paper is that the authors are neither strident nor particularly ideological; their tone is calm, their arguments rational. It’s clear that their stand is opposed to both gender activism and progressive authoritarianism, but they don’t mention their ideological opponents, but merely proffer an argument. Here’s an overview of the damage that, they say, desexed language does:

Desexing the language of female reproduction has been done with a view to being sensitive to individual needs and as beneficial, kind, and inclusive. Yet, this kindness has delivered unintended consequences that have serious implications for women and children. These include: decreasing overall inclusivity; dehumanizing; including people who should be excluded; being imprecise, inaccurate or misleading; and disembodying and undermining breastfeeding. In addition, avoidance of the term “mother” in its sexed sense, risks reducing recognition and the right to protection of the mother-infant dyad.

Note that they mention six deleterious consequences. For the rest of the paper they take each in turn and show the harm that desexed language does. I’ll give just one; read the paper if you want the full argument:

Dehumanizes

Numerous alternative terms for “women” and “mothers” involve references to body parts or physiological processes. Referring to individuals in this reduced, mechanistic way is commonly perceived as “othering” and dehumanizing (67). For example, the term “pregnant woman” identifies the subject as a person experiencing a physiological state, whereas “gestational carrier” or “birther” marginalizes their humanity. Efforts to eliminate dehumanizing language in medical care are longstanding (68), including in relation to women during pregnancy, birth, and new motherhood (67, 69–71). Using language that respects childbearing women is imperative given the prevalence of obstetric violence (18, 72, 73). Considering women in relation to males as “non-men” or “non-males”, treats the male body as standard (8) and hearkens back to the sexist Aristotelian conceptualization of women as failed men (74).

Note that this trend of reducing dehumanization is ubiquitous, as in eliminating “slaves” in favor of “enslaved persons”; eliminating “the homeless” for “people experiencing homelessness”, or eliminating “prisoners” with “person or individual with justice system involvement.” Some of these are okay, while others, like the new term for “prisoners”, is both overly complex and best avoided.

The authors conclude that whatever language is used, it should be clear, avoid conflating sex and gender, uses “sex” when one refers to sex and “gender” when one refers to “gender,” and that you ask yourself a number of questions when treading this ground, questions like “How can I ensure that the special needs of those who are female, but who have a gender identity they experience in conflict with their sex, are met?” As you see, the authors are not dogmatic but try to effect compromise. Nevertheless this paper will be met with rancor from gender activists. As I said, I was surprised to see it published (as an op-ed, of course) in a reputable, peer-reviewed medical journal, as it would seem to find its niche in something like The Journal of Controversial Ideas.

In the end, this does constitute pushback against wokeness and extreme gender activism, but kudos to the authors for their rationality, clarity, and refusal to accept terms being forced upon people by Progressive Authoritarians like The Lancet:

Here’s another article with some of the same authors (click to read). It’s a case study, and I’ve put the abstract below the fold should you be interested (the paper is from February of this year in the same journal as above):

h/t: Anna

Gribble, K. D. et al. 2023. Effective communication about pregnancy, birth, lactation, breastfeeding, and newborn care: the importance of sexed language. Front. Glob. Womens Health, 07 February 2022 Sec. Maternal Health Volume 3 – 2022 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fgwh.2022.818856

 

Click “read more” for the abstract of the last paper mentioned above:

Continue reading “New paper advocating sex-specific language” →

Readers’ wildlife photos

May 14, 2023 • 8:15 am

It’s Sunday, and so we receive our weekly batched of themed bird photos from John Avise. John’s narrative and captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Habitat Birds

All birds show habitat preferences, and in a few species these are reflected in the birds’ official common names.  This week’s post shows several examples of what I’m talking about: birds whose common names include their preferred type of habitat.  The state where each photograph was taken is indicated in parentheses.

