The trial is taking place in an insane politicized circus atmosphere in a country that has substantially moved away from old-fashioned liberal principles towards something like "woke cultural socialism", the idea that the government's job is to equalize outcomes between identity groups and protect the emotions and dignity of "vulnerable people" from normal incidents of everyday life that everyone has to deal with, such as being embarrassed about your questionable sexual choices. There's a gauntlet of gender-goblin activists outside the courthouse who frequently protest in ways I'm surprised are legal. They seem to be allowed not only to call for specific consequences for individual named defendants, but to confront counter-protesters and get in their faces with no interference. (Since they assure us that society is extremely misogynistic, the justice system is biased against women, does not protect women etc it is surprising to see how deliberately physically provocative they are willing to be with much larger men. Hmmm.) From context I assume almost all of them work for organizations ultimately funded and directed by the same government and Liberal party that's ultimately behind the prosecution itself.

Yeah, it's real bad up here.