I hate summer too, esp. the heat and humidity. I’m lucky to have air conditioning.

Glad your project at work is going well 👏

My mom made me some dumplings, so that’s nice 😁

Povetry:

Overall, more than one in five LGBTQ+ adults (22%) are living in poverty, compared to an estimated 16% of their straight and cisgender counterparts.

Trans folks in particular suffer from unemployment due to discrimination, and those that find jobs suffer from low wages and underemployment:

• Transgender workers report unemployment at twice the rate of the population as a whole (14% vs. 7% at the time the workers were surveyed).
• More than four in 10 transgender people (44%) who are currently working are underemployed.
• Transgender workers are nearly four times more likely than the population as a whole to have a household income of under $10,000 (15% vs. 4% at the time the workers were surveyed).

💖 🌈 💕

We will allow the following women to be nominated by the council or referral agency, and join our public waiting list:

1. Any woman female by birth (Gender recognition Act 2004)
2. Any woman who holds a gender recognition certificate legally declaring her female (Gender recognition Act 2004)
3. Transgender women who meet the definition of a person who ‘intends to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone gender reassignment’ (Equality Act 2010).
4. Non-binary women who are either born female, or meet the 2 and 3 above

We will not accept nominations from the council, referral agency or waiting list for:

• men who cross dress
• transgender men
• anyone who we know has a history of male violence against women or children

The QL system should ask for gender and options should be:

• Man
• Woman
• Other

3.4. In terms of if a woman transitions to a man while living in our stock we would not take any action to end the tenancy

So, it’s a bit of a mixed bag - but it’s not the transphobic policy I expected (excluding trans women entirely). Not sure how transfem enbies would feel about this policy, or how difficult it is in the UK to get the gender recognition certificate, or what their definition of “gender reassignment” means.

• if possible, skip the bra and use pasties or something minimal to hide the nipple
• wear natural fibers like linen (not cotton or synthetics like polyester)
• agreed with others re sunscreen, wear and re-apply, and wear hats and cover up with UV protective clothing if you know you’ll be in the sun
• wear less clothing 😉
• bring a change of clothes
• move from air-conditioned place to air-conditioned place and don’t dwell in the humid hell between

First of all, yes, I think some people find it controversial to use the term “genocide” to refer to what’s happening to trans people. Part of the debate about the term “genocide” is whether it can apply to non-ethnic groups, for example. I would argue the spirit of the term does apply to any group, but some people disagree. I’m not sure why it’s so important for the term to be limited to ethnicity, I tend to think these arguments are not in the spirit of validating or recognizing very real oppression and violence intended to completely eliminate a certain group.

The motivation to use the term “genocide” is that the anti-trans movement has explicitly stated as their goal the total erasure of trans people:

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/cpac-speaker-transgender-people-eradicated-1234690924/

During his speech on Saturday, Knowles told the crowd, “For the good of society … transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely — the whole preposterous ideology, at every level.”

Knowles subsequently claimed that “eradicating” “transgenderism” is not a call for eradicating transgender people and demanded retractions from numerous publications, including Rolling Stone.

Erin Reed, a transgender rights activist and writer, tells Rolling Stone that it’s an absurd distinction. There is no difference between a ban on “transgenderism” and an attack on transgender people, she says: “They are one and the same, and there’s no separation between them.”

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/matt-walsh-supreme-court-erase-trans-ideology-earth-1235192666/

“We are not gonna rest until every child is protected, until trans ideology is entirely erased from the earth. That’s what we’re fighting for, and we will not stop until we achieve it,” he said.

Specifically, the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention has described the anti-trans movement as genocidal:

https://www.lemkininstitute.com/red-flag-alerts/red-flag-alert-for-the-anti-trans-agenda-of-the-trump-administration-in-the-united-states

The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention and Human Security condemns the anti-trans agenda of the second Trump Administration and warns Americans that the recent spate of executive orders, which are in line with a genocidal process against the transgender community that has been emerging in the United States for over a decade, are meant to pave the way for greater state repression against all individuals and other groups in the future.

…

The Lemkin Institute believes that current anti-trans hysteria within the government is meant to serve three purposes within a wider genocidal process. First, the Executive Orders constitute the paper marginalization and ‘paper persecution’ of an identity group that has recently gained rights and greater acceptance in order to lock in evangelical support for the Trump administration. Second, the executive orders create a fictitious ‘cosmic enemy’ that will justify radicalization of government in general, leading to ever-more power for the executive branch; and third, the executive orders, over time, aim to normalize the destruction of identity groups by desensitizing the public to state-sponsored persecution of people based solely on their identities.

Taken together, the Trump Administration’s executive orders related to trans people would effectively destroy, if fully implemented, trans people as a group, in whole, to summarize the text of the Genocide Convention. The orders begin the process of removing a trans presence from collective life and preventing trans people from existing as themselves, forcing them back into invisibility and isolation. This attack on trans identity is reminiscent in the US context of the Native American Boarding Schools, where the goal was to “kill the Indian … and save the man.” Not only would the effort to deprive trans Americans of gender affirming care constitute a form of torture (and medical malpractice) with terrible mental health repercussions, but also such measures are a common phase in genocidal processes and generally lead to ever greater persecution.