Prairie Warbler, Setophaga discolor (Florida):

Field Sparrow, Spizella pusilla (Illinois):

Marsh Wren, Cistothorus palustris (California):

Canyon Towhee, Melozone fusca (Utah):

Eastern Meadowlark, Sturnella magna (Florida):

Boreal Chickadee, Poecile hudsonicus (Alaska):

Mountain Bluebird, Sialia currucoides (Wyoming):

Mountain Chickadee, Poecile gambeli (Colorado):

Swamp Sparrow, Melospiza georgiana (California):

Savannah Sparrow, Passerculus sandwichensis (California):

Sagebrush Sparrows, Artemisiospiza nevadensis  (California):

Sage Thrasher, Oreoscoptes montanus (California):

California Scrub-jay, Aphelocoma californica (California):

California Scrub-jay headshot (California):

Sunday: Hili dialogue

May 14, 2023 • 6:45 am

It’s Sunday, May 14, 2023, National Buttermilk Biscuit Day. If you haven’t had this Southern U.S. delicacy, make some (they’re not hard). Here’s a plate from America’s Biscuit Mecca: the Loveless Motel and Cafe outside of Nashville, Tennessee. I asked to be taken there as my honorarium for giving a talk a Vanderbilt in 2012. The preserves are homemade. The difficulty is not to fill up on biscuits before your eggs, grits, and country ham arrive.

The rest of the meal: fried country ham, fried eggs, and grits.  That’s red-eye gravy on the side. There is no finer breakfast in America, or perhaps the world:

It’s also International Dylan Thomas Day (his play Under Milk Wood was first read on this day in 1953), International Migratory Bird Day, National Train Day, Sun Awareness Day, World Belly Dance Day, Hastings Banda’s Birthday in Malawi, and National Unification Day in Liberia.

Most important, it’s it’s also Mother’s Day, so, if your mom is still with us, celebrate her! Google did with a special doodle with ten animal-themed pictures of moms. Click screenshot below to start looking at them.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the May 14 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*I guess Peggy Noonan has come a ways since the days she was a prominent conservative, working as a speechwriter for Ronald Reagan and stumping for W in his election bid. I now learn that she won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary, and, in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, she eviscerates both Donald Trump and CNN for giving him a platform.

Well, that was a disaster, a politically historic one. It situated Donald Trump as the central figure of the 2024 presidential cycle, certainly more compelling than the incumbent or the other competitors. It will have an impact on the campaign’s trajectory.

When it was over I thought, of CNN: Once again they’ve made Trump real.

It was one of those events in which you understood within 45 seconds what you were seeing. He was greeted by a standing ovation. The audience didn’t surprise itself by doing this; it knew how it felt.

From that moment Mr. Trump dominated.

He was focused, high-energy, looked capable in his insane way. Tanned, rested and ready. Actually he looked pretty much as he did in 2016; on Wednesday night at least, age hadn’t taken the round side of its ball-peen hammer to him.

He steamrolled the moderator, talking over her, dismissing her, as they stood together, as nasty. He spoke with what seemed like conviction, backed down on nothing, made things up.

It was salutary in that it was a reminder of Donald Trump’s power. But it was all misconceived.

. . . I don’t suppose we’ll ever know, but one got the impression the network agreed to a lot of conditions to get the get. He was addressed as “Mr. President” throughout when, considering the circumstances and after Jan. 6, Mr. Trump would have been just fine. He gave no sign he saw the moderator as formidable. As for the audience, a local New Hampshire official seemed to sigh in a text: “I assume that was part of the deal.”

. . . Ramesh Ponnuru in the Washington Post offered the kind of questions he wished had been asked: Why have so many high-level officials of your own administration, including an attorney general, national security adviser, defense secretary and two communications directors, turned against you? Are you bad at hiring people? With Republicans holding both the House and Senate in the first two years of your presidency, why didn’t you get funding for the border wall? Were you rolled by Speaker Paul Ryan, or did you just drop the ball?

. . . To a Republican who might vote for him, who’d consider it but isn’t committed, Mr. Trump likely came across Thursday night as on point, committed and informed, though a little wild around the edges, and maybe not totally trustworthy. But I imagine a lot of wavering Republicans might be thinking to themselves: inflation, crime, interest rates, senility, we’re slipping, Joe Biden went too far left . . .

This doesn’t sound like a Republican writing!

*One would think that the chaos at the border, as Title 42 was lifted, would spur on efforts in Congress to reform immigration. But one would be wrong. According to the NYT, the rush to the border has only widened the difference between the two parties.

 A crush of asylum claims at the U.S.-Mexico border is complicating an already intractable immigration debate on Capitol Hill, pulling the two parties further apart and threatening to undermine what some lawmakers have viewed as the best hope in a decade for Congress to forge a comprehensive immigration deal.

