October 15, 1965 In demonstrations organized by the student-run National Coordinating Committee to End the War in Vietnam, the first public burning of a draft card in the United States took place. David Miller burning his draft card, 1965. These demonstrations drew 100,000 people in 40 cities across the country. In New York City, David Miller, a young Catholic pacifist, became the first U.S. war protester to burn his draft card, doing so in direct violation of a recently passed federal law forbidding such acts. Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation later arrested him; he was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. Memoirs of a Draft-Card Burner
October 15, 1966 Huey Newton and Bobby Seale formed the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense in Oakland, California. Its revolutionary agenda, and the fact that its members, all U.S. citizens, were armed, prompted FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover to refer to it as as “the greatest threat to the internal security of the United States.” First 6 members – Top Left to Right: Elbert “Big Man” Howard; Huey P. Newton, Sherman Forte, Chairman, Bobby Seale. Read the Panthers’ Ten Point Platform and Program: Bobby Seale(L) and Huey Newton(R) Black Panther Party Legacy and Alumni Black Panther Party pin
October 15, 1966 The “Endangered Species Preservation Act” became law. It allowed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to identify plant and animal varieties threatened with extinction, and to acquire land to preserve their habitats. How the law has evolved
October 15, 1969 22 million took part in the National Moratorium, a protest against the continuing war in Vietnam. This was an effort by David Hawk and Sam Brown, two anti-war activists, to forge a broad-based movement against the war.The organization initially focused its effort on 300 college campuses, but the idea soon grew and spread beyond colleges and universities. Hawk and Brown were assisted by the New Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam, which was instrumental in organizing the nationally coordinated demonstrations. One of the largest of the many events involved 100,000 people converging on Boston Common, but activities nationwide also included smaller rallies, marches, and prayer vigils. The demonstrations involved a broad spectrum of the population, including many who had never before raised their voices against the war. This was considered unprecedented: Walter Cronkite (then CBS news anchor) called it “historic in its scope. Never before had so many demonstrated their hope for peace.” Later, a declassified Kissinger (then Nixon’s National Security Advisor) file revealed that these protests discouraged a plan by Nixon to use nuclear weapons in Vietnam. Read more Reissued: The original Vietnam Moratoium Peace Dove button
Hi everyone. Thank you to Ali and Randy for keeping things running here. I went from my own personal melt down to now helping someone avoid theirs. I will explain.
So many may have noticed I am only posting view email news now mostly, I am not keeping up with comments, however I have saved them all in open tabs to get to later after this passes, and I am rarely interacting.
I really wanted to do this as a video as I feel I could do it so much better. But I can’t ever find the time and now don’t have the energy to do it. So here is what is going on.
I have a friend who is a fellow survivor. He was kidnapped at 7 yrs old and then tortured and trained to be a sex toy. Very harsh graphics if you ever read it. It led to lifetime victimization that he details on MS and with me in our talks. But the short version is he got out of it when he turned 40 but it has nearly destroyed his life. So now you understand the backstory. We have been working on and helping each with our abuses. He is one of the few people that understands some of the things going on with me and my issues. He has insights that have helped me and I help him. He tells me I am one of the few who also understand what he is dealing with emotionally.
My friend Kamyk was getting very sick. He has diverticulosis, infected pockets in his intestines. But his are in his in colon area, the upper sigmoid colon. He started having fevers of 104 and me and others begged him to go to medical care. He did. They hospitalized him because one or more pockets burst and were killing him. But the suddenness of it and the situation left him without any of his coping methods such as his computer but only his phone which he used to contact me. He has since gotten some things to help him, but his situation medically is iffy and his emotional situation is protected only by me and one other person that really can only contact him a few hours during the deep morning hours.
So the first days of communication were me trying hard to keep him from freaking out and his needing me to be with him almost all the time he was awake. He left our communications on even when the doctors were talking with him, which he gave them permission to tell me. I have not violated those talks as my own training tells me what I can repeat and what I can not. I do not repeat the doctor’s words but my friend’s fears and worries along with his understandings of medical things.
