What happened to Transtifa?

I didn’t know or even know of Transtifa — I’m not a Twin Cities person — but I have to admire the work mentioned in this testimonial:

Been meaning to make this post for a while and putting it off bc idk how to do it right, but here goes: earlier this summer I learned of the passing in April of the legendary Twin Cities tagger Transtifa, who tormented local nextdoor nerds and facebook fascists more than perhaps any single person over the past 5+ years.

Seeing a transtifa tag around town always made me and my homies smile – and you were bound to see them everywhere, because that bitch got AROUND. How did she do so much? I learned how one day after catching a glimpse of her roller skating down a dark street at lightning speed in a crop top and short shorts, bag of spray cans and paint pens slung over her shoulder.

I was hashtag blessed enough to meet her before Transtifa took off, thanks to (and this fits her perfectly) grindr. We didn’t totally hit if off at the time (mostly bc i figured she was totally out of my league, lol) but we did have a nice stroll around town sharing art tips. Later we worked together on some art in advance of an action and damn, her freehand lettering sucked but she blew me away by climbing out to paint the outside of a railroad bridge with zero hesitation. Tbh just the amount of haters she had was admirable.

She was one of the boldest and bravest people I knew, one of the few people I’ve ever remained in awe of after meeting them, and lived far more in her too-few years than most people do in a lifetime. I didn’t know her well but I miss her a lot–just knowing she was around tearing up the streets gave me something vaguely like hope.

I’d say be the transtifa you want to see in the world, but there won’t be another quite like her and I wish I’d told more how much I appreciated her when I could. Rest in power and paint, girl.

She sounds like a good person. I don’t know that I want to know what happened to her — too often the fate of trans women is shocking and depressing.

No pierogis for Mr Dershowitz!

This is a pathetic, pitiful performance. Dershowitz is basically begging for a token pierogi to demonstrate that he isn’t despised and ostracized.

Former Jeffrey Epstein lawyer Alan Dershowitz was yelled out of a farmer’s market in Martha’s Vineyard on Wednesday after he again tried to convince a food vendor into selling him pierogies.

One week after he threatened to sue a “bigoted vendor” for refusing to serve him, Dershowitz returned to the scene on Wednesday in a second failed attempt at securing Polish dumplings.

“I’m here in an effort to try to restore community and to ask you to sell me pierogi in the interest of keeping the island together so we don’t have to have two pierogi stands: one for anti-Zionists and one for people who will sell to anybody,” Dershowitz told the vendor. “So I’d ask you to please just sell me any one of your products to show that you’re prepared to sell to anybody and not allow your anti-Zionism to decide which people you’ll sell to.”

That’s a standard bigot approach: you’re not allowed to protest against the Israeli genocide in any way, or that makes you an anti-Zionist (which is OK) or an anti-Semite (gross disgusting bigotry). As it turns out, Dershowitz isn’t just anti-Palestinian and pro-genocide — it’s fine to turn their rhetoric right back at them) but is also pro-sexual assault and anti-LGBTQ.

After Dershowitz then tried to hand the pierogi vendor a signed copy of his book, which was politely refused, the vendor said, “I am very surprised that you’re here because of the things that you’ve been saying about us and the business online… I really do not appreciate what you’ve been sharing in the last week.”

Dershowitz interrupted, “It’s true,” to which the vendor replied, “Is it true? You have proof that I am an anti-Semite?”

The conversation devolved further after Dershowitz used the wrong pronoun in reference to the vendor.

“My pronouns are they/them, and you’ve continued to misgender me,” protested the vendor.

More irony: the vendor, Krem, that Dershowitz claims is anti-Semitic, is Jewish themselves.

* I, Krem, am Jewish. Members of my immediate family live in Israel. I love Shabbat and baking challah. My friends call me “Rabbi Krem”, and I have personal relationships with both Rabbis on-island.
* We are proud co-owners of a Martha’s Vineyard business that deeply values its relationships with its partners, vendors, collaborators, and most importantly, its clientele.
* We are a minority-owned (LGBTQ+) operation. Krem is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns.
* Prior to this incident, Good Pierogi had never refused service to anybody.
* We stand against those who harm or seek to harm others as well as those that would defend them.
* Finally, we don’t back down to bullies – no matter their size.