For decades, bipartisan discussions on such a compromise focused on pairing beefed-up border security with a pathway to legalization for undocumented immigrants and expanded legal pathways to entry. But in recent years, an explosion in the number of migrants asking for asylum — a protected status for those fearing persecution in their home country — has scrambled the equation, exposing deep political and moral divisions.

The shift helps explain why talks on Capitol Hill to find a consensus on a comprehensive immigration overhaul have sputtered, despite lawmakers’ hope that the expiration this week of Title 42 — a pandemic-era policy that had let authorities swiftly expel migrants — would force Congress to act.

But why? It’s because the landscape has changed, and now divisions have widened because Democrats want more open border for those seeking economic advantage, and Republicans want to hold on to the old rules, but even tighten them, making immigrants seeking genuine asylum wait outside the U.S.:

Asylum claims were intended to be reserved for people fearing persecution on the basis of their race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a social group to seek protection on U.S. soil. But in recent years, they have increasingly become a go-to tactic for migrants with no other options to enter the United States, and who know it could take years before their cases are heard and — if unfounded — rejected.

In recent months, Republicans and Democrats have embraced radically different positions on how to address abuses of the asylum system.

Republicans have proposed steps to restrict access across the board, pushing legislation through the House this week that would require migrants claiming a credible fear of persecution to wait outside the United States for their cases to be heard in court. They only narrowly stopped short of approving language that would have shut down the asylum system if the United States ran out of detention beds.

Democrats have largely gone in the other direction, embracing a right to seek asylum protections as intrinsic to the character of the United States and calling for expanding other pathways to legal immigration to alleviate the strain.

*Chonkasaurus! The discovery in the Chicago River of a HUGE snapping turtle, now dubbed “Chonkasaurus” or “Chonk” for short, is the talk of Chicago.

The enormous snapping turtle has made national headlines in recent days after Joey Santore and Al Scorch, two longtime friends from La Grange and Portage Park, respectively, shared video of him through their social media and YouTube project, “Crime Pays But Botany Doesn’t.”

The duo document natural areas and animals in and around Chicago, humorously narrating their videos with heavy Chicago accents. But their video of Chonk, which they released Sunday, has made big waves — not unlike the turtle himself.

“Look at the size of that thing! Oh my God, it’s a massive turtle,” Santore says in the video, which has racked up more than 68,000 views on YouTube and more than 590,000 views on Twitter.

The duo dubbed the snapper Chonkosaurus, but Chicagoans have quickly shortened that to Chonk.

The video pans to show the enormous snapper sitting in the Chicago River near Division Street in Goose Island as the two friends narrate.

“Look at that beast! Hey, how ya doin’, guy? Ya look good,” one says. The two continue to joke about the snapper’s size, saying, “You look good! I’m real proud of ya. You been eatin’ healthy. … We should take him out to eat.”

The spotting and viral video weren’t planned: Santore and Scorch were simply kayaking and observing invasive plants along a retention wall on a recent warm day.

“We had no intention of necessarily filming,” Santore said. “I just kind of do it on the fly whenever it feels like it’s appropriate or when it could be fun.”

But then they came across the oversized snapping turtle perched on a pile of rusty chains and rotted pylons, Santore said.

The longtime friends were floored by the sight.

“Look at the size of this f—ing thing thing. Holy hell,” they say in the video.

LOOK AT IT!

*I didn’t know that Ukrainian President Zelensky had a peace plan, but he presented it to the Pope yesterday, seeking his approval. I don’t know if Zelensky is religious (I doubt it), but you have to pay fealty to the pontiff to get credibility:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had private talks with Pope Francis at the Vatican on Saturday, later saying he sought support for his peace plan from the pontiff, who in the past has offered to try to help end the full-scale war launched by Russia a year ago.

Zelenskyy held his hand over his heart and said it was a “great honor” to meet with the pope. Francis, using a cane for his knee problem, came to greet the Ukrainian president before ushering him into a papal studio near the Vatican’s audience hall.

In a tweet after the 40-minute audience, Zelenskyy expressed gratitude to Francis for “his personal attention to the tragedy of millions of Ukrainians.” He said he spoke with the pontiff “about the tens of thousands of deported (Ukrainian) children. We must make every effort to return them home.”

and this,, apparently is the peace plan:

Zelenskyy’s 10-point plan would establish a special tribunal to prosecute Russian war crimes. It would also create a European-Atlantic security architecture with guarantees for Ukraine, restore Ukraine’s damaged power infrastructure and ensure safety around Europe’s largest nuclear power plant at Zaporizhzhia.

