Voting

I voted! (Did you?)
Barack Obama, though I certainly thought about voting Cynthia McKinney--but all the McCain signs in my area of MI scared me off.
I did vote Green for Senator and a few other local/state elections.
I am very, very irritated with my bf; he couldn't get off his ass and register. At least he is in NY, not a battle-ground. Its one thing if you choose not to vote, its another to just be too fucking lazy/not care.

So, comments will be moderated because I'm off again to my grandparents tomorrow.
At least I conquered the evil fridge-monster last time I was there. (did you know that pickles and pickle juice can mold? well, a jar of pickles and pickle juice can get a cm-thick layer of mold)
This time I need to get my grandma to go through their clothes and choose what to get rid of.


(Pictures!)

(The Last Unicorn is a great movie and book.)

(Pirates vs Ninja? Ninja totally win.)

(Quote from Shawshank Redemption--a totally awesome movie)

(If anyone has decent Ferngully slashy art/fic I will love you forver)

(Yes I totally do)

(Gaming + comic books = two great things, now go great together!)

[picture redacted]

(Guess who plays with GIMP?)

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Link Farming

Lisa and a friend of Ginmar both could use some donations Ginmar's friend could also use some resources for MN sex workers, single moms, etc.

Australia to follow China's lead on censoring the internet? (h/t Ren)

GOP is yet again trying to steal the election, except this time they're also accusing Democrats (& ACORN) of voter fraud (h/t). And yes, this does affect trans* people as well as many other oppressed peoples.

Women's Rights advocate, Esha Momeni, was arrested by the Iranian police. She is a student and she went to Iran to work on her Masters thesis on the Iranian women's rights movement.
The shit with Stonewall and Julie Bindel is still going on. If you're in the UK near London and can get to the demo, please go and support trans* people.

(from transe-generation, which seems to be down atm)

Cedar has some powerful posts about the genocide of trans* people. The medical industry, anti-trans* feminists, various governments, etc have all supported or perpetrated in it.
Yes, saying that trans* people should be morally mandated out of existence or that we should be barred from medically transitioning and instead go through reparative therapy "talking therapies" to cure us of trans*ism (about 8:40 in--you have to download to make it work) is fucking genocide.
We are an oppressed group of people that you want to make not exist; what other word would you use for that? Or do you consider what Zucker is doing a "good start"?
"Talk therapies" DO NOT work to "cure" us; they murder: us, our self esteem, our voices, any chance of happiness...
"Talk therapies" are aversion/reparative therapy just as much as electro-shock therapy was. They have tried everything to "cure" us, from drugs to behavioral to the wrong set of hormones, and all they do is suppress our trans*ism and cause us pain and suffering and death.
We don't need curing. We don't need fixing.
Everything that is "wrong" with us can be fixed by fixing this transphobic, kyriarchal society and allowing us to self-determine what sort of transition is best for ourselves. AKA, we aren't in the wrong, y'all are.
(If anyone reading this has a facebook, you can link this on the wall to prove that Bindel has in fact endorsed "ex-trans" therapy).
And yes, I'm ranting and angry and my tone is totally not polite at all. Perhaps if I make her kri ;_; from my m33n words, Bindel should sue me with her e-laywers/gf. ;_;

(you can easily replace the triangle with the trans* symbol and Christian with radfem)

Fuck the District of Columbia Department of Corrections.

Nix has an awesome excerpt from a lecture he'll be giving on cissexism in criticisms of Boys Don't Cry.

Dear Candidates, there are more colors than "Black, White, and Whatever". "That One" is also quite racist.

Palin is most definitely not an advocate for people with disabilities.

City dwellers and POC are "pro-American" too. I for one, was really moved by Biden's speech.

How black fathers are put on pedestals at the expense of black mothers via Womanist-Musings.

This is an interesting look at [transsexual-centric] transition; especially the difficulties of. One thing I'd like to add on the subject of Mike/Christine's re-transition, is that a number of trans* people have transitioned, re-transitioned, and then later transitioned again (often in a different way and/or to a more genderqueer gender). Most of the stories I've heard said that the pain, danger, etc of transition caused them to re-transition until they were in a better place or were more prepared for the hurdles of transition.

Happy news, I'm going to try Nanowrimo! Yeah, I know I haven't been updating much, but I hope this will get rid of my writers block and apathy.

ETA: I've also slightly edited my definitions post.

