Principal Fired for Showing Michelangelo’s David

Read more HERE: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo…

“A parent in Tallahassee, Florida cost a charter school principal her job after complaining that one of the world’s most beloved artistic masterpieces was pornographic.

Hope Carrasquilla, who had just stepped into her role at Tallahassee Classical School less than a year prior, announced her resignation on Monday during an emergency board meeting, according to the Tallahassee Democrat’s reporting.

She spoke with the Tallahassee Democrat about the incident and the end to her time at the school. Ms Carrasquilla told the paper that the school board’s chair, Barney Bishop, informed her that she would either need to quit or she would be fired.

Though it appears he did not specify why the principal was asked to leave, she believes it was related to a lesson on Renaissance art.”

Montana Republican Admits Detransition Is Rare, Witness States “0 Of My Patients Regret Transition”

https://erininthemorn.substack.com/p/montana-republican-admits-detransition

 

 

Montana Republican Admits Detransition Is Rare, Witness States “0 Of My Patients Regret Transition”

A Montana hearing for Senate Bill 99, a gender affirming care ban for trans youth, featured incredible moments. A therapist, when asked, said “none of my patients regret.” A Republican conceded that.

 

 
 

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Montana’s House Judiciary Committee met today to hear a bill that would ban gender affirming care for trans youth. Senate bill 99, which passed the Montana Senate previously, bans gender affirming care, explicitly legalizes nonconsensual intersex surgeries on intersex youth, and attacks Medicaid coverage for institutions providing such care. One of the ways that the bill is supported by proponents is through the use of detransitioners, including multiple political detransitioners. The House hearing was filled with expert witnesses, including people like Dr. Anna Peterson, who has treated transgender people for over two decades. When asked how many people she has cared for have regretted their transition, she stated that of the hundreds of patients she has seen, none have expressed regret. Ultimately, this led to Representative Jennifer Carlson (R) admitting that detransition is indeed rare, undercutting a major justification for the bill.

Montana’s bill would ban gender affirming care entirely for trans youth. It states that no person may provide gender affirming surgeries, hormone therapy, or puberty blockers to anyone under 18, in violation with widely accepted standards of care and medical evidence. It removes doctors licenses and even removes their ability to indemnify themselves using malpractice insurance for youth gender affirming care. A severability clause at the end ensures that if parts are found unconstitutional, other parts will remain in effect, indicating proponents of the bill know that it is likely the bill will indeed be found to be unconstitutional:

 
Severability clause in SB99

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In order to argue for this bill, people often point to and raise the fear that those who are transitioning will later come to regret it. We often hear this with respect to outlandishly high detransition rates that are often claimed by proponents of bills like this. In this hearing, they brought forward one detransitioner to make this case – he did so using religious justifications for his detransition, not that unlike the old ex-gay movement.

We know from modern studies that detransition is very rare. In the hearing, multiple witnesses in favor of the bill brought up the much-debunked “80% detransition rate.” This rate is based on decades old data and standards. Much of the data comes from a noted conversion therapist, Ken Zucker, who advised the parents of trans kids to do things such as avoiding “wrongly-gendered toys.” We know from modern studies that the actual detransition rate among trans youth is only 2.5% – and many of these who do detransition do so because of lack of acceptance rather than because they are “not trans.”

It is upon these facts that Representative Zooey Zephyr (D) asked Dr. Anna Peterson, a therapist who has worked with transgender youth for two decades, how many people she has seen who have regretted their transition. Dr. Peterson responded, “I’ve worked for many years with this population. Of the hundreds of people over many years… the incidence of regret in my practice, simply put, is zero. And I work with these kids over time, into adulthood.”

See the exchange:

The exchange was enlightening, and it seemed to throw Republican questioners off, who may have intended to rely on high detransition rates to get their point across. Later in the same hearing, Representative Jennifer Carlson (R) brought up detransitioners, but clearly had to adjust her questioning. She stated, “With respect to those who reverse course… go back… which we know is a small number…” and proceeded to ask about the reversibility of the procedures. The moment was significant as it was the first time in the hundreds of hours of legislation I have witnessed where a Republican conceded that point.