Earlier in the day, Zelenskyy received from Italian officials pledges of open-ended military and financial support as well as stronger backing for Ukraine’s cherished aim to join the European Union.

“The message is clear and simple,” Premier Giorgia Meloni said after a meeting with Zelenskyy that lasted more than an hour. “The future of Ukraine is a future of peace and freedom. And it’s the future of Europe, a future of peace and freedom, for which there are no other possible solutions.″

Well, all well and good, but it’s ludicrous to think that Russia would agree to a plan that would allow Putin, his cronies, and some of his generals to face a “human rights tribunal”!

*Finally, Ginger K. reminds us that May 15 (TOMORROW) is the deadline for submitting your comments on House Bill HR 734 (bill here), the “Protection of Girls in Women and Sports Act of 2023 (there’s a companion bill s613 pending in the Senate). You can go to this page to bust the chops of your Representative (if they’re a Democrat, as NONE of them voted for it), or write to your Senator about it. However, realize that this is going to be a straight party-line vote in both Houses because of this provision, which is sensible:

“(d)(1) It shall be a violation of subsection (a) for a recipient of Federal funds who operates, sponsors, or facilitates athletic programs or activities to permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designated for women or girls.

“(2) For purposes of this subsection, sex shall be recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth.”.

Apparently, Democrats favor the demise of women’s sports. Of course I dislike finding myself in bed with Republicans, but that’s what you’ll have to do if you don’t want transwomen taking over women’s sports teams.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili, the editor of Listy, is letting his lackeys do the work.

Hili: I’m looking and I’m impressed.
A: What impressed you?
Hili: That you are still in there going on with it.
In Polish:
Hili: Patrzę i podziwiam.
Ja: Co podziwiasz?
Hili: Że wam się chce.

********************

From Pyers, what really happened during the coronation:

From Nicole:

From Jesus of the Day (I presume that the cats will be raptured):

From Masih: an Iranian woman banned from college for being photographed without a hijab. The Guardian has a story about Sepideh Rashno, her likely torture, and her coercion to apologize on television.

From Malcolm: a cat goes after its tail. (Do they know that the tail is part of their body?)

From Larry the Cat via Simon. Somebody’s feet smell weird!

From Luana. Yes, Smith did it too (it started at USC):

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a woman perished who is among Yad Vashem’s “Righteous Among the Nations,” non-Jews who helped save Jews during the Holocaust.

Tweets from Matthew. Have a look at these clowns!

This is an amazing overhead video of bubble net feeding, which you can read about here: it’s an amazing cooperative feeding strategy of humpback whales.

Ducks make themselves a tiny pond:

Duck retrospective: Remembering Honey and her oversized brood

May 13, 2023 • 11:45 am

Those of us (especially me) who welcomed the renovation of Botany Pond as both an improved facility but also as a break from last year’s spate of difficult duckling rescues, now find ourselves missing the mallards. Occasionally a duck or two may stop by the pond, looking quizzically at the absence of water, but otherwise there are no ducks to be seen. (Some of us get our duck fix by visiting nearby ponds.)

We also find ourself remembering the mallards of bygone years. For example, Honey was here for six straight years, but I doubt that I’ll ever seen her again. Three years ago, her brood hatched on May 1 and then another nesting hen, Dorothy, hatched her own brood on May 3.  You may remember, if you’re a regular, that Honey managed to kidnap all of Dorothy’s brood, winding up with 17 ducklings to tend. We are proud that they all lived to fledging, but Dorothy was bereft. Fortunately, she nested again and produced a second brood of seven, all of which she brought up herself.

Here’s Honey with her huge brood, calling them to leave the plaza and enter the water. It’s fun to watch them hustle to mom and leap over the metal barrier, and makes me miss the ducks even more. The video below is by Jean Greenberg. (Click to enlarge.)

Here she is with her entire brood that year, resting on the “duck ring” in the center of the pond.  I suppose that, when the pond is refilled in October, she might come by to say “hi,” but I have no guarantee that she’s alive, and she was looking a bit peaked last year, showing up only at the end of the season.