No one likes you, Alan Dershowitz. You’re a sad desperate creep.

It’s a circus all the way to the top

Speaking of incompetent clowns running major federal institutions, Linda McMahon was speaking at the National Conservative Student Conference. She was being interviewed by Scott Walker, the former governor of Wisconsin, a notorious anti-union conservative zombie, when students hacked the sound system and played insults, like that she was a corrupt billionaire, and pumped out calliope music over their conversation.

http://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1953149542456574062

Very appropriate. The name of the tune is, ironically, “Entry of the Gladiators.” I think it ought to be played for the entire collection of bozos Trump has jumped up to high office.

McMahon isn’t at all qualified to head the department of education, which is why she got the job — she’s supposed to wreck it from within.

P.S. Sorry, WordPress doesn’t handle Twitter links very well anymore. Try clicking on this: https://x.com/atrupar/status/1953149542456574062.

The lies will kill us all

Don’t you know? RFK jr is not anti-vax. He supports safe vaccines.

News reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine or anti-industry. I am neither. I am pro-safety, Kennedy said in his opening statement before the Senate Committee on Finance, prompting a protester to shout, “He lies!” Kennedy added that all of his children are vaccinated—a decision he has previously said he regrets—and said vaccines play a critical role in health care.

He lies! Those two words need to be written on his tombstone, preferably sooner than later.

We know he lies because he just slashed half a billion dollars from the budget of the department specifically tasked with developing and testing new vaccines.

The US Department of Health and Human Services said on Tuesday it would terminate 22 federal contracts for mRNA-based vaccines, questioning the safety of a technology credited with helping end the Covid pandemic and saving millions of lives.

The unit, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, helps companies develop medical supplies to address public health threats, and had provided billions of dollars for development of vaccines during the Covid-19 pandemic.

HHS said the wind-down includes cancellation of a contract awarded to Moderna for the late-stage development of its bird flu vaccine for humans and the right to purchase the shots, as previously reported in May.

He basically wants to kill mRNA vaccine development, the technology that saved millions of lives in the recent pandemic. His excuse? In addition to his usual claim that the vaccines contain fetal tissue and DNA fragments — all false, and even if it were true, what does he think is present in the roadkill he eats? — he claims that mRNA vaccines are ineffective against viruses that affect the upper respiratory tract.

Kennedy said the HHS is terminating these programs because data show these vaccines “fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu”, but did not offer scientific evidence.

“We’re shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate,” Kennedy said.

COVID was an upper respiratory infection, and the mRNA vaccines seem to have helped protect millions of people against that, but RatFucker Jr is going to just ignore that. He lies, and is wrong.

KENNEDY: “As the pandemic showed us, mRNA vaccines don’t perform well against viruses that infect the upper respiratory tract.”

THE FACTS: His claim is contradicted by scientific evidence. Countless studies show that vaccinated individuals fare far better against COVID-19 infections than those who are unvaccinated, while others have estimated that COVID-19 vaccines prevented millions of deaths during the global pandemic. The mRNA vaccines do not prevent respiratory diseases entirely, experts say. Rather, they can prevent more serious illness that leads to complications and death. For example, an mRNA vaccine against COVID-19 may prevent an infection in the upper respiratory tract that feels like a bad cold from spreading to the lower respiratory tract, where it could affect one’s ability to breathe.

While he’s cutting the budget for specious reasons, he’s also telling the scientists he doesn’t want to pay to pursue a new/old line of research.

He has also ordered a sweeping new study on the long-debunked link between vaccines and autism.

There is no link between vaccines and autism. There is a link between mRNA vaccines and preventing death.

He lies.

Abby Hafer has died

Sad news: we’ve lost an important scientist and atheist, Abby Hafer, professor and American Humanist board member. Also, the Discovery Institute hated her, which is a tremendous accolade.

The enmity arose when she published an article titled No Data Required: Why Intelligent Design Is Not Science, in which she pointed out that the ID movement was barren of data and hypothesis testing, and was essentially a club for debate-bros who would masticate observations until they were a gooey pulp that they could sculpt to fit their conclusion.

