The War on Trans People: Part 4, The Legislative Onslaught

just like pill people on fascist esotericism. What a what a fun joke that would be happen here show we talk about things that could happen, of about just talking about the onslaught of of bills that have been introduced the past few months that attacking kind of trans rights

and queer people in general. Yeah, so we've we've we we've heard about gay marriage, We've heard about turfs a lot the past the past few episodes, and now we're going to be kind of focusing on the Yeah, like I said, the kind of current legislation that's happened specifically within the past six months, um that I've been targeting kind of LGBTQ people in in schools, particularly that, and a lot of it's been targeted towards towards miners, teen teens, adolescents,

UM and restricting the visibility and uh and kind of what's allowed to be said and mentioned in schools. So we're gonna kind of actually talk about UM books first, because a lot of this stuff is kind of tied into the critical race theory UM kind of like organizing

that the right was doing. So. Yeah. The American Library Association says that between September and December alone, they received more than three thirty reports of book challenges, for which is the most over two decades in terms of people trying to restrict what books are allowed to be in schools. Boy, I experienced a book challenge lately. Tell you what, trying to read through the new James Patterson book. What do

either of you know who James Patterson is? No? Was this was this was a bad idea on my back? Please continue, Garrison, I was. I was busy reading the before you logged on. I have a different interest in books. You know, actually very similar books, very similar and the Pelican brief basically identical. I have no idea how much. That's gonna get bleeped, but it's gonna be funny. Um

so yeah. A Tennessee school's removal of Mars the Holocaust graphic biography became kind of the most famous example of this trend a few months ago. Um, the book was allegedly banned due to due to nudity and because of curse words. But this is kind of you know it was. They claimed it had nothing to do with actual political content. Um, it was just because of the the inappropriate images to children, which is a little a little dubious since it's all

you know, starring mice. Um yeah, yeah. But the majority of challenged books have been kind of those focused on lgbt Q characters or themes. Back in November, nearly two dozen people a day we're dying from COVID nineteen in South Carolina. Thank god that god better. Thank god we knocked that ship out. But rather than try to handle the public health crisis, Governor Henry McMaster seemed more interested in pressuring the state's Department of Education to crack down

on queer theme two books. He directed the Department of Education and the State Board of Education to create quote, statewide standards and directives prevent pornography and other obscene content from entering our state's public schools and libraries of the Governor said in a letter to the Superintendent of Education. Inside the letter, it was specifically targeted towards uh Maya Kobe's book Gender Queer, a Memoir UM, which is a gender queer graphic novel kind of detailing what it's what

it's like to be gender queer. It's definitely popular among kind of the adult like a young adult kind of age range and and as and as a good resource for kind of gender bending type stuff. Um and it has faced a large amount of a large amount of the onslaught and like the bashing of queer books have been focused on this specific book. It's an autobiographical book based on the Bay Area non binary writer and the

illustrator UM. It's been challenged and it started being challenged at one of South Carolina's nearly five hundred schools and then got banned from all of them just because people were mad at about it. At one school, it was being recommended for those in the tenth grade or higher to learn about kind of queer issues UM and it is now become one of the most banned books of this past year. It's been removed from schools in Virginia, New Jersey, Florida, North and South Carolina, Texas, and a

large amount of other states in the South. Um. Speaking speaking of Texas, the Agenda Queer Graphic novel was just one part of a massive kind of horrifying purge led by Texas Republican state Representative Matt cross Uh. He he led an effort to pressure and forced schools and libraries to remove books based on a list of undesirable reads

that he compiled himself. Um. The list is a sixteen page spreadsheet with over eight hundred and fifty books cataloged on Crouse's eight hundred and fifty strong list of titles that he wants spanned from Texas libraries, of them concerned LGBTQ issues. Um, it's kind of clear that what he

did this, Yeah, well what what what? What? What he did to make this list is just like googling the words like queer and l g b t Q and g and trans like with book and just found a list of books that have it like mentioned to somewhere, so like a lot of so many books are just like completely a banned that aren't even really like yeah, like the list is nearly one thousand books, like log so like he was just like Google searching to like add as many books to lists as that he could.

It's not actually about the content beyond the fact that the content acknowledge the existence of queer people. Like yeah, that's to the extent that he knows about the content.

