Tidbits From My Neglected Email

This one’s a couple of months old, but good for Women’s History Month.

William Merritt Chase, the Accidental Ally

Painter William Merritt Chase opened an art school for a new generation of women, teaching them how to draw as well as how to advocate for themselves.

William Merritt Chase with Parsons School of Design students via Wikimedia Commons

The story of the establishment of the Chase School of Art, forerunner of the Parsons School of Design in New York, offers an unlikely object lesson in what happens when you seek to realize your creative aspirations in an era of political and cultural upheaval. In 1896, the Impressionist painter William Merritt Chase was ready to declare independence from the rigid hierarchies of the New York art scene and its dependence on European masters and methods. He dreamed of establishing what he considered an explicitly American school of art, one that encouraged artists to embrace and portray the unique character and energy of the young nation and its people, and he needed money. To get it, he founded an experimental new school for painting in Manhattan that would, ironically, thrive on the burgeoning hopes of women in an era of their growing liberty and opportunity.

Best remembered for society portraits, plein air paintings, pastel seascapes, dead fish still lifes, and depictions of dancing white clouds, Chase suddenly found himself in an unfamiliar role: he was, if not quite an equal rights leader, then an ambitious artist who, in pursuing his own interests, opened avenues for women artists and played a part in establishing a new era of American art beyond his own envisioning.

As June L. Ness writes in Archives of the American Art Journal, Chase stood among the most influential artists and art teachers in the country at the turn of the twentieth century. He was on the faculty at the Art Students League, the Brooklyn Art Association, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts; he instructed a cadre of private students in his home studios and abroad; he lectured in Connecticut, Chicago, and elsewhere; and he oversaw a summer art school outside the Long Island town of Southampton.

A man of his times, Chase and his wife, Alice Gerson, an amateur photographer, ran at the limits of their finances. In 1896, as parents to four children, they faced a turning point. Chase wanted to quit teaching altogether and devote himself to painting. Yet the couple also wanted to maintain luxury residences in both the city and the country while traveling extensively but lacked the resources to sustain such a lifestyle. (snip-MORE, plus art!)

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Cadged these snippets from my Naked Pastor email:

Cartoon of the Week

You’re not broken.

I mean it.

Dad Joke

I keep saying “It is what it is,” but what even is it???

Quote

I recently saw a clip from a Leonard Cohen interview. She asked him about him spending time with Roshi in a Zen monastery. He said it was like a hospital, and Roshi was the doctor. The interviewer asked what he cured him from. Cohen replied, “The illusion that you are sick. He cured me of the illusion that I needed his teachings.”

You’re Okay!

Let’s make this one short and sweet. I agree with Cohen. I also agree with Sinéad O’Connor’s therapist, who told her the whole point of therapy was to help her realize she didn’t need therapy. The same with Gabor Maté, who said that I am not broken, but just wounded. Underneath the wounds and pain is wholeness. A wholeness already there, just waiting to be embraced. These all ring true to me. When I share cartoons like the one here, The Best Healing, I get some positive comments, but also a lot of angry and offended ones.

And I understand why. I, too, was raised to believe that I was born a sinner, deeply broken and flawed and depraved, in need of a saviour to redeem me. The whole theological system and enterprise is founded upon the assertion that I am a vile sinner who needs to be saved by a divine being.I know how difficult it is to walk away from this belief, because it’s not just a belief, but a whole worldview, an entire paradigm, complete with its religion, institution, scriptures, and priests. It’s like leaving the universe to start over in a new one. One that says you’re okay. It’s a radical step, and maybe you have taken it. I’m proud of you for that.

Leaked Interior Department database reveals US plans to revise historical information

This is total white supremacy Christian nationalism and an attempt to both roll back all civil rights of minorities and project a fake white Christians were the only good people in the country mentality. Propaganda in other words to support fragile white men’s egos and prop up declining church attendance. This is driven by people who don’t want to share the country equally with others but want everything for their group only. They want to remove an entire group of people from society, the LGBTQ+ community and go back to the pre1960s civil rights for nonwhites. Hugs

An internal government database first reported, by the Washington Post and posted on two public on Monday revealed the scope of the Trump administration’s effort to revise or remove information on African-American history, LGBT rights, climate change and other topics at hundreds of national park ⁠sites.

