Liberation Station

that people w penises are generally v v educated about their bodies as kids like they know exactly whats gonna happen

but like for me i had no idea what vaginal discharge was and when i started getting it in 5th grade i was fucking petrified and i hear so many stories about little children thinking that theyre dying because no one told them what a period was

if anybody asks me why i hate men, i’m just gonna redirect them to this post.

it’s pretty fucking obvious that men only want to invest in breast cancer research to further degrade, objectify, and jerk off to body parts they already feel 100% entitled to. that’s what is at stake for them. 

If the woman is single, as was my case, doctors have actually recommended postponing surgery until she finds a relationship, because “it could be nearly impossible to find someone who accepts it [your unnatural tatas] in years to come”. 

I’m 15 months post-mastectomy, and the date I had this past week was the first time since then that a guy hadn’t reacted negatively to my scars. The relief was so overwhelming that I was fighting back tears. When I told him —essentially warning him that my body wasn’t what he must be expecting — I felt so guilty; it seemed to have the same weight and shame as telling someone I had some sort of an incurable STI or a felony record.

This incredible 95-year-old transwoman flight instructor found love late in life– only to be denied social security benefits by the government because she’s not cisgender

A beautiful interview with a woman who transitioned in 1976 shows how life for transgender people has changed over the years, although some terrible consequences remain the same.

Gifs: Lambda Legal

I was wearing this outfit today to a grocery store when I made a baby smile. I was wearing this outfit today when I threw my head back and laughed, when I sang in the car with my family, when I filled it with yummy food to keep it healthy.

I was wearing this outfit today to a grocery store when I overheard a woman telling her young daughter who was pointing and laughing that I would get what’s coming to me. I was wearing this outfit today when a woman told a man that it was the wrong kind of attention and that I was asking for someone to get me. I was wearing this outfit today when the same man stared at my body longingly and then agreed with the woman that I was asking for an attack.

I was not wearing this outfit when I was raped. I was wearing a size XXL hoodie and a pair of my mom’s sweatpants, much to the shock of the friend I told after, who asked what she’d been taught to ask: “What were you wearing?”. I feel so terrible for the little girl whose mother was teaching her at the grocery store that she deserved to be assaulted if she dressed comfortably for the weather, which was climbing above 80 degrees, or for an injury, which called for a brace and a boot that doesn’t allow room for long pants, or for her body, because it’s hers and she can put on it what she damn well pleases. I feel terrible for the man who will look me up and down as though I was a 5 for $20 steak deal he might purchase and will immediately after speak to a presumable stranger about the violent fate I deserved. I feel terrible for the woman with fabulous hair who feels she can express herself but refuses to let me do the same.

Summer is coming up. It’s hot outside. I have an injured ankle, and a tight boot and brace to wear on one leg. I will not dress uncomfortably to protect complete strangers who are so offended by an expanse of skin that they console themselves by predicting my next rape.

Stop perpetuating slut-shaming and thus perpetuating a culture of excused rape. Stop perpetuating slut-shaming and thus perpetuating a culture of insecurity, inherent shame, and body image distortion which can cause an innumerable amount of incredibly dark issues nearly impossible to overcome.

My body is mine, and I love it. It is the house I live in, with which I will someday create a family, with which I run and dance and hold the strong lungs I use to sing. I refuse to be ashamed of it for any reason, especially the reason being that this culture which glorifies sex and punishes those who have it, which encourages being sexy and then preaches that sexy girls ask for attack, has taught its people that my stomach is a sin.

(This alternate version is kind of out of sync but contains the end of the trumpet solo.)

After playing with the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, Davis opened a lesbian club in Chicago with her partner of 40 years, pianist and drummer Ruby Lucas, called Tiny and Ruby’s Gay Spot.

Here’s a shortened version of a 1989 documentary short about the two of them, Tiny and Ruby: Hell Divin’ Women — featuring Davis jamming on the trumpet with her grandson!

I couldn’t find as much on Wong, but she actually survived until June 2016. She was 95.