BRUTE FORCE AND THE WILL TO LIVE

I am begging the UK trans community and its allies to attend the rescheduled Mass Lobby at Parliament, now on Wed Sept 9th, 1pm-5pm, organised by Trans Solidarity Alliance.

The new EHRC Code of Practice pushes trans people out of toilets, hospital wards, and community spaces. It normalises gender policing based on appearance and stereotypes. It became statutory guidance in the UK on August 5th, 2026.

Trans people are now legally their assigned gender at birth and must join gendered spaces accordingly, but if they are perceived as their lived gender, they can also be ejected from those spaces. The guidance says: either break the law, or don’t pass too well.

A mass lobby is where you invite your MP to discuss your concerns with you in-person. Our demands have changed. Ask your MP to:

Write to Ministers and Prime Minister Andy Burnham to say they are profoundly concerned by the rolling back of trans rights, and that they believe that it is time for Parliament to legislate to protect equality for trans people.

Ask parliamentary questions focused on protecting trans people’s rights and defending trans people’s abilities to live safe and dignified lives.

Speak up both inside and outside Parliament in defence of trans people’s rights.

Meet regularly with trans constituents to understand their lived realities. 

Your MP does not have to be an ally, they do not have to respond to your email for you to show up and greencard them (details below the cut.) What matters is that as many people as possible show up.

I cannot stress this enough: Showing up in person matters. It is much more effective than petitions, emails, and letters.

We have already had some wins because we took action. The 2026 EHRC guidance has already rolled back its most harmful elements because of mass campaigning by individuals like us, and groups like The Good Law Project. This summer, 166 MPs signed the Early Day Motion 240 to reject the EHRC Code of Practice, because of our campaigning. That is 1 in 4 MPs.

It is a horrible, stressful time, and I am so sorry if you're trans and live in the UK. But I was at last year's mass lobby and the line for greencarding alone stretched around the back gates. It was a record breaking mass lobby and made us impossible to ignore. Let's do even better this time. Details under the cut:

But anyway, this does have a downside; vivid, elaborate dreams make for vivid, elaborate nightmares. I can usually tell when it’s one of those nights, since he grinds his teeth pretty badly.

I was never quite sure what to do when I knew he was having a bad time of it, though the grinding alone was enough to worry me and push me towards intervening. I used to just shake him gently, hope to rouse him just enough to reset the dream or something, but it wasn’t too effective and anyway waking him up all the time isn’t good for rest.

I’m rather proud of the strategy I eventually settled on: gently, so as not to wake him up, I’d lay one arm across his hands, wrapping his fingers around me so that he was holding on. Nightmares being nightmares, I can usually count on a pretty tight grip when this happens.

It may seem a little odd, but consider that holding on to something with both hands is typically a very agentic frame of mind. We hold on to things that give us power, in one way or another, and possessing objects often makes us feel powerful in some respects. That has consequences, even for a dreaming mind.

I knew it was working when he woke up rather mystified from one such dream, and told me that he’d been running through the caverns of some dungeon or cave system, pursued by monsters, but then all of a sudden he was holding a giant anime sword and fought them off instead. So I got to be a sword for him that night, I was delighted.

I don’t usually get to know exactly what happened, since even for a very vivid dreamer like Ritter, nine tenths of these things get forgotten. But I know I’ve been things like door handles, steering wheels, stuff like that. And even when I don’t know what I am to him, he doesn’t grind his teeth nearly as much- the sleep is deeper and more peaceful, so I get plenty of feedback that it’s working.

It’s such a perfect encapsulation of love in microcosm, isn’t it? No matter how much you mean to them, and how much they mean to you, the gap between two conscious lives is fundamentally separating you. But fundamental does not mean insurmountable. There’s this whole world in him, full of dreams and perspectives that I’ll never truly experience. But I will be a part of those worlds all the same, finding little ways here and there to make sure that the dreams of me make him a better, stronger, and happier person.

Season 2 Ending: Trinity Santos invites her lonely coworker to get drinks and sing karaoke so she won’t be alone on July 4th

My sister took more photos of my dress. I am very happy with how this turned out :)))))

anyways, go stream Slayr and Sawtowne

First of all, if anyone here hasn't read it yet, GO. I promise. Go now, trust me.

You can read it in like twelve minutes!

And it'll mess you up! :D

Ok spoilers ahead baby here we go

So: of the many many incredible themes and messages here, what do we want to dig into first? Op mentioned systemic violence being perpetrated by well-meaning people against themselves, for reasons no one even remembers anymore. You're right; they believe this violence may be regrettable but it's ultimately necessary, even though they could stop doing it at any time. And some cities have stopped, a fact that makes our characters uncomfortable in ways they can't fully articulate.