That's it, Like, you can't be reading all these books no, because like one of the more interesting trends that you can find on this list is that it challenges and tries to ban books that teach students like their legal rights, um like not even counting books about like reproductive rights or writes his like l g b t Q people. It also it includes in this list like titles like the Legal Atlas of the Unit in States, um Team legal Rights, Uh, the legal Rights, Yeah, equal Rights, we

the students, Supreme Court cases for and about students. Uh yeah, I mean this is my my support for LGBTQ people is worring here with my belief that children should not know their rights because they're they're they're they're they're getting too upty. As it is, we gotta we gotta crack look, could we crack down on kids in a way that isn't bigoted, That's all I'm asking for. Nope, nope, absolutely no, we gotta slow them down. Kids. You must know your rights.

And the very important thing here is that if you keep WE in your locker, the school can just search it. So don't put in your locker. If you put it in your car, they it's it's way harder for them to search it in the principles car store guns. They're wait, okay, sorry, let's um. Yeah, I'm not sure if you can find that in the legal acts less of the United States. But to be fair, Texas kids can't read that book

either now, so who knows who knows what it sets? Yeah, So to Virginia, school board members kind of called for a sexual books quote unquote sexual books to be burned at a meeting last year. Um, and a lot of these, like a lot of the rhetoric around like book book burnings and book bannings was specifically tied to the kind of the effort to harass and gain support in school boards.

And we saw us last year with like proud boys and extremists, and it's like other like random people who got their brains kind of warped by propaganda kind of leading these like incendiary charges against against the school board members. Some you know, the school board members got fired, like threatened with arrest just for allowing books that mentioned the existence of being queer. It was, it was, it was quite quite a problem that is now influencing this current

legislative cycle. UM. In almost every case, quote unquote, like concerned parents have swarmed school board meetings and flooded kind of mailboxes with outrage over what they call pornography UM

being distributed to their children. You know, people will will plaster signs with you know, scenes from the gender queer graphic novel that is like what they they they deem as being like porno like pornographic UM when it just depicts like how how like adults and young adults behave accurately, just like you can find in any like fucking like

Batman comic. Like it's not like it's it's like it's like not it's it's it's it's both in line with other comic books and also like it's obviously dealing with like issues around being queer as like that's the whole point of it. So but yeah, just blasting this blasting like queerness as innately pornographic, is you know, a big, a big part of this type of propaganda push. It's it's, uh, it's pretty upsetic because I mean a lot of these adults and like quote unquote parents, you know, who knows

if they're actually parents. You know, it even goes and stuff to being like, you know, they're accusing librarians and teachers of being pedophiles for having this, for the having these type of materials. In Wyoming, prosecutors considered charging library staff with stalking books about sexuality, um, including like literary classics under like the sex said banner, like sex is

a funny word and this book is gay. Um, but I considered charging library staff, like with cribs, for for stalking these books, which are like very typical sex said books. It's it's incredible because when I was in a Texas public school, I read all of the Wheel of Time books from my school library, and those are horny in a much much more unhealthy way than any of the books that you're talking about could possibly be described as well.

You get that, you get this fun thing where it's like they're basically running the clock back on the turf arc like if you if you remember, we're talking about church in Mexico. It was okay, So the ark that they did was they were anti porn people, but then they lost anti porn wars, so they became anti trafficking people. And then when sort of turfishing came back, they went from anti trafficking back to being turfs. And it's like this, this is literally they're they're doing this whole thing in

reverse right there. Their starting position is that their anti trans and they're just going back to like the anti porn stuff, but like bringing in and sort of like bringing in an anti trafficking angle, and it's it's great, It's extremely fun. Yeah, this is I would describe this is fun. This is what I consider a fun time. Yeah, well I know what you consider a fun time here. You do notice my my carefully place, carefully placed books on on my Yes, I'm extremely aware of that. Garrison.

Harrison is reading books that will get them canceled by like five specific people if we talk about them too much on this show. That is always the fear of that's always the fear of Twitter. It's being canceled by five people. My favorite thing about doing a podcast for an audience of millions, Garrison is telling a joke that is that is precisely for you and me and making

that like several minutes of content. Sorry. Um, And Oklahoma bill was introduced to the state Senate that would prohibit school libraries from keeping books that focused on sexual activity, sexual identity, or a gender identity. Um, you're gonna gonna use the word gender identity a lot. That kind of just refers to anything that even I mean, like it refers to even mentions of being cinis gender, right, because if you bring up the concept of cis gender, that

infers that there is an alternative to that. So so like even any if anything even mentions being sis, it means that there must be something other. So that already falls into the gender identity kind of framework. So it's just like anything that suggests that you are that you that there's like, gender identity is not something you are innately born with and are forever, is is gonna be it's gonna be is banned and is seen as pornographic what I'm seeing or is like grooming children or whatever