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Three Notices

For Immediate Release
September 17, 2008
For information Contact:
Randy Alexander (901) 359-4982
Marsha Katz (406) 544-9504
www.adapt.org
www.duhcity.org

50 Arrested as ADAPT Takes Affordable, Accessible Housing Crisis to Congress

Washington, D.C.—From their base at “DUH City”, groups of ADAPT activists fanned out on the Hill to hit congressional leaders who have responsibility to help solve the housing crisis for low income people with disabilities. Visits to the offices of Rep. Barney Frank (D, MA), a longtime leader on housing issues, and Senators Chris Dodd (D, CT) and Richard Shelby (R, AL), the Chair and ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs resulted in a total of 50 arrests.

“Our first stop was to see Rep. Barney Frank,” said Diane Coleman of ADAPT in Rochester, New York. “ADAPT has been in talks with him over the past year, and early on he told us in no uncertain terms that he could get 500 housing vouchers from HUD that would be targeted to free people with disabilities who live in nursing homes and other institutions. He repeated that promise for months, and we kept trusting his word, and then one day he suddenly says he can’t help us. We were also working with him to get funding that pays for segregated housing redirected to support integrated housing and more vouchers. Sen. Frank arranged a hearing on this funding, and not only did he not invite any people with disabilities to testify, he didn’t even notify us about the hearing. So, today, we decided to confront him on his broken promises and bad faith.”

Shortly after 13 ADAPT members entered Franks’ office, he ordered staff to have them arrested, refusing to even discuss the ADAPT concerns, or strategies to address the housing crisis for low income people with disabilities trapped in institutions for lack of affordable, accessible, integrated housing.

ADAPT went to the offices of Dodd and Shelby because HUD and housing fall under the purview of their committee. Sen. Shelby declined to work with ADAPT saying, “I don’t help people who can’t help themselves.” There were 19 arrests made in Shelby’s office. An aide to Sen. Dodd spoke with ADAPT, but declined to put her remarks on paper after indicating she might be willing to do so. ADAPT conti
nued to wait for the written statement, and eventually nearly 25 people were arrested.

“The TV is full of news about the bank crisis, and the mortgage crisis, and the need for candidates to appeal to middle income people,” said Cassie James, Philadelphia ADAPT organizer. “Meanwhile, people who live on disability benefits, and people who are trapped in nursing homes because of no housing are being held hostage while the government bails everyone else out. Rent has gone up so much, it’s higher than many monthly disability benefits. Not only do us younger people with disabilities need affordable, accessible housing, older people need it, too. This is a crisis, and we need help to solve it.”

ADAPT has been in D.C. since September 13, erecting DUH City, a tent city, on the plaza outside HUD headquarters to bring attention to the situation of the people who have been ignored in this election year- low income people with disabilities. The crises with the economy and housing extend well beyond the middle class, but the Presidential candidates and their parties have seemingly forgotten that fact. Not so, ADAPT.

Press release also posted here and here.

h/t Monica Helms and Lisa

save Bitch Magazine!
as many of you know, a slew of really awesome independent magazine (such as Clamor, Punk Planet, LiP, Kitchen Sink, to name a few) folded over the last year or two as a result of the whole IPA debacle. One of the few to survive was Bitch Magazine, but now they're facing more financial difficulties. So I highly encourage you to find out what you can do to help!

this is from their website:

First the bad news: The print publishing industry as a whole is staring into a void. Across the board, newsstand magazine sales are in a slump, subscriber numbers are down, and paper and postal costs continue to rise. But it's not magazines like US Weekly or Vogue that you'll see disappearing from the newsstands—they have the parent companies and the resources to weather industry ill winds. It's the small, independent magazines like Bitch that will disappear, because the odds are already stacked high against us. And simply put: We need to raise $40,000 by October 15th in order to print the next issue of Bitch.

Now the good news: While it's true that $40,000 is a lot of money, we know the number of you Bitch supporters is in the hundreds of thousands. And we're asking each of you who values independent, nonprofit media and intelligent feminist cultural analysis to contribute what you can to ensure that Bitch thrives. And while we can't say what form Bitch will take in the future (our direction will depend, in part, on your feedback), we can say that we've been hard at work to find an innovative publishing model that will allow us to maintain the spirit and integrity of Bitch while also reflecting the changing world around us.

As a nonprofit, reader-funded media organization, our fate really is—and always will be—in your hands. We don't need a parent company. We just need you!

