This is long, and maybe too long for most people. It took me three days to watch it all. But it is even handed, it is informative, it is well documented, and it is truly how I and so many feel. I loved TYT, but about the time Cenk decided to run for office and gave a lot of control over the company / show to Anna, I noticed a shift / change in both hosts and the company direction. Cenk became very bitter and anti-democratic party, while Anna became overly more assertive on every show. When Cenk came back so bitter from being what he felt was unfairly treated by the democrats but others felt was him trying to claim a position without doing the work others had done before him Anna started talking over him, interrupting him, not letting him finish his sentences. But at the same time if he tried to interrupt her she got very vocal about it and wouldn’t tolerate it. She was now in charge and she wanted the world to know it. It showed how she felt about her position, she had the authority and say, so don’t disagree with her. That was very off-putting for me a long time viewer and supporter of the show. But then Cenk’s constant vitriol against the Democratic Party started to interfere with his reporting on Biden. Right from the start he wanted Biden to do the impossible and when he did not Cenk couldn’t even give him credit for what he did get accomplish. Cenk being a bombastic fighter spent two years demanding Joe Biden attack and call out Joe Manchin and pushed for the most virulent attacks on him. Which would have lost the democrats the control of the Senate and stopped any left leaning judge appointments. Then Cenk got more bitter towards Biden and other progressive members of congress who did not throw the disruptive bombs he wanted to destroy the party, so he openly attacked the very groups he started along with attacking all progressives. What crossed the line for me what his attacks on Biden and openly trying to promote primary challengers to him talking up fringe candidates, knowing historically any time a sitting president was primaried they lost, giving the other party the win. He did not care, his bitter anger was more important to him. He kept up his now constant attempts to tear down Biden to the point he is doing the work of a republican challenger for president. I wrote that when I canceled my long time membership, that Cenk was doing the work of the Republican Party in tearing down and maligning Biden. This hard right turn of Anna’s and Cenk’s weirdly not even willing to listen to any criticism of her was the last straw for me. He is not even really addressing the issue that Anna made as the start of this problem, and keeps misrepresenting it. If Anna wants to be called woman that is great, if trans women demand to be called women that is great and everyone would do as they ask. But there are transmen with parts that medical people need to address and that are on medical forms / question forms. It was pointed out so often that no one in conversation referred to Anna as a “birthing person” but she still took offense to the term even existing. She was demanding a medical term to be inclusive not exist because she felt it diminished her as a female. Total right wing maga fundamentalist thinking. This is entirely a case of two people drinking their own Kool-Aid on their own importance and getting called out for it. Their egos have gotten in the way of the work they were doing. I can no longer support them as they are, and I hope people will watch this well researched and documented video. Hugs
Cenk Uyger, Ana Kasparian, and The Young Turks have had a history of scandals and controversies throughout the existence of the network. I want to talk about that history, as well as the events leading up to their recent meltdowns on the podcast circuit and Twitter.
A growing network of foreign organisations are pouring hundreds of millions of euros into “culture war” groups campaigning to roll back LGBTQ+ rights across Europe, European lawmakers have warned.
In a resolution published earlier this month, the European Parliament raised the alarm about foreign interference in all democratic processes in Europe,pointing out that most of the foreign funding originates from Russia and the US.
This foreign interference, coupled with disinformation and numerous attacks perpetrated by malicious foreign actors, is predicted to increase in the lead-up to the European Parliament elections in 2024, becoming more sophisticated in nature.
MEPs flagged that at least 50 organisations now fund anti-gender activities — opposing what they call gender ideology.
“Europe is seeing a growing number of anti-gender movements, specifically targeting sexual and reproductive health, women’s rights and LGBTIQ+ people,” the EU parliamentary report read.
“Such movements proliferate disinformation in order to reverse progress in women’s rights and gender equality. These movements have been reported to receive millions of euros in foreign funding, either public or private, including from Russia and the US.”
Funding and modus operandi
The strategies employed by these foreign actors have evolved over time, due to increasing funding and intensifying disinformation campaigns, human rights observers have warned.