That set up a pattern that was made from his desperation and fear along with my wanting to be there for my friend just like Randy was there for me when I had my break down in 2014. He did the same thing spending as much time as possible that I needed but in his case he was working nights in a 12 hour shift in a hard job. But he did it to keep me from cutting myself and my wanting to die. I am now so much better I am paying his grand wonderful sacrifice forward. Every waking moment I had was spent with him in his waking moment and he slowly adjusted so has become calm. I have only my health, abilities, and emotional stability to work around. Again Randy had it much worse and he did it. So then should I try.
He today was going in for a dirty surgery. I am not posting the details but to only say that this is not preferred and going to be hard on my friend. I stayed with him via text even during my doctor’s office. My provider is so wonderful she took time to explain his situation internally and reassure me. But he went into the pre-op about 1 pm my time. It is now 8 pm my time with no word from him. Ron has tried to get me to go to bed, but I am so worried I can’t do so. Ron has reminded me of my training that I know a hard surgery could take a long surgery recovery time and now he will need / want / be kept under so he is not awake to text. But even though I know all that, I worked that, I did that, I still worry about my friend. Not really for the surgery. It will be what it will be. But his emotional state when he wakes up. He is so fragile. I have had all my life to deal with mine, I had my melt down mental break in 2014 so have had time to deal with that also. Kamyk just remembered parts of his abuse a year ago and his horrible kidnapping at 7 and the total mind, emotional, and physical fuck of a 7-year-old boy is something that is only months old and he is trying to deal with. He has turned to me as so much of what he endured was like what I endured. Sweet soul he is he thinks my own abuse was worse because of the constant violence I experience for 17 years, and I think his is worse because of the constant sexual use of his body over the years while mine was again only 17 years plus three people raping me as an 18, 19, and 20 year old, one person a female that made it worse for me somehow did it 4 times before I found a way to stop it. I guess we are two very damaged people desperately trying to help each other in our passage in life.
One last thing for this post. I should have gone to bed at 5 or 6 when I was tired. Ron is asking me to try to go to bed now. But I don’t feel sleepy even though I woke at midnight and only had a 2 hour nap because he came and laid down with meat 3 pm today. But remember I got shot up with steroids today. It is going to wreak havoc with my emotions, with my sleep, and my eating needs for a few weeks again. Thank each one of you that comes to Scotties Playtime and for each of you that read this post. It is important to me. Hugs.
Oklahoma school officials worship at the altar of Trump Read on Substack
(Some blue language within.)
Yes. This is happening.
A knuckle-dragging religious troglodyte Trump cultist in Oklohama disguised as the state superintendent of schools has made Bibles in the classroom a statewide requirement. Oh, it gets worse. Initially, when the requirement was made, only one Bible fit the requirement. I’ll let you guess which one.
The initial requirement was that the Bibles be bound in “leather or leather-like material for durability,” and include the United States Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Pledge of Allegiance. The only Bible that fits that requirements cost $59.99 and puts the profits directly into the wallet of one Donald J. Trump.
Fortunately for Donald Trump, while the requirement was that the Bibles purchased for schools with state money contain the U.S. documents, there isn’t a requirement that they not be made in a factory using child labor in China.
Fun fact: The “God Bless the USA” Bibles, as they’re called and selling for $59.99, are only made at the cost of $3, and again, in China…the nation Trump claims is bribing President Joe Biden.
I never read the entire Bible but because of a mostly-Southern childhood where I was forced to attend church, Bible school, revivals, a Baptist Halloween, and even a Baptist private school against my will, I am pretty damn familiar with it. I know there’s no mention in the Bible of the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, the United States, or Donald Trump. Also, how was I forced to attend all that Baptist stuff when I was born Catholic? Why?
What fucknut Ryan Walters is trying to do is force his religion on the children of Oklahoma while making a broad appeal to Donald Trump.
Donald Trump is the easiest politician to manipulate because he’s a corrupt narcissist. It’s why Republicans and foreign governments rented his hotel rooms while he was president (sic), even when they didn’t stay at his hotels. There are many ways to purchase Trump’s affection.
William Barr once rented the ballroom at Trump’s Washington hotel. Who the hell goes to a William Barr party? That sounds brutal. You could run into a Cory Lewandowsky or a Stephen Miller at one of those. Scott Pruitt, a member of Trump’s cabinet needed a new mattress and instead of buying a new one at an actual business that sells mattresses, tried to purchase a used one from Trump’s DC Hotel. Why would you want to buy a used mattress that thousands of people got funky on and could possibly contain bedbugs instead of, oh, I don’t know, purchasing a brand new one nobody’s ever shagged on? A mattress that MAGAts got busy on is the worst.
