Not having it.

An internationally renowned researcher on tax avoidance is believed to be the first person in Britain to lose her job for saying that transgender women are not women.

Maya Forstater, 45, was told by her managers that she had used “offensive and exclusionary” language.

She was accused of “fear-mongering” for tweeting her concerns about government proposals to allow people to legally self-identify as the opposite sex.

Link to the crowdfunding campaign to help with legal expenses as she takes this case to employment tribunal hoping to show that no one should be discriminated against for having gender critical views and talking about them.

Link to these tweets.

Her update.    

Professor of philosophy Kathleen Stock’s call uponother UK academic philosophers and other academics to publicly demonstrate their disciplinary values.

I am not the least bit surprised the judge was a male.

This is MALE PRIVILEGE being used to silence women.

He was given an award by the Financial Times for Women in Business, despite being a part time crossdresser. Also he wear clothes women in Banking would not wear:

She misgendered this gorgeous woman, and did her irreparable psychic harm

I mean, honestly. Who would misgender her?! Who could be so close-minded as to refuse to accept her in a rape crisis shelter, or in a change room, or sharing a room in hospital or hospice?

Lesbian Connection

Bi Women Quarterly

Maize Country Lesbian Magazine

Sinister Wisdom

Carolyn Gage

We gotta get offline and meet in person. Connect with women in person. Meet in spaces that are safe, where you can voice your opinion, shout, sing, laugh, cry, and dance. 

My gay ass:

Just once I’d like the see an historical heroine be asked if it bothers her that she has to wear skirts and have say, “Not really. I couldn’t fit this in a waistcoat.” and just pull out a loaf of bread or something and start eating it right in front of the baffled male lead.

Long answer:

One way to look at the transfiguration of women’s tied-on, capacious pockets of the mid-eighteenth century into the early nineteenth century’s tiny, hand-held reticule is to consider that this transformation occurred as the French Revolution, a time that violently challenged established notions of property, privacy, and propriety. Women’s pockets were private spaces they carried into the public with increasing freedom, and during a revolutionary time, this freedom was very, very frightening. The less women could carry, the less freedom they had. Take away pockets happily hidden under garments, and you limit women’s ability to navigate public spaces, to carry seditious (or merely amorous) writing, or to travel unaccompanied.

Witches Heal is a feminist classic of herbal medicine. Written frankly in the language of oral tradition, it offers information about plants and remedies collected from old wyves’ tales, Native American medicinals, [Asian] and European herbal traditions. Witches Heal is not a field identification guide. It guides women in the medicinal use of plants, allowing them to reclaim their connections to nature’s healing powers.

read pdf here

a practical, accessible starter guide for those interested in herbalism by a very special and wise lesbian healer. rest in peace, billie potts.

Several news sites have set up ways for whistleblowers to contact them securely. Some have very good instructions and guidance on which method you might want to use. Spread it around.

How to leak information to the New York Times

How to leak information to the Washington Post

How to leak information to ProPublica

you should also highly consider secure communication if you’re planning to protest/demonstrate

I’d suggest you look into ACTUAL queer history and not the ahistorical bullshit recently made up by hetkweers and transhets to excuse their invasion of the lgbt community because the history of female he/him lesbians is well established.

He/Him lesbians are what we now see as “transmen” along with other gnc lesbians and were ALWAYS part of the lesbian community before transhet fuckers came in with their homophobic misogynistic cosplay oppression. As long as they’re female and explicitly sexually attracted to other females, they’re lesbian, so no “wow” about that.

It’s literally the only movie I can think of that is based completely around the unheard of “FEMALE gaze.” Granted, while I’m a huge movie buff I’ve not seen every movie ever made. But even so, even if there’s another example of the “female gaze” in cinema that has escaped me it’s still damn impressive that a kids movie from 1997 based on a Jay Ward cartoon from the 60’s managed to turn gender representation in media on it’s fucking ass!

First things first, let’s look at our leading lady and love interest - Ursula, played by Leslie Mann.

