Your may tell yourself, "well it's just a few of Group [ ], so what."

That's how it starts.

It ends with you going into hiding, desperately trying to get a flight out of the country, or trying to make it over the border.

"Where's my 'go' bag?"
"I'm a friend and an ally — will I be next?"
"Dr. X was my professor, am I in danger?"
"They've come for my friend's sister, they're taking the parents too..."


It won't be tomorrow or next week, but delusional fundies are trying to outdo themselves in expressions of cruelty and hatred.


Erasing people and ending their existence?

What kind of "faith" justifies this?

The group deemed an "enemy of God" and the "spawn of Satan" today maybe the group you belong to tomorrow.

No one in 1922 thought that a looney tunes loudmouth whacko's crazy hate speech would result in mass killings, death camps, gas chambers, and crematorium ovens running on twenty-four shifts...

https://19thnews.org/2023/02/2023-anti-trans-lgbtq-bills-record/

2023 wave of bills is fueling a political ‘war against LGBTQ+ people,’ new report shows
From bills in legislatures to restrictions in schools and health care, growing rhetoric throughout the US is part of a “full-out attack” against LGBTQ+ people, advocates say.


In a new report, the Movement Advancement Project (MAP), which tracks LGBTQ+ policy, describes the current political landscape as a “war against LGBTQ people in America and their very right and ability to openly exist.” It is a culmination of efforts: gender-affirming care bans for trans youth becoming law in states where such bills were previously blocked, growing efforts to restrict how students learn about LGBTQ+ subjects in schools, an increase in dehumanizing rhetoric that could lead to harassment or violence.


I’ve been working in the movement for 15 years,” said Naomi Goldberg, deputy director and LGBTQ program director at MAP. “To me, this is a different moment. … It is hard to see this as anything but a full-out attack and full-out war on LGBTQ+ people when you look at all of the areas of life, at all of the parts of our communities that are being attacked.”

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the country’s largest LGBTQ+ organization, sounded similar alarm bells earlier in the week. The organization has so far tracked 340 introduced anti-LGBTQ+ bills, including the most anti-transgender bills ever filed that the group has seen.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/01/2023 11:35PM by anybody.

It's my hope that each of the 'sides' will focus on the 'sides' they see being opposed to their views, and that those of us in the middle, or seemingly unaligned, will have plenty of time to assume the necessary disguises for our various particular situations.



I am reminded of a trip in the late 70s to Dallas, TX.  My return flight was late in the day, a Sunday.  After checking out I headed for the airport, but got the bright idea of stopping at tavern to eat, and hopefully watch the Dallas v. Rams NFL game.

I found a nice place, full of mature Dallas White people, so I felt it best to not appear to be the LA Rams fan that I was at that time, Georgia Frontiere not yet having broken my heart...

So I cheered every Dallas advance...  And mourned when they lost the game, until I got out to the parking lot and remembered that I was a Rams fan!

This event contributed to my estimation that White people are fine with minorities who do their best to act White.  I was in a dark three-piece suit, neat hair, subtle make-up, and speaking very proper English.  My welcome there was so great that a complete stranger approached me to tell me that he and some of the regulars were ordering out and did I want to join in.

White people are some of the nicest people I've ever met!


Act like them, dress like them, talk like them...  This probably works in many relationships.

Is that, dear friend, how you got the job as relief society president?

Sometimes I long for you to be more crude and less silly!


Nothing personal, in terms of negativity, but did you know some people call you Res Ipsa Lopsideder?

I can't get past the fact that you believe your thing speaks.

Have you consulted a doctor about that?

If the Red States start printing their own currency...

That's right up there with 'outlawing' political parties currently not in power!

I'm all for it.

If the red states issued their own currency, they'd have their own exchange rate. That would enable me to short the currency and wait the 30 seconds it would take markets to realize there is no underlying economy. Who wouldn't want to sell for a dollar and repay with a nickel?

Soon I'd displace Elon Musk as the world's richest idiot.

Would it be a cryptocurrency? Maybe? Maybe not?

Keep your eye on the following formula that has been exploding the past 12 months.

US1Y * USND / USTW

In just the past year this formula amount has gone up significantly more than tithing from about 0.5% up to 16.5%. If it goes up another tithing then you'll see the US end up like the Soviet Union where the federal level simply collapses under its inability to even collect enough taxes to pay its interest bills.