“The narrative being advanced is false and these draft, deliberative internal documents are not a representation of final action taken by the department,” an Interior Department spokesperson said. The National Park Service is part of the Interior Department.

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https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/leaked-interior-department-database-reveals-us-plans-revise-historical-2026-03-03/?taid=69a67fff36cfd000018dfcee&utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter

By Kanishka Singh

March 2, 20269:36 PM ESTUpdated 23 hours ago

United States Department of the Interior logo and U.S. flag are seen in this illustration taken April 23, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration

The U.S. Interior Department said a database revealing how President Donald Trump’s administration planned to revise information on key phases of American history at national park sites was deliberative and the employees ‌who released it “will be held accountable.”

An internal government database first reported, by the Washington Post and posted on two public on Monday revealed the scope of the Trump administration’s effort to revise or remove information on African-American history, LGBT rights, climate change and other topics at hundreds of national park ⁠sites.

“The narrative being advanced is false and these draft, deliberative internal documents are not a representation of final action taken by the department,” an Interior Department spokesperson said. The National Park Service is part of the Interior Department.

Trump has targeted cultural and historical institutions – from museums to monuments to national parks – to remove what he calls “anti-American” ideology.

His declarations and executive orders have led to the dismantling of exhibits on slavery, the restoration of Confederate statues and other ‌moves ⁠that civil rights advocates say could reverse decades of progress.

The Interior Department spokesperson alleged the internal working documents were edited in a misrepresenting way before being released. The spokesperson also labeled the release as inappropriate and illegal, without specifying the law it ⁠allegedly violated.

“Employees who altered internal records and leaked in an effort to hurt the Trump administration will be held accountable,” the spokesperson added.

The Trump administration has sought to stifle internal dissent within ⁠government agencies and taken action against employees who have criticized its policies.

Last year, some employees at the Federal Emergency Management Agency were put on leave ⁠after they signed an open letter against the agency’s leadership, while some Environmental Protection Agency employees were fired after they signed a letter critical of the government’s actions.

Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Thomas Derpinghaus

GOP Senator blasts Noem: ‘That is why I’ve called for your resignation!’

This is how every hearing in congress of the lying tRump admin officials should go from both sides of the isle. Hugs

Your Josh Day Next Day!

A Nationwide Book Ban Bill Has Been Introduced in the House of Representatives

Again all this is about is a Christian nationalist desire to mimic Russia and remove all LGBTQ+ representation from the public view in the name of “protecting children from porn” as if just being or media representing LGBTQ+ people is pornographic and sexual. These people feel anything not straight and cis is sexualizing and abusing children simply because they do not want the LGBTQ+ people to exist. Hugs

Side note. Ron got home last night 3-2-2026 about 6 pm. I made him a supper of a salad and two hamburgers with the fixings. He was so happy. I was happy. We went to bed and snuggled which made Tupac who has snuggled me every night a bit unhappy but he pressed in from the other side. All day Ron and I have been together, unloading the car, doing laundry, Ron started on the floors in the kitchen, and we are making a pork tenderloin, potatoes, brown gravy, carrots, and greenbeans for supper. It is so good to have my husband home. I understood why he had been gone for the better part of three months but it sure is grand to have him home. I feel better, anxieties lower, and happy feeling up. Also for those worried I was not eating which I was not, I ate like a pig at a trough tonight, having a first heaping plate of everything and then going back for a second heaping plate. The end of the second one was a bit challenging to finish but I did. I offered to pick up the last bits of left overs but ron said he would do it. I think he noticed I was trying to hide that I was swaying and wobbleing when I walked due to my pain levels. Hugs

Discussion of gender is not sexualization. Making books available to students that represent the diversity of their experiences and showcase the numerous ways to be a person in the world is not sexualizing them. Such an interpretation says far more about the adults and the perspectives they’re applying to books than it does about the books or their intended audiences.

Following this week’s State of the Union Address, House Republicans worked quickly to advance legislation to ban books from public schools nationwide. House Resolution 7661 (H.R. 7661), also known as the “Stop the Sexualization of Children Act” would modify the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 by prohibiting use of funds under the act “to develop, implement, facilitate, host, or promote any program or activity for, or to provide or promote literature or other materials to, children under the age of 18 that includes sexually oriented material, and for other purposes.”