It is also notable that in this hearing, there was only a single detransitioner. Many trans people spoke against the bill. If there was an “explosion of detransitioners” as some proponents tried to claim before this exchange, where are they? You might expect that they would out in droves to testify in these hearings, especially if the number is as high as what is commonly cited and the procedures are so damaging. There continues to be no evidence that this is the case.

There were other remarkable moments of questioning, such as when Representative Durham questioned multiple doctors about the use of blood tests to determine someone’s biological sex. When both a psychiatrist and an emergency department doctor both stated that you cannot use blood tests to conclusively determine someone’s biological sex by measuring hormone levels, the Representative seemed to grow dubious, stating that he disagreed. When the crowd shouted, “you’re not a doctor!” he responded, “But I’m married…”

SB99 will come up for executive action in the coming days, and if it is voted out of the committee, it will go to the full Montana House. Should it pass, Montana will become the 10th state to ban gender affirming care fully for trans youth. It is an extreme bill that will harm trans kids in Montana and will usurp parental rights over healthcare decisions. The representatives who are on the fence on this bill should use these lines of questioning and the answers they received to help them realize that this bill does not base itself on scientific fact or any material good for the patient population they seek to legislate.

Disclosure: Representative Zooey Zephyr is the author if this article’s partner.

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Ron DeSantis HUMILIATES himself live on air

100-year-old woman slams Florida book bans and brings the house down at school board meeting

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/24/2159893/-100-year-old-woman-slams-Florida-book-bans-and-brings-the-house-down-at-school-board-meeting

 

GraceLinn_BookBAn.jpg

Florida’s book bans continue unabated. On Tuesday night, the Martin County School Board met and held an hours-long hearing about the proposed banning of books that some feel are inappropriate. 

During the meeting, where some people voiced support for banning books while many others voiced anger and dissent at such censorship, 100-year-old Grace Linn, a Martin County resident, spoke into the microphone from her wheelchair. Saying she was “a hundred years young,” Linn spoke about her husband who was killed in action during World War II while “defending our democracy, Constitution, and freedoms. One of the freedoms that the Nazis crushed was the freedom to read the books.”

Linn brought and displayed a quilt that she made in protest of a potential book ban. Stitched into Linn’s quilt are books that have either been targeted or banned. She explained that the books on her quilt represented “a few of so many more books that are banned or targeted and need to be proudly displayed and protected and read.”

The end of her remarks brought the audience to cheers, and rightly so. Linn’s speech is all that needs to be said about banning books.

“Banned books and burning books are both the same,” Linn said. “Both are done for the same reason: fear of knowledge. Fear, not freedom. Fear, not liberty. Fear is control. My husband died as a father of freedom. I am the mother of liberty. Banned books need to be proudly displayed and protected from school boards like this. Thank you.”

 

USA TODAY: Man had $39,500 seized by Arizona police for nearly 3 years. He finally received his money back.

Man had $39,500 seized by Arizona police for nearly 3 years. He finally received his money back.
Civil forfeiture has drawn sharp criticism as it has often allowed law enforcement to seize assets without needing to charge the owners with a crime.

Read in USA TODAY: https://apple.news/AyItdySAxSMGoEcSF1dytBg

Shared from Apple News

Best Wishes and Hugs,Scottie

THE TRACE: Most parents fear school shootings. But kids are 3 times more likely to be shot at home.

Most parents fear school shootings. But kids are 3 times more likely to be shot at home.
Most parents worry a shooting could happen at their children’s school. But a Trace analysis found that three times as many kids were shot in domestic violence incidents between 2018 and 2022.