Here, Walters is appealing to Trump’s narcissism and corruption, possibly to win a spot in his administration. Bribing someone is so much easier than working to charm them. And here, Walters, who probably has zero charm, is bribing Trump with taxpayer money.
Just as Louisiana is forcing the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every public classroom in the state despite its abysmal literacy rate, Oklahoma is forcing Bibles in its classrooms when 45 percent of its fourth graders are below the basic reading level. That’s not OK (see what I did there?).
Maybe Oklahoma should use the textbooks it has now to teach its children how to read before sticking unnecessary zealotry bullshit on its walls that they can’t read.
It’s too bad “thou shall not grift,” “thou shall not bribe,” and “thou shall not force its religious fuckery on thy schoolchildren” aren’t part of the Commandments.
Also, Bibles should NOT be in any public school classrooms. The Bible should not be taught in schools. What should be taught in school is math, reading, and history. Maybe if we do a better job at teaching history, we’ll stop being so stupid to repeat it. Current events should also be taught in classrooms as well (not what Beyonce is wearing but news) so people in Oklahoma and Louisiana can see that their Republican officials are trying to turn their states into the Taliban. Don’t do that. Taliban bad.
Because of pressure, the state is backtracking and adjusting the requirements for the Bibles, which they’re taking bids for now. The Constitution, Declaration of Independence, etc, etc, don’t have to be a part of the Bible now, they just gotta come with it. They’ve also adjusted the requirements for Fruity Pebbles to be sold in Oklahoma as the Ten Commandments no longer have to be printed on the label and can now be the toy surprise inside. It’s gotta suck to be a kid in Oklahoma. I’d Sooner live in a blue state. See what I did there? Never mind.
Walters is upset about having to change the requirement and said, “The left-wing media hates Donald Trump so much, and they hate the Bible so much, they will lie and go to any means necessary to stop this initiative from happening.”
Hmmm….if it didn’t have anything to do with Donald Trump, then why are you bringing him up? Walters is having great difficulty in hiding that this was all about buying 55,000 Trump Bibles at $55.99 each.
But, you don’t have to hate Donald Trump or the Bible, which Trump has never read, to not want Bibles in public schools.
Instead of requiring that Bibles and the Ten Commandments be placed in schools, require that the Constitution be placed in schools. Or better yet, before you become the State Superintendent of schools, especially in a yee-haw state, there should be a requirement that you READ the Constitution…and take a test on it.
Ryan Walters would flunk on the First Amendment as it says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Now, I know Walters is not Congress but I’m pretty sure the Constitution forbids any government from establishing a religion, which is what Walters is trying to do. He’s not trying to force the Koran or Torah in classrooms.
And by the way, is Walters requiring math and history books to be leather-bound or just the school’s Bibles? Maybe could they use that cheap “leather-like” material the $59.99 Trump Bibles come with.
Hey, shitweasels… When you guys pull this kind of crap, can you find a way to make it appear that it serves the betterment of society, the public, and the greater good instead of just serving Donald Trump and yourself? Hmmm?
Music note: I jammed to Verbena while coloring. (snip)
(It can’t hurt to put bits like this out into the universe. Somebody’s working on this, and more people ought to. So a nice little discussion of what’s working is appropriate. -A)
October 11, 2024 ARC Laureate Fellows
This Cosmos series on Australian Research Council Laureate Fellows 2024 reflects excellence from world class researchers in Australia.
Chris Gibson is a Senior Professor in the School of Geography and Sustainable Communities at the University of Wollongong. For his ARC Fellowship, he is investigating how decarbonisation impacts Australian regions.
Professor Chris Gibson: finding a truce in the climate wars.
Decarbonisation and energy transition are at the sharp edge of a hot political battle. There is a lot of dispute over new technologies like offshore wind, and exactly what mix of energy we need. It’s like a second iteration of the climate wars. But after a decade of stalled policy on climate, we have to embrace the decarbonised future, whether we like it or not. It’s an issue that needs to transcend the political divide.