kind of words that they use. Um, And like all of this rhetoric is much worse for l g B two Q authors who are black or people of color. There's books like All Boys Aren't Blue by writer George M. Johnson, whose whose book led one white school board member to call the police on her own district's librarian for keeping it in stock. It's uh the the the Central York School District in Pennsylvania, and an extensive list of books last year that was almost entirely written by the authors

of color. This is all the stuff has been happening, like concurrently with the anti critical race theory, like organizing in protests, which again obviously isn't about actual critical race theory, just about the suggestion that maybe racism is something that is not just an individual problem, but it's maybe kind of built into our entire culture and system of governance, UM and education. So it's it's not actual critical race theory,

it's that. But I think everyone listening to this kind of already are already knows that Texas Governor Greg Abbott, which is gonna be just who's gonna be a recurring character on this episode, UM, kind of has taken this whole you know, calling the police on librarians thing, uh much further kind of demanding that the state's education agency quote investigate any criminal activity in our public schools involving the availability of pornography, a move that kind of librarians

in the state fear could make them targets of criminal complaints. For again, the stalking books about sex said, or you know, stalking books that not even not not not even not even not even but like sex head, just just like books that mentioned an alternative to the heteronormative, like you are the gender that you are signed at birth, like idea, like anything other than that is now could get them in trouble. So anything that doesn't kind of fall under

the Christian supremacist like worldview of sexuality and gender. It's it's not great. There's a it's so yeah, all boys aren't blue. The book written by by George M. Johnson, has been similar to the gender queer graphic novel is one of the most banned books of last year, targeted for removal in at least a fifteen states. Um, it's a lot of the organizing of these efforts kind of

start online. There's like Telegram channels, Facebook groups, and then they carry over into like school board protests, and then eventually like you know, maybe some school board members will will will catch onto this and start advocating for it. Then you know, the state governor, does you know it's

city city councilman. Like all of this thing is is is his whole cycle of organizing that's really picked up alongside the anti CRT stuff many many parents have seen, like Google docs or spreadsheets like the sixteen page one made by Matt Krausse of of contentious titles posted on Facebook by local chapters of organizations such as Mom's for Liberty.

So people will make these giant, giant spend streets talking about books that they don't like, and then they'll get shared around on Facebook groups, Telegram channels from their librarians. Uh say that parents will ask their schools if these books are available inside libraries, and then we'll start rallying and organizing to get them banned from being available in any kind of public, public government setting, whether that be school libraries, whether it be like public libraries, whether that

be like online access, all this type of stuff. So yeah, it's a it's I don't know, it's Organizing against these types of things is never the easiest thing, um, because a lot of times they these people get really get really dedicated onto this because it is such a it's it's it's the whole save the children a kind of idea which gave Q and On such strength, and Q and On is kind of taking a dip down. This stuff is taking a rise up. It's kind of it's

passing over the same type of organizing principles online. As as mentioned before, the governor of South Carolina asked the state's Superintendent of Education but also it's law enforcement division, to investigate the presence of quote obscene in pornographic materials from its public schools um you know, citing the Gender and Queer graphic novel as an example that you've seen.

You've seen mayors in difference in different cities withhold funding from county libraries saying that he will not release money to these candy library systems until books with lgbt Q themes are removed. It's it's pretty grim, uh, And so far efforts to bring criminal charges against librarians and educators have largely faltered, as as law enforcement officials in like Florida and Wyoming and other sites for this type of thing has been attempted. Have you know, found really no

basis for criminal investigations. But still it's like the same thing for like, even even if this process gets started, it's about building like fear that it could happen to you. It's about you know, this fear that someone's always watching and someone's always wanting to report you. Um, and it's the thing that they happened with Texas and abortion. It's like trying to have like the bound hundred idea of be like parents are trying to find examples of this

to report it. So then so it's like this like proactive kind of surveillance of anything that doesn't fall into the Christian supremacist idea of gender and sexuality. It's you know, now, of course that's like a specific interpretation of Christianity. I'm not not saying all Christianities like that, but it is the one of it's them in the South, it's it is like one of the bigger strains of that type of of that type of kind of religious and politic synthesis.