Read in The Trace: https://apple.news/AQ7EWPckWT9-SsqiPBvia7Q

Shared from Apple News

Best Wishes and Hugs,Scottie

VICE: Russia Appears to Be Deploying 75-Year-Old Tanks to Ukraine

Russia Appears to Be Deploying 75-Year-Old Tanks to Ukraine
Open-source intelligence groups say the T-54, a tank built in the 1940s, is being shipped to the front.

Read in VICE: https://apple.news/Ag0-PcMEZRUG5JATppsa49w

Shared from Apple News

Best Wishes and Hugs,Scottie

Why it matters 2

This is the second in which I hope will be many future posts by Randy.   Please give him some love and support as he starts to feel more comfortable doing posts.   Hugs from Scottie.  

In the very proclamation of dissent and foundation of a new creation, AmericaPicture 1 demanded that laws be emplaced for the fair governance of the people.  In fact, it was the failure of the British Monarchy to govern with fair laws, to allow representation and fair justice, to abide by a set of laws even, that brought about these ringing words of courage and relative insanity when considering the scope of the argument: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal.”

How bold a statement is that!  And yet it is the very foundational argument upon Picture 2which this country called America was founded, and ironic in that the very people of the argument and their following generations have striven mightily to disprove.  From the institutions of slavery to Indian Affairs, Rockefellers to Swaggerts, people have sought ways to remove this idea that each of us is created equal and beholden to the laws of the country.

The Rule of Law has been bandied about in one phrase or another since the musings of Plato, if not before.  It was Henry de Bracton, a medieval jurist, who is credited with the famous phrase “no man is above the law”.  It is quite literally the defining characteristic of a civil society, one which is not governed by the arbitrary ruthlessness of a corrupt power simply doing as it pleases, and the initial downfall of any society as those who would subject others to the law fly in the face of the very same.

America, for all its unwillingness to abide by its own creation, has managed to somewhat self-correct over time, if such things can be considered as correctable.   There will always be injustices in the world, but “men of good conscious…” do sooner or later find ways to bring us back from the edge even as generations are squandered and sullied in the process and allow us to muddle down this road.  In truth, it is the mark of a healthy governance and populace to ensure the shortest of time between abuse and correction.

As we look upon the actions of Donald Trump, he is in some ways a scape goat. Picture 3 Given far more power than he was built to manage and surrounded by sycophants, coat-tail riders and sociopathic anarchists all seeking to rape and pillage their way to the top, he is asked now to answer for grievances he never should have been given the opportunity to incur.  I find myself feeling somehow sorry for this spoiledPicture 4

tantrum throwing delinquent, but even more sorry for a country that must force an acknowledgement that, truly, no man should be above the law.  What I fear the most is the generations that will be squandered and sacrificed should we fail.  Make no mistake, those who willingly placed a man so ill-prepared and incapable of the job into the highest position of trust and power in the land are perfectly willing to pick over the carcass as this asshole attempts to burn it all to the ground.

Why it Matters

This is a guest post from Randy.   As most people here already know Randy is someone I admire greatly.  Randy is my online brother and a member of our family.   Randy is smart, funny, caring, kind, willing to reach out a hand to those in need while also willing to stand up to protect others.   Randy is the kind of guy who if he knew a co-worker had no other way to get to a much needed job during a snow storm he would get up out of his warm bed and go take them to work.   And not ask any for doing it.   I have asked Randy if he would be a guest author as he has time.  He has delighted me with the first two posts of what I hope will be many more.    Thank you my brother, Hugs.

Why it Matters

In this era of Blue Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter, even All Lives Matter, the defining characteristic is that the authors, the progenitors of the movement, are trying to indicate to the public that there are folks who do not see the lives of some persons either being in jeopardy, being disenfranchised, being set upon as a second class, being abused.  The irreparable loses for some came too early, like the Native Americans, and for others they somehow bought in to the larger idea, others still labor under a “lesser than” status that evidences in odd circumstances when people need someone to blame.