Some other formulas to keep your eye on is this one:

FTYR = FI / (1 - FT)

FFIC = USND * FTYR

FFIP = FFIC / USTW

At some point if FFIP gets to be too high then of course the federal system will collapse.

US1Y = US 1 year Treasuries rate - about 5% now
USND = US National Debt - about 31.4 trillion now
USTW = US Total wages - about 10 trillion now
FI = Forecast Inflation Rate
FT = Forecast Tax Rate
FTYR = Forecast Treasuries Yield Required
FFIC = Forecast Federal Interest Cost
FFIP = Forecast Federal Interest Percentage

Thanks to Bretton Woods 1944 the USD became the "world reserve currency" but that will change if the expected Inflation Rate becomes unstable. Even now when they say that the USD should lose about 2% of its value per year (i.e. target inflation rate of 2%) there are investors who are tired of paying such a huge price to park their investments in USD. And the talk is of even increasing this overhead cost up to a target of 4%-5% inflation & that'll likely send global investors looking for a more stable baseline currency where they don't have to pay so much and most likely they'll search for some currency that'll be consistent with the 10bp-30bp you typically see charged by low admin ETFs where the purchasing value of such a currency would reliably lose only a couple percentage of value per decade instead of the half loss they've grown tired of having with USD.

In such a scenario if the USD is depreciating around 4% per annum with tax forecasts of losing a third back to Uncle Sam then the FTYR will need to be at least 6% in order for the stable currency investors to pull their money out of their mattresses to invest in US Treasuries. Right now the National Debt is approx pi times wages (i.e. 3.14) and on track to growing to 4 times wages in about 5 years. So, as a result the FFIP will be around 24%.

If the Federal Government can't inspire wage earners to fork over 24% of all they earn to pay for interest on the Debt then the Weimar way will be their only option and it'll end up like France did with their Reign of Terror & Napolean and like Germany ended up with Hitler and the Holocaust & WW2 devastation. That would happen if the Federal Reserve would resume "Quantitative Easing" to be the way of funding the National Debt. But that would cause M1 to explode, then M2 to explode, then the PPI to explode, then the CPI to explode, and the feedback cycle would just spiral out of control as hyperinflation takes hold, US Treasury can only spend what the Fed prints, everyone very quickly spends it as fast as possible, and a Weimar 1923 moment hits America like a tsunami.


This "US1Y * USND / USTW" formula has already exploded and its a good leading indicator on how much the Federal Debt burden is going to hit Americans in the future. So, unless the Federal Government proves its going to live within its means, the States would be wise to prepare for stability in case the Hyperinflation Tsunami destroys the federal government.

In one of my ROTC classes, we had to learn about the seven determinants of national power — one of which was "a well educated, homogeneous population." I don't think we have that any more. Fundies have abandoned all pretense of democracy and want power by any and all means.


https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/02/destruction-us-abortion-laws-human-rights-violation-un


Top human rights organizations are calling on the United Nations to intervene over the destruction of abortion rights in the US.

In a letter shared in advance with the Guardian and sent Thursday by nearly 200 organizations and experts, the authors detail how, since the overturning of the federal constitutional right to abortion in June 2022, some 22 million women and girls of reproductive age live in states where abortion access is now either banned or inaccessible.


Among the signatories are the Global Justice Center, Pregnancy Justice, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. They are joined by a broader coalition of groups and individual advocates for human rights and racial and economic justice.

Abortion restrictions, the signatories write, deny “women’s decisional and bodily autonomy in a way that rejects the agency, dignity and equality of people who can become pregnant.”

The groups in the letter claim that overturning the constitutional right to abortion contravenes the US’s international obligations as a UN member organization. Member states are obliged to protect and uphold the rights to life, health, privacy, liberty and security, along with freedoms from torture and inhumane, cruel or degrading treatment.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 01:30AM by anybody.

There are a lot of countries in the UN that prohibit abortions.

We're fast approaching an 1850s situation with fundies all over the country -- not just in red states -- over abortion and LGBTQIA+ rights. Instead of "property" rights over slavery, it's now "god" supposedly telling people to deny the right to control your own body or allow your child to be who they were meant to be.