Let's let's see. So courts have generally taken the position that libraries should not remove these books from circulation um, but sometimes due to pressure via like loss of funding or depending on how like the how much how much like who is in charge of each state's kind of education system? A lot of a lot of a lot of these books have been banned and have have been

pulled from many school libraries and many public libraries. Even if it doesn't like go all the way to being like you know, court mandated all of it, sometimes it

doesn't need doesn't even need to get that far. So yeah, because like even if it doesn't get to the court, librarians kind of librarians have said that just the threat of having to defend against charges and having to defend against like accusations of pedophilia and grooming and all this kind of nonsense is enough to get many educators to censor themselves by just not talking these books to begin with, to avoid that whole kind of debacle, because even just

the public spectacle of an accusation can be enough to like ruin someone's life inside like a small like in like a small community. Right, it's it's it's is if you know parents, if you know kids, and this is like part of your social group, it's part of like wherever you're like situated in your community. If this type of thing starts up, it can really be devastating to

someone's personal life. And of obviously this is very ironic because all these same people who are trying to get get these books banned also crying and scream about like censorship and cancel culture um, while literally advocating the burning of comic books um, and even like fucking like advocating the burning of know your Rights books. So it's it's like, yes, they will cry and scream about canceler culture um, but they will do all of this stuff as well. It's

not it's not right. There is no ideological consistency. They're they're they're they're not they're not trying to that's not that's that's not part of the point. It's because it's not even hypocrisy in their own eyes, because all of this is for the greater good. It's it's about protecting the innocence of children. Right. If you'll notice that a lot of these bills and efforts try to not explicitly attack books for being gay or queer. Instead, they will

label them as pornographic or obscene um. Obviously, many books that conservatives will defend have just as graphic depictions of intimacy or autonic like or um or anatomy um, but usually heterosexual in nature, and alongside other kind of values that the right wants to push. Um. You know, even like the fucking Bible is more graphic than the gender

queer and graphic novel um. But when conservatives say pornography, what they just mean that is any display of queerness, right, anything outside the mold of the fundamentalist Christian supremacist worldview that they're fighting for. Just like when they say banned critical race theory, they don't they don't actually mean that. What they mean is ban any discussion on racism that

kind of disrupts white comfort. It's it's it's it's they they have their own framework to view this and they can justify it within their own framework, so you know, it's It should not surprise anyone that many of these queer book bannings are being organized alongside bands on books

focusing on race and racism. UM. Matt Cross's sixteen page spreadsheet was was was made to accompany House Bill three nine seven nine, the so called anti CRT bill, that band's teaching of any materials that could mean quote an individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other psychological distress on account of the individual's race or sex. So just banning teaching of things that could make a medical person kind of uncomfortable, which is it seems like a

great way to view education. Uh yeah, let's just skip over the parts that are uncomfortable and that I'll make a great society. Wow. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna quote from a great article by Samantha Rydell in them dot Com quote small. Wonder then that much of the current of fervor can be traced back to the conservative group No Left Turn, founded in to ban books

about racial inequality from classrooms by Elena fish Being. An a line of fish Being believes that Antifa children quote quote quote Antiva children are going to assault her kids for being white. Um. The organization No Left Turn rocketed to prominence in the anti education right wing after fish Being was interviewed by Tucker Carlson on Fox News. UM a tie, which similarly lifted like minded boat such as

Moms for Liberty. No Left Turns website directs parents to a laundry list of books that they claim are used to quote indoctrinate kids into a dangerous ideology. Including a robust section on quote comprehensive sexual education. UM here that pornography lie is laid bare with over forty books whose only kind of through line is that they deal with

lgbt Q themes. The picture book I Am Jazz, uh, Kate Bornstein's My Gender Workbook, and the y A novel Two Boys Kissing also included, as Margaret Atwood's The Hand The Handmaiden's Tale. UH. No Left Turn discriminately targets all these titles because they simply feature queer people having lives or, in the case of like Margaret Atwood, having their lives

be ended. So after all, ideas, ideas like that might influence kids to think that they could be different right any and for conservative parents, there's no greater horror than the thought of not being able to control their children or the idea that their kids might not straight. It should come as no surprise that the grassroots campaigns quote unquote grassroots campaigns like No Left Turn are in reality links to influential conservative donors and packs like the Cato

Institute and the former Federative Society Pardon Cato. Like the Cato It's named after Kato Kalin, the guy who lived behind o Ja's house. Is that true? No, it's yeah. I should have just let that. I should have just here's gonna slightly continently expand by like red string like my red string board its head by head like yeah, oh yeah. Cato Institute named after Kato Kalin, the guy

who o j Surper bro buddy. But it should come as no surprise that the grass roots quote unquote grassroots campaigns like No Left Turn and Reality link to influential conservative donors and packs like the Cato Institute and former Federalist Society Vice president Leonard Leo. But then again, lies don't matter to the reactionary base that Republicans are hoping

to rally to the front of this culture war. What matters to them is controlling the information that children have access to to obsensively keep them safe and innocent, but in truth, because they think that if kids don't know but lgbt Q identities, they won't form one. It's conversion therapy by ignorance end quote. But that that's an idea I'm going to kind of come back through, come back to a few times throughout the course of this episode.

