For some bracing feminist-inclined fresh air after all this fetid Westminster stuff, swing by BBRU 217 hosted by Philobiblon.

Plenty of gripping links. Not least this startling account of the way Jersey is run these days.

And this angry but confused piece from Penny Red about why it’s OK – nay essential – for women to be angry. She denounces ‘society’ which (she claims) says that angry women are ‘ugly’:

The only way society knows how to cope with angry women is to stereotype them as deranged, ridiculous and, worst of all, ugly…

Her evidence for Society’s odious attitude? One silly YouTube vid. Earth to Penny: angry men are ugly too.

But read also this one from Mr Eugenides (picking up this one by James Graham on the lack of much analysis or sympathy from right-wing bloggers/pundits on aggressive police behaviour towards Ian Tomlinson at the G20 protests):

Because "protest" has traditionally been a tool of the left – the average Tory does not go to many demos, no matter what government is in power – it is something that many on the right simply don’t and can’t identify with.

One of the most powerful factors that drives empathy for those whose civil liberties are being curtailed – "there, but for the grace of God, go I" – often doesn’t apply to the same extent in these cases, because at some level there is an unspoken assumption that if you go to an anti-capitalism protest, given the violence we have seen over the last decade and more in cities from Genoa to Seattle, you are consciously putting yourself in harm’s way and have to take your chances accordingly…

… Yes, it could have been me. It could have been anyone. In the event, it was Ian Tomlinson; and now he is dead. He deserves, and we should demand, a full inquiry into the circumstances of his death, and we need to have it now.

And no-one should ignore it, whatever side of the spectrum they write from; because if the state can beat one man to the ground for being in the wrong place, and do it with impunity, then we are all in the wrong place, and we are all on our knees already…

Well put. But is it true? Let me think about it and get back to you…