The Weekly Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3447 by Angharad Copyright© 2024 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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Later, I was safe from my memories as the girls and Tom took all my attention. It was Saturday, and upstairs in bed lay my husband who had been pleased to see me and showed it. I was still sore from his affection but trying not to walk too funny and set the girls off. Danni had noticed but unlike Trish she said something quiet and supportive. After breakfast she had to rush off to Bournemouth for a preseason friendly with Reading, so she would meet girls she used to play with, but which were now their opponents. Their coach had come up with a plan that Danni plays out of position and with a different style to puzzle their opponents and then when a scoring chance arises for her to go back to her normal aggressive style of play. Being aggressive doesn't mean knocking players down or fouling, or it didn't in her case, it just meant playing forward and trying to score goals.

As in many other teams she had played for, she wasn't the thrust of the team, but with her exceptional ball skills, she required heavy marking and often that took attention from another player who could nip in and score. She was a huge distraction and very dangerous anywhere in the opposing half, she had scored goals from all over the pitch and because she had a footballing brain she had opportunities before others did if they saw them at all. Sometimes the first any of the other team knew it they were kicking off again being a goal down.

Her coach couldn't understand why England weren't more interested in her, because of her skill level, they merely replied that she didn't fit their playing style. One correspondent had asked which playing style was that - losing? The Bournemouth coach had decided that if they didn't want her in an England jersey, he didn't care because Bournemouth wanted her in one of theirs, not only that but she had a new contract which included a significant winner's bonus and a separate one for goals made or scored. If she wasn't injured, she could make quite a lot of money. I thought she was worth it but then, I'm her mum. It worried me because if it became known, other teams would try to close her down and neutralise her team, and one way to do that is by injuring her. I therefore made it known that we would sue for any deliberate fouls or injuries in the same way you may for injuries caused outside a football pitch. Not that it would stop a determined fouler until they met Jason across a courtroom. I knew there would be cries of it's alright for the rich to which I would reply, it isn't alright for bullies and dirty players, they will pay for their sins and I meant it.

Danni told me not be silly, I told her I wasn't and if someone's deliberate foul stops you playing for any length of time, or permanently, I am going to sue them for every penny they have, plus any they expect or their family or team or club has. It will cost me loads, but it will cost them more. I will also sue referees and the FA if they allow dirty play to happen. Eventually, the bullies will be chased away.

"You have an issue with bullies, don't you?" Dannie asked me.

Yes, I was bullied for the first twenty-odd years of my life. Now I can respond by going after them, I will and that includes my family. I will protect them.

"Aren't you being a bit of a bully, yourself?"

"I don't think so, because I'm only after those who deliberately go after me or mine, it means that genuine accidents will be excused, deliberate ones will be prosecuted."

"What if we, your precious family become bullies?"

"Danni if that happens, then I shall know that they don't understand anything about me and I will take suitable steps to teach them."

"I think you're being a bit over the top with this."

"We'll see, won't we." I began to wonder if my kids really understood me. The word bully makes me flinch and I will stop it if I can. We'd had riots after three little girls were murdered in Stockport. The riots were nothing to do with the murders, in fact those who were most affected called for demonstrations to be stopped. They weren't and groups of louts and thugs went on the rampage smashing and looting properties usually those of minority groups, damaging mosques and setting fire to cars, including police vehicles.

The government reacted and dozens of the thugs were arrested and charged with all sorts of crimes, but it seems to have been stirred up by rightwing agents on social media. Often the accusations or slurs are full-blown lies, that the perpetrator of the murders was an illegal immigrant and muslim. As far as we know he's neither. But it gave xenophobes like Nigel Farage a chance to ask questions which were in themselves racist and incited other to rage. He should be prosecuted for it and other crimes he has committed and thrown out of parliament. The man is poison and should be sent to the Tower, like they did in olden days.

It seems that anyone with a racist gripe can use social media to encourage others to do their dirty work for them. Maybe if we sent them to prisons in India or Iran they'd learn something from the brutality of the systems there. Then they'd know what bullying was all about including waterboarding and electric shocks.

