no more worry, i killed it with both hands!

Well I don't like how it feels. I don't feel cleaner without body hair. I don't prefer not having body hair. But who will advocate for women like me, but me? For women who do like hair removal, they are advocated for every time they step out of the house and see 99% of the female population also conforming to that standard, or when they watch a movie and see all the shaved actresses, or view an advertisment, or open a magazine, or watch a music video, or scroll through social media, or walk down the streets without receiving insults and glares for having a completely normal bodily feature.

i used to work at a Local Organic Produce store that's popular with the lefties in my city who are interested in food justice. i quit for a lot of reasons, mostly the boss, but something i will always remember is one of our suppliers coming in to drop off produce, being told her check wasn't ready, and her laughing and responding it didn't matter -- even a low bank account was more than enough to pay the migrants who picked her produce. i am not filling in any blanks here. she said this.

after quitting, this was a common story i told people about my time there. some then became annoyed at me, acting like i was a wokescold trying to undermine the store's "eco" mission with unrelated "ethical" concerns. but, like -- if food justice isn't for the people making food, who the fuck is it for?

I work in an obstetrician and gynaecologist’s office. we have to tell patients on a regular basis that they are binge drinking weekly when they think they are simply consuming a normal amount of alcohol on the weekends.

having more than 3 drinks in a single sitting if you have an estrogen based endocrine system is a binge that is medically significant.

having more than 5 in a sitting is a medically significant binge for someone with a testosterone based endocrine system.

every time you do this, it significantly impacts your risk of getting breast cancer, and damages your liver. it takes time to recover from that liver damage. if you’re having a 3-5 or more drink binge on a weekly basis, you are an alcoholic, medically speaking, and your liver is not recovering.

again: the bar for what binge drinking is, medically, is so much lower than what you think it is.

alcohol is a really toxic substance and not something you should fuck around with.

again: if you have an estrogenized hormone system (common for most women), then 3 drinks is a binge. if you have a testosteronized hormone system (common for most men), then 5 drinks is a binge.

anything above that number, consumed as frequently as weekly or more, and you’re medically a binge drinking alcoholic.

also, if you’re drinking any quantity of alcohol 6 days a week or more, that’s another threshold at which, medically speaking, you meet the definition of alcoholism. your liver needs more days without alcohol in your system than just one a week to recover and be healthy.

I don’t say any of this to shame anyone—to me, alcoholism or substance use disorders aren’t a sign of weakness or moral failing. and most of us genuinely don’t know this stuff.

information is key. you don’t have to stop drinking, but the utter lack of education on alcohol + the normalization of binge drinking in current society leads to many people drinking without any idea of what it’s doing to their bodies.

Because a vodka shot is not the same as (idk, some low alcohol percentage alcohol.)

do we have evidence of this being hormone related? Like in trans individuals or maybe people with PCOS or intersex people or is this purely body size?

I would like to be wrong but this sounds like a thing where “hormones” are a stand in for “sex at birth” and where the real issue lies is in body size and composition. Estrogen OS = overall shorter with more fat. Testosterone OS = overall taller with more muscle. Fat/muscle affects how things are broken down and used, and how much of those things someone needs. Meds, alcohol, food.

Not trying to be an asshole, fully believe that there are variations in how much people can tolerate and that body size and composition do tend to align with how the medical industry sorts people into two sexes. Just…I don’t trust research to look that deeply into things like this, once they start getting quoted.

Also just a smidge of “LADIES are delicate and too much of the demon rum will overwhelm their uteruses and they will swoon.” The way women are told they should eat less than a man their height and weight just because they are women, and women should eat less (delicate flowers, must not be seen to swallow meals like a snake, must not be allowed to get fat). No. You are feeding a body. If you aren’t feeding muscle, you are telling it to store fat.

This just sounds like science that is broadly right, for really stupid reasons.

For example, your liver screens excess estrogen from your body but will not do so efficiently if it is dealing with a damaging poison like alcohol. Having estrogen levels higher than your body would normally self regulate to is a major factor in breast cancer. Studies indicate that for people with estrogenized endocrine system alcohol consumption can increase the risk of breast cancer by as much as 35%

This also means that for anyone on HRT involving estrogen (common for a variety of situations, from menopause to transitioning) the risk of cancer goes up significantly when you are drinking. For example, post-menopausal women who are taking HRT and drink one or two alcoholic drinks per day have a breast cancer risk that is three times higher than women who don’t drink and don’t take HRT.

Alcohol also increases the risk of many types of cancer in people regardless of sex or hormonal system. Heavy drinking can increase the risk of stomach, prostate, and pancreas cancer (among others).

Light drinking, even a single drink each day, can increase the risk of several other types of cancer in any person (for instance liver cancer and colon cancer)

Of these, one notable and significant risk increase is for breast cancer in a person with high levels of estrogen.

Sexism and especially misogyny in medicine is a real issue but the information in this post is good and should not be dismissed on the assumption that medicine is probably wrong and sexist when it says things are “different for women than men”, even tho we may wish they would use other language to describe that situation (i do like estrogenized endocrine system here, because that is the relevant part of the biology).

A local paper had some great photographs, all taken by Nicole Hester:

The day before, Rep. Justin Pearson tries to attend a Senate Committee meeting and is barred access by the Sergeant at Arms.

Lawmakers and protesters link arms as the descend the capitol steps.

Once inside the chamber, Democratic representatives continued to stand together with arms linked.

They continued standing together with arms linked as votes were cast.

Democratic representatives take a group photo protesting the redistricting.

Rep. Justin Jones burns a photo of the Confederate flag with the words, We will not go back.

And stomps the ashes.

KeShaun Pearson being escorted from the building by the Staties.

KeShaun Pearson (left) being taken into custody. Rep. Justin Pearson (right) showing his support of his brother.

Additional information: State lawmakers have been gunning for Pearson and Jones nearly their entire terms. Most notably, in 2023, the House expelled them for participating in a protest at the Capitol. Their districts had to have special elections to have them reinstated.

Pearson is one of the plaintiffs of a lawsuit seeking an injunction against the redistricting.