Is the idea of conversion therapy by ignorance, which really does kind of I think have introduced a really good like mental framework to understand why these things are happening, because they think if they can keep kids from learning about these things, then they won't become gay or trance. It is it's like trying to isolate them so that so that their reality tunnel is so small so that they won't hopefully will never like break out of it.

Um Now, obviously, if kids feel if kids start having feel things that break that piannel, if they don't know that there's an alternative to that, that really kind of leads to things like depression and suicide, which is why it's so high among among queer kids in that region because it's like there's it's like they're fundamentally breaking realities. So it's that's hard to cope with. We're I'm just

gonna it's gonna do. What's gonna do? Kind of one more segment quickly before before we haven't had break it is uh. It's it's interesting we have like a lot of the parents that have been rallying for this, UH have some interesting track records themselves. If we can even you know, go back to um UH to the Family Research Council, with Josh Dougger having the save the children idea well you know himself being a child bleicster or

help bill like yeah so um. In a secondingly ironic case, a Missouri parents named Ryan Utterback was charged in December with multiple accounts of child molestation and giving and distributing pornogu fee to miners, including a child as young as four. Um. Upon his arrest, utter Back was heavily involved in the book banning advocacy, including protests against the books All Boys

Aren't Blue and uh and other sex a books. Um. He he said he gave a quote before he got arrested and when he was still doing like the book banning advocacy quote, only I have the intimate understanding of what isn't isn't appropriate for my children, uh, which is quite quite the sentence to say on someone who is now arrested for a child molestation. So yeah, that's not yeah,

that's uh that sucks. But yeah, so like it's it's the idea that erasing erasing documentation of queer lives and making it so that so that people to their kids only are exposed to a very kind of isolated worldview will make it easier to control um and if they don't hear about something, maybe they'll just you know, live their life as a regular straight child. And that's that's

their hope. Now obviously that doesn't that doesn't really happen in practice, but that's kind of what they're working towards, and that that's why they save the children thing is so important to them, because they really do think that they can save the kid children, like they do think

that they can keep keep them from this stuff. So I think there's one other reason that they're doing that specifically they focus on books too, specifically the pornographic attack, which is that these kind of like incredible hard right evangelicals are not the entire Republican base, and so that there are people who they have to convin like they have to fully radicalize into into the extermination of where people,

specifically the exermination to trans people and the like. The easiest way to do that is just by constantly associating anything queer with pedophilia and with like specific tifically pedophilia and specifically grooming. And you know, these kind of campaigns like they have dual effect. They have the effect on the one hand of the actual material harm to children, and they're you know, like preventing them from having any access to anything that shows them that they could be queer.

And then simultaneously it has this effect of creating this association inside of conservatives that allows you to push for even more genocidal stuff that without this they might not have been able to swallow. Yeah. Well, speaking of genocidal actions, I'm sure that one of our sponsors have contributed to at least one attempt to genocide. I mean we we are actually entirely sponsored this week by the former Indonesian dictator Suharto, So you know, big, big thank you to him.

Uh Pancasila forever. And yeah, here's the matter. Ah, we're back. Don't don't don't google what Cukarno did in uh in West Popua. Hey, Hey, hey, hey, Sue hard too and Sukarno different. Yes, yes, yeah, I am very clear on this, and that's why you should not google what Zukarno did in in Papua because dear God. But we will put his patreon in the description. We will be backing his patreon. Look at the show notes for that. Um hi, welcome back.

We're gonna we're gonna segue into other types of legislation now, but still kind of focusing on the whole parents rights to decide what scientific and medical knowledge children can have access to UM in terms of like the conversion therapy by ignorance category. So we're gonna talk about they don't

