Stupid Tests
In an article detailing how some of Ms. Semenya’s people knew there might be something up about her gender, a CNN article blithely describes the history of gender testing:
The process of gender verification has undergone big changes since it was first introduced for international competition in the 1960s, the IAAF said.
The first mechanism involved “rather crude and perhaps humiliating physical examinations,” which soon gave way to mouth swabs to collect chromosomes.
There were too many uncertainties with mouth swabs, so the IAAF abandoned them in 1991 and the International Olympic Committee discontinued them in 2000.
A proper test has yet to be found, the IAAF said, and the current tests are considered a good interim solution.
Apparently it’s not at all a good interim solution, if an athlete that just won a race is now on suicide watch. Well done, assholes.
Midwest Gender Resources
You have ’em, I need them.
I met someone at TransOhio who writes the Midwest GenderQueer blog.
& Of course there’s TransOhio.
& The Big Gay Conference (2009’s site is here, but I haven’t found 2010’s yet).
But I need more: give me your midwest queer resources, peeps. Thank you!
Elephants!
Yesterday was Elephant Appreciation Day & I missed it. I love elephants.
(You can see more at the HuffPo post about it.)
Hunter’s Sucks
This bar’s new ID policy is utter bullshit and transphobic nonsense. Hunter’s has benefited from trans patronage for years, but now wants to keep trans people out.
Maybe the patrons who are against the policy can swap IDs at the door. Make a mockery of it. Everyone do drag next Friday & Saturday nights. When they get no business because of this policy, they’ll change it.
Comedians Make the Point
RIP Jim Carroll
Damn, Jim Carroll died. I missed the news probably because he died on 9/11 this year, & that’s the day I avoid the news (because every clever media asshole thinks it’s a good idea to replay footage that still traumatizes me). Still, it’s fitting that this NYC icon died on 9/11, in a weird way; Jim Carroll might have died of a lot of things in his life – drugs, alcoholism, AIDS – but he didn’t. He made it to 60 & had a heart attack.
“And the next day they were dead.”
Have people seen this video of Tom Duane arguing to cap the cost of shelters? It’s amazing.
Wonky RSS?
I’m getting reports that my RSS feed has gone wonky again, except that it’s not wonky everywhere. So I’m wondering for those of you who are having problems, what your feed reader is. So far, this seems like it’s a Google RSS Reader problem.
Gendered Recession
& Here’s some classist bullshit from The NY Times. The question put to me by my friend who sent it:
“So, was working for women always a dog walking on its hind legs sort of thing? News: Upper class educated w choices have fewer than they’d like right now, but, don’t worry, their friends will hire them. What about the women who never had the choice and had to balance the job and the commute?”
Exactly. So for the record: this article is not about how the recession is affecting women. It’s about how it’s affecting a tiny tiny tiny privileged minority of women.