My mind was brought back to current issues when Danni asked me what were we going to do about the TERFs? I hadn't updated myself that day but I was soon appraised of the situation. Diane had sent me a text that Esmond had told her that something was afoot but that he had no details of it. I suggested that we go on an alert and keep watch so as not to be caught napping. Simon told me that things appeared to be happening at the baptist church in the US which were funding the TERF group. He wasn't definite but he said their financial activity seems to have been activated again after weeks of inactivity. It looked as if they were getting ready for something but it was all very secret and they were using Telegram, which encrypts texts between members. This was now the preferred social media for criminals, racists and associated arseholes.

Speaking of the States, they were running away with the medals table of the Olympics and surprisingly, Biles hadn't won all the gold medals for women's gymnastics, one had escaped her. She is still a phenomenon. I wanted to know how Australia, a country with a quarter of our population was well ahead of the UK. I suppose it comes to the UK being a third world country these days after 14 years of the Tories. The same would happen to the US id Trump got in again. His voters don't seem to be on the same planet as the rest of us, seemingly not understanding cause and effect and what he has threatened to do.

They say it's going to get warm again, after a few days of unsettled weather. I speak to people all the time who are asking if this is global warming, where's the heat. I try to explain that climate change causes unsettled weather patterns and that each year for the last twenty of more had been increasingly warmer overall. The oceans were warmer and that was where our weather came from. The energy stored in the Pacific could be released at any time and the power involved in it was mind-blowing, as it caused typhoons and twisters or tornadoes in the Caribbean or southern states of the US, across Asia and parts of Africa and occasionally other places too like mudslides in India and South America. Some seemed to think that was all right but if it meant a wet summer in the UK, it wasn't. I asked them to think about what they had just said. Some don't even seem able to consider they had just talked a load of cobblers, a bit like Reform voters, because they can't see it at all, and it isn't because I've been to university, although that helps you to think critically, it's because they are too thick to understand what they are saying, like Republican voters, didn't weall know that the cause of all the problems in the world is transgender children, or women having the right to choose how they control their reproductive rights. Of course these two groups are the cause of everything and it's nothing to do with the old white men who control everything, including legislatures. See, going to university didn't enable me to see these things, that Trumpites and Republicans can. I obviously don't read enough social media.

Seriously, Danni who had several social media accounts, said that she thought something was happening on Telegram as well as Ticktock and Facebook. It was all very cryptic but it seemed to be moving towards things starting in the next week or two. I repeated my warnings and informed Esmond and Simon and just for completeness sent the text to Henry, he sent me one back thanking me and urged caution.

I'd heard nothing from Laura and assumed she'd gone to ground somewhere in Europe, but obviously, I didn't know for sure. But unbeknownst to me, the biology department was postered over the weekend. This means we had posters calling us tranny lovers stuck everywhere, including over the cameras we have in hallways. They didn't see the hidden ones that James had advised me on, but all the poster stickers were young women dressed in masks and balaclavas, so were probably unidentifiable anyway. They were guilty of a misdemeanour rather than a crime by posting their stuff everywhere. They were also guilty of a hate crime in urging others to action against a sexual minority, transpeople aren't really but it's understood by ordinary people as such. They were breaking the rules of the university council which outlaws such discrimination and were likely to have disciplinary action against them including suspension or expulsion. While it was probable some of them were not students here, if they were students anywhere their own unis could take action and those of ours who let them in, what is supposed to be a secure area, would be prosecuted. It was also going to use strained resources to remove the posters, we have neither loads of staff in the summer, nor the money to waste that these louts have caused us to spend.

I didn't know any of this until someone sent me a What's ap video when they went to feed the dormice on the Sunday. I went absolutely ape, and sent for the head of security who knew even less about it than I did. I was so cross I actually told him to check his pension rights because he may need them early. We called the police, who were no use because it was a civil matter. The only saving grace was one of the caretaking staff wondered if the posters would come off with a steam cleaner, they did or some did and we managed to recover some in one piece. I called James and he collected them for fingerprinting. We reminded to police of hate crimes and I informed them I intended to prosecute everyone we could. I wanted these bastards to have criminal records, to cause them as much pain as they were causing trans students.

They should know the stigma of being different already and they seemed unable or unwilling to see how bigoted they had become but then they were being funded from America and also involving Sussex University as well as our own.

I wanted revenge and I set about plotting how we'd get it including trying to get as many fingerprints from Sussex as we could. I was forming a plan of both action and revenge and my team were all on board, only Tom was urging caution and I told him, "Why? Hanging's too good for them." He visibly paled and walked away.

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