Trans Women in the Loo

(I’d say trans people, but let’s face it, most of the people behind these bathroom bills give much more of a fuck about trans women because ZOMG penis then for trans men. But the risks of assault and arrest for everyone is shitty.)

Thanks to encouragement by some groups for cis men to walk into the ladies room and show off their best helicopter dick, here is a short list of things conservative and TERFs think trans women want to do in the loo:

• Whip out their dicks
• Molest ‘real’ women and girls
• Get man cooties all over “women’s” spaces.

 

Here’s what trans women actually want to be able to do in the loo:

• What everyone else is doing.

 

And in case you’re unclear, that’s

• Pee
• Poop
• Wash hands
• Check hair
• Check makeup
• Check clothes
• Change a baby
• Accompany a little kid who needs to pee/poop
• Sit on a toilet seat and cry

 

And hey, because trans women are people too, let’s go for the not so savory things people do in the bathrooms:

• Snort coke
• Smoke weed
• Bone a stranger you just met at the club/bar
• Get into a hair pulling fight with some so-and-so taking up too much space at the mirror
• Drunkenly make new friends they’ll promptly forget
• Puke

 

…And that’s all.  That’s it.  Not so scary, huh?

 

 

I Got Nothing, Y’all

No Charges for Cleveland Police Officers in Shooting Death of 12-Year-Old Tamir Rice.

 

I got nothing but tears and rage right now.  This boy was executed and lied about.  His murders not only walk free, but with badges and jobs intact. Tamir’s mother and sister will have that wound, that loss, for the rest of their lives.

All because our children, our black children, are never treated like children.  A 12-year-old with a toy gun becomes a dangerous armed suspect in the eyes of our racist police system.  And that system becomes judge, jury and executioner in a matter of seconds.  SECONDS.

Look at this child.  LOOK AT HIM.

 

I don’t care if he was tall, I don’t care if the gun didn’t have some sort of “I’m not real” indicator.  I don’t care.  THIS IS A CHILD. And now he is dead, and will have no real justice for his murder.

We have failed him.  As a country, we have failed Tamir.

I’m sorry, kid.  I’m so sorry.

 

 

Peaceful Savages

As I’ve said a lot among friends, if black people were as violent as white people think we were, this entire shit would have been burned to the ground long before I was even born.

But we’re not, no matter how many dogs get sicced on us or hoses are sprayed at us, or tear gas canisters are thrown at us, rubber bullets shot, fully armed to the teeth cops being intimidating, we don’t bite back.

(sure, there have been riots, but never in direct response to being threatened, and aren’t the focus of this post)

We have been insulted to our faces, told our hair isn’t acceptable, our skin too dark. White supremacists burn crosses, ride confederate flag festooned trucks past our children’s birthday parties, walk in our neighborhoods openly carrying their guns, mock our dead, and very rarely do these people get popped in the fucking mouth.

And it’s not just black folks. Due to the recent attacks in Beirut and Paris, people are tripping over themselves to see who can be the biggest Islamaphobic douchenozzle.

Then act surprised when white people start fucking with anyone in a hijab or on a prayer mat. Mosques and Muslim owned businesses have been vandalized and anyone wearing a scarf on their head is a potential target for verbal or physical abuse by complete strangers.

And through it all, there is no retaliation.

I could go on with examples; pro-choicers NOT going after pro-lifers in the wake of violence, queer people NOT going after straights after a bashing, and so on and so forth. You wanna know why?

Think about what that would look like. Especially in the media, who looks for just about any excuse to demonize the opressed. Already keyed up bigots, who who only need little reason, no matter if true or not, wanna act out so badly.

I’m gonna quickly point out here the desperation of white racists to start a Race War by taunting black people in so many ways, waiting for us to respond in kind, so they can go “see, these niggers ARE violent and dangerous”, and justify killing us. It’s quite literally the “I’m not touching you” game that ends up in someone getting hit.

And deep down, we all know that. So we refrain. We act with peace. We may make a fuss, but we don’t go eye for an eye.

We can’t go eye for an eye.

And you need to understand what a further burden that is. To be taunted and abused and knowing damn well you can’t respond in kind. You have to be the bigger person while bigots get to act all kind of ways.

That is some hard shit. We need our allies to know that. So the next time you want to say something like “Well, if that was me, I would…”, stop and think.

And then shut the fuck up.