But we’re faced with a dilemma: we need urgent change, but urgent change rarely occurs, if ever, in a way that is fair. The burdens and benefits of change are not distributed equally across society. And the quicker the change, the more risks there are. Regions can be all too easily left behind.
Geographers think about how substantial change, like this energy transition, affects communities. We think of ourselves as an integrative discipline. We bring together expertise from across environmental science, economics, social geography, legal geography, and from experts who are good on governing transitions. By stitching together insights from all directions, we try to see the bigger picture.
My ARC project is aiming to put together a systematic understanding of what’s happening in decarbonisation, both from the top down, with a nationwide view, and from the ground up, about how people in different regions are responding to change.
We’re putting together a team to look at how decarbonisation hits the ground in different regions, and how it affects different workers, different industries, what kinds of opportunities come out of that, what kinds of changes are needed, how communities and households are responding to the decarbonisation challenge, and how a First Nations’ perspective can lead the way.
Community responses have to be taken seriously. It’s too easy and too convenient to cast aside sceptics as “nimbies” (Not In My Backyard) or selfish or ignorant. If you take the time to hear the diversity of opinions that come from communities, you’ll often find that people are worried about real issues, with valid concerns. Local communities are very knowledgeable about their patch, and have a capacity to understand what kinds of changes are needed. If we can forge a more inclusive process that brings regional perspectives, skills and experience to the forefront, we reduce the risk that regions are left behind. And governments might actually see regional communities as an opportunity rather than a hindrance to change.
A good example is here in the Illawarra, (Coastal New South Wales) where offshore wind has been very controversial in the last year. One of the lessons to be had is to not underestimate the community’s ability to understand what an energy transition means, and not to underestimate the degree of attachment people have to their local places.
The community here is highly knowledgeable about energy. The Illawarra has a workforce with a long history in heavy industry – the number of electricians per capita in the Illawarra must be as high as anywhere in Australia. And people have opinions – it’s not a passive region that knows nothing about the change that’s coming. The task is not purely to convince local people that this is a good thing, but to have a mature conversation with them about the pros and cons.
Who benefits in the energy transition?
There are all kinds of philosophical questions about who benefits, how those benefits are shared, what it means to turn our oceans into a space for energy generation. Some members of the community are asking for a proper conversation, because they don’t feel like they’ve been part of the story so far.
People react unpredictably to change that they see is imposed upon them. Let’s say it’s closing down a coal-fired power station in the Hunter Valley in New South Wales, or proposing a green hydrogen hub in South Australia – people don’t necessarily assess these as singular proposals that exist outside of everything else in their region or in their lives. People make sense of change in relation to their place, their community, their household, their family.
My work is about putting those people and their households first, and looking at it from their point of view. How does structural change look when we take into account the pressures of cost of living, on housing, on employment? People are grappling with these issues in their everyday lives.
There’s also a real risk in introducing changes that are presented to communities as if they have arrived from elsewhere, as a fait accompli. The direction of the flow of ideas and proposals, how they hit the ground, are a very important part of the process. If a proposal seems to arrive in their backyard from the top down – from a government or a corporation provider – you can get a community offside from the outset.
My work is about setting up different kinds of approaches that recognise that these communities have their own capacities and their own perspectives to offer. What we hope to do in the five years of the ARC Laureate program is develop an evidence base so that we can craft better models of how to manage this change. We’re looking at some of the implementations that have already occurred, tracing where those decarbonisation initiatives are hitting the ground, and looking at different kinds of community reactions – what sorts of processes work better than others in terms of building that relationship with community, as well as what happens when things end up in a more antagonistic situation.
Geography is the study of the relationship between humans and our environment. It has always occupied a slightly slippery position in universities and in public life, because we’re both a science and a social science, because we do this work of integrating perspectives from different areas of knowledge. In fact, we call ourselves all sorts of different things: we’re also environmental managers and coastal managers, policy officers and sustainability experts. It’s a discipline that connects, that fills the gaps. We often find solutions to problems by putting knowledge together from those different perspectives. It’s making these connections that can make a big difference.
(Note from Ali: Jess wrote the anti-misogyny rant I was thinking of.)
