Day: January 27, 2016

  • I’m poorly made.

    The good thing is humans have a lousy warranty, so you might as well void it anyhow :)

  • These Bills Are Steaming Piles Of Transphobic, Homophobic Trash

    seattlish:

    Gosh, the Leg session is just so fun. Let’s all gather ‘round the campfire to read a dumpster fire of a bill introduced by a pair o’ bigots. 

    HB 2782, introduced today as an amendment to existing anti-discrimination legislation (49.60 RCW), is called the “

    Washington gender privacy protection act” reads as follows:

    (1) Nothing in this chapter or in any other provision of state
    10  law grants the right to any person who possesses male anatomy or male
    11  deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) to enter into or use a public or private
    12  facility that is open to the public and is or has been segregated by
    13  gender for the private use of those who possess female anatomy or
    14  female deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) including, but not limited to, a
    15  bathroom, restroom, toilet, shower, locker room, or sauna.
    16  (2) Nothing in this chapter or in any other provision of state
    17  law grants the right to any person who possesses female anatomy or
    18  female deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) to enter into or use a public or
    19  private facility that is open to the public and is or has been
    20  segregated by gender for the use of those who possess male anatomy or
    p. 1 HB 2782
    1 male deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) including, but not limited to, a
    2 bathroom, restroom, toilet, shower, locker room, or sauna.

    Are. You. Fucking. Real.

    Introduced by Rep. Tom Dent (R, Moses Lake) and Rep. Brad Klippert (R, Kennewick), the bill seeks to explicitly preclude trans folks and non-gender-binary individuals from using the restrooms which they find the most safe and comfortable. It’s a direct response to the clarifying language that was quietly enacted by the Human Rights Commission in December, allowing trans people to use bathrooms based on their identity, not their DNA (because seriously fuck that). 

    As if that’s not bad enough, the bill has an ugly brother that’s also been introduced—this one focusing on the “religious freedom” to be a fucking transmisogynist AND ALSO just straight-up homophobic jerk. Here’s part of that text:

    In general. Notwithstanding any statute, rule, or order to the contrary, the state shall not take any discriminatory action against a person, wholly or partially on the basis that such person believes, speaks, or acts in accordance with a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction that:

    (a) Marriage is and should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman;

      (b) Sexual relations are properly reserved for marriage;

    © Male (man) and female (woman) refer to an individual’s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics by time of birth.

    WOWWWWWWW. What year is it again?

    Klippert is also a sponsor on this bill, alongside Reps Graham Hunt (R, Orting), Matt Shea (R, Spokane Valley), Jesse Young (R, Gig Harbor), David Taylor (R, Moxee), Elizabeth Scott (R, Monroe), Hans Geiger (R, Puyallup), and Jeff Holy (R, Cheney). 

    All are members of the House GOP, who had the audacity to tweet a fucking MLK tweet on Monday (some fight for freedom you’re leading!), and have not yet commented on these two abominations yet today. 

    Ansel at the Stranger predicted that this would happen/forecast it a few weeks ago; though it’s easy to get conned by Seattle’s liberalish-ness, remember that a lot of this state is staunchly red and staunchly invested in oppression and bigotry. 

    Interestingly, the ultimate right-wing manbaby, Rep Matt Manweller, is not included on any of these bills. That hasn’t stopped him from running his bigoted mouth about trans people, though, calling it “silliness.”

    Yes, because it’s fucking hilarious that trans people are being murdered at historic rates and that legislation like this 100% supports the kinds of transmisogyny that spurs hate crimes. 

    Of course, Governor Jay Inslee gets it; he’s unlikely to let any of this transphobic, homophobic nonsense become law if he has anything to do with it, which he will.

    Still, though, it’s fucking repulsive that these human beings are a.) being paid by our tax dollars and b.) will be supported every step of the way by people who thoroughly refuse to move away from the outdated idea that gender is anything other than a social construct and that a person’s genitalia is any kind of determining factor regarding their personality, their presentation, or their person as a whole. 

    H/T to Billy Duss for bringing these pieces of drek to our attention. 

  • shadesofmauve:

    pyoorkate:

    shadesofmauve:

    pyoorkate:

    shadesofmauve:

    I’m upset, because a friend posted this article about companies that send people potatoes, and it turned out to be about gag-gift potato messages. I thought it was going to be some sort of potato-of-the-month club.

    I wanted to sign @tinierpurplefishes up for it.

    A potato of the month club would be *amazing*. There are thousands of varieties of potato, and we in the ‘west’ eat about 8. So sad.

    Yup! There’s usually only four or five varieties in the grocery store, if that. I’ve had a few others when mom’s grown ‘em (She’s particularly fond of ‘la ratte’: “It’s called ‘la ratte’! It’s French for ‘the rat’! ‘Cause they look like rats!” /mom). I would totally be up for fancy landrace potato comparisons.

    …of course, if I had more disposable income I’d have no trouble disposing of it on cheese and wine and charcuterie and and and and.

    TL;DR: DELICIOUS NOMS.

    Noms are the best bit of every day :)

    OH BY THE WAY! You two are in the northwest now, so you should definitely know about Territorial Seeds once you have some land to grow things in. Only 11 kinds of seed potato, though. Everything they sell is test grown in the Willamette valley, so it’s specifically grown for the PNW. There are other, smaller local seed places that are very cool too – Territorial is just sort of the grandma.

    (Also they were totally smeared by uninformed people at the Oly co-op, so I feel like plugging them is a little bit of redress).

    Oh oh yes. Definitely. I am looking forward a ridiculous amount to having a garden to play with. First, a house (which is why the Timberland Regional Library is now lacking rather a lot of house building books).

    But I wonder if… oh yes, google tells me there are many people who specialise in heirloom potatoes. Between that and the heirloom apple bloke, I forsee much fun in the future.

    Mnyum. 

  • leftist-daily-reminders:

    As long as capitalism is a thing, progressive tax all the fucking way. The more you have, the more you pay in taxes percentage-wise.

    Even in vanilla liberal language, the rich make their money through the collective effort of workers, trade, and infrastructure, so they owe their fortunes to the interconnectivity of life.

    In spicy leftist language, the rich make their money through the extraction and appropriation of surplus value produced by workers and through the nature of hierarchical property relationships whereby owners profit off of users.

  • Because the pussies, or catkins, lengthen as the flowers mature, many pictures you see will not show the tight “pussy” that many people would recognize.

    I know it’s been awhile, but please try to remember you’re writing about a tree.
    (via shadesofmauve)

    “…it has attractive pussies in early spring before the leaves appear.“

    (via tinierpurplefishes)