Say Gay bill. So Florida's House and Senate just passed the so called Don't Say Gay Bill that bands mentioned of anything other than the strict heteronormativity and the you are the gender assigned that birth kind of idea UM. For at least most of elementary school, it's banned and possibly farther reaching than that UM, with teachers also opening

themselves up lawsuits if they fail to comply. It's formally known as the Parental Rates in Education Bill, and the text of the legislation states that quote classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through third grade, or in any manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards. So it is it is very intentionally vague for how far reaching

this can be. For how much they will determine what and what isn't appropriate for grades for an up who knows. Uh. Yeah, but it's not just it's not just limited to early grades. Classroom instruction on sexual orientation and general identity could be prohibited or at least taken to court at all grade levels, Uh, depending on what the parents find unacceptable. Right, it is, it's it's it's based on what the parents want to want to happen to to to the kids that are

under their care. So it's it's specifically following kind of the framework that yeah, you can you can report something if you don't like it. So it's it's it's very much pandering to like a reactionary conservative all this stuff that conservatives said was a nightmare about, like the Stazi in East Germany and the KGB. They're like, but what if we just decentralized that, you know, and and let anyone who's a bigot report and ruin the lives of

people around them for a variety of bullshit reasons. It's good. Yeah, it's ah. And I mean, just like other states, like in Texas, the enforcement of it is not initially done by the government but is open to a concern to fanatical public, saying that parents may bring action against the school district to obtain a declaratory judgment UM, and a court may award damages an attorney's fees if it finds the school violated the measure. So there's like financial incentives

for parents for this UM. The bill will come into effect on the first of July, with all school districts UM required to update their policies by at least June. There was there was also a proposed amendment that would have required schools and educators to report if they knew or suspected a child was lgbt Q to their parents within six weeks of learning. That UM, so within six weeks of learning, if they're not sis or straight, they

would have to be reported to the parents. UM. But that that part was withdrawn before the bill reached the House. But in terms of like this is the type of thing that well, this is that like the legislators are

thinking of. When it became increasingly apparent that the bill was going to be passed no matter what, UH, a Democrat, Chevin Jones, the first openly gay Florida state senator, tried to amend the bill to narrow the language to say that in classroom instruction should not be intended to change students sexual orientation or gender identity, and specifically not marginalized queer people, and instead just limit the bill to itach

appropriate sex said, and that amendment obviously failed, with Dennis Backley, the bill's main sponsor, saying that it would significantly gut the bill's intent. So it's it's it's it's specifically to suppress knowledge of being queer. That is, that is the

whole that's the whole point of the bill. Um, you know, I mean the the governor claims that the bill addresses quote sexual stuff and quote telling kids that they may be able to pick genders and all that, uh, saying that that has nothing to do like this is nothing to do with sex at all, like literally nothing. It's like but nothing, it's but they still do it, like the pornographic obscene kind of category because like it's right, it's the same thing like if you show gay people kissing,

that is sexual. If you show story people kissing, that isn't right. It's it's being queer as innately more obscene. It is it is, it is it is so much more of an issue. Rana Santas governor also said, like how many parents want their kindergarteners to have transjagenderism or something injected into their school discussion? Um, but that's so that type of stuff he says that like press conferences

and stuff. So yeah, it is. It is very clear that the bill is targeted specifically towards gay people, um, and being trans or being queer, being non sis, non straight, that whole that that that whole category. Um. The governor's press secretary called it the anti grooming bill. Um. You know, reviving the type of like you know, whether that LGBT attacks have had for years, suggesting that you know, being gay means that you are a pedophile or being trans

means that you're a pedophile. It ties in with this thing you'll see in like the far right and the libertarian right, where people who have like kill your local pedophile bumper stickers and stuff because you can't argue with like, yeah, pedophiles are are the worst. That's horrible, But you don't

actually mean people who molest children. You mean people who live in a way that you consider obscene, which are equating with pedophilias that you can justify murdering those people eventually yep, uh yeah, and when and when when confronted with the the actual pedophiles, they literally don't do ship well. They are off Like Andy No, for a great example, has regularly hung out around a specific I think a

most lee is his name pedophile. The longest serving Republican Speaker of the House was a pedophile and passive scale dinn it Dennis Haster d hast that's what that? Um, that's what that? What's that German band? This would have been a decent joke if I remember their name right away Romstein. Yeah, well I sucked it up, okay, so anyway,

please please continue. So yeah, but like they don't say gay bill tries even less than some of the like school book bands to hide behind the defense of prohibiting pornography. Like it just says the quiet part out loud, you know, saying that this bill is grounded in the belief the loud part out loud. Yeah, yeah, I like the bills just grounded in the belief that LGBTQ people simply by exist thing are a threat to like children and must

be completely arrased. Like that's that's the whole that's the whole. Idea. Following several hours of debate ahead of the vote in the Senate, a bill sponsor Atlanta Garcia claimed that quote, gay is not a permanent thing, and l g b t Q is not a permanent thing. So yeah, it's the type of like commercial therapy by ignorance thing. A lot of these people have advocated for conversion therapy to be legalized in the past or re legalized in the past. So yeah, they just they just don't want gay people