The bill was introduced by House Representative Mary Miller (Republican, Illinois). 17 additional Representatives cosigned it.

H.R. 7661 is an anti-trans bill, and tucked within its provisions are those that ban books for those under 18 that “include sexually oriented material.” This is the same vague language used in numerous states across the U.S. to ban books from public schools and public libraries. This bill includes “lewd” and “lascivious” dancing as prohibited topics or themes. No such books for young readers exist, but facts don’t matter to a regime seeking total and complete control.

The bill goes on to further define “sexually oriented material” as anything broaching the topics of “gender dysphoria or transgenderism.” The latter is an intentionally harmful word used as a cudgel to harm trans people. Such a broad definition also ensures that this kind of bill could be applicable in any situation where it would benefit the banners. It isn’t a stretch to see a bill like this used to outright ban all books by or about LGBTQ+ people under the guise of it being “sexually oriented.”

Though this legislation would apply to institutions using funds from the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, there’s little question that it would expand to include all public libraries, not just those in public schools. We’ve already seen this very thing play out across the country.

Katy Independent School District (TX) banned any books about “gender fluidity” among its bans of “sexually explicit materials.” Just last month, the Texas school district outside Houston banned over 140 LGBTQ+ books under the policy. Greenville Public Library (SC) has banned all books for those under 18 with “trans” themes or topics, a ban later replicated and expanded in York County Library to include “gender identity” books (also in South Carolina). Greenville’s library was sued by the state’s chapter of the ACLU on behalf of several library patrons.

These local-level policies, alongside state-level policies like Iowa’s Senate File 496 and Idaho’s House Bill 710–both still working their way through numerous lawsuits–provided the roadmap for the proposal of federal-level book ban legislation. It was only a matter of time, and the ongoing onslaught of anti-trans legislation and rhetoric that has grown exponentially under the Trump-Vance regime made this the prime moment.

Discussion of gender is not sexualization. Making books available to students that represent the diversity of their experiences and showcase the numerous ways to be a person in the world is not sexualizing them. Such an interpretation says far more about the adults and the perspectives they’re applying to books than it does about the books or their intended audiences.

You can read the full text of H.R. 7661 here, including its list of cosponsors. Right now, your best way to have your voice heard about this hateful and discriminatory bill is to call your House representatives and urge them to veto this bill at every opportunity. There are years’ worth of resources from which you can pull about where and how all of these bills are calculated and targeted, and you can pull from the numerous ongoing lawsuits challenging similar bills and policies at the local and state level. Let your lawmakers know that you’re watching them and their voting records, especially if they’re among the roster of those proposing the legislation.

These bills aren’t about removing books; books are just one of the tools. These bills are about the complete and total erasure and removal of queer people from American life.

I Can’t Not Share This

but you don’t have to read it. It’s nothing bad, but is very truthful. From 2007, but the locations, of course, are interchangeable.

https://www.gocomics.com/lay-lines/2026/03/02

Let’s talk about Trump ignoring MAGA….

The diagnosis of my pain doctors and it was worse than I thought.

I have been promising this post since monday. But I have always been too tired or in too much pain to write it or post it. I am going to start this tonight but it is late for me and I may go to bed before finishing so it may take several days.

The fact is before I even went to my pain doctor to tell me the result I knew things were bad. In the morning I can only sit in my chair for at most two hours before I have to get up and do something that helps relieve the pain. Mostly that is going to bed. I don’t sleep just lay their reading news or telling my self stories I create hoping to fall asleep. Randy sent me a headband with speakers but that just interferes with my own thoughts and keeps me awake. It was a good try and I bought one for Ron and he loved it. I will give this one to him. I go to bed and lie there only to get up and sit for a couple of hours to have the pain again overtake me. Once the pain gets that bad it is 10 to 15 minutes at most before I have to leave the desk and simply walk around or do something because the pain gets so bad so fast.

Also Tupac is on the desk being as close to me as he can. He is not lying on the towel I leave down for him but as close to the keyboard as possible even at time placeing his paws on the on the keybord hitting random keys. He wants to be as close to me as possible since Ron has been away so long. He feels he lost another human. I will be exciteed t0 see him react when Ron gets home on monday night.

