I think maybe where the author gets stuck is probably here,

>More troubling is his use of essentializing language and further histrionics to try to inflame the reader (the phrase “penis-having rapist in prison with captive women” comes to mind). His insistence on misgendering Bryson, first simply as ‘he’ and then more troublingly as ‘it,’ suggests that Žižek sees respecting trans identity as something discretionary and contingent on good behavior. Žižek is, in this article and to put it lightly, transphobic.

The portion where Zizek has made such statements, it didn't allow them to look past that 'dishonesty' as they call it and so preferred to highlight those misgivings rather than attempt to build their own narrative, to clarify how this relates to policy, and how it'd be better than what Zizek is suggesting. The latter was a tougher task so it's always easier to shoot down the argument anyway.

I partly agree with the charge that this was a lazy attempt and maybe even a disarray of random thoughts that were all trying to fit in. The article could have been more condensed because I actually think it's the reverse; Zizek glossed over multiple examples in a half-hearted manner with the assumption that the reader will have known them, but actually just a couple of those references would have sufficed to make his point, and he has done it quite well, especially the ending. It's strikingly resemblant to a few Upanishadic teachings on dreams.

What the author sees as troubling is actually from what I could understand is Zizek's way of highlighting the dubious ways of Isla during the case. What should have been purely about the atrocity committed by a human, the focus shifted towards identity and respect and the author prefers to cater to this. So Zizek's harshness is more about bringing to light this aspect and given that the shameful act was indeed committed, for a moment one could look past the gender play here and recognize the need for a proper judgement aside of personal preferences that evolved during the case.

This is not a case of Zizek being unclear at least, the article is simply the realization on the part of the author, that Zizek is much more crazier than I ever thought, and that disturbs my personal view of what I thought Zizek had been implying all this time. So the author's anger is justified really, but misdirected. Their anger is on themself actually.

The issue I understand though was Scotland's handling of it and the new policy that came up,

>The case sparked a change in policy in Scotland so that "any newly convicted or remanded transgender prisoner will initially be placed in an establishment commensurate with their birth gender.

But nevertheless, it is evidently clear as to what Zizek is focusing on and that does not necessarily point to disrespecting trans identity as such. Of course Isla couldn't have controlled the period of transition, but then it'd also be naive for someone to not consider the possibility that this did indeed help Isla's case to somehow bring in the 'woke' culture to her rescue to try and lessen the impact on her tarnished image. Perhaps they were hoping that'd it would influence the sentence as well. Like the author wishes to hop on without clarifying what her policy stance is.

Anyway, as an Indian I could relate highly with some of Zizek's points here given that there is a need to discuss caste based discrimination in Indian circles and whenever attempts are made to present objective data and re-look history without the colonial lens, tensions flare up and people resort to my way or highway and prioritize feelings over actually finding ways to focus on understanding commonalities and all of Zizek's examples were spot-on, especially activist Maryam's incident which is brushed off as insignificant. Almost something exactly similar happened in the Hijab case in the last 2 years - how religious organizations sprung to defend the choice of women apparently, when it is indoctrination at best with little to no choice for a girl child in Islam, so very applicable unlike what the author says, but in a different context.

>The black woke elite is fully aware it won’t achieve its declared goal of diminishing black oppression—and it doesn’t even want that. What they really want is what they are achieving: a position of moral authority from which they may terrorize all others, without effectively changing social relations of domination.

This is to the point. Some of the oppressed communities in India too rightly protest about this but many events off late have indeed confirmed that they are aligning with literally anybody eg., Khalistanis and other separatists to sort of literally avenge the past and also falsely glorify the atrocities committed to further trigger the masses rather than focus on resolving what can be done now with pragmatic understandings and dialogue over honest acceptance of what actually transpired. But historians who have been proven to be literally wrong through primary sources are still used as weapons to hurl, furthering casteist notions when actually it began to solve them.

Anyway this deviated, but news is that Zizek is well and kicking, maybe a little more insensitive than usual, which is not uncommon, and yet still makes some great points.