Caturday felid trifecta: Medieval Muslims’ love for cats; Choupette stars at the Met gala; arrested stray-cat feeders go free; and lagniappe

May 13, 2023 • 9:30 am

As I’ve mentioned before, many Muslims love cats but consider d*gs unclean.  Muhammad himself is rumored to have had a cat named Muezza, and this story is a popular one:

Many Muslims believe that Muezza (or Muʿizza; Arabic: معزة) was Muhammad’s favorite cat. Muhammad awoke one day to the sounds of the adhan. Preparing to attend prayer, he began to dress himself; however, he soon discovered his cat Muezza sleeping on the sleeve of his prayer robe. Rather than wake her, he used a pair of scissors to cut the sleeve off, leaving the cat undisturbed.

Cats are often welcome in mosques, and when I visit Istanbul I always notice the prevalence of street cats and cats in mosques. Here’s a cat at the Prince’s Mosque:

. . . and me feeding the famous Hagia Sophia cat Gli in 2008. (In Turkey I always carry a box of cat food in my daypack.) At the time I didn’t know that Gli, now deceased, was so famous and beloved:

But on to the topic: medival Muslim cats, which you can read by clicking on the screenshot below from Weird Medieval Guys:

It retells the story of Muezza, and adds that in the UK you can buy halal cat food named after Muhammad’s cat (click on screenshot):

An excerpt:

But it wasn’t just the prophet himself who loved cats! They occupied a unique place in the medieval Islamic world. The Middle East and Mediterranean are famously full of stray kitties nowadays, and it seems that 500 years ago, things weren’t too different. Medieval Europeans who travelled eastward were baffled by both the sheer quantity of free-roaming cats and the affection lavished upon them by locals. Flemish nobleman Joos van Ghistele wrote of his surprise at seeing a cat shelter in Damascus in the late 15th century CE, and a 13th century CE Mamluk sultan apparently mandated that all the strays of Cairo be taken care of by the local government. An English visitor to Cairo in the late 19th century attested that the sultan’s wishes were still being upheld, much to the exasperation (and expense) of the chief judge, to whom the responsibility fell.

(from post): Cat figure, Persia, 12th-13th century CE

As well as collective care for strays by the community, a number of sources describe cats’ status as beloved pets for people from all levels of society in the medieval Islamic world. For much of the Middle Ages in Western Europe, pet ownership was seen as an indulgence afforded primarily to noblewomen and monks. High-ranking men might have owned hunting dogs, but these animals served a largely utilitarian purpose. The keeping of animals for emotional companionship would have been rather taboo for a Christian man of the day. Muslim men, whether nobles or humble labourers, don’t seem to have been subjected to the same stigma surrounding their pets.

Prince Rokn-al-Dawla of the Deylamites (in modern day Iran) reportedly had a pet cat that he was so fond of, petitioners would attach written requests to its neck to make sure that prince received them. One Sufi sheikh is said to have had shoes made for his cat so that it could sit with him on his prayer rug without snagging the fibres on its claws. Women doted on their cats, too, with one Persian source reporting that it was common for noble ladies to adorn them with jewellery and even dye their fur.

And a story depicted in the painting below:

Let me close this post by sharing another Nasreddin joke, this time about his wife and his cat:

After the Hodja got a liver recipe from his friend, he bought some liver. Nasreddin loved liver and he wanted to eat it very often. But everytime he brought livers, he couldn’t eat it because his wife said that the cat took the liver and fled away.

One day the Hodja became very angry and said: “Woman, I brought liver! Where is it?” “Oh”, said his wife. “The silly cat took it and fled away.” At this same time the cat was in the room.

The Hodja caught it, brought a steelyard and weighted the cat. Then he said: “That is exactly two kilos. And the liver which I brought was also two kilos. Now tell me: If that is the liver where is my cat, if that is the cat, then I want my liver.”

(from post): The husband of a greedy woman weighs the cat that supposedly ate all the meat that he bought for his guests. From a Persian and Arabic manuscript made in India, 1663 CE.

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If you know about fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, you’ll know that the love of his life was his pampered longhair cat Choupette. Here’s a photo of Lagerfeld and his love that appeared on Choupette’s Instagram page, which is still going:

Harper’s Bazaar tells you everything you want to know about Choupette, including this:

The designer’s beloved Burmese has lived a lifestyle nearly as luxurious and chic as his, and following his death, she is rumored to inherit a portion of Lagerfeld’s €200 million net worth. Though, shockingly, that does not make her the richest cat in the world (Taylor Swift’s Scottish Fold, Olivia Benson, beats her with a reported worth of $97 million), she is certainly still amongst the wealthiest, and arguably the favorite within the fashion world.