“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
~Maya Angelou
I go solo camping often. I head up to the North Shore in Minnesota or down to Northwest Arkansas and hang out a few days by myself or with my daughter. My husband is a big ole, corn-fed country boy who will not sleep on the ground, so we leave him at home.
I love to sleep outside, but the very thing I hate about camping is sleeping outside — exposed. As a woman, this is something I think about a lot. When I wake up for some unknown reason and wonder if I heard something in my sleep. Or, I wake up to actually hearing something or someone. I get scared. I get nervous. I wonder why in the hell I do the things I do and take the chances I take.
And then I go back to sleep and wake up on Lake Superior or Devil’s Den and hike to waterfalls and forget it all until it is time to go back to sleep outside. Love and hate.
Lake Superior, Split Rock Lighthouse State Park.
I once asked my husband if he’s ever afraid when he is alone. He laughed out loud.
“Of what? Why would I be scared?”
I tend to be an overthinker, but I can’t tell you how many times I have wondered about his statement of fact. He is not scared. Of men or animals or most of the danger I intuitively see around me. He has nothing to be scared of — he is physically imposing and there is not one law on the books that will harm him.
He has never worried about walking at dark. Or encountering someone on a trail. Or sleeping outside. Or most of the things that take up a lot of my mental space.
He has lived his life completely unencumbered by his environment, even as a resident of a red state. A homegrown Missouri man.
Sure, the Missouri GOP trifecta, a supermajority, has defunded the schools and let our roads crumble and closed hospitals and generally made a nuisance of themselves, but that is exactly what they were to him. An inconvenience. Annoying. Turds in the punchbowl, but nothing to get too riled up about.
He was just living his life.
He didn’t see it. Not because he is not empathetic. Not even because he doesn’t pay attention to politics. It’s because he has lived his life with a privilege he didn’t know existed until I pointed it out. Because, until he saw the world through his daughters’ eyes, through my eyes, these things just never occurred to him. He didn’t deny privilege, he just didn’t see it. He isn’t uncaring or a dolt — he just had absolutely no experience being marginalized. I had to tell him.
Once he saw it, though, he couldn’t look away. He was disgusted. He understood.
This is where I should mention something that I have spoken of in front of safe men. When I tell them that I have been sexually assaulted as well as almost every woman I know, they are astounded. When I tell them of sexual harassment, they are amazed. And then, one day it clicked for me. These are good and safe men and the predators know it. They don’t hurt women while they are around. They don’t talk about it or joke about it, because these men wouldn’t put up with it. The good guys have often really not been a witness to the behavior we have endured because they are just that…good guys.
I am not making excuses for the menfolk.
The men in my life will attest to the fact that I constantly push them to see what we see. I am hard on them. I ask that they look beyond themselves and be an ally to others. To be a witness and bear witness.
We don’t need protectors, but we do need witnesses.
As a woman, as a mom of girls and granddaughters, I have no degree of safety in Missouri and I know all of my girls fall into the same category. They are not safe from sexual assault or rape. They are not safe after a sexual assault or rape. They will likely be dismissed, or worse, blamed. They would be forced to bear the child of their rapist. They would likely be forced to co-parent with their rapist.
Missouri has a total abortion ban with no exemptions for rape or incest. Not that it would matter…I am sure there is some process to that exemption as well and I really hate the notion that a woman or girl can’t have bodily autonomy unless she has first been violated.
Writing that sentence made me sick at my stomach.
Missouri women have been denied care because of the abortion ban. A Kansas OBGYN, Dr. Ahmed, shared a story last week about her Missouri patient who suffered a miscarriage:
“She came in for a follow-up still bleeding,” said Dr. Ahmed. “Turns out there was some tissue that was still there. Retained tissue in that setting can become infected, can cause a lot of bleeding, so I discussed with her the options.”
The patient decided on medication and Dr. Ahmed says she prescribed it. But the following morning, she received a fax from Walgreens on Stateline after prescribing Misoprostol or Cytotec for the miscarriage stating, “Under Missouri law medication abortion is now illegal. Please advise patient to fill across Kansas border”.
Missouri has also had a 25% decrease in OBGYN residency applicants willing to come to our state because of the ban. That decreases care for all women, not just pregnant women.
We aren’t safe in Missouri.