Families are already fleeing red states to stop their children from being forcibly taken from them. We're already seeing lives and careers ruined over just being a friend and an ally. We're going to see things like people being hunted by abortion bounty hunters or kidnapped and dragged to red states. If fundies get their way with national bans, we're going to see people fleeing to Canada just like the Underground Railroad smuggling people to Canada after the Fugitive Slave Law.

https://www.losangelesblade.com/2023/02/03/rabbi-11-year-old-son-testify-against-anti-trans-legislation/


ST. LOUIS, MO. — Rabbi Daniel Bogard should be spending this Shabbat preparing for tonight’s service at the synagogue he leads in St. Louis, Central Reform Congregation. Instead, he’s defending his family from death threats and planning his next trip to the state capitol, two hours away in Jefferson City, where Republicans hold a super majority in the state legislature and the governorship.

That’s also where the state GOP is pushing forward six bills: Three that would ban gender-affirming healthcare for transgender children and three more that would prohibit them from competing in school sports according to their authentic gender identity. Every year for the past few years, Bogard said he has testified against bills like these.

“Every year, again and again and again,” he said. “And it’s dehumanizing and degrading and genuinely traumatic.”

That day, Bogard was one of a half dozen fellow Jewish as well as Christian clergy who spoke out against the legislation, many of them testifying at a marathon, nine-hour hearing focused on student-athletes.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 07:58AM by anybody.

I don't disagree with any of that.

My point was two-fold: 1) the UN membership includes a score of countries that ban abortion under any conditions and dozens more prohibit it with limited exceptions, and 2) it therefore makes no sense to ask the UN to "condemn" the recent changes in US law.

The United Nations is far more inclusive than it is liberal. In fact, with China and Russia on the Security Council and some of the worst countries sometimes leading the human rights and women's rights agencies, it is a reactionary organization. It's silly to pretend there is some global standard regarding these issues.

It's up to the United States to fix its internal problems. That's where our efforts must be focused.

Lot's Wife Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> The United Nations is far more inclusive than it
> is liberal. In fact, with China and Russia on the
> Security Council and some of the worst countries
> sometimes leading the human rights and women's
> rights agencies, it is a reactionary organization.
> It's silly to pretend there is some global
> standard regarding these issues.
>
> It's up to the United States to fix its internal
> problems. That's where our efforts must be
> focused.


Agree, but the UN appeal is a sign of desperation, not hope.

The fundies want to drag the US back to the nineteenth century and then some.

> Agree, but the UN appeal is a sign of desperation,
> not hope.

It's rather pathetic. And it merely reinforces the attitude of Americans who think the UN is a means of violating US sovereignty. My view is it would make more political sense not to confuse the issue with vain appeals to groups that are not universally respected and to focus instead on the needs of American women and families.


---------------
> The fundies want to drag the US back to the
> nineteenth century and then some.

Yep. My disagreement with you on this, the trans sports problem, and some other topics is tactical and not strategic or moral.

Well, things are going to get a lot more interesting in the 21st Century.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnVxA2FesQ8

The wonders of womb transplants | 60 Minutes Australia


According to Professor Mats Brannstrom who pioneered womb transplants, the procedure can, in the future, be an option for:

-women who have had a hysterectomy
-those with cervical cancer
-those born without a uterus
-transgender females


We as humans need to decide once and for all that each individual has agency -- something that Mormons keep crowing about -- and have the right to decide who and what we are...and not somebody else.

The Federal Constitution doesn't yet spell out a right to abortion. That of course will change if an Amendment is ratified to affirm this. So, when you write "overturning of the federal constitutional right to abortion in June 2022" you are being inaccurate. What you should have written was "overturning of the federal supreme court ruling for a right to abortion in June 2022". You won't win any arguments if you don't try to be forthrightly honest.

And you are being intentionally obtuse.

There was a constitutional right to an abortion until last June. You would have us believe that its loss of that status over the last several months mans it never existed. But the supreme court decided three times explicitly to endorse that right.

You cannot find any case or legal text book published after Roe and before Dobbs that says what you assert. Whom are we to believe: the courts or you?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/2023 06:34AM by Lot's Wife.

"The group deemed an "enemy of God" and the "spawn of Satan" today maybe the group you belong to tomorrow."