Throughout her lifetime, the booked-and-busy feline has graced several magazine covers—including that of Harper’s Bazaar UKin 2013—and even had her own line of makeup and a book about her life.

She has traveled by private jet, alongside a handful of bodyguards, agents, chefs, and personal assistants. And she dined across from Lagerfeld every evening, during their time together, in the designer’s Paris apartment.

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Lagerfeld told Numéro in 2016, “Now that she is an adult, she eats at the table with me. She sits across from me and only eats what she needs to eat. Before, she used to attack a shrimp, but now she only touches her four different dishes that are prepared for her the same day, served in lovely bowls. Everything has to be fresh, otherwise Mademoiselle sits in front of her croquettes in sauce for three quarters of an hour, giving me murderous looks, without touching them.”

The 11-year-old Burmese currently lives in Paris and is now owned by Lagerfeld’s former housekeeper, Françoise Caçot, who has since dropped her nanny role to care for the feline full-time.

From the article:

(from the WSJ): Choupette with her agent Lucas Berullier. PHOTO: MY PET AGENCY

Choupette traveling (from Instagram):

As the Wall Street Journal reports below, Choupette was the theme of the Met’s Gala ball this year, honoring Lagerfeld, who died in 2009. Click to read:

An excerpt (my emphasis)

At this year’s Met Gala, the celebrity-packed museum fundraiser held on the first Monday in May, the most anticipated guest is a cat.

Choupette Lagerfeld, an 11-year-old Birman with enormous blue eyes and silky white fur, belonged to Karl Lagerfeld, the late German fashion designer and honoree of this year’s ball. For the former creative director of Chanel, Fendi and Chloé, who died in 2019 at the age of 85 without children, Choupette may be the closest thing to a living relative. Fans are hoping to see her strut the red carpet at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in his honor.

“She was his baby,” said Françoise Caçote, Choupette’s caretaker. A former housekeeper for Mr. Lagerfeld, Ms. Caçote, 50, has been Choupette’s nanny since 2012 and inherited the cat permanently after her boss passed away. “He would say, ‘In my life, my priority is Choupette, and then everything else.’ ”

Mr. Lagerfeld often talked about how much he adored Choupette, and treated her to multicourse meals on Goyard dishes and supplied her with two maids. She has her own agent, coffee-table books, a skin-care collaboration and social-media followers spanning the globe.

Choupette didn’t show, but stayed in Paris.

Mr. Lagerfeld shared photos of the cat on his Twitter and Instagram and fans loved seeing the notoriously sharp-tongued designer, known for his long ponytail and signature sunglasses and leather gloves, be tender with an animal.

Choupette has graced the covers of British Harper’s Bazaar, Grazia and German Vogue and has posed with fellow celebrity catwalkers Linda Evangelista and Kendall Jenner. Most recently, she starred with Naomi Campbell in a May photo shoot for American Vogue. In 2015, Mr. Lagerfeldtold New York magazine that Choupette had earned 3 million euros from two modeling gigs.

In 2018, Mr. Lagerfeld told Numero, a French magazine, that he had left some money for Choupette in his will, which sparked rumors and some catty talk that the feline would inherit a fortune. But Ms. Caçote said she hasn’t received any money from the estate, and that the situation with Mr. Lagerfeld’s inheritance is complex.

 Ms. Caçote said she takes care of Choupette with her own money and does so happily, as it was Mr. Lagerfeld’s wish. She and Mr. Berullier said they are setting up a feline-focused charity in the cat’s name.

Choupette is content at Ms. Caçote’s Paris apartment, she said. The cat likes to wake up early, and her fur is brushed multiple times a day. Choupette relishes walks on the balcony and treats herself to the catnip planted outside. Choupette’s favorite toys are Chanel paper bags and Chanel ribbons, Ms. Caçote said.

Jared Leto dressed up at Choupette at the Met Gala (tickets run, I hear, around $10,000):

Three photos from the Gala by Mike Coppola//Getty Images

. . . and so did Doja Cat:

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Finally, here’s a story from Lady Freethinker about two women from Alabama who were arrested and fined for feeding stray cats on city property, but then had the charges dismissed. Justice was done!

PETITION UPDATE: Criminal Charges Dismissed Against Wetumpka Women Who Fed Stray Cats

An except:

Two women criminally charged after they fed community cats on public land in Wetumpka, Alabama, got a reprieve this week when city prosecutors said they’d no longer pursue the case.