Counter-Protesting: How Not To Fucking Help

The issue of counter protesting at women’s clinics can be a dicey one.  Some places, like the Pink House in Mississippi, do it very fucking well, with clinic defenders at the front lines.  Others would rather that not happen, at least not during clinic hours.

I’m of the latter, I feel that having too many voices yelling would further upset and confuse patients, and it’s my job as an escort is to be very aware of the patients’ safety and comfort.  So far, among escorts, anyway, we’ve most decided to live and let live, do what works for your location, etc.

But…

BUT…

BUT…

There is a way to fuck it up.

1. Be a white dudebro who apparently has never interacted at a clinic before.
2. Be doing it less for the comfort and safety of the patients and more for attention.
3. Make the goddamn escorts uncomfortable.
4. Assault the fucking protesters.

So, Nik Stevenson (read down to the updates to see what the fucking problem is) and Nik Stevenson AKA “Judo Jesus” (yes, same guy), you’re not helping.  Go away.  Go FAR the fuck away from any clinic.

This isn’t for you.  Yes, being spat on by a protester IS assault – but if you had any understanding of how these fuckers operate, which the escorts could have happily told you if you weren’t such a fucking toolbox towards them, confrontation is WHAT THEY FUCKING WANT, especially a physical one.  They want someone to give them that sort of attention.  I don’t even want to think about the buzzing around on social media by pro-lifers about how one of their own was assaulted by one of those pro-aborts.  What you should have done, what you have the privilege of doing since you’re the not the one who either have an appointment to get to OR be an escort who is iffy about getting their name on a police report, is CALL THE POLICE.  REPORT THEIR ASSES.

Are you actually here to help patients? Obviously fucking not. So go away.  Stay away.

This is why I don’t want a bunch of angry counter-protesters showing up.  Y’all don’t know even how to act. You seem to think that just showing up and yelling at the protesters is going to do anything.

It will not. It only makes them feel more empowered. It might make you feel like you’ve done something really important, but let me assure you…YOU ARE NOT. You really want to help, show up, put on a vest, stand with us (or again, learn from groups who are already doing a fine job of C-P, like the aforementioned Pink House). Otherwise, this is more about you than the patients, and we don’t need you.

Look, if you wanna play in this game, learn the rules or stay the fuck home.

Mashable Tries To Help

How to confront friends who wear offensive Halloween costumes.

Not a bad list, but I feel it’s missing something.  And since I’m a helper, allow me to assist:

7. Say “What the fuck is wrong with you?” 

If you’re at the store with said friend, say it loud. If friend is showing you the costume at home, say it loud.  If they show up wearing it, say it loud every time you run into them while they’re wearing it.

Bonus help: “Accidentally” spill your drink on the costume.  Now they have to change. How helpful of you! You’ve prevented personal embarrassment of being the friend of a complete toolbox.

At Least SOMEONE’s Being Honest…

I even made it bigger so you could get a good look.

We knew this.  We’ve always known this, and they’ve always denied it.

Sometimes you gotta argue them down to this point.

But it’s “nice” to have one of these assholes actually ADMIT that they’re anti-“sex for pleasure and not for making of the babies”.

It makes it easier to mock them, yes. But I worry.  I worry that even if every single anti-choice flapping lips admitted this, it wouldn’t matter to anyone on the fence.  Anyone who is pro-choice, but not willing to admit it (“I’m pro-life, but I wouldn’t stop anyone from having one themselves”, those people), won’t care to stop listening to these toolboxes.

But it’s nice to hear one of them admit just how pie in the sky their wants are.  People have been having sex for recreation since they figured out what sex was.  You can close down every Planned Parenthood and other reproductive health clinics, promote abstinence education at every school in the nation, make divorce illegal, make abortion a capital fucking crime, and ban every type of contraception except for Natural Family Planning, and people are gonna have sex for recreation.

Good luck stopping that.  You’re gonna fucking need it.

Cry Moar, White Feminists (TM)

How did I miss this opinion piece on Ebony, entitled “You Ain’t the ONLY Woman: The White Cis Grasp on Womanhood Is Failing“.  Reading it made me want to raise a fan and wave it like we were at a summer revival. Praise Intersectionality! Hallelujah Actual Sisterhood! Preach that good word, Pastor Lesli-Ann Lewis, and pass the collection plate!

Especially this line:

If the White man’s burden was to bring the “savage” to civilization, then in 2015 the White woman’s burden is to teach the rest of us bumbling half-humans how to be women.

Ohh, I felt that deep in my non-existent soul!