Revolutions always eat their own when they don't work out. Something worth remembering.

...where are these people getting their money. If one can find and stop the money flow to these groups (and the U.S. Supreme Court has laid a lot of walls in the way to prevent one from doing this), these groups would lose both their soap boxes and their power.

It's not just money.

The fundies are cranking up the crazy stuff way past eleven.

Why?

Birthrate decline?

White "extinction" anxiety?

Fear of living in a secular democracy?

...for if these groups didn't have the money, they couldn't afford to pay off politicians and judges to support the actions they wish. They couldn't afford to pay for $2 million advertisements during Super Bowls to encourage people to look again at Christianity. Without the money, they couldn't promote themselves to the general public as a cause worth supporting.

Yes, I agree with you about the roots of these people's behaviors and their utter insistance on a white-dominated U.S. with no hope for any other groups. But if the money weren't available to them to promote their hateful concepts as necessary for their own preservation, then nearly all of their efforts would go nowhere.

I think these guys might have more money than LD$, Inc.

https://baptistnews.com/article/he-gets-us-part-1-the-men-and-money-behind-the-movement/

Tisby is right on at least one count. The financial backers for He Gets Us are extremely wealthy. The campaign’s funders are a group of billionaire families who, in 2000 under the direction of Bill High, formed a 501(c)(3) called The Servant Foundation to dole out money to conservative Christian causes.

They do much of their doling — $4 billion dollars’ worth so far — under the name The Signatry. The Signatry’s website says its vision is “to write the last check to the last missionary to be sent out to the last unreached people group so the last person can hear the gospel.” It is aggressively evangelical.

It’s impossible to know the identities of The Servant Foundation’s backers and just who will fund that last check because The Signatry is a donor-advised fund, or DAF.

DAFs are not required to disclose the identities of contributors, which makes them convenient for people who want to funnel money to organizations without the public’s knowledge. For example, the fossil fuel industry uses DAFs to fund fake conservative think tanks that spread false information about climate change. An estimated one in eight charitable dollars now flow to DAFs, far surpassing contributions to organizations like the American Red Cross, the United Way and the Salvation Army.


Rounding to the closest million dollars, the largest donation, $50 million, went to the National Christian Foundation, another DAF. DAFs often transfer money to other DAFs to further hide donors’ identities or as a means to reap tax deductions without actually distributing the money. TrustBridge, another DAF, received $16 million, and The Servant Foundation gave The Signatry, its alter ego, $18 million.

The extensive list of funding recipients includes many charities traditionally associated with evangelical Christianity, like the American Bible Society ($7 million), Young Life ($3 million), Wycliff Bible Translators ($10 million), Campus Crusade for Christ ($1 million), and scores of churches and crisis pregnancy centers.


Some organizations on the list might be less palatable to spiritual skeptics and the general public, such as the fundamentalist charity Answers in Genesis ($10 million), the group responsible for the Creation Museum and Ark Encounter; the Navigators ($1 million), a complementarian discipleship group; Al Hayat Ministries ($200,000), a team seeking to “unveil the deception of Islam”; and the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission ($700,000) for its mission to install ultrasound machines in those crisis pregnancy centers and distribute a sexuality guide blaming gender dysphoria on “the Fall.”

Perhaps most disturbing, The Servant Foundation gave nearly $17 million to the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative nonprofit that claims to defend free speech and religious liberty as “secular forces chip away at our nation’s Judeo-Christian roots.”

ADF got started in 1994, founded by 30 conservative leaders, including James Dobson of Focus on the Family, Bill Bright of Campus Crusade, Coral Ridge Church’s D. James Kennedy and Don Wildmon of the American Family Association. They originally formed the organization to combat the American Civil Liberties Union, but ADF has expanded its mission to include opposition to homosexuality, transgender rights and health care, abortion, and the “myth of separation of church and state.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center labeled ADF a hate group for its efforts to criminalize sexual acts between consenting LGBTQ adults and its support of the state-sanctioned sterilization of trans people.

Rubicon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> United just announced a pro LGBTQ+ flight to
> Australia. What's the problem?