The good news is that Missourians will get to vote on Amendment 3 in a few weeks. This amendment will restore abortion rights in Missouri. We will be the first state to overturn a complete ban.
The bad news is that our bodily autonomy is even put to a vote. That geography dictates our rights. That random folks will get to decide if we are first or second-class citizens. That we have been treated as less than. That our rights have been up for debate.
This is red state shit. We are used to it. It is constant and it is something we live in fear of every day. It is the thing I point to when I am speaking to the men around me. I never let them daydream their way back into complacence. I don’t let them fade into the peace of not knowing…of not being engaged. I don’t let them forget the fear of the women around them. I keep them awake.
Woke. (Emphasis mine- Ali)
I don’t want to be scared of living in Missouri anymore. I don’t want anyone to be scared in their home state. This is why we have to speak on it. Say it.
The reality is that we cannot gain our rights back without involving men. I have such good men in my life. Would they have voted yes on Amendment 3 without me telling them? I’d say yes. Would they be as rabid in telling other men around them to vote yes if I had not worked on them for so long? Maybe not.
It’s not that we are dealing with self-centered jerks. It’s that they didn’t know what they didn’t know.
“We need cis allies to speak up for us. Vote to remove the bigots from positions of power. The biggest thing you can possibly do right now is to vote. Vote for Democrats. Because, no, they aren’t perfect, and no one is. But they are a darn sight better than the alternative.”
I hope this short video means as much to others as it meant to me. Growing up gay meant I was different. Coming from an abusive family meant I had no support and it hurt my sexual identity even more as those abusing me used homophobic slurs against me, but they were the ones forcing me to submit to them. I have watched several videos of reverse gender stereotypes and sadly the ones that need to see it won’t and I doubt they would absorb the message if they were forced to view them. but it is important to understand the stereotypes are created to give the majority a feeling of security and normalcy as they try to force every child into the mold preset by their thinking that the child should be. Making mini me copies of the parents. That is not normal or how it should be. Each child is a new being and should be allowed to have the feelings and express themselves are they really know themselves to be. Openly and freely without repercussions and targeted harm. Please watch the short video, it is eye opening at the end. Hugs. Scottie
(Note from Ali: I’ve seen a couple of headlines that the Don’s campaign plans to run heavy anti-trans ads in the swing states. I’ve used all my free NYT articles for life, but they have a story about it. So this is of interest to All Women.)
Black trans women are a small subset of trans voters, who make up a small portion of the electorate — but they’re also longtime leaders of the LGBTQ+ rights movement who know what’s at stake.
Five years ago, Democratic presidential primary hopeful Kamala Harris stepped onto a stage at a CNN LGBTQ+ town hall in Los Angeles.
“My pronouns are she, her and hers,” Harris said in her introduction.
Offering her pronouns, which wasn’t nearly as commonplace in 2019 as it is now, showed solidarity with transgender and nonbinary Americans. It was a simple but impactful gesture for a community in the midst of an unprecedented homicide crisis, whose rights and humanity had been challenged by former President Donald Trump, who was in office at the time, and other Republicans
In standing shoulder to shoulder with transgender people, Harris began to shift a relationship that had been dogged by decisions of her past, like her support for bills cracking down on sex work during her time as a prosecutor in San Francisco and, while California’s attorney general, her state’s opposition to gender-affirming care for an incarcerated transgender woman in 2015.
Today, Black transgender women, some of the same people who questioned her candidacy five years ago, are supporting Harris on and off the campaign trail. One way they have shown up is by raising money and drumming up support, like a Zoom call in August that was joined by more than 1,000 transgender people, the brainchild of veteran Black trans activist Zahara Bassett.
“I felt that we need to let people know that our voices are at the ballot,” Bassett said. “When we speak to you about our rights, about our visibility of being here, that needs to be respected.”
Bassett enlisted the help of several trans luminaries, including Precious Davis, who had long heard criticism of Harris among her LGBTQ+ peers. Davis, chief strategy officer of Center on Halsted, Chicago’s largest LGBTQ+ community center, said she knew it would be critical for Black trans women to show up for Harris, in part as a way of signaling to Black trans women and queer communities they had permission to vote for the vice president.
“We are a part of a community who have the most to lose,” Davis said of Black trans women. “Our rights and freedom are at stake. We have seen Donald Trump’s attacks against the trans community time and time again.”