Given the repeated historical nonsense that comes every single time White Feminism (TM) and everyone else clash, this article was wonderfully timed, even back in June.  It’s still needed.  All of the other articles addressing this is needed.  This article you’re reading right now is needed *dusts off massive ego*.  Why?

Because the same shit keep happening, y’all.  White Feminism (TM) keeps trying to hold on to the mic and hold up all the seats at the table, saving the space for only those who are like them – or who agree with them.  And the rest of us ain’t asking for space anymore.  We’re snatching the mic, we’re sitting down and they will just have to deal.

Sadly, they’re doing more whining than dealing.

White Feminism, when we say “take all of the seats”, we don’t mean “and leave no room for anyone”. You’re not the only “women” around.  Your feminism ain’t the only one in town, and if the choice is your way or the highway, we’re miles ahead of you, leaving you in a cloud of exhaust. Non-white women exist and are sitting down, trans women are sitting down, poor women are sitting down, non-college educated women are sitting the fuck down and you WILL hear us.  We will drown out your ridiculous bullshit, and you will HAVE to deal with us.

It’s kinda sad, really.  The day I read that TERFs who are lesbians believe that trans lesbians are just men who want to force their penises into ‘women’s’ spaces, it took all day to find my eyes, as they rolled out of my head.  I had another loss of eyes when I read various complaints by white women that non-white women are being mean to them when they fuck up.  The rage of reading things like “lynch mob” and “witch hunts” made finding the fuckers a lot easier.  I just felt for the burning, burning heat.

The whitewashing of the presence of minorities from history, like in Stonewall and Suffragette (really, any mention of black or Indian suffragettes?), will be pointed out and screamed about, because it’s bullshit.  Yes, being aware of history is important, but not at the cost of leaving us out.

I remember reading the memory of a 16 year old trans girl being surrounded and threatened and berated by a group of “womyn” at the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival (may it rot in pieces), and it’s the perfect analogy.  A group of marginalized people spitting venom at one person who is even more marginalized for existing.  TERFs who treat trans people like shit, who can’t even STFU when others use inclusive terms for reproductive rights, are spitting venom at a more marginalized group.

(which is ironic, given that more inclusive language is more for the benefit of trans MEN and non-binary folk with uteruses. But any reason to shit on trans women is valid, I guess)

We have white women with blogs and speaking gigs and published book and articles and shit whining and complaining about non-white women with Twitter accounts.  And THEY’RE the victims, screaming into the mic while keeping it away from the ‘horde’ of loud uncouth women who are being “rude”.

Yeah, because calling out your bullshit is so rude.  Don’t we know that we’re supposed to sit quietly and smile?

Lewis also points out the blatant hypocrisy when it comes to sexuality.  White women “explore despite the male gaze”, non-white women “cater to the male gaze”. Beyonce can pose in front of a fucking lit sign saying “FEMINIST”, be a great role model for young girls, an awesome wife and mother to a beautiful child, but because she signs about sexy things and dances sexy, oh noes, she’s not.

Don’t get me started on Nicki Minaj.  Please. We’d be here all day and I have to go save Tamriel again.

What really gets me is that while all of this is happening, White Women (TM) still claim victimhood.  Second Wavers are crying victimhood when the next gen doesn’t give them the respect they think they’re due.  Yes, they did amazing work in their time, but this ain’t their time anymore.  That’s why there’s a Third Wave, you see.  Either catch up or be left in the dust.  You’re not the fucking victims because time has changed. We are more marginalized than you.  We don’t need your help to “feminism” properly.

Cis women, you’re not the victim when trans people call you out on your bullshit. They are more marginalized than you.  They don’t need your help to “feminism” properly.

White women, you’re not the victim when non-white women call you out on your bullshit. They are more marginalized than you.  They don’t need your help to “feminism” properly.

Do I need to go on?

Say it again, Ms. Mock:

Saturday Storify: Did You Miss Them?

It’s been a while since I escorted, thanks to two months of mental and financial fuckery (things have smoothed over with my public assistance, thanks much), so I returned last week, just in time for 40 Days of Life.  Again.

I don’t understand why.  It’s not even Lent.  Do they need attention that badly.

Don’t answer that.  I already know the answer. Yes.

Since WordPress doesn’t play nice with Storify, here’s the link.  I hope you enjoy!

Invoking “Black Lives Matter” – DON’T DO IT

I didn’t want to get involved in the whole “Ophelia Benson reveals her TERFy self” nonsense, given how it’s hurt and tore through my friends lists.

I really didn’t.