YES.

And the really striking thing (pun intended because I'm terrible) is that it's direct and visceral violence. They're not just pushing a button or signing an executive order; they're not even just throwing the rocks from ten feet away. The haunting last line is "and then they were upon her." This violence is intimate.

But they still consider themselves good people. They consider their traditions a sacred link to their past and a safeguard for their future. These are normal average people who gossip with each other and tut-tut their children and bitch about taxes.

They are just like us.

And once a year, they commit an act that in any other setting they'd rightly consider an atrocity. And then they all look at each other, their faces covered in blood and dirt and brain matter from someone they've known all their lives (someone who, incidentally, was on board with all this right up until she was the one sacrificed), all of them equally complicit in cold-blooded murder.

And then they go home and have lunch, and the box is carelessly put back in storage until next July.

YESSS

But can we also talk about the gender divide in the story? How the proceedings are run by men - but when a woman is selected, it's the women who move in first? Did you notice that the last thing the victim did in her life was finish up the dishes? Wanna delve into the psychological implications of one woman picking up two small rocks, just enough to be seen participating but not enough to be lethal, while another woman weilds the biggest rock she can lift? Is that second woman succumbing to rage and bloodlust - or is she hoping to end the victim's suffering as quickly as possible?

Want to talk about class divide? Like how wealthy Mr Summers is the one who gets to handle the box and preside over the event, and he's the one who made the black spot and folded all the papers... so it would be incredibly easy for him to mark them in some subtle way that nobody else would notice? Which would explain why he's the only person who's chill and convivial the whole time, because he knows he's gamed the system?

What about the generational divide? How the oldest person in town, oblivious to his own survivor bias, is the most vocal supporter of this tradition with a catchy slogan that ryhmes and everything? How he's the first to loudly shame and scold anyone who might someday question this tradition, because he can't imagine not beating someone to death once a year? Because the only thing more painful than having to think about all the people he's helped slaughter would be if everyone else decided that all those deaths had been pointless? When those children grow up, how many of them will remember all this with disgust - and how many will advocate for bringing the lottery back?

You could even talk about the difference between city folk and country folk, because the larger your population is the better your odds are. How many people moved away from this particular town for that very reason?

Actually wait, I think I first want to talk about something that just recently occurred to me: this story was first published in 1948, just a few years after World War II.

I can't believe I never realized it before, but among all its other messages, "The Lottery" is also about the draft.

The US has always had a... complicated relationship with WWII, because it wasn't fought on our soil but it absolutely shaped our culture. For a lot of Americans, their experience of the war boiled down to various fundraisers, general frugality, and watching Donald Duck's fever dreams about being a Nazi. (For real!) It was something important but distant - something that happened, as the one song put it, Over There.

Oh except for almost every man aged 18-45, who was enrolled in the draft whether he liked it or not. And if your number comes up, well, off you go! Time to fight and kill and die for a good cause! Thank you for your service and/or sacrifice! We're all cool with this, for some reason!

When this story was first published in the New Yorker, it received severe backlash. People were super duper mad. As a teenager, I assumed it had offended so many because they thought there was some small town really doing this, in the same way that Jonathan Swift published "A Modest Proposal" and then immediately had to publish "What?? No, God no, I didn't mean we should ACTUALLY start eating Irish babies, Jesus Christ, what's wrong with you people".

But upon reread, I realized that everyone in 1948 would have immediately spotted the parallels to conscription, because everyone knew someone who'd been torn from his home with no apparent rhyme or reason and either came back broken or never came back at all. And people were told that this is all very good and normal - that your loved one was a hero who died making the whole planet safe for democracy, somehow, a line vague enough to still work today.

So these readers had offered up their sons and brothers and husbands while they held parades and waved banners and felt really good about themselves for being on the right side of history... and then Ms Jackson (I'm nasty) rolls up and says "Actually, what if it wasn't worth it? What if we just killed a bunch of people in horrible ways because that's just what we always do in war? Hey, hey you - yeah YOU, reading this right now. Set aside all the propaganda you've been taught, and ask yourself: how complicit are you in these deaths? How many rocks did you throw in the town square today? How many will you throw next time? How many next times will there be?

The article links this gofundme for her:

The Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe made this card for their citizens to present to ICE.

If you are in a different federally recognized tribe in Washington State:

“I am a member of the (insert tribe here) Tribal Nation, which is Tribal Nation federally recognized by the United States.

This means I am also a United States citizen according to the U.S. Citizenship Act of 1924, 8 USC Section 1401.

Our tribe’s enrollment office number is (insert phone number here).

"Good Morning, Rose"