Picture1

It is easy to use extremes to make points in writing, so I’ll use one now.  In the late 1930’s an individual rose to power who realized that it was far far easier to capture the public’s anger and fear through hate and destructive rhetoric.  Hate is bred from fear, and Germany recovering from WW1 was reeling through poverty, inflation, low productivity, and a miasma from losing a war.  This individual captured that fear with not only an ideal he espoused upon the country but a scapegoat: otherwise said is “this is the ideal, but these are the people for whom to blame for our lot.”  It should be noted that an erstwhile general failure in his other pursuits, this individual honed a craft of speaking what people begged to hear in a manner that was convincing enough to overpower the very voice of decency within them.

Picture 2 What did that individual do?  He convinced people that it was ok to place a mark of second class on another human being.  He convinced people that they should be “segregated” for the good of the countrymen.  In time, it went from a fringe movement to the government’s position, and men, women, children were rounded up and “quarantined” for the safety of the citizenry.  Some bought into this with a passion, others were put into a position of placing their own lives in peril to not go through with this new government program as their neighbors were taken, were abused, disenfranchised and even killed. Only a sociopath would look upon the truth of this matter with anything but horror, but it’s amazing what people can justify to themselves when their own comfort is on the line, when their own well-being is on the line.  That individual, after committing war Picture 3 upon his own land, went on to view people in other countries as “lesser than”, as not worthy of existence as neighbors, and went to war with them.  The irony learned by the very public this individual used and then abandoned in his bid for power is that they were now only worse off after his blame-game and were forced to face what had been done in their name.

So, why is that relevant today?  Anytime, Anytime, Every time we accept a person to be cast as a second-class citizen for no other reason than their very being, we lose.  We lost when we decided that Native American Cultures were lesser than.  We lost when we decided that African lives, African American lives were lesser than.  We lost when we decided that whoever was in power at the moment, however that power was expressed- be it by government, wealth, violence- was the correct arbitrator of a person’s worth as a citizen.

This blog clearly speaks up for those who have felt the abuse of those in power due to their being gay, being trans, being somehow different.  Some have looked upon this championing as an acceptable forum for conversation and determination Picture 4of another’s rights and status when said persons  have harmed no one and sought only to be genuine to themselves.  The false definition of reality seems a favorite of those who seek to justify abuse, and let it be understood that abuse of power is what it is!  I see no debate as warranted or even allowed when we seek to determine how another person defines himself.  That is their business, and though we may find it uncomfortable for ourselves we have no right to dictate to another who he or she or they express themselves.

I would like to harken back to the very extreme example used earlier in this writing:  Declaring a person to be lower class and unworthy of their own personhood, their liberty, is not American, but damn if it isn’t what Americans seem to demand.  Excusing and justifying abuses and horrors in the name of being free is antithetical to the very existence of the Constitution, and yet we do it.  Over and over again, we accept abuses on others.  You want examples? Picture 5 Ok, we accept a death knell of school children for the right to sell guns to near anyone.  We accept the demand that drag shows be stopped because it violates our own religious beliefs.  We are demanding that people exhibit who they are defined to be at birth despite who they genuinely feel themselves to be.  We demand that children starve in our public schools so that the wealthiest don’t have to pay a fair tax rate.  We demand that children go to school, then declare their well-educated instructors abusing them for allowing them to have an education.  We demand that the sick seek to gamble their very lives as they balance eating and health care.  And, we demand that the mother give birth to her child no matter how old she is, Picture 6 how she became pregnant, the viability of the fetus, the physical and psychological toll it will put on the mother, the financial devastation it will inflict upon her life, even the ability to feed, clothe, educate, and love the child do we still demand she bring it into the world, then we turn our back upon her.

