An OBE; Belcher's Ballad (Trans Complaint Ecology #4)

Imagine this: your child - your teenage daughter, in fact - writes and performs a song for you, as a gift.

In it, she rails against discrimination you face, and declares her devotion to you. You are affirmed, praised and empathised with. She is fearful for you, and believes you need their unwavering support. 

Incredible, huh? How many have teen daughters who would do this - a song, in which you are described as a queen, a goddess?! 

And, most importantly, why? Why does she fell this way? 

Because you are trans, and your child thinks this identity means you are hated and conspired against. 

Maybe there have been negative consequences, attacks, which few know of, but having seen multiple examples of what Helen Belcher calls abuse, I'm having problems believing that. 

It looks to me that this identity, being trans, has been the foundational characteristic, almost a springboard to relevance and, some degree, of power. 

But back to you, with the song from your daughter - you're an affluent, extremely well connected, upper-middle class professional, now branching out into politics with a lot of support from your party's head honchos. 

But still, you constantly, gratuitously overplay the trans vulnerability card, and now your child writes this song. 

Personally, I'd feel pretty bad. 

The O.B.E

We began shitty January with uplifting news: Belcher has been awarded an OBE in 2023's New Year's Honours List, lauding his work for the 'trans community'.

When it was Kathleen Stock, we heard a lot about colonial back pats, boot-licking, establishment stooges etc. Teeth were verily gnashed by frantically fretful fannies. But, now it's Belcher's turn, the mood has changed. There is applause aplenty, and all are appreciative and congratulatory. 

Well, almost. Obviously, I can't fairly be described as happy, because I think it's an offensively gratuitous show of old boy's network-ism and utterly fucking redonculous. 

In true Belcher style, the award was of course an honour, but also chilling and ominous and bound to invite transphobic fuckery. If it was for anyone else, he feels there'd be 'just loads of celebration' and maybe he has a point. WHERE is his street party? Surely there are some tressell tables and bunting left over from the Queen's Jubilee? 

This is a familiar patter for Belcher, who's bombastic fragility and bellicose claims of vulnerability have become legendary in terven circles, and, I can only assume, in complaints' departments the length and breadth of the country. 

For example;

TRANSWOMAN FEELS ACCEPTED - BUT LIVES IN FEAR Of BEING MURDERED - that headline's a cracker, isn't it? It's also an accurate representation of what's inside, though.

In it, Belcher describes a life which gives absolutely no reason to be anything but happy - 

"Helen confirmed she faces more abuse for being a Liberal Democrat than she does for being transgender" it explains. That is, apart from when online, where Belcher apparently suffers "vile abuse" daily: “The bulk of the hate" apparently comes through the mainstream media. 

Which is telling. Thanks to relentless lobbying (AKA organisations involved with, or founded by, Belcher) the press are so ideologically captured/terrified that they will use female pronouns, or the descriptor 'woman' even for hulking great rapists. So, if this accounts for 'the bulk of the hate', I suspect the bar for what passes as hate is lower than a centipede's sphincter. 

"While she feels accepted by the community, Helen still lives in fear of being injured or killed "I’m worried about being murdered”, Helen exclaimed. "You get trans people who are murdered." 

Which, well, sets the bar at subterranean depths, possibly within a brisk waddle to the earth's core. Of course, "you get" trans people who are murdered. 

Further on in, Belcher also says he knocked on 9,000 doors canvassing and only one person had a trans-based objection. So, how does he justify comments like this? 

“If I get killed, I get killed and that’ll be the end. I won’t know anything else, but if my family gets attacked, I would have to live with that" he says with great magnamity, before claiming trans people are beaten up "often" in the UK. 

I wish I could reassure Belcher that transphobic violence is so rare in the UK, significantly more trans people have been convicted of murder than been murdered, and of those few, it's doubtful any were motivated by transphobia. At least 10% were committed by another trans person. 

And, most hate crime reports are non-violent incidents like misgendering or suspicion an offense (whether personal or criminal) was inspired by the other's prejudice, not roving gangs of qu**r bashers, not homicidal thugs and not even life-long lefty feminists talking to each other about the critical need for same sex spaces. Those genocidal maniacs. 

But, maybe it would be better to advise his daughter. 

If you read the previous blog you'll have seen just what a privileged position Belcher is in. 

It leaves me wondering, if he is so afraid, why make so many grabs for the limelight? 

Why become so well known in the town you live in, campaign for a role where your address becomes public knowledge?

Really, it's implausible he's unaware trans people are in the safest demographics, even in that country with supposed murder epidemic on transwomen, America. 