Many LGBTQ+ advocates have argued that even if Harris has room for growth on LGBTQ+ issues, it’s nearly impossible to compare her with Trump, who regularly misgenders trans women and refers to trans people as “insane.”
“I will say that I would rather have a fighting chance with her than have no chance at all with Trump,” said Hope Giselle-Godsey, executive director of the National Trans Visibility March, another organizer of the Zoom call for Harris.
While she was roundly criticized four years ago for mixing up language in referring to transgender women, overall, Harris’ record on LGBTQ+ rights is largely viewed positively. She provided some of the earliest support for marriage equality of any presidential hopeful when, as district attorney in San Francisco, in 2004 she officiated a same-sex wedding in California. She also opposed so-called gay and trans “panic defenses,” where perpetrators attempted to claim that fear or disgust of LGBTQ+ people was reasonable motivation for attacking them.
She lost significant ground going into 2020 after her support of FOSTA/SESTA, a 2018 package of bills that aimed to crack down on websites used by sex workers. Transgender people are disproportionately forced into underground economies like sex work due to a lack of employment opportunities.
Trump, however, has fared much worse. During his four years as president, the National Center for Transgender Equality labeled his cabinet the “Discrimination Administration” and the media advocacy group GLAAD logged 210 attacks on queer people. He also barred transgender people from serving in the military, banned Pride flag displays at embassies and gutted transgender health care protections under the Affordable Care Act, among other things.
Channyn Lynn Parker, CEO of the Brave Space Alliance, which serves trans and gender nonconforming youth on the south and west sides of Chicago, speaks about both candidates with resignation. She, too, helped organize the Zoom for Harris, though less enthusiastically than her peers.
Parker has worked with street-based and unhoused youth for more than 10 years and has seen Democratic candidates come and go, all of them with different promises for the community; for example, Biden pledged to trans kids that he “had their backs.”
Meanwhile, the kids she works with still face the same challenges. Many are still kicked out of their homes by their own parents and they’re particularly vulnerable to the anti-trans laws and hate that has also flourished across the country.
“I have never seen a candidate where I feel completely safe, and I’ve ever been able to breathe a full sigh of relief, never,” Parker said. “So, I don’t know if Kamala is going to be any different in that regard.”
Black trans women are a small subset of the transgender voters, who make up a small portion of the electorate. An estimated 825,100 transgender adults of all races will be eligible to vote in November, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. As of last year, 161 million Americans were registered to vote.
In recent years, advocates have invested heavily in giving credit to Black trans activists for leading the charge at the Stonewall uprising in 1969, where queer people famously fought back against homophobic policing in New York City.
At the same time, Black trans women have been overrepresented in the numbers of trans homicide victims and often underrepresented in the media.
At the 2019 LGBTQ+ Town Hall, where Harris introduced herself with her pronouns, Black trans women made headlines by interrupting the event repeatedly, noting that not a single Black trans woman had been invited to ask candidates a question.
The town hall also included a gaffe: Immediately after Harris shared her pronouns, CNN’s Chris Cuomo replied, “Mine too.” To transgender people, the moment highlighted how, even at an event centered on LGBTQ+ communities, transgender issues could become an afterthought. And in the four years since, Trump and his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, have repeatedly attacked transgender people; 176 anti-trans bills have become law; and none of the debates have delved meaningfully into LGBTQ+ issues.
The Black trans women backing Harris see the setbacks — and also an opportunity if Harris wins. Davis said she is ready to lobby Harris on trans issues the moment Harris takes the oath of office. Bassett has at the ready a wish list of policies that would make gender-affirming care more accessible and less stigmatized.
And Parker is clear about one thing: Supporting a candidate doesn’t mean agreeing with them unconditionally. It means challenging them to be better.
“We’re going to provide you with all the necessary tools and resources and individuals to help you to get this right,” she said. “If you don’t use those tools, meaning the individuals who are providing you with the level of access and education needed, then shame on you.”
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The UK’s last coal-fired power plant, Ratcliffe-on-Soar in Nottinghamshire, will close this month, ending a 142-year era of burning coal to generate electricity.
The UK’s coal-power phaseout is internationally significant.