So before the doctor told me the damage I knew something was badly wrong. So remember that even before I talked to the doctor I knew something had gone drasticly wrong. Sadly the MRI showed that.

Yup figured that would happen the pain levels are too high so I am going to bed. It is 8 PM my time.

It is now Saturday and I am trying hard to get this post done and out. But today my pain levels are very high and it is difficult to focus but I will do my best.

One of the things that the doctor told me was that my spine is no longer aligned; the disks are not lined up with each other but shifted to different degrees. Remember this was only the lower spine now they are going to MRI the upper spine. Second my spine has curved wrong. Then we got to the serious stuff. Degenerative discs, bulging discs, and discs so damaged that the nerves are outside the spinal channel. The arthritis is so advanced it is deep / spread in each vertebra. She tried to explain all the medical terms. At one point she excused herself to go speak to the surgeon I see for spine shots. When she came back it was with bad news. He no longer thinks epidurals will help me in my lower spine and I need nuero surgeon to do back surgery. Crap I cannot afford that. I am losing my sight, Ron has to have eye surgery right away, and the van needs 2 grand in repairs. That doesn’t even include my eye surgery and the repairs on our home.

While I did not understand everything she said I so desperately wished Ron had been there as he often explained these things to me later, and I have forgotten some of it, the situation is I need an MRI of the upper spine as well, she has refered me to her prefered spianl nueraal surgenon. Then I will need spinal surgery as the state and federal government won’t let them increase my pain medication because I can’t take the fentanyl patches with my skin allergies. I am being squeezed into a surgery I cannot afford or seeking illegal drugs for relief to be able to function.

I remember when I started in this clinic in 2009. They looked at my MRI of my spine and gave me 75 gm of morphine twice a day. I asked it to be reduced to half that amount and it was and I could live normally. But after the opioid “crisis” the states started to inject non-medical legislators into the medical field to show they were tough on abuse and misuse of drugs. It got ever more crazy until my life went from normal and even being able to work for a few years to not even getting enough pain relief to sit in my desk chair and blog for an hour. Now the federal government is demanding it be restricted even further, as RFK Jr. taking steroids can work out in jeans. On the restrictions I can’t get enough relief to blog for any extended time of the day. I spend half of my awake time in bed instead of at my desk. I struggle to stand to do dishes. I just told Ron that I cannot clean the floors before he gets home as I tried and it left me in tears. Even with our lightweight, easy to use cleaning devices. The damage to my spine and the lack of medical relief have gotten that bad. This makes no sense to me. Why deny me the pain blocking medications that allow me to fuction semi normally. It simply makes no sense to me. Why put me in this state what is the goal?

Do you see my point? Why put me and people like me through this? Do they want us to use illegal means for relief, or do they want us to suffer to death and go away? Do they care about us at all as they make these rules? There is more things my pain doctor told me about my spine I did not list yet, things like protrusions, spikes hooking nerves, some thing she kept say stenoisis, and nerves being pinched between vertebrae. At one point she mentioned I have advance degerneritive disc, I so wish Ron was there as I understood so little of it, then came the but you need a neurosurgeon and back surgery to help you because the state and federal government won’t let us give you enough medical relief to have any life. I hate this regressive holier than thou republican elected officials that swallow all the illegal drugs they can get from their providers while denying us poor people relief for bigoted racist reasons and their personal gains.

I am sure I left things out. I had to take after talking to Ron a saved 30 miligarm instant relief morphine because I was going out of my mind. I try desperately to save extras so when the pain is so off the chart I can get relief. But with the new restrictions, how do I do that? Why do the people in power who have access to pill mills and who have no pain and want to just make a name for themselves while doing the very thing they legislate against try to hard to make the live so people like me so hard? And I am poor and scared. Hugs

American Psychological Association Reaffirms Support For Trans Youth Care, Pushes Back Against NYT

https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/american-psychological-association

A recent article from Jesse Singal in the New York Times seemed to indicate the organization might be quietly retreating from supporting trans youth care.

Erin Reed

Feb 25, 2026

B Christopher/Alamy

Erin In The Morning is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a subscriber.