Beverly Roberts, 84, and Mary Alston, 60, made international headlines in June 2022 when three police vehicles and multiple officers arrived on a vacant, county-owned lot and told the women to stop feeding and trying to trap the stray cats that liked to congregate there — or be arrested and go to jail.

Body camera footage showed the women asking questions about why they were being threatened with arrest. When Roberts attempted to hand her car keys to Alston, an officer told her, “It’s going to get ugly if you don’t stop.” Another officer handcuffed Alston’s arms behind her back, telling her she wasn’t listening “fast enough” and that “You wanted to keep talking so now you’re going to jail,” according to the body camera footage.

Wetumpka Municipal Judge Jeff Watson convicted the women of misdemeanor charges in December after a 5-hour long trial — Alston for reported criminal trespassing and obstructing government operations and Roberts for reported disorderly conduct and criminal trespassing.  He sentenced the women to two years unsupervised probation and 10 days, suspended, of jail time.

Attorneys for the women — including William Shasy, a retired Montgomery County Circuit Court judge — appealed the ruling to the 19th Circuit Court. A GoFundMe account to help cover legal costs raised more than $87,000, according to news reports.

Following the appeal, Wetumpka prosecutors submitted a motion saying they would no longer pursue the charges, without giving a reason for that action. Circuit Judge Amanda Baxley signed off on the plan, also without giving comment on her ruling, according to court records.

Here’s a news video of the ladies being arrested. DEFUND THESE COPS!

Charges could still be reinstated, though, and prosecutors have until June 25 to do so. If they know what’s good for them, they’ll leave this be.

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Lagniappe: Reader Peter sent me this photo and some notes:

Freddie Mercury of Queen (1946-1991) was well known as an ailurophile, as well for other things. According to the BBC (source: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-65375583), his friend Mary Austin is about to auction a large collection of Mercury’s possessions, including some great artworks, antique furniture, costumes, and of interest to WEIT readers, “his favourite waistcoat”, with hand-painted portraits of his six cats.

The BBC adds this:

There is also his favourite waistcoat, worn in his final video These are the Days of Our Lives, in 1991. The silk panels of red, green and purple are each hand-painted with one of Mercury’s cats, Delilah, Goliath, Oscar, Lily, Romeo and Miko.

h/t: Ginger K., Thomas

Readers’ wildlife photos (and video)

May 13, 2023 • 8:15 am

Send in your photos, folx!  I need seven batches a week to keep this going (and thanks to those who heed my calls).

Today we have several contributors, the first being reader Don Bredes. All contributors’ words are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them:

Our rose-breasted grosbeaks (Pheucticus ludovicianus) showed up here in northern Vermont this past week. They perch on the deck railing, chirping for us to come out and feed them a few sunflower seeds and waiting, trustingly, right there. We’ve seen only males so far. They remember us, clearly. Rose-breasted grosbeaks can live in the wild for 10 years or longer, twice as long in captivity.
In the fall they migrate from their breeding grounds in North America to Central and northern South America. Most fly across the Gulf of Mexico in a single night, although some migrate over land around the Gulf. Their population globally, now at 4,700,000, is dropping slightly. In their wintering grounds, they are commonly trapped for sale as caged birds because they’re beautiful, and their song is lovely.
We can’t help but wonder about the little neighborhood in Belize or Venezuela where “our” grosbeaks spend their winters and whether another family there may have befriended them.

From Peter, a poisonous juvenile Dugite snake (Pseudonaja affinis) gets killed by a Redback spider (Latrodectus hasselti). He added this:

Two decades ago I took a photo of a redback spider that had killed a small lizard. This is next level up.

A video from Rick Longworth, who says he’s put up a new house for the displaced wood ducks:

Today a pair of wood ducks (Aix sponsa) inspected my duck box for nesting. Unfortunately for them, a Western screech-owl (Megascops kennicottii) had already taken ownership and was sitting on eggs. The woodies both inspect the box and look down the back side where the opening is. The male—the one wearing the tuxedo—looks on as the female makes attempts to enter the hole. Imagine her shock to see two enormous, yellow eyes staring back. Suddenly, a different female shows up. The male is pretty upset and tries to intimidate the interloper. The original female gives up and scurries off. Soon the male leaves too. Music is Kevin MacLeod ~ Fluffing a Duck.