to be around because they find the nikki. So it's it's not it's not just Florida though, right the fears with like hyper focusing on you know, just justin, justin, don't say gay bill in Florida kind of like, you know, it ignores a lot of the other stuff that's happening across the entire country if you do when you're just focusing on state because they are like fifteen similar bills moving through state legislators that are strict how textbooks and

curriculums are allowed to teach lgbt Q topics and and like who can be hired as teachers and what are what are like what's allowed to be said when it comes to genderal identity and sexual orientation. All like stuff is happening all across the country. UM. A house bill in Tennessee would ban textbook and instructural materials that promote normalized support or address lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender lifestyles quote unquote um in in in k three twelve schools.

So also also high school um in in UH. In Kansas, there's a bill that seeks to amend the state's obsidity laws to make using classroom materials depicting homosexuality a class B misdemeanor. UH Legislators in Indiana are working to bar educators from discussing any content about sexual orientation, quote, transgenderism,

or general identity without permission from parents. In Oklahoma, there's a senate bill that would ban public schools from employing anyone who quote promotes positions in the classroom or any or any function of the public school that is the opposition to the closely held religious beliefs of students. So

that's that's interesting framing there. Yeah, and again we need to be very clear about this when like, when these people say deeply have religious beliefs, they mean fundamentalist Christianity. They're there, these people are very specifically attempting to turn the state into a Christian at those state, and this is the ship that they used to do it. And

it's yeah, it's it's it's grim. We can look at like a recent report from the Trevor Project UM which is an lgbt Q suicide prevention and crisis internation group, and they did a recent report finding that l g B t Q youth who learn about l g b t Q people or l g b t Q issues in the school have a tecent lower odds of reporting

a suicide attempt in the past year. So just that, like the knowledge that there is an alternative is like is life changing for people, right, the ability to to read eyes that there are other reality tunnels is can save people's lives, like it is Yeah, I mean I like I I watched this happen like my my public school, Like I was in a public school, but I was in public school in a really conservative area. The only time anyone even mentioned being gay was screaming about gay marriage.

And like we fucking saw some ship, Like a lot of extremely bad things happened to the queer kids. They're including me, like it yeah, like this this This stuff

kills people. It stilf hurts people. It is I think that's that people in like more blue states don't quite understand, is how how absolute this type of thing is, like living in these communities, How how narrow your version of reality is, Like how how everything you're exposed to is so hyper focused that even knowledge of an alternative can be so mind blowing that it really is important to have at least this to be knowledgeable, because yeah, a lot of people who you know, a lot of people

may not have access to the Internet in the same way. It's like a lot of these groups, especially like especially Christian groups specifically have like like you know, services that you can buy to like suppress websites on your WiFi. Writers is that only you're only available to access like certain websites like like like, it is a whole effort to restrict the reality that kids are exposed to two kind of railroad them into this hyper specific, kind of

heteroonormative idea of existence. So yeah, any type of thing that breaks these kids out of out of these reality tunnels can can be life changing, which is why they're trying to ban all these books of libraries because yeah, even if you even if you block websites, even if you were strict internet access, even if you were strict what can be taught in schools? You know, there's the fear of what if a kid goes to a library

and finds a book about being gay? Then oh wow, that could that would you know, undo all of the effort that undo the thousands of dollars we spend on blocking internet access to two websites. So like, that's why they're talking about like libraries and stuff is because yeah, if they find out about this stuff anywhere, then they gonna be in trouble. Like that's that's it's the whole

point of like isolating people, isolating what they view as possible. So, yeah, we're not gonna talking about some Uh, we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna talk money, money, money, money. Uh. The other thing that they don't say. Gay Bill has highlighted is the extent to which big businesses and corporate America is financially funding many of these recent efforts to hack

away queer rights. Uh. This has kind of been like a back and forth thing, though, especially if you look back in the past few years under the Trump era. Let's take the North Carolina Bathroom Bill for example, arguably the opening act for the current onslaught of socially conservative legislation targeting and trans people. Remember this was like right after the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage. So this is when the needle starts to shift towards trans people.

This is the bill that said that you have to use the bathroom assigned at matching the gender you were assigned at burg on your certificate. All types of stuff, um, putting again unspoken bigotry, us oaken stuff. You know, you could be you know, arrested or harassed for doing this previously.