We as a country seem to demand the right to make these decisions for others, to define them, to restrict them, to force them to conform to what we see as comfortable and proper for them, and yet in the near past, especially, have I seen excuse upon excuse for criminal and the worst examples of abuses inflicted upon others.  Picture 7These so-called Christians – and I place that lowercase as they seem to refuse to follow the example of the one written as Jesus Christ – refuse to use a common reality, hold themselves accountable, hold others in their politics driven values accountable, and as I mentioned, refuse to do as Christ demands, yet stomp their feet if someone were to live in defiance of those somehow “deeply held religious beliefs”.  And, again, harkening back to the earlier extreme example:  1930’s Germany was a very religious country and look at what they allowed for their politics-driven morals and values.

Russia disinformation looks to US far right to weaken Ukraine support

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/16/russia-disinformation-us-far-right-republicans-ukraine

Now House Speaker McCarthy admitted that there were members of the republican party that were on the pay roll of Russia.   Now there seems to be a lot more of them.   How is it patriotic to be on the payroll of an enemy foreign government who has attempted for years to subvert our democracy to support their dictatorship?  Hugs

The Kremlin is deploying new tactics by drawing on favorite themes and conspiracy theories of rightwing Republicans

President of Russia Twitter account on a screenA report found Russia-linked accounts on Twitter have shifted toward stressing energy and economic impacts of the war. Photograph: Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto/Rex/Shutterstock


As Russia’s ruthless war against Ukraine has faced major setbacks since it began a year ago, the Kremlin has deployed new disinformation themes and tactics to weaken US support for Kyiv with help from conservative media stars and some Republicans in Congress, according to new studies and experts.

Moscow’s disinformation messages have included widely debunked conspiracy theories about US bioweapon labs in Ukraine, and pet themes on the American right that portray the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, as an ally in backing traditional values, religion and family in the fight against “woke” ideas.

 

Further, new studies from thinktanks that track disinformation have noted that alternative social media platforms such as Parler, Rumble, Gab and Odysee have increasingly been used to spread Russian falsehoods since Facebook and Twitter have imposed more curbs on Moscow’s propaganda.

Other pro-Russian messages focused on the economic costs of the war for the US have been echoed by Republicans in the powerful far-right House Freedom Caucus such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Scott Perry and Paul Gosar, who to varying degrees have questioned giving Ukraine more military aid and demanded tougher oversight.

Since Russia launched its invasion last February, the Fox News host Tucker Carlson and Trump ally – turned influential far-right podcaster – Steve Bannon have promoted some of the most baseless claims that help bolster the Kremlin’s aggression.

For instance, Bannon’s War Room podcast in February 2022 featured an interview with Erik Prince, the wealthy US founder of Blackwater, where they both enthused that Putin’s policies were “anti-woke” and praised Putin’s homophobia and transphobia.

Last month too on the anniversary of Moscow’s invasion, Carlson revved up his attacks on US support for Ukraine claiming falsely that Biden’s goal had become “overthrowing Putin and putting American tanks in Red Square because, sure, we could manage Russia once we overthrow the dictator”.

Analysts who track Russia’s disinformation see synergies between the Kremlin and parts of the US right that have helped spread some of the biggest falsehoods since the start of the invasion.

“Russia doesn’t pull even its most outlandish narratives out of thin air – it builds on existing resentments and political fissures,” Jessica Brandt, a policy director at the Brookings Institution who tracks disinformation and foreign interference, told the Guardian.

She added: “So you often have a sort of harmony – both Kremlin messengers and key media figures, each for their own reasons, have an interest in dinging the administration for its handling of the Ukraine crisis, in amplifying distrust of authoritative media, in playing on skepticism about the origins of Covid and frustration with government mitigation measures.”

“That was the case with the biolabs conspiracy theory, for example, which posits that the Pentagon has been supporting the development of biological weapons in Ukraine. The Charlie Kirk Show and Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast, among others, devoted multiple segments to the claim. It’s not so much that we’re witnessing any sort of coordination, but rather an alignment of interests.”

Brandt also noted that Russia had an “interest in promoting authentic American voices expressing views that align with the Kremlin’s foreign policy goals. And that’s why you often see them retweet Americans that make these arguments.”