Members of the US far-right and the Russian Orthodox Church, two major players of the anti-gender movement, have joined forces to ramp up funding to Europe-based ultra-traditionalist actors with a specific focus on targeting LGBTQ+ rights, according to sources who agreed to speak to Euronews on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Over the past decade, key Christian right organisations, usually funded by private individuals linked to far-right and libertarian causes in the US, and Russian oligarchs have established a network of agencies set up in human rights institutions across Europe to carry out anti-gender diplomacy and infiltrate positions of power in member states.
Other tactics include abusive lawsuits intended to suppress, intimidate and silence critics (SLAPPS), money and reputational laundering, physical harassment, sending paid fight squads to LGBTQ+ marches or drag stores, hacking journalists’ devices with the Pegasus software and using troll farms spreading disinformation against LGBTQ+ activists.
And the movement is gaining momentum with more organisations from other countries, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Vatican City, closing ranks in their anti-LGBTQ+ lobbying and funding.
Their usual targets include minorities in unstable countries where they can exploit polarisation to radicalise the political debate and fuel violence, sources said.
Undermining the case for EU membership
Georgia’s gay pride festival on 8 July is the latest LGBTQ+ event to have fallen victim to foreign interference.
A mob of up to 2,000 anti-LGBTQ+ protestersfrom the Russian-affiliated group Alt Info, stormed Tbilisi’s festival in an attack described by Pride’s director Mariam Kvaratskhelia as “pre-planned”.
“I definitely think this [disruption] was a pre-planned, coordinated action between the government and the radical groups … We think this operation was planned in order to sabotage the EU candidacy of Georgia,” she told Reuters.
Members of Alt-Info, an ultra-conservative TV broadcaster with close ties to the Georgian Orthodox Church, had already disrupted Tbilisi Pride in 2021. Since its foundation as a conservative media platform in 2019, the group has tried to expand its political influence by creating an alternative party to both the governing Georgian Dream and opposition United National Movement. Among its stated goals is pursuing closer relations with Russia.
The former Soviet republic’s path to EU candidacy has been slowed by deeply polarised politics and the excessive influence of vested interests in economic, political and public life, alongside its territorial dispute with Russia in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions.
And the cancellation of its Pride festival could deal yet another blow to its EU aspiration.
Roberta Metsola, the President of the European Parliament, condemned the “violent disruptions”, saying “anti-LGBTIQ rhetoric, disinformation and violence have no place in these debates”. The counter-protests represented a violation to the EU’s freedom of expression and right to peaceful assembly, the EU Ambassador for Gender & Diversity tweeted.
Divide and conquer
The same tension has broken out across Western Balkan countries where leaders have struggled to walk a fine identity and political line between anti-LGBTQ+ religious nationalist movements and pro-LGBTQ+ Europeanising public opinion.
While these countries generally have high levels of political and public support for joining the EU, their progress towards membership has stagnated over the past decade.
Religious nationalism has posed a significant challenge, as leaders from the Serbian Orthodox church, the Catholic church, and Islamic authorities have rallied behind their targeting of LGBTQ+ rights and formed coalitions with conservative political parties.
In recent years, anti-LGBTQ+ actions have turned more violent, with physical assaults by ultranationalist protesters on attendees of the Bosnia and Herzegovina Pride in March of this year, the Belgrade Pride in 2022 and the Zagreb Pride in 2021.
The controversy surrounding a veto that would have recognised same-sex unions in Serbia in 2021 is just another example of the growing conservative backlash against LGBTQ+ rights taking hold in Western Balkan countries.
‘The tip of the iceberg’
Yet, this trend is not unique to Western Balkan countries.
In 2021, the European Parliamentary Forum for Sexual and Reproductive Rights (EPF) unearthed more than $707.2 million (€600 million) worth of anti-gender funding from the United States, the Russian Federation, and Europe, specifically targeting LGBTQ+ rights across Europe between 2009 and 2018.
The wide-ranging report, which examined 117 anti-gender funding actors active in Europe, insisted the findings were only the “tip of the iceberg” as half of them — 63 — had no existing financial data.