Trans people in Florida prisons are being forcefully detransitioned and forced into pseudo-science conversion “therapy”, I don’t think it’s hyperbolic at this point in time to say the intentions of the anti-trans movement are genocidal, and I think the movement is largely succeeding in their goals.

So far necessary medical care has been denied to trans youth in many states, and the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that discrimination against people on the basis of “gender dysphoria” is legal. We already have data that the ban of gender affirming care (and in some cases, forcing physicians to detransition trans youth) has significantly increased the rate of suicide attempts among those trans youth.

We are also seeing tools used in previous genocides, such as “social death” where the concept of being trans is eliminated from the law and thus on a social and legal level trans people cannot “exist”. Laws in some states have already achieved this (which results in trans people never being able to fix their birth certificates or update their legal documents, for example), and now the federal government is operating under executive orders that establish the same (making it impossible for trans people to have accurate passports or federal documents, for example - but the policies impact much more, including forcing male TSA agents to pat down trans women and vice versa).

So the methods and goals are all genocidal, the only problem is that trans people as a group are not a national or ethnic group, so this would fail a narrow definition of genocide that way.

I get that, but I tend to think the burden of proof in a criminal case is much higher than the burden of proof to believe a victim outside of a courtroom.

In this case I don’t think there is any reason to doubt the victims, and the pressure and evidence points to victims tending to not come forward, the fact that there are multiple accusations from multiple victims indicates to me a much higher probability that Gaiman is guilty of some sexual crimes than not. Luckily my opinion or assessment of Gaiman’s behavior doesn’t have consequences like jail time, so my beliefs do not demand the same scrutiny as a judge’s or a jury’s.

Not that it’s wrong to think about the evidence, but culturally I think we tend to discount survivors and victims more than we validate them, and that can make questions about evidence really difficult, even harmful. Still, we obviously can’t ignore the problem of evidence, but luckily that’s primarily a concern for the courts (not that being cancelled doesn’t have consequences, and “cancel culture” can be reactive, essentializing, and unfair - that’s probably something we should collectively think about more).

here are the things I’ve read:

overview: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman#Sexual_assault_and_misconduct_allegations

some reporting: https://www.vulture.com/article/neil-gaiman-allegations-controversy-amanda-palmer-sandman-madoc.html

note: content warning, NSFL

yeah, I agree with you - the harm is severe, it’s just with such a small population we can’t show the concrete harm the way we can with a trans population where deaths are already happening (but that doesn’t diminish the actual harm to Gaiman’s victims, which I would say is extreme).

aw, thank you! I’m a big fan of dandelions and other flowers.

Alan Moore agrees:

https://www.indiewire.com/features/general/watchmen-creator-alan-moore-hates-superhero-movies-1234591751/

“I haven’t seen a superhero movie since the first Tim Burton ‘Batman’ film. They have blighted cinema, and also blighted culture to a degree,” Moore said. “Several years ago I said I thought it was a really worrying sign, that hundreds of thousands of adults were queuing up to see characters that were created 50 years ago to entertain 12-year-old boys. That seemed to speak to some kind of longing to escape from the complexities of the modern world, and go back to a nostalgic, remembered childhood. That seemed dangerous, it was infantilizing the population.”

that’s a good point, part of the assumption that it’s all for them is that their preferences are all that matter 🤦‍♀️

Some men seem to think women dress and do makeup and hair for them alone, and that this is inherently sexual; meanwhile if there were no men I would continue to dress up and do hair and makeup and I think this is because lots of women dress and do makeup for ourselves and for other women, to feel human and have self esteem, and also to establish social status among other women.

yeah, that would put me in full cope mode too, lol

overview: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman#Sexual_assault_and_misconduct_allegations

some reporting: https://www.vulture.com/article/neil-gaiman-allegations-controversy-amanda-palmer-sandman-madoc.html

note: content warning, NSFL

haha, I think in terms of gender identity I am similar, I’m probably a 2, sometimes I can vibe with anything from 2 - 4, but compared to other women in my life I tend to be more femme.

This chart could use a second dimension for saturation / intensity.

And yeah, I’m definitely rigid in my rule-applying 😆 Will commit moderation hate crimes apparently 😝

the anti-trans movement’s achievements like taking away gender-affirming care have directly been shown to result in increased suicides, as far as I know Gaiman’s actions have not directly killed anyone, while Rowling’s advocacy does directly support a movement that results in deaths - I think the per-person severity of harm when a trans person self harms, attempts suicide, or succeeds in suicide (not to mention when anti-trans bigots rape, torture, and murder trans people) are all worse AFAIK

same, lol - I was like daaaaaamn

I think the moral arguments aside, there is just the practical matter that having read what he did, I cannot stomach to consume content made by him. The association is naturally aversive, I don’t need a rational argument about how it’s immoral to support a rapist - I just don’t like it.