I was boarding the airplane through the forward hatch. As I entered, the cockpit door was open, and I heard what sounded like...PRAYER! Things like,
"We ask for your blessing..."
"We pray for good weather...
"...if it be Your will..."
"...that we all perform our duties properly..."
I couldn't believe my ears! I asked the greeting attendant, "Is the cockpit crew Christian--are they praying?"
He poked his head in, then answered, "Yes, they are."
My heart, pounding and gasping for breath, I found my seat, next to a distinguished-looking man with an olive comple+ion, which I found, symbolically at least, comforting, sort of an offset to those horrible zealots. I told him what I had just witnessed.
"You think we're safe with Fundies operating the plane?" I asked him. "That they're not counting on some kind of deity to get us there safely, they haven't been sprinkling holy water on the wings, stuff like that?"
He shrugged and turned to his book. I spent the flight time mentally composing letters to the airline and the FAA so that something could be done about these zealots put in a position of such technological peril. I felt better as we began descent, and remarked to my seatmate, "I hope these Fundies can land a plane safely!"
He smiled benignly, and replied, "Insha'Allah."

There's a bit to unpack in that little story which is sort of an urban legend type tale nowadays.

There are all kinds of Christians.
When I hear one say, "Jesus take the wheel," it makes me think maybe the person is not fully prepared to take control and drive themselves.

When a surgeon prays and then says it was "God's will" when something goes wrong, it makes me think he was never going to take full responsibility. Obviously many things can happen that we cannot control. It isn't reassuring when someone is praying to the god that presumably caused the issue.

So, you have to hope you have a reasonable Christian who won't cop out and expect God to intervene. I can say I ran across a few types in my former job who blamed God's will when they failed on a team project. Christians, like everyone else, are a mixed bag. It wouldn't be fun to wonder if your pilot was a flake. I don't see much difference between an Islam flake who believes his version of God's will.

In the big picture, beyond all that which we cannot agree on or even agree to disagree as a nation, we are failing to notice that we are doing the work of those who wish to dominate us, take us over. We are dividing ourselves so that China and Russia can concentrate on the divide part of the "Divide and Conquer" equation that is at the heart of domination.

War has been monetized and China is winning the war. Money is the new WMD.

What does China eat while watching a train wreck other than popcorn? Green bean cakes?

I think we are embarking on a brilliant strategy. If we are that unattractive as a potentially occupied country, nobody would want to take over the U.S.

China and Russia are totalitarian states; the governments actively attempt to control the expressions of the people.  That 'social scoring' thing the Chinese are doing is an Orwellian wet dream.

In the US, I see more and more elected officials wanting to have a bigger hand in controlling how citizens express themselves in their work and play.

There is some hope, though: both China and Russia lack the complete control they'd like to have.  Criminal activists are the leaders in that regard, but they just want a different kind of control.  Russia is kind of melting down right now.  What's the dream for Russia?

"The People" are, by their very nature, an incoherent force.  "I" know what "I" want, but "I" give neither thought nor energy to organizing a path to get what "I" want; "I" simply sneak as much of it in as "I" can.

Some day someone will organize a popular party based on one unalienable philosophy: Do not seek more control than what you can gain when everyone obeys clear, easily understood laws; then obey those laws, and do whatever you want that doesn't hurt anyone around you, and RESPECT THAT RIGHT IN OTHERS.

The Sci/Fi in me says that when the catalyst is discovered that separates water into two gases and then burns the two gases to create "free" energy, which is then used to 'replicate' whatever the hell you want using the 'universal replicator,' no one will lack for whatever they want ...  Except 'Control.'

94.08% of humans just want to be happy, but there are some humans for whom 'happiness' means being in Control.  

I see that 5.92% as what's wrong with us as a race of herd animals.  The vast majority of us are content just grazing.  Right now, there are just too many wolf-humans and not enough guard-dog humans.

One thing I will say is that the justice system has diligently pursued cases against the January 6th insurrectionists. They've successfully brought a number of them to justice already, and have still not quit. And just today, the Justice Department made the determination that former President Trump can be sued for damages, for inciting to riot during the Jan. 6th attacks.

https://www.cbsnews.com/atlanta/news/justice-department-says-donald-trump-can-be-sued-for-jan-6/

Was there anything in that ruling supporting the right to pursue a complaint based on how annoying both he and some of his views are?

United just announced a pro LGBTQ+ flight to Australia. What's the problem?