The current flap has been dutifly and wonderfully documented by some fine folks and former colleagues of hers, here, here, here, and here.  I’m with them.  “Correcting” an abortion provider for using more inclusive language is shitty, petty, and downright trolly.  So that’s handled and I don’t have to go in about it. Thanks, y’all.

But I AM gonna mention the fucked up comparison of inclusive language to “All Lives Matter”.

What the fuck?

Seriously, what the fuck?

If this wasn’t the most White Feministy of White Feminist (TM) nonsense, I’d eat my hat.  As soon as I get a hat.

This isn’t the first time a white person has tried to invoke BLM/ALM for some other bullshit, but damnit, it’s getting tiring.  You can’t compare a movement about black people being shot, beaten, killed in the streets by cops to whatever bullshit bugbear that’s bothering you.  You can’t.  Because it’s comparing apples to a fucking grenade with the pin pulled. Stop it.

It’s not the same, it’s not remotely the same, and it reminds me why I’m always wary of white feminists who seem to forget that whole “intersectionality” thing. You’re not on my side.  I don’t want you on my side.  Our struggle isn’t fodder for your bullshit.

(Mod Mistress Note: We’re not rehashing any old arguments about “who/what/when/where/why is a TERF or whatever “here. Try it and watch your comment not even make it through modding, kay?)

Mourning Someone Else’s Choice: Pro-Life Selfiness

So, last night the hashtag #ShoutYourAbortion trended, thanks to one Lindy West, with people declaring that they’ve had an abortion and don’t feel the first lick of shame about it.  It was a challenge to the pro-lie of the miserable sad wretch who regrets their abortion and cries at hypothetical birthdays, either that or they never, never, never reveal such a shameful secret.

Because abortions are something to be ashamed of, right?

BLEH.

I have never had an abortion, though it’s the plan should the unfortunate happen, so I started Tweeting supportive stuffs, like the website for Exhale, an organization where people can call and talk about their experiences without judgement and a guilt trip. Because who needs that shit when you’re already working out how you feel about the abortion you’ve had, right?

Yes, I know, I’m acknowledging that not everyone skips out of the clinic afterwards (well, given how the procedure actually works, there’s probably very little skipping anyway). It can be an easy decision for some, it can come to be an easy decision for others, and for even more others it’s complicated.  Because this is how reality works.

As I said up top, it trended wildly.

There were pro-lifers on the hashtag of course, yelling out the same shit and boy oh boy do I wish I screenshotted the best/worst.  There were people going “use birth control!” right above or below someone Tweet about how their BC failed.  There were calls to come to Jesus or God contrasting with condemnations of burning in hell. The usual deluge of fetal snuff pictures, ‘whores’ left and right, and the Pro-Choice Butts* were out in force.

Usual stuff.  But what got me all writey/ranty was the number of people who seemed…entitled?…to someone else’s choice.  Here’s a Tumblr post to illustrate my point:

Say WHAT?

You read that right, cats and kittens. Some Nonny has the sads because some stranger may have aborted their future wife.

Again, I wish I had screenshots, but the number of people saying crap like “did you tell your children about the sibling they’ll never play with” or “my best friend had an abortion and now my kid doesn’t have a best friend”  or “that’s one child I couldn’t adopt” or “I’ll mourn your baby FOR you”  was mind boggling.  My flabber was gasted.

And then I got pissed.  Because for all the claims that people who have abortions are selfishly prioritizing their lives over the ‘baby’ inside them, these oxygen thieves have the nerve to stake a claim on the reproduction of complete strangers. What the entire fuck is that about?

It shows, once again, that this isn’t about the pregnant person at all.  They really do care more about the ‘baabbbee’ than anything else. Nothing else matters, not the situation, finances, relationship status, or fucking health of the walking uterus.  Nope, everything will work out perfectly once you decide to keep that baby, by gum.  As you know, pregnancy is super easy to endure for everyone, especially when you didn’t want to be pregnant in the first place. And just think, you’re providing some rando with a potential friend or even a spouse! Isn’t that amazing! Praise Jesus! Diapers for everyone!

And they still want to claim that WE’RE the selfish ones.  Get that shit out of my face.

I needed an excuse to use this gif again.

(EDIT: realized I didn’t address that aside)*”Pro-Choice Butts” are my name for those who have to have conditions for their support of the right to an abortion, usually starting their sentences with “I’m pro-choice, but”.  I don’t think they’re actually pro-choice, and are more like judgmental assholes.