Intelligent Design (ID) proposes that biological species were created by an intelligent Designer, and not by evolution. ID’s proponents insist that it is as valid a theory of how biological organisms and species came into existence as evolution by natural selection. They insist, therefore, that ID be taught as science in public schools. These claims were defeated in the Kitzmiller case. However, ID’s proponents are still influential and cannot be considered a spent force. The question addressed here is whether ID’s claim of scientific legitimacy is reinforced by quantified results. That is, do they have any data, or do they just argue? The ID articles that I analyzed claimed to present real science, but they rarely referred to data and never tested a hypothesis. Argumentation, however, was frequent. By contrast, peer-reviewed articles by evolutionary biologists rarely argued but referred frequently to data. The results were statistically significant. These findings negate claims by ID proponents that their articles report rigorous scientific research. Teachers will find this article helpful in defending evolution, distinguishing science from non-science, and discussing the weaknesses of ID.

She was sharp. She will be missed.

Spider mommies are the best mommies

How nice. The mother of these spiderlings lies back and lets her babies eat her.

Not so nice: the spiderlings then gang up and cannibalize all the other adult spiders in the colony. Hooligans! These kids, always getting into trouble.

Which reminds me…I have to go into the lab this morning and sort out a couple of egg sacs I expect to see hatching out. The species I work with don’t practice matriphagy, but I do like to set up the young’uns with a lot of flies early on.

They have to be desperate to resurrect boomer technology

This generation…they claim to have reinvented the bus, the train, the bodega, and now, the 45 rpm record?

On Monday (Aug. 4), a small but mighty new physical music format arrived: Tiny Vinyl. Measuring at just four inches in size, Tiny Vinyl is a playable record that can hold four minutes of audio per side.

The disc, according to a press release, aims to “[bridge] the gap between modern and traditional to offer a new collectible for artists to share with fans that easily fits in your pocket.”

OK, there are differences. This thing is played at 33rpm, not 45rpm, and is smaller than the old format, which was a 7 inch disk, but I don’t see any advantage. It doesn’t matter that it fits in your pocket — in order to listen to it you also need a turntable and a set of speakers. They also cost $15 each. It’s a gimmicky promotional toy, not a serious means of distributing music. People are used to loading up thousands of MP3s on their phones and being able to play them through ear buds, you’d have to be a serious hipster to think that unlimbering a turntable and a pair of portable speakers so you can listen to singles at the coffeeshop is “cool”.

Sex is a spectrum

Agustín Fuentes has published a new book, Sex is a Spectrum: The Biological Limits of the Binary. I just started reading it last night — and it’s very good so far — so don’t expect a full review just yet, but El Pais has published an interview with Fuentes in which he discusses the main themes. As you might guess from the title, he’s rejecting the idea that sex is a binary, and further, that the general implications of sex are not reducible. He’s an anti-Coyne. He’s also strongly advocating for a view of organisms that incorporates environmental factors beyond naked genetics.

Q. You assert that sex is a biocultural issue… but many of the people reading this interview will think that sex is about biology, not culture.

A. That depends on how you define “sex.” If you’re speaking only about gametes, everyone understands that [an] egg isn’t a woman and [a] sperm isn’t a man. We have to rethink a little about what we’re talking about. Just think about our feet, which are biological traits. But at the same time, look at your foot and look at the foot of a person who has never worn shoes. The two are almost distinct: the structure of the bones, the muscles and the skin changes. When I discuss sociocultural contexts, we’re talking not only about the embodiment of culture, but the mutual exchanges between experience, perception, bones, muscles, digestive systems, vascular systems… there’s a lot of interconnection between our physical body and the world and the experiences we have. There’s always more intermingling and a bit more complexity.

One of the unfortunate consequences of the Mendelian revelation is that we’ve swung way too far the other way, treating the individual as nothing more than the combinatorial action of a set of genes. Development is a critical and complicated input in generating the information that makes up the individual!