I cannot imagine a woman carrying on with this hysterical alarmism without the Internet erupting into coffee-spitting mirth and ridicule. It would see the birth of a thousand memes of a Big Red, Ficki Fiona or Cathy Newman genre.

Personally, using any opportunity - even when every measure of privilege has been afforded - to fabricate or exaggerate dangers and adversity I face, to relentlessly 'raise awareness' of my unimpeachable victimhood or martyrdom, would be far too humiliating for me. 

And I say this as a former heroin addict who begged (a very low-shame / high desperation threshold required for this sympathy-taxing pursuit) - I couldn't do it. I'd be mortified. And I've never met with government ministers several times a week to further my rights; been affluent or well connected. That's just audacity. 

It's impossible to prove, but I think it's simply a cynical ploy - after all, being analytical, astute and heavily involved in all the debate, Belcher must know the truth?

And, surely, he doesn't repeat this crap to friends and family, unnecessarily frightening them? 

- Belcher's Ballad - 

In one of my many online searches, I came across something which I found infuriating. 

It's one of Belcher's children (the one he said he feared growing to hate) with a song written for his birthday.

I am, of course, not going to link to it, and I would be horrified and thoroughly pissed off if this lead to people sharing it - so please don't. Belcher's political chicanery and feminist's objections to them should not impact his kids. If anyone known to the family sees this, I would suggest making it private. 

However, I feel compelled to comment on this. It's a startling sign of how the fear and pity propaganda permeates and how effectively and thoughtlessly it is propelled. 

It's a well executed and sweet song, and I find it unspeakably sad. 

During a child's adolescence, the parent is normally bolstering their child's confidence as they set out in the world. To flourish, young people tend to benefit from feeling that home, or at least their parents, are stable, safe and there for them. It's the age most people are rebelling, but this teenager yearns to comfort and reassure their parent. She's probably university age, but this near-adult child is being pulled back into the family, apparently worrying herself silly. 

 

She has a pretty voice and does a cute, quirky instrumental; it demonstrates a deep love and also concern. It's almost a lullaby and, aside from some unknown private tragedy, I find it dazzlingly disproportionate, painful, and, try as I might, I can't imagine the sentiment behind it is founded on anything but years of ingesting these theatrical, catastrophizing narratives.

The daughter seems sure her father requires intense emotional and moral support, and that she must provide it. She writes and sings a song to her father where he is the victim of multiple hardships and 'hate.' 

Belcher is called a queen, a goddess.  

🎼 "I'm not an angel

I can't make a sad song change its tune

I don't believe in miracles

but I will be there for you

🎼 When it feels that the whole world is conspiring

 And existence is nothing but tiring

Remember you are my angel

and one day you'll rise above it all

🎼 There is no limit to the hate that exists out there

As we set out on a journey that's not gonna be fair

But one thing I know, history has shown when fear breaks only love grows

🎼You are a queen

But no body knows

You must tell them so

....

🎼 I don't pretend to understand what it is you do

And I only see a fraction of what you go through

🎼 But I'm not naive

still I believe

As you fight on, I won't leave

...

🎼 And you are a goddess

they don't want you to be

but you must make them see

🎼 "When you feel like you're failing

you can always return to me

🎼 When your heart started breaking

I hope that you'll see

🎼 You are the only thing

 I want you to be

You have the power to make a difference so use it wisely

It is mind-blowing. 

I try to imagine, if my child(ren) wrote such a thing for me, I would be deeply moved, but mainly I'd be devastated that there was so much fear for me. 

I may have detailed my struggles here, but not to them. They get a heavily redacted and edited version, as and when it's necessary. Why set them up for fear and a victim mentality? Why set them off on their new lives as adults with one eye on you, praying you'll be ok? 

Children should not feel emotionally responsible for a parent. Children, of her age especially, are to be encouraged and helped to centre their needs as they venture out into the world, empowered.

I'm left with so many questions: would Belcher's son write this? Does his daughter know she is no one's emotional support person, and that facts exist which put these claims into perspective? 

If it ever came to it, can she stand her ground with a man who may cry helplessness, prejudice and sadness? 

Of course, we don't know what praise and gratitude Belcher heaped on his daughter in private, but on the post this is his response:

Not, even, a verbal reply.. 

It makes me angry. There is no need for her to feel like this, and almost all young women need guidance in learning to put their needs first. 

It's just a snapshot, though a painful one, of a complete 180° on the child/parent role: the child, desperate to comfort the parent. And after much reading, I do not believe Belcher is in any way disempowered, vulnerable or helpless - or feels that way. 

I think it's a cynical ploy. 

Trans Complaint Ecology #4 is here