The apparent fact that an airline feels it necessary to label a flight pro-LGTBQ+ proves the point, doesn't it?

fear is the habitation of the god-less ~

Smugness and self delusion are the habitation of the god pushers. Some people need their own brand of Santa to make it through the day.

You put it more clearly than I.

My inclination was to ask if the fear felt by Jews in concentration camps was evidence of Godlessness. But I know how ziller would have answered that.

Well, things are going to get a lot more interesting in the 21st Century.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnVxA2FesQ8

The wonders of womb transplants | 60 Minutes Australia


According to Professor Mats Brannstrom who pioneered womb transplants, the procedure can, in the future, be an option for:

-women who have had a hysterectomy
-those with cervical cancer
-those born without a uterus
-transgender females


We as humans need to decide once and for all that each individual has agency -- something that Mormons keep crowing about -- and we each have the right to decide who and what we are...and not somebody else.



Most of the fundies are my parents and grandparents age, and won't be here in the next twenty to thirty years.

I really don't care about someone's parts, I'm sick of the fearmongering and discrimination, and all the fundies want to try and stop the world from changing.

America is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Even in Russia and China, the totalitarian government can't stop information from getting through. The fundies will fail.

The only question is how many lives will they destroy and how much blood will be on their hands in their attempt to stop the future.

The future is coming at the speed of tomorrow.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 10:10PM by anybody.

anybody Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Even in
> Russia and China, the totalitarian government
> can't stop information from getting through.

Yes they can: not 100%, but assuredly 80% or more.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/03/2023 01:14AM by anybody.

For every one of you who fears and loathes the opposite side,
you have a counterpart there who fears and loathes you.

"Nature always maintains a balance."
Right, SchrodingersCat?

  
  

Just quoting him.
I realize, of course, that "Appeal To Authority" is a (il)Logical Phallacy.

> . . . a (il)Logical Phallacy.

Please, please tell me that spelling was intentional.

Please!

But that is so much more than just creative spelling. Freud would have a field day; you might have been one of his case studies.

Old enough to have met him, perhaps, but to have all the necessary machinery to generate such issues up and running?

THAT'S where your argument strikes me as phallacious.

I don't care what fundies do. They want to control what I do.

The difference is they care what I believe or don't believe, even if they don't know me or anything about me.

They want to make the world in their image, and reject the plurality of existence.

Fundies think that the mere existence of others who are not like them or do not believe what they believe is a threat.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 11:56PM by anybody.

watch what's behind you

Rubicon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> United just announced a pro LGBTQ+ flight to
> Australia. What's the problem?


I was boarding the airplane through the forward hatch. As I entered, the cockpit door was open, and I heard what sounded like...PRAYER! Things like,
"We ask for your blessing..."
"We pray for good weather...
"...if it be Your will..."
"...that we all perform our duties properly..."
I couldn't believe my ears! I asked the greeting attendant, "Is the cockpit crew Christian--are they praying?"
He poked his head in, then answered, "Yes, they are."
My heart, pounding and gasping for breath, I found my seat, next to a distinguished-looking man with an olive compleion, which I found, symbolically at least, comforting, sort of an offset to those horrible zealots. I told him what I had just witnessed.
"You think we're safe with Fundies operating the plane?" I asked him. "That they're not counting on some kind of deity to get us there safely, they haven't been sprinkling holy water on the wings, stuff like that?"
He shrugged and turned to his book. I spent the flight time mentally composing letters to the airline and the FAA so that something could be done about these zealots put in a position of such technological peril. I felt better as we began descent, and remarked to my seatmate, "I hope these Fundies can land a plane safely!"
He smiled benignly, and replied, "Insha'Allah."

anybody Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> No one in 1922 thought that a looney tunes
> loudmouth whacko's crazy hate speech would result
> in mass killings, death camps, gas chambers, and
> crematorium ovens running on twenty-four
> shifts...

Pretty sure Nietzsche called it!
Bit was a nihilist, so, good thing he hated Jews so bad he kicked out the smartest one who said, Here’s how you make a nuke, e=Mc^2, do it, before that NAZI does!

I’m all for survival, which, to me, seems like involves winning the chess game the West is in with Putin, which is currently in stalemate. He captured Crimea in 2014 and the West said, “Oh well, at least it’s not Eastern Ukraine. But now a decade later, it’s, “Well at least it’s not Poland!”
Then it’ll be Poland.