Then he gets into a point I’ve made multiple times before: there are so many distinct criteria that are used to identify a human’s sex, so just the fact that there are multiple independent measures refutes the claim that there is one pure definitive definition.

Q. You write about how the concept of “sex at birth” isn’t very rigorous, because it can mean many different things. You talk about the “three Gs.”

A. In the biological context, we’re talking about typical categorizations based on three factors: genes, gonads and genitals: the three Gs. A 3G woman would be one who has ovaries, clitoris/vagina/labia, and XX chromosomes. And a 3G man would be one who has testicles, penis/scrotum and XY chromosomes.

The importance of using 3G is the range of variation: it’s a spectrum that has standard groupings. We assume that, by looking at the genitals, you’re sure to have the other two Gs. And it’s true that they’re highly correlated, but not absolutely correlated, not 100%. We must understand, biologically, that these categories don’t contain all the variation in human beings; there’s variation beyond that. And, among the 3Gs, there are people – more than we think – in whom one of those Gs is a little different. If we use only the genitals at birth, or the chromosomes or the genes, we’re leaving out a lot of extremely relevant information.

I agree, except I’d suggest that there are more than three factors used. Some people claim that behavior is a factor in defining sex — true women, as we all know, are submissive, while men are dominant and aggressive. We can pile up all sorts of stereotypes and associations and none of them are going to be universal.

Q. This 3G explanation doesn’t reflect the biological reality of 1% of humanity, as you state in the book, which is at least 80 million people. But if it reflects that of the 99%, so isn’t it natural for many people to say, “Well, 99% is almost binary, isn’t it?”

A. But what is binary? I’m not saying there aren’t things that are binary in human beings. Gametes are binary: sperm and eggs. But saying that human beings are binary is a failure. It limits us too much when we’re thinking about the full range of variation between human beings. A binary relationship is that of one and zero. They’re completely distinct. This concept is used in computer science, because there’s no overlap in any element: either you have a one, or you have a zero. But human beings – our bodies, our ways of being – aren’t like that. There’s nothing between men and women that makes them totally different, like one and zero, because they come from biological materials that overlap on that spectrum of variation in our bodies.

To say that we’re binary is philosophy. It’s not biology. It’s declaring oneself essentialist: there are [men and women], two types of humans. But our biology doesn’t validate that position. Yes, there are binary things in our biology, but to say that human beings come in two different types is false. And we can prove it. Genitals, hormones, brains, organs… when you understand the range of variation between our bodies, it becomes very clear that human beings don’t come in binary, but in typical sets.

“Almost binary” — how can anyone say that with a straight face? The word “almost” refutes the claim.

Q. Is this an attempt to invoke science to justify a model for people? A model for society and a model for women?

A. Trump isn’t using science; all of his executive orders are a total scientific failure. Science – by pointing out the range of biological variation in human beings – shows us that there are indeed several ways to be human. And that’s the important thing. In any country, in any culture, there’s a range in bodies and sexualities, but our cultures, our governments, diminish the possibilities of expressing [ourselves] and living within that range. We’re always on an average; we’re bits and pieces of the full range of human beings. And the main thing is to at least know what the possibilities of that range are… to understand that this is what being human is all about: variation, not a standard.

Our culture is always controlling where we can express ourselves. We’re biocultural organisms: there’s always a greater range of variation than what’s culturally accepted. And that’s the difficult part. Because many people are certain that “this is a woman and this is a man.” But if they start thinking, “My cousin has a slightly different body,” they then realize that there’s greater variation. We all know people who are outside the typical categorization, be it behaviorally or biologically, of what we think women and men are.

Wait — he didn’t answer the question! Should we have a different model for society, men, and women? I’d say yes, and I can see how Fuentes is addressing an implied point, by bringing up Trump’s anti-scientific attempts to impose a rigid binary structure on America. It is the scientist’s role to explain how our preconceptions about the universe are contradicted by nature, and the narrow perspective of conservatives is flatly wrong, and therefore is a bad foundation for building social policy.

Fuentes for president! He’s American-born, so he qualifies, but he “wants to regain Spanish citizenship for fear of the political degradation in the United States,” so I’d worry that he’s going to be part of the flight of intellectuals from the US.