“Of course there are enormous data gaps that cannot be filled at the moment, so $700 million is really the tip of the iceberg of how big this anti-gender movement is,” said EPF’s secretary Neil Datta.
According to Evelyne Paradis, executive director of ILGA-Europe, the anti-gender movement’s efforts to further polarise public discourse is dragging pro-democracy governments into fuelling prejudice and hatred towards LGBTQ+ people.
“The practice of scapegoating LGBTQ+ people is starting to be instrumentalised by both the pro-democracy and the anti-democracy sides. If you make it a marker of how good you are, then you’re creating this divide,” she told Euronews.
“This [growing polarisation] is not helping what should be a healthier, calmer conversation. What’s happening at the moment is the complete opposite.”
Instead, Paradis said pro-democracy governments need to move forward with their progressive agenda and steer clear of the perverse effects of foreign-funded polarisation.
“We’re all in reaction mode and it’s very hard to resist and be in a pro-active mode. Governments need to pass through the anti-gender movement’s negative agenda and keep on pushing our positive agenda. That’s where the strategy of the opposition is working – it’s really pushing everybody in the reactive mode.”
Thank you Ten Bears. Seriously important information in an easy to hear and understand format delivered by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. Damn well worth listening to the entire 9 minutes, because we are damning ourselves by what we are doing. Hugs
Tonight, a judge ruled in favor of the 15 women who sued Texas after the state’s abortion ban put their health and lives at risk. Travis County District Judge Jessica Mangrum issued a temporary injunction that will stop the law from being enforced against doctors who provide abortions using “good faith judgement” that a pregnancy is unsafe for the pregnant person, or that a fetus is unlikely to survive.
Texas will definitely appeal; but for now, people in the state with dangerous or doomed pregnancies should be able to get care.
I am so grateful for the women who laid their pain bear in public for the chance to change this law just a little—but so distressed that they had to fight so hard to be given this bare minimum of humanity. It makes me feel a bit ill, to be honest, that these are the kinds of ‘wins’ we have to hope for.
The lawsuit, brought by the Center for Reproductive Rights, required women to relive the horrors they were forced to endure because of the state’s abortion ban. One woman, Samantha Casiano—who was forced to give birth despite the fact that her baby had anencephaly and was missing parts of her brain and skull—ended up vomiting while recounting her experience. She said that talking about what happened “just makes my body remember and it just reacts.”
Lawyers defending the state, meanwhile, were extraordinarily cruel. One attorney said, “Plaintiffs simply do not like Texas’ restrictions on abortion.” Another not only frequently interrupted as the women spoke about their experiences, she also asked each one individually if Attorney General Ken Paxton had personally denied them an abortion. Plaintiff Amanda Zurawski, who nearly died after being denied an abortion, said, “I survived sepsis and I don’t think today was much less traumatic than that.”
There is a reason Texas tried to stop these women from telling their stories: there is no arguing with their experiences, no turning away from the horror these laws have caused. As happy as I am for the people in Texas who might be able to get the care they need as a result of this decision, I keep thinking about Terry—the young woman I spoke to in June—and how this ruling came too late to help her:
An American Nightmare: Young, pregnant & living in Texas
I love the rational well thought out response to this guy, who was so stunted early in his mental growth by religion, who claims it is more scientific and less magical to say god created the entire universe per the biblical creation, rather than in his view that the idea of the big bang which calls pure magic. Hugs
Today, we look at a video from a podcast in which Matt Powell debunked us all. So it’s time to give up and go home.
Very interesting, wonderful calm delivery. Informative. Well reasoned with out a lot of science or medical jargon, just cutting through the bullshit. Towards the end she even addresses those that still claim gametes are the real determining factor of a persons sex. I enjoyed this. Hugs
TERFs say the LGBTQ community is harming women by erasing biological sex. But can they even agree on what biological sex IS?