Yesterday, anti-transgender activist and columnist Jesse Singal published a piece claiming there were “cracks in the wall” around gender-affirming care (which you can find fully fact-checked here). To make that case, he relied heavily on a statement from the American Society of Plastic Surgeons that bypassed the organization’s normal scientific review process and was advanced under pressure from leadership aligned with the Trump administration, including a president who is a major Republican donor. Singal also invoked the American Psychological Association, suggesting the organization was retreating from its 2024 position supporting transgender care and rejecting claims that gender identity is “caused” by external factors. But a representative for the APA tells Erin In The Morning that the organization stands firmly by its 2024 guidelines supporting transgender youth care and provided documentation indicating Singal mischaracterized its position.

“No, APA’s position has not changed,” says a representative speaking for the APA, attaching a link to their 2024 policy statement which provided broad support for gender-affirming care. “APA continues to support unobstructed access to evidence-based care for transgender and gender-diverse individuals of all ages.”

The 2024 policy statement is to date one of the most significant supportive stances of any medical organization for gender-affirming care. It states that gender-affirming medical care is medically necessary, opposes bans on gender-affirming care, declares that being transgender is not caused by autism or post-traumatic stress, establishes the organization’s support for combatting disinformation on transgender healthcare, and finds that rejection of a trans youth’s gender identity can increase their risk of suicide and harm their psychological wellbeing. The policy was passed overwhelmingly, 153-9, with each voter representing a large subset of the organization’s 157,000 members. Now, the organization says that it is not accurate to claim that there is any regression on support for transgender youth care from the organization.

The organization also disputes Singal’s portrayal of a 2025 letter written by Katherine McGuire to the Federal Trade Commission. In his piece, Singal claims the APA “cautioned that gender dysphoria diagnoses could be the result of ‘trauma-related presentations’ rather than a trans identity,” and noted that “co-occurring mental health or neurodevelopmental conditions (e.g., depression, anxiety, autism spectrum disorder) … may complicate or be mistaken for gender dysphoria,” framing this as evidence that the organization is retreating from its 2024 policy supporting transgender youth care. That interpretation is incorrect, according to an APA representative, who says the letter does not contradict the organization’s 2024 position and does not represent a regression in its support for evidence-based transgender care.

The FTC letter sent by APA Services was not saying that transgender identity can be caused by autism or depression. Rather, it was describing what any competent psychologist does with any patient: assess the whole person, including whether conditions like depression or anxiety are present. The letter does not say that depression or anxiety or autism cause gender dysphoria; it says that psychologists are careful about not mistaking these conditions for gender dysphoria. Notably, the letter was written in direct response to the Trump administration’s FTC, which had accused gender-affirming care providers of deceiving consumers, and McGuire was explaining that psychologists conduct thorough, individualized assessments—not that the organization’s position on care or “causes” of being transgender had changed. Had McGuire not indicated that psychologists were making these determinations, the FTC would likely then accuse the organization of not investigating its crank theories on gender dysphoria.

You can view the letter here:

American Psychological Assocation Response To Ftc Rfi Gender Affirming Care 9 26 2025 Signature (1)

323KB ∙ PDF file

Download

“The 2024 policy statement and the 2025 FTC letter are consistent. The 2024 statement reflects the organization’s policy position on access to care. The 2025 FTC letter describes what competent psychologists do in individual clinical practice: they do not make generalized claims to families but instead provide individualized, evidence-based assessment. Both documents reflect APA’s consistent commitment to evidence-based psychological care,” says the representative.

The American Psychological Association’s reaffirmation of its support for transgender youth health care is significant. The organization is among several reportedly under FTC investigation as part of a broader effort to pressure medical bodies to retreat from transgender youth care. It is also facing a coordinated pressure campaign from anti-trans activists like Jesse Singal and outlets such as The New York Times, both of which have repeatedly sought to cast doubt on established standards of care. That context makes Singal’s portrayal especially consequential. Readers were left with the impression that the APA was backtracking. According to the organization itself, that is false. What Singal presented as evidence of “cracks in the wall” was yet another attempt to manufacture doubt around the professional consensus supporting transgender youth care.

Erin In The Morning is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a subscriber.