Then what’ll they say?

At least it’s not France!

> The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the country’s
> largest LGBTQ+ organization, sounded similar alarm
> bells earlier in the week. The organization has so
> far tracked 340 introduced anti-LGBTQ+ bills,
> including the most anti-transgender bills ever
> filed that the group has seen.

I have friends and family who are LGBTQ and they’ve got a real battle ahead. Ron Desantis is leading the opposition and he’s more dangerous than the last wanna be Hitler, because he has a Harvard Education and he’ll have the right people behind him.

Fascism 101: Whip your followers up into a state of fear, demonize a small minority unable to defend themselves, and then eliminate and/or kill them.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/03/05/florida-bills-would-ban-gender-studies-transgender-pronouns-tenure-perks/


Florida legislators have proposed a spate of new laws that would reshape K-12 and higher education in the state, from requiring teachers to use pronouns matching children’s sex as assigned at birth to establishing a universal school choice voucher program.

The half-dozen bills, filed by a cast of GOP state representatives and senators, come shortly before the launch of Florida’s legislative session Tuesday. Other proposals in the mix include eliminating college majors in gender studies, nixing diversity efforts at universities and job protections for tenured faculty, strengthening parents’ ability to veto K-12 class materials and extending a ban on teaching about gender and sexuality — from third grade up to eighth grade.

The legislation has already drawn protest from Democratic politicians, education associations, free speech groups and LGBTQ advocates, who say the bills will restrict educators’ ability to instruct children honestly, harm transgender and nonbinary students and strip funding from public schools.

It shall be the policy of every public K-12 educational institution … that a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait.
— Florida House Bill 1223


https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/politics-issues/2023-03-03/legislation-illegal-gender-affirming-care-transgender-youths


The bills (HB 1421 and SB 254), filed by House Health & Human Services Chairman Randy Fine, R-Brevard County, Rep. Ralph Massullo, R-Lecanto, and Sen. Clay Yarborough, R-Jacksonville, are the latest in a series of moves by lawmakers and Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration aimed at transgender people.

The Florida Board of Medicine and the Florida Board of Osteopathic Medicine last month moved forward with rules that would prevent doctors from providing such treatments to minors.

But the bills would go further by placing a prohibition in state law. The House version would require that doctors lose their licenses if they commit violations, while the Senate bill could lead to criminal charges for a person who "willfully or actively participates in a violation."

The House bill also would make changes including preventing health insurers and HMOs from providing coverage for treatments such as puberty blockers, hormone therapy and gender-affirming surgery and would largely block people from changing the sex listed on their birth certificates. Both bills would bar state agencies and local governments from spending money on such treatments.

The bills, which were filed as lawmakers prepare to start the annual legislative session Tuesday, will add fuel to debates that have repeatedly flared in Florida and numerous other Republican-controlled states about treatment for gender dysphoria. The federal government defines gender dysphoria clinically as “significant distress that a person may feel when sex or gender assigned at birth is not the same as their identity.”

“Parents have the right to raise their children as they see fit, and government intervention should be a last resort," Senate President Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, said in a prepared statement Friday. "Unfortunately, all too often we are hearing about treatments for gender dysphoria being administered to children, often very young children. That’s just wrong, and we need to step in and make sure it isn’t happening in our state.”

But the LGBTQ-advocacy group Equality Florida issued a news release about the House bill that said it would "strip families of their medical freedom, put government in control of insurance coverage decisions, and codify a ban on transgender people being legally recognized as themselves."

"Transgender people are neighbors, friends, family members," Nikole Parker, Equality Florida director of transgender equality, said in a prepared statement. "We exist and we matter. This bill to rip away lifesaving health care, shred insurance coverage and bar birth certificate access will cost lives."

Fine’s committee last month held a panel discussion that included doctors, researchers and other people opposed to gender-affirming care for transgender minors. At the time, Fine indicated he would file legislation on the issue. Massullo, meanwhile, is a dermatologist.

“I will tell you this. I say these panels are often a predicate for what’s to come. That’s exactly what today was. And I promise you, you will like the bill,” Fine said at the end of the Feb. 21 meeting.