Likewise, two reports issued separately last month by the Alliance for Securing Democracy and the Atlantic Council, reveal how Russian state media have shifted some messaging themes and adopted new tactics with an eye to undercutting US backing for Ukraine.

The Alliance report documented a shift in messaging in the US and Europe from directly defending Russia’s invasion to stressing the energy and economic impacts that it was having, themes that seem to be resonating with some Republican politicians.

In the first six months of the war, Alliance data revealed that Russia-linked accounts on Twitter mentioned “Nazi” in more than 5,800tweets.

But in the following six months from August 2022 through January 2023, “the number of ‘Nazi’ tweets dropped to 3,373 – a 42% decline”. Likewise, mentions of Nato by Russian-linked accounts on Twitter dropped by roughly 30% in the second six-month period.

By contrast, in the most recent six-month period the report said that “tweets mentioning both ‘energy’ and ‘Ukraine’ increased by 267%, while tweets mentioning ‘cost of living’ increased 66%” compared to the first six months of the war.

In another twist, Bret Schafer, who leads the Alliance’s information manipulation team, told the Guardian: “In response to restrictions and crackdowns by major tech platforms, accounts and channels affiliated with Russian state media outlet RT, which has been banned entirely on YouTube, have fanned out across alternative social media and video sharing platforms like Rumble and Odysee that have less restrictive content moderation policies and that allow RT to operate without labels or restrictions.

“Those platforms also tend to cater to audiences who are not necessarily pro-Russian, but are certainly more apt, based on the other videos found on those platforms, to oppose continued support for Ukraine.”

Despite Moscow’s disinformation offensive and the $100bn plus in military and financial assistance that has flowed to Ukraine in one year, the ex-Republican House member Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania said that “most GOP members still support Ukraine in its fight against Russian aggression”.

But Dent stressed that “the hardest edge of the Bannon-Carlson wing of the Maga movement in Congress is more sympathetic to Russian arguments and has an isolationist view of American foreign policy. There are some members who are less willing to push back against autocrats. There are others too who find common cause with Russia’s professed socially conservative orientation.”

Those voices are especially loud in the Freedom Caucus which is wielding growing influence with the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, who has said he will not support a “blank check” for Ukraine and this week declined the invitation of the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to visit Kyiv.

Freedom Caucus member Greene from Georgia at the recent CPAC conference said flatly: “We’ve done enough.”

Democrats are especially worried about the embrace of pro-Kremlin disinformation by the American right.

The Democratic senator Chris Murphy blasted US conservatives for echoing Kremlin propaganda and traced its roots back to ex-president Donald Trump, who at the start of Russia’s invasion lauded Putin as “savvy” and a “genius”. Murphy said Trump’s “admiration for Putin” has “turned into a collective rightwing obsession”.

 
How big a threat does the hard right pose to US support for Ukraine?
Read more

Murphy noted that among the obsessed on the right are Donald Trump Jr, whom he follows on social media, and who is “relentlessly making fun of Zelenskiy online”.

Meanwhile, Putin’s own words and propaganda have lately shifted as he has tried to influence opinion in the US and the west, and blunt Russian dissent.

“Millions of people in the west understand they are being led to a real spiritual catastrophe,” Putin railed last month in a wildly hyperbolic speech that homed in on “the destruction of families”, and related themes.

Russia experts warn that Putin’s rhetoric and Kremlin messaging on these themes is far removed from the reality in Russia.

“One of the glaring mistakes of far-right propagandists is to view Vladimir Putin as some kind of defender of Christendom, of family values and as a protector of the white race,” said Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center. “They repeat the Kremlin talking points and get excited about the Russian ‘gay propaganda’ law. Nothing could be further from reality.

“Today Russia is the leader in Europe of high divorce rates, HIV infections, and low church attendance and practice.”

Senator Murphy expects Putin to count “on the [American] right wing to advance Russian propaganda and exploit our internal divisions.”