Let me just say that while Leslie Mann is adorable and a talented actress, she does look a little less conventional and a little more plain compared to the bombshells that Hollywood likes to churn out. Leslie, in comparison, looks much more like a real women you’d meet on the street. She dresses pretty conservatively and plain throughout the film ; Wearing outfits that are more functional than fashionable for trekking through the jungle, pulling her hair back and so forth. Not that if she was dolled up and more scantily clad it would give her character any less integrity, but can we appreciate how RARE that is in the male dominated industry of film? Just think about all the roads a film about a woman in the jungle COULD have taken but didn’t - no scenes with her clothes strategically ripped or anything! You can say this is a kids movie, intended for children and that’s why the sensuality of the female lead is so downplayed but there are PLENTY of kids movies that handle women in a very objectifying and sexualized manner despite the target audience is pre-pubescent. Like, a disgusting amount. So I don’t think “it’s a kids movie” is why the film doesn’t take ANY, let alone EVERY, opportunity to showcase the main female character’s sex appeal…

…especially considering the sex appeal of the film rests squarely on the well defined shoulders of our male lead, George of the Jungle played by Brendan Fraser in the best god damn shape of his life!

*Homer Simpson Drooling Noises*

Whenever members of the reddit community try to compare the sexualization of women in fiction to the design of characters such as Batman and Superman, I always want to just sit them down and show them this movie. Because THIS is what the female sexual fantasy looks like, and Batman and Superman are male power-fantasies. Look at him - his big blue eyes, his soft hair, his lean, chiseled physique built for dexterity rather than power. He’s wild and free, but gentle. It’s like he fell right out of that steamy romance novel your mom tried to hide from you growing up.

Hell, the whole plot seems to be designed around how damn hot he is! First, for the majority of the film, he wears only a small strip of cloth to cover the dick balls and ass. Everything else is FAIR GAME to drool over for 40 minutes. Then, after he meets Ursula she takes him with her to San Francisco just so we can enjoy him in a well-tailored suit (as seen in the gif set), running around in an open and billowy shirt along side horses while Ursula and all of her friends literally crowd around and make sexual comments about him, and my personal favorite, ditch the loincloth entirely and have him walk around naked while covering his man-bits with various objects while one of Ursula’s very lucky friends oogles him and makes a joke along the lines of “So THAT’S why they call him the ‘KING of the Jungle’…”

And yes, it’s also a very cute and funny little movie. Out of all the movies based on Jay Ward cartoons, it was the most faithful to the fast-paced humor and wit of the original source material (yes even the new Peabody and Sherman movie which honestly I thought was too cutesy-poo.) But that’s not why this movie is popular with the gay community or why we all became women in 1997. It’s just really cool that there’s a film out there where the sensuality of the female form takes a back seat for the oiled up, chiseled, physique of Brendan Fraser (in his prime that is)

he’s non threatening

let’s take a look at his rival - Lyle is a cravat-wearing trust-fund kid (who, interestingly, is into Ursula’s fortune more than her, which kind of makes this a gender-swapped gold-digger thing too). He’s blonde and Ursula’s mom LOVES him. He’s more uncomfortable and less prepared to cope with the jungle than Ursula is, in his pastels and shiny shoes.

But he talks over Ursula, insists he knows what’s best for her, ignores her autonomy. In spite of the fact that Lyle Van de Groot is a rich, educated, social climber who cares deeply about his clothing and appearances he is a point-by-point checklist of unhealthy masculinity in a way that beefy, inarticulate, uneducated George could never be. Ursula is off on her own doing her own thing and Lyle hires two FUCKING POACHERS to track her down in the middle of the jungle while she’s working (or on vacation? It’s never made clear because he interrupts her before she can explain why she went on the expedition). Lyle ignores the local guides, claiming his experience with a bridge in Maui means the bridge they’re on is safe - which leads to a significant injury for one of the guides. He then tells Ursula the guides are conspiring against him, trying to make himself and his poachers seem safe and the Africans who make up the rest of their party seem dangerous.

Check that body language! A post above points out that we’re never worried about Ursula when she’s around George. That’s because Lyle talks to her like this. Look at his aggressive lean! Look at him literally looking down at her! She’s tilted away from him in the least threatening position possible and he’s so aggressive about whatever point he’s making. When he finds her after he pushed her toward a damned lion he kisses her and she pushes him away. Want a textbook example of gaslighting? Here you go: she says “don’t get all smoochy with me! I remember what happened with that lion” and he responds “What are you talking about? I was fighting that lion the whole time - you were just so terrified you don’t remember.”  Then he shoots George! And then he kidnaps Ursula and attempts to force her into marriage!