Equality Florida described the speakers at the committee as a “sham panel.” It also accused DeSantis of using the issue “in his quest to build a right wing presidential resume.”

“This one-sided discussion, which relied on fringe speakers from social media and from outside of Florida and the U.S., does not change the broad scientific consensus from our nation’s leading medical associations — that gender-affirming care improves health outcomes and saves lives,” Parker said in a statement after the meeting.



https://floridapolitics.com/archives/592722-anti-trans-bathroom-bill-filed-in-supermajority-gop-florida-senate/



A bill filed Friday in the Florida Senate would assert legislative intent in bathrooms and locker rooms, restricting usage of single-sex facilities to genders assigned at birth.

SB 1674, called the “Safety in Private Spaces Act,” would mandate “exclusive use” of restrooms and changing facilities by gender. The legislation from Sen. Erin Grall, a Republican from Vero Beach, would ban people from “willfully entering” such a facility designated for “the opposite sex.” Violators of this law could face second-degree misdemeanor charges and fines of up to $10,000.

Grall’s bill posits that “females and males should be provided restrooms and changing facilities for their exclusive use in order to maintain public safety, decency, and decorum.” These include “changing facilities” in schools, jails and prisons, public shelters, and health care facilities ranging from optometrists to pharmacies.

The bill defines “female” and “male” by tying those terms to their respective “specific reproductive role.” The “female” is tasked with “producing eggs” and the “male” is tasked with “producing sperm.”

There are permissible exceptions in the bill. Chaperones for young children are exempt, as are police officers and emergency workers doing their jobs. If the same sex restroom is out of order, then someone can provisionally use the opposite sex facility as long as no one is in there.

Schools are to punish violators in their code of student conduct, and jails and domestic violence shelters must strictly segregate the genders, except for family units in the latter case.

The bill holds that each provision is severable, meaning that a successful legal challenge of one part of the bill would not invalidate the law overall.

There is no House companion for this yet, but should it become law, it goes into effect July 1.

Grall’s bill is the latest in a series of recent bills from the Florida Senate that serve as a socially conservative rebuke to the LGBTQ+ community, as the Republican supermajority flexes its muscles. Three of those bills were filed earlier this week by Sen. Clay Yarborough, including legislation to claim territory in classrooms, performance venues and health care facilities in the new front involving children and gender identity.

The bills are:

— SB 1438, which appears to have been inspired by the annual tour of “A Drag Queen Christmas,” a show where children were photographed during the holiday season. The legislation would revoke the license of any public lodging that admits a child to an adult live performance. Republican Rep. Randy Fine filed identical legislation in the House.

— SB 1320 which would prohibit people from using preferred pronouns that do not correspond with the gender identity assigned to the person at birth. It would also ban classroom instruction related to sexual orientation or gender identity until the ninth grade. Two related bills are moving in the House. HB 1069 defines “sex” and is moving through committees. HB 1223, concerned with pronouns, sexual orientation and gender identity instruction, was filed Tuesday.

— SB 254 would give the state temporary emergency jurisdiction over children if they are at risk or are getting what some call “gender-affirming care” and others call “sex-reassignment” prescriptions or procedures. Also, it would require health care providers to say they don’t provide the treatment to children younger than 18 or face losing their license.

Fine and Republican Rep. Ralph Massullo filed similar legislation (HB 1421) in the House.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/2023 06:32PM by anybody.

It seems like the North needs to start a new underground RR out of the Bible Belt.
Floridians love DeSantis, having re-elected him in a landslide. I’m old enough to remember when Florida was a swing state. Now it’s about as RED as UT!
But until now UTs Gov hasn’t started registering bloggers who criticize their Dear Leader.

And let there be no doubt -- the driving force behind all of this is ultra far right, white nationalist, "christian" religious extremism.

Twenty or more years ago, Florida was considered to be a desirable destination for teachers. I knew of teachers who packed up from Maryland and left for Florida. Now it is the joke of the entire education community. Teachers nationwide are watching what is going on in Florida with horror.

One problem with school vouchers is that in most places, private schools considerably underpay the public schools. I could not have afforded to become a teacher if private schools were the only option. That's probably true for most teachers. Florida is already about a thousand teachers short. Any further moves will only worsen the situation.