Commentary How revealing a little punctuation mark may be! A recent headline in the left-leaning, once liberal newspaper, the Guardian, ran a story with a headline as follows: “University defends ‘academic freedoms’ after calls to sack professor.” The university was Sussex and the professor was Kathleen Stock, a feminist philosopher. She was accused of the thoughtcrime of transphobia by an anonymous group, which demanded that she be sacked from the university. The vice-chancellor, Professor Alan Tickell, was forthright in his response—alas, untypically so for persons in his position: “We cannot and will not tolerate threats to cherished academic freedoms and will take any action necessary to protect the rights of our community.” Professor Stock’s thoughtcrime was to have thought and said openly that you cannot change your biological identity simply by wishing to do so and by taking a few drugs or having a few operations. Your identity is not …