Once again, the link to donate is:
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/bitchs-fate-is-in-your-hands

help make the weiner dog grow!
-julia

Copy/pasting Lisa's edit:

Edit:

"As Cedar says in comments:

I’m frustrated, though, that 1)the few feminist presses that actually take (white) trans women seriously and publish folks like Serano & Stryker do busted, racist shit (I want there to be good folks and bad folks, damnit!), and 2)that other folks aren’t willing to say yeah it’s not ok, but they’re the only folks that are not doing this other kind of not ok thing… I don’t know, it feels very hierarchy of oppressions to me. …I want them to be held accountable and not have an option to keep doing this shit, AND I want to have the only people who have my back to stick around. (no, feministing does not have our backs)

And Renee:

I have not been reading bitch for long but I do know that it speaks for some women. They did have a good article up about black motherhood not to long ago. I believe that any magazine that is not created for the specific purpose of serving WOC means that white women will be privilege within its pages. Is that in and of itself reason enough to wish that Bitch closes…I don’t think so. It is still far more progressive that say a glamor magazine and we can over time push for it to take a more inclusive approach. When I think of where the best chance of being heard as a WOC is in a traditionally white magazine, I tend to think it would be at places like bitch over say cosmo.

And of course this scandal earlier this year. There may be other stuff (but I’m not clued in at the moment, and google hates me).

And this kind of thing, I think. Although Lisa Jervis fixed that quickly."

24,700 crowns and 5 years
That is what a Romany teenager's life is worth.

"The youth who beat dead with an axe a Romany, aged 14, in a street in Jasov, East Slovakia, was sentenced to five years in prison today, court spokeswoman Marcela Galova told CTK.

Besides, the assailant must undergo psychiatric treatment and pay a compensation of 24,700 crowns to the family. [currency converts at 813 British pounds, or 1,457 US dollars]

The attack was racially motivated, Galova said.

The attack occurred in early last December when a boy, aged 17, attacked the boy outside a house and repeatedly hit his head with an axe.

The Romany boy tried to escape, but as he fell down, the assailant dealt him more blows. He then pushed the body to a brook and left the scene.

He caused to the Romany boy a fracture of skull and brain concussion. The Romany boy died in hospital after a week.

The punishment was proposed by the prosecutor. The court today approved an agreement on guilt and punishment. There is no appeal against the verdict.

The assailant told the court today he regretted the crime, Galova said."
h/t Debi

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RNC Brutality

Theres been a bunch of stuff happening that I really should have been blogging about. I'm sorry, but I just wasn't up to it; loads of stuff offline and personal things, but I'm also getting burned out. I am so tired of the same old cardboard arguments getting thrown at us, the same old trolls sapping our energy, and the constant betrayal for crumbs from the kyriarchy. But I'm not the only one and getting tired of getting shit thrown at you and yours is bound to be tiring. I'll rest when I need it and get back to cleaning when I can. ^.~

So, back to what I should be writing about:

RNC. Blackwater, targeting medics(!!!), illegal arrests (journalists!!!), illegal searches(!!!), police brutality(!!!), fascism, actual assassination plots going unpunished (who cares if Obama gets killed), media blackout, gathering info on undesirables...
Need I go on? (no need, BFP has been awesome)
Of course, everyone is focusing on Palin and her baby's baby and not the Illegal Activity the government is participating in. I don't give a fuck about who is preggers and who wasn't.
I give a fuck that the government is stepping up it's fascism and brutality to levels that are obvious to anyone with eyes. How long until this becomes the common way of treating all citizens? (already intersections of POC, queer/trans* folks, homeless folks, poor folks, etc are treated this way)
How long until running to Canada is more than just talk? How long until the doors of moderate straight, white, cis*, men and women are getting broken down because they said something unpatriotic? How long until the S.O.S. men are real?

PS: petition to drop charges against the journalists.

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War

I just got this video from Lisa; and it's...chilling.
I hope to the Gods that this Scott Ritter is exaggerating or mistaken. I do not want nuclear war; do they not know that MAD stands for Mutually Assured Destruction?


I agree with Lisa; we cannot let McCain win.

Almost forgot, Don't click play if you can't handle disturbing video. Including small children who are injured/dead.

ETA: Sorry Andy, I completely forgot to give a summary I watched the video and thought "I have to post this, I am terrified of this possibility"; parts of the video are text though.
Basically its a bunch of quotes from Republicans and various military higher-ups about how McCain is a loose-cannon and the idea of him being POTUS scares the hell out of them.
I'm not sure about the details or the validity of his statements, but the author Scott Ritter is talking about his book and how the Bush administration has made it easier to use nukes on "enemies".
Theres also a lot of quotes from McCain about how we'll be in Iraq for 100 years and how there will be more wars in the next few years (Iran was mentioned as a specific example). Also about how the "young people" in his audience would be serving in those wars.
This makes me hope that if McCain wins, DADT stays in place; because you just know they will make it impossible for us to get out of McCain's draft otherwise. And yes, McCain would like to reinstate the draft. Fyi, my spiritual beliefs would make me unable to participate in a war unless it was entirely defensive (like, if Canada invaded MI) but because I'm not a Christian, and my beliefs aren't written in some holy book, so theres no way they'd let me out of a draft.

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