It is the first major economy – and first G7 member – to achieve this milestone. It also opened the world’s first coal-fired power station in 1882, on London’s Holborn Viaduct.
From 1882 until Ratcliffe’s closure, the UK’s coal plants will have burned through 4.6bn tonnes of coal and emitted 10.4bn tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) – more than most countries have ever produced from all sources, Carbon Brief analysis shows.
The UK’s coal-power phaseout will help push overall coal demand to levels not seen since the 1600s.
The phaseout was built on four key elements.
First, the availability of alternative electricity sources, sufficient to meet and exceed rising demand.
Second, bringing the construction of new coal capacity to an end.
Third, pricing externalities, such as air pollution and carbon dioxide (CO2), thus tipping the economic scales in favour of alternatives.
Fourth, the government setting a clear phaseout timeline a decade in advance, giving the power sector time to react and plan ahead.
The UK’s experience, set out and explored in depth in this article, demonstrates that rapid coal phaseouts are possible – and could be replicated internationally.
As the UK aims to fully decarbonise its power sector by 2030, it has the challenge – and opportunity – of trying to build another case study for successful climate action.
I bet the next election will be well attended and these people will lose their seats and new progressive inclusive people will win. That is what has happened all over when the right bigots and haters snuck into school board seats, they go too far trying to erase the LGBTQ+ kids / people from existence, then they get kicked out. Sadly by then the damage is done. What they hell do they want people perving on kids in the bathrooms for? To make the kids scared to use them and to make sure the weird kids are not doing weird gay stuff in them, right? Hugs. Scottie.
By the way. We have a hurricane headed right at us. It will be here Wednesday at around noon, but we have three days of wind and rain beforehand. It will hit at a class three. It is projected to hit just above us but could hit us directly. We will be spending the next few days getting as much done as possible, stocking in cat food Ron forgot and getting more gas and propane for the generator. It is unlikely that pole of ours will survive another storm as it is already leaning hard. Repair crews are already stretched thin in other areas so won’t be able to come rescue us in our time of need. Going to be a very long few months. Hugs. Scottie
YORK DISPATCH EDITORIAL BOARD
York Dispatch
At the risk of stating the obvious, South Western’s elected school board is making some strange decisions.
For the last two years, they’ve fixated on which bathrooms LGBTQ+ kids use. In 2023, officials in this Hanover-area district played musical chairs with school bathrooms in a misguided attempt to appease the loudest bigots among them — ending up with five different types of bathrooms.
After a low-turnout school board election in which several far-right members joined their ranks, they hired a Christian law firm, decided to begin banning books and reopened the bathroom issue. Board President Matthew Gelazela, who was elevated to his post after previously serving as the board’s most vocal bomb-thrower, pointed to Red Lion’s discriminatory policiesas something to aspire to.
These adults want to make it easier for other people to watch your children while they’re in the bathroom. It’s absolutely mind-boggling.
Gelazela, who’s steadfastly refused to explain the logic here, said in a public meeting that the windows help “[add] privacy in the toilet facility” and that they “increase oversight of the wash area.”
There’s a reason public restrooms tend not to have windows — or, if they do, they have frosted glass.
No one wants to be spied on when they’re relieving themselves.
The parents who spoke to The York Dispatch about the latest bathroom renovations said their children no longer feel comfortable using these bathrooms. One of the parents went to the principal and asked for an exemption to allow her son to use a different bathroom further away from class.
Her 13-year-old doesn’t want to be spied on while he’s in the bathroom.
And we don’t blame him.
It’s creepy and weird.
And let’s not ignore the bigger picture: This is happening at a time when this and other York County school boards are pushing policies that would restrict what books students read, what sports teams they compete on and even which pronouns they use.
All of this is part of an attempt to erase LGBTQ+ people.
Cutting a window into these bathrooms is an intimidation tactic designed to make sure students who use the so-called “gender-identity” facilities — and, let’s be honest, any student who doesn’t fit neatly into the worldview of the school board’s far-right majority — know they’re being watched, controlled and judged.
In their quest to punish LGBTQ+ kids, however, the misguided “adults” on this South Western School Board are doing the things they accuse others of doing.
This is an invasion of privacy and a waste of taxpayer dollars.
Scottie's Playtime 