Now look at how George and Ursula interact (slightly NSFW):

Even though he’s a big strong dude and he thinks he’s doing what’s okay he lets her set the tone for their interactions. He accepts that he’s out of his wheelhouse and even if he doesn’t understand it he does what she says is culturally appropriate. He learns from her! He listens to her! Compare Lyle leaning into Ursula above to this image of George and Ursula talking:

He’s listening to her, all of his attention is on on her, but he’s totally nonthreatening. His torso is turned toward her but he’s not invading her space, his hands are clasped, he’s smiling, and she’s the one leaning into him. Look at that smile she has, look how happy she is to be listened to. Her posture in both images is vulnerable but in this one with George she’s vulnerable because she has chosen to share with him instead of because she feels threatened.

When George rescues Ursula from Lyle at the end of the film it isn’t a typical damsel situation - George doesn’t have a knock-down-drag-out fight with Lyle, he swings into a tree and offers Ursula a hand so she can reach up and save herself (and before he does it he acknowledges how much it’s going to hurt and *whimpers* and looks human and scared). And you’ve gotta remember that George rescues everybody. It’s not just Ursula - he also rescues a parasailer and gets shot rescuing Shep and Ape. He just likes helping, dammit!

AND this movie offers a perfect counter to the “nice guy” thing - Ursula starts engaged to a jerk who her mom thinks is a “nice guy” the moves on to actual nice man George who isn’t *just* nice - he’s also patient, listens to her, has his own skills and talents, is okay with being goofy, has his own social circle and isn’t totally dependent on Ursula, and looks amazing. Ursula doesn’t go with George just because he’s a *nice* guy who rescued her from an asshole, Ursula goes with George because he’s an interesting, fun person who is supportive of her different way of being an interesting, fun person. AND he’s emotionally available. Google image search George of the jungle and see how many smiles you can find, see how many open looks of confusion there are, see how much sadness you can see in George’s face. Now look for images of Lyle. His two expressions are a smirk and cartoonish fear. I know this is a cartoonish kid’s movie, but it is SO powerful that the hero shares his emotions while the villain masks every emotion but fear. Lyle doesn’t want to open up, he doesn’t want to be vulnerable, he wants CONTROL. George wants to learn, to protect people he cares about, to explore new places, to laugh when he’s happy and to be sad when he’s sad, and that he does that while being a broad-shouldered, physically powerful dude who is NOT totally self-involved is just…

Like, look, I didn’t sign on to tumblr dot com for George of the Jungle discourse, but I’m just now realizing that this movie may have done the most for destroying my conception of stoic masculinity and gender roles as a child.

Like

the idea that it’s femininity which is under attack implies that femininity is inherent to women, and that women are oppressed for our femininity. again, this is opposed to the idea that women are oppressed with femininity. 

this ends up leading to ideas like ‘masculine privilege’–butch women oppress & have power over feminine women, and butch women reject femininity due to internalized misogyny (since they’re supposedly rejecting their nature). I’ve actually been accused of the above by a liberal feminist. 

2nd wave feminism would state that “masculine privilege” doesn’t exist, because masculine women are still oppressed for being women under patriarchy and are punished in various ways for rejecting femininity (the tool meant to oppress them). only male privilege exists, and masculinity is only rewarded in males.

old people: let me speak to your manager. This never would have happened in my day. And yet you all want the minimum wage raised. I’m going to kill you.

cashier: I’m sorry it’s going to be a 5 minute wait for your food

So I walk past the woman and put money in teen's tip jar. Haven't even gotten ice cream yet.

Woman looks at me. Turns back and yells some more with the teen. I put more money in the tip jar.

Like, if you can't tear yourself away from a video game, even to make it to an important event on time? Addictive tendencies.

If you keep spending your allowance money on those funny collectibles or new shoes even when you promise yourself you're going to save it? Addictive tendencies.

If you find yourself unable to resist and manage food cravings, or frequently overeating even when it makes you feel bad? Addictive tendencies.

Don't hurt them by being suffocating or obsessive.

Don't hurt yourself by making them your entire world.

So a woman posts that a clear predator is staying at a womans shelter. And look at their reply....