Yet the governor is focused on wiping out woke, and making the LGBTQ+ disappear from society. I guess pushing his religious conservative ideology on all students is more important that solving the problems in the state, or helping the people. Hugs
CDC Issues Warning On Rise In Florida Leprosy Cases
Health officials say that cases of leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, are surging in Central Florida. In a news release Monday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that Central Florida has accounted for 81 percent of reported cases in the state and almost one-fifth of reported cases nationwide.
Authorities said that several cases in Central Florida have demonstrated no clear evidence of zoonotic exposure or traditionally known risk factors. They also noted that they have reported a case of lepromatous leprosy in the area in a male resident without risk factors for known transmission routes.
Florida, USA, has witnessed an increased incidence of leprosy cases lacking traditional risk factors. Those trends, in addition to decreasing diagnoses in foreign-born persons, contribute to rising evidence that leprosy has become endemic in the southeastern United States.
Travel to Florida should be considered when conducting leprosy contact tracing in any state. Prolonged person-to-person contact through respiratory droplets is the most widely recognized route of transmission.
A high percentage of unrelated leprosy cases in the southern United States were found to carry the same unique strain of M. leprae as nine-banded armadillos in the region, suggesting a strong likelihood of zoonotic transmission.
A recent systematic review analyzing studies conducted during 1945–2019 supports an increasing role of anthroponotic and zoonotic transmission of leprosy.
However, Rendini et al. demonstrated that many cases reported in eastern United States, including Georgia and central Florida, lacked zoonotic exposure or recent residence outside of the United States.
Given those reports, there is some support for the theory that international migration of persons with leprosy is a potential source of autochthonous transmission.
Cases of leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, are surging in Central Florida, according to health officials. https://t.co/TPF2nWvwPJ
Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, is an age-old bacterial disease that affects the skin and nerves. Here's what to know about symptoms to treatment. https://t.co/02cGJ9Clax
This video is somewhat technical medically, but understandable by nonmedical people. The Professor speaks rather fast. He is going over briefly medical studies that show the brains of trans sexual people appear to have the structure of the identified as sex instead of the one assigned at birth. He talks about how the studies were repeatable, and they were backed up by controls to rule out different causes. It is becoming more clear just as it did with same sex attraction being inborn and not an illness to be cured, the same is true of transgenderism. No wonder the teaching of these medical advancements and knew understandings terrify the fundamentalist religious right and why they are removing all advanced placement classes that talk about gender and sexual orientation. The ones demanding we retain only the ideas of the past, that we accept only what was understood even a century ago are unable to tolerate growth in what we understand. At one time mental illness was thought of as demon possession. I have little doubt that those who still push conversion therapy and others who think you can pray away sickness will change their minds even when science proves them wrong. Some people still fight against evolution and think creationism is legitimate. Hugs
This is a snippet from ‘Lecture 15: Human Sexual Behavior I’ of Stanford’s ‘Introduction to Behavioral Biology’ given by prof. Robert Sapolsky.
Students in teacher Kelly Meahl’s (right) AP American Literature class at Seminole High School listen during a lesson at the school in Sanford, Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2008. AP classes are popular in Florida, but Thursday the College Board said the state has effectively banned AP psychology because its lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity violate state laws and rules. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel)
Florida will not allow public school students to take Advanced Placement psychology because the course includes lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity, topics forbidden by the state, the College Board said Thursday.
The state, however, said the College Board was “playing games” and that the course could be offered. However, the Florida Department of Education had previously told the College Board it would need to sign an “assurance document” that AP psychology, and other AP courses, met Florida laws and rules.
The College Board would not do that and said to offer its course in Florida would mean dropping sexual orientation and gender identity – key topics in a college-level psychology course. As a result, it advised school districts not to make it part of their schedule for the coming school year.
That means the class schedules for thousands of students are likely up in the air now, with school starting Aug. 10 in most districts. About 5,000 students in Central Florida and about 28,000 statewide took AP psychology last year.
A spokeswoman for Lake County schools said the district would not offer AP psychology this year, based on guidance from the College Board and the education department. The district will be giving students options to take other college-level psychology courses that do not include the banned topics, Sherri Owens said in an email.
