syd

Worried about what to say? Bring your personal worries about transphobia being signed into law, and trans friends being excluded from public spaces. You are a living person who deserves dignity. Remind your MP of that. You will also get guidance and brochures from Trans Solidarity Alliance that outlines our demands. This is mine from last year.

Money issues? Trans Solidarity Alliance provides a travel bursary that you can sign up for via the link.

Got a refusal or no response from your MP?  Come anyway! You can request a same-day appointment with your MP through a process called greencarding. They will come and see you if they’re already in Parliament. Even if they don’t, they’re made acutely aware of your cause because you showed up in person. This is my greencard from last year.

Here is the EHRC Code of Practice in full. It's a tough read, but some highlights are:

Organisations can’t provide trans-inclusive, single-sex services, or they risk being sued for discrimination. e.g. domestic violence support for women including trans women, men’s rugby group including trans men (12.68).

Trans people will have nowhere safe to pee. If you’re a trans man, businesses can't allow you to pee in the men's, and you can also be ejected from women’s bathrooms if you’re perceived as a man. Vice versa for trans women. EHRC suggests a ‘third space’ bathroom, which is discriminatory and unworkable for most businesses. (13.130-133)

Sports organisations must exclude trans people from single-sex competitions (13.73).  A women’s only sports competition must exclude trans women because of their biological advantage or face potential lawsuits (13.74), but a trans man who has undergone testosterone treatment can also be excluded based on fairness rules (13.81).

Trans women are stripped of the legal definition of ‘lesbian’, and therefore no longer have legal protections if they’re discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation. (2.50, 2.92).

Here is the Good Law Project's better explanation of the EHRC Code.

shauna is completely isolated in her grief. she is surrounded by people (people she doesn’t know how to trust anymore after her extremely vivid hallucinations) yet she is all alone.

at her breaking point, she beats up lottie.

and to me — this isn’t shauna hurting lottie because she wants to hurt her. it’s a result of all of this pain that has boiled within her, bursting at the seams, begging for release, and when shauna reaches that final trigger — she can’t keep it in any longer.

lottie, in her own way, understands this. she lets shauna take it all out of her. and shauna does.

does she go too far? yes, definitely. but while shauna is in this trance, acting beyond her own control — everyone stands around watching.

shauna is then blamed for the violence she committed. but what about the violence in being permissive? in standing around, watching blood splatter, and allowing lottie to get as injured as she did? there were at least five girls watching — if they banned together they could’ve easily pulled shauna back. but instead, they chose to let lottie suffer.

then afterwards — nobody asks shauna what she meant when she said “you ate my fucking baby, i saw you, you were covered in blood” ! nobody asks where that came from or why she thought they did. the focus obviously has to be on lottie in the immediate following, but if anyone had reassured shauna that that hadn’t happened or helped bring her back to reality — wouldn’t that have done something?

in the aftermath, we see that again, shauna’s anger is gone. she’s terrified and sad, like a confused child. she tries to bring lottie a blanket only to be villainized by gen (“oh, so now you care about lottie?”) but the question was never about wether or not shauna cared. shauna has always cared so much — perhaps to a fault — and nobody around her sees this.

the yellowjackets see her violence, but not how badly she is hurting. they see her anger, but none of the pain beneath it.

when misty says that lottie wants them to use her body if she dies, shauna is one of the first to admit (visibly terrified) that she can’t imagine being in the wilderness without her.

lottie, the person who overstepped boundary after boundary with shauna’s pregnancy. lottie, who tried to force shauna’s baby to be some sort of cult symbol even when shauna kept resisting. lottie, who is pioneering this dangerous religion that shauna wants absolutely nothing to do with.

shauna can’t imagine being there without her.

because shauna still remembers lottie in the before. she still remembers lottie as her friend, her teammate. shauna still has the humanity to see lottie for who she is — not the scapegoat prophet she’s been turned into.

then, everyone decides that lottie’s too valuable to die, so they have the hunt. and when they bring javi back, shauna looks horrified. shell shocked.

because yeah, they all just killed a kid. but days ago, shauna lost her baby boy, and now, the closest thing she had to a little brother is dead too.

so shauna retreats within herself afterwards. we see her sitting in the arm chair silently, just trying to process what she’s done. until her name is called, because even after everything she’s endured — she is still expected to be the butcher.

now, everyone knows that shauna is postpartum. everyone knows she just lost her little boy. yet, nobody ever factors this in. all that they consider is that they don’t want to butcher him. cutting up and preparing a child’s body to eat is a sickening, repulsive task and if shauna knows how to butcher animals — well then, she can do this too. she can hand a 13-year-old boys raw heart to his older brother, days after giving birth to her own baby, and she can deal with it the way she’s dealt with everything else.

it all reaches it’s peak when lottie says the wilderness has chosen a new leader.

in shauna’s mind, obviously it should be her.

after all, she is the only reason any of them are even alive to have a new leader! she starved rather than taking extra rations, leading to her still birth. she butchered javi because nobody else could — getting them through the rest of the winter. she gave everything for them.

but no, natalie is crowned antler queen and shauna is once again, ignored. her sacrifices, her pain, her trauma — all completely overlooked.