Orange County Public Schools sent messages late Thursday to parents of students enrolled in AP psychology, telling them the class cannot be offered because of “select content” that isn’t allowed by Florida rules and because the “College Board requires educators to teach the entire curriculum for an AP course for college credit.”
With AP psychology no longer an option, OCPS schools are “working to identify alternative options for your child’s schedule,” the message said.
Other Central Florida districts did not immediately respond to questions about their plans for AP psychology.
Cassie Palelis, an education department spokeswoman, said other “advanced course providers,” such as the International Baccalaureate program, had “no issue” with offering a college-level psychology course in Florida, and that the College Board should do the same.
“The Department didn’t ‘ban’ the course,” Palelis said in an email. “The course remains listed in Florida’s Course Code Directory for the 2023-24 school year. We encourage the College Board to stop playing games with Florida students and continue to offer the course and allow teachers to operate accordingly.”
But the College Board said it advised districts not to offer the course because doing so would violate state law or, if altered, the requirements of the class.
“We are sad to have learned that today the Florida Department of Education has effectively banned AP Psychology in the state by instructing Florida superintendents that teaching foundational content on sexual orientation and gender identity is illegal under state law,” the College Board said in a statement.
“Therefore, we advise Florida districts not to offer AP Psychology until Florida reverses their decision and allows parents and students to choose to take the full course.”
The College Board runs the 40-course AP program, which aims to offer high school students introductory college courses and a chance to earn college credit. AP psychology has been offered in the state since 1993.
According to the College Board, the education department told school superintendents they could offer AP psychology only if lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity were omitted.
But the College Board said those are part of the class and, if deleted, the course will not be able to carry the AP designation.
“This element of the framework is not new: gender and sexual orientation have been part of AP Psychology since the course launched 30 years ago. As we shared in June, we cannot modify AP Psychology in response to regulations that would censor college-level standards for credit, placement, and career readiness.”
Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, called the state’s stance a “terrible decision” that is “100% politically motivated” and will hurt Florida students.
“As someone who graduated from Florida public schools with college credit via AP classes, I know how powerful and effective these classes are and I am sick to my stomach to see what Governor Ron DeSantis and the Republican Party are doing in our state,” she said in a statement.
Equality Florida, the state’s largest LGBTQ civil rights group, also criticized Florida’s decision, saying it was “at war with students and parents, censoring more AP curriculum and denying students the opportunity to earn college credit.”
Earlier this year, Gov. Ron DeSantis rejected the AP African American studies course, saying “woke” topics violated Florida laws.
In May, Florida asked the College Board to review all its courses to make sure they comply with Florida law, which because of new laws and rules, prohibits teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity as well as certain race-related topics.
In June, the College Board told the state it would not alter the AP psychology course, which had been taught at 562 Florida high schools.
Florida has had a two-decade relationship with the College Board and its courses are popular among public school students looking for challenging classes and a chance to early college credit.
In 2021, Florida had the highest AP participation rate in the country and ranked second, behind only Connecticut, for the percentage of high school seniors who had passed at least one AP exam, the Florida Department of Education said. In 2022, Florida high school students took nearly 364,000 AP exams, College Board data shows.
But that relationship soured in the last year, most notably when Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration announced the rejection of the AP African American studies because of content it found objectionable.
DeSantis this spring signed legislation that authorizes the development of a state-based alternative to the AP program and allows students to use the Classic Learning Test in addition to the ACT and SAT to qualify for Bright Futures scholarships. The SAT, the most popular college admission tests in Florida, is made by the College Board.
Florida’s ban on instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity was part of its Parental Rights in Education law, dubbed “don’t say gay” by critics. The law, first applied to kindergarten through second grade, was expanded this year, and a new State Board of Education rule banned those topics in all grades through high school.
That April vote by the board immediately prompted questions about whether schools could keep AP psychology given that those topics could not be taught..
Florida is banning AP psychology courses across the state because of the Don't Say Gay law. pic.twitter.com/xWK46qoaSi
The DeSantis regime is at war with students and parents, censoring more AP curriculum and denying students the opportunity to earn college credit.https://t.co/Zn6p2yYPUQ
Scottie's Playtime 