But it's like putting this type of idea into concrete law. Right, this is once once progress starts, there's this like back pedaling so that they you know, they put they put that, they put what was once like unspoken bigotry and just like obvious bigotry into actual written law. Um, it's like make making it concrete. So during the bathroom bill kind of whole thing in North Carolina, um, we saw corporations trying to stay conscious of culture shifts, attempting to stay

on the sympathetic side of the rising generations. Who would you know, become their future employees and customers, trying to appeal to them and keeping that in mind. So in the aftermath of the passage of the bathroom Bill, multiple companies like PayPal, Adidas, Doutche, Bank Um all rescinded plans to invest in the state wild to Like, I mean, if there's if there's evil going on, Deutsche Bank is

providing money to make it. Yeah, it's it's it's it's stunning, Like how bad you have to be that Deutsche Bank is Like no, I like like every every person who's like Russia yet like like Deutsa Bank like before, like I knew someone who worked there who two of his coworkers like started like doing audits of their accounts and both of them wound up dead in their hotel rooms.

Non extradition countries. Yeah that scans yeah, like even okay, So yeah, Deutsche Bank initially said they weren't gonna pull out of Russia, but like two days ago, as we record this started pulling out. But they pulled out in North Carolina. They pulled North Carolina. Jesus Christ, big, big, big. You know. There's a degree to which is probably just like that raytheon Energy where it's like Raytheon, We're great

with trans people. Exact, you're making missiles, then you're fine. Exactly. Yeah, I mean big musical artists like Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam and a former former R E M member Ringo star kesled concerts there. Did you call Ringo star a member of R E M. Garrison the the n C double A announced it was that was championship durn Okay, okay, okay. If you'd lived through the nineties, you would never make fun of Michael Stipe again. At the National Basketball Association

pulled its All Star game from Charlotte. Almost seventy companies, Joy did a lawsuit against the bill. UM and you know,

money talks. The pressure worked. The state repealed the law in twenty's seventeen UH the same year I brought a coalition of business leaders in Texas blocked a similar bill pushed by these Tonchley conservative then Republican Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick UM And we've seen the same type of thing happened in Georgia the past few years, UM with with actions like Corporate Boycott's many large employeers pushing back on

the succession of socially conservative bills, including like racist voting restrictions, six week abortion bands, and quote religious freedom bills that would give businesses protection to refuse customers or higher employees that are queer. UM. Prominent in that resistance was a Disney, which cast a long shadow over Georgia's economy via its filming of Marvel movies inside Atlanta. Yeah so yeah. Across many states, big corporate brands were quick to condemn obviously

bigoted political moves. UM. Prominent Tennessee employeers like Nissan, del Amazon, and Vandorbilt University sent a since sent a letter last year opposing a suite of bills targeting LGBTQ rights, and a similarly, a group of Texas businesses business leaders declared opposition to Governor Greg Abbotts recent directive to investigate parents and others who provide transition treatment for for transgender youth.

But after Trump got out of office, and particularly during this recent round of a tax on queer rights, companies have not really been backing up their words with any equivalent actions. After Tennessee last year past all the bills that targeted lgbt Q rights, including measures restricting classroom discussion, um barring trans girls from any high school sports and it's and its own version of like the bathroom bill,

it faced nothing like the North Carolina boycotts. There was, there was, There was just nothing because this is when Biden was president. Now, um so, whether it be the anti c r T stuff, voting restrictions, or stepping away lgbt Q rights the past year under Joe Biden, companies are not really bothered to push back on these socially conservative bills were taking many states. It's it's they don't it's it's easier to push back. But it's easier to push back on something when you know when you have

a big bad in office. I guess, uh well, and I think also it's it's the companies can see which way the wind is blowing, right, Yeah, Like it's a sa standing with grifters when you when you when you watch people like when you watch stream races, like suddenly start to flip the political positions. When you when you watch the love the live streamers in particularly do this. When you watch them starting to flip that that's how

you can tell which way the wind is blowing. And this is really fucking scary because you know the way the wind is blowing right now that that these corporations are are are you know, drifting towards is just you know, refusing to oppose is just this exterminationism. Yeah, I mean so thankfully Disney got you know, shouted to like we're going to talk about so creators of the movie Song

of the South. UM. Was notable that in their refusal to criticize the bill as it moved through the legislator under um the kind of recent stuff inside Florida specifically so, but this was part of an overall pattern, like the corporate response was was much more muted to they go to they don't say gay bill um in Florida compared to other stuff across across the country even UM and it shouldn't really surprise any uh many of the Republican backers of the bill in Florida are actually bankrolled by

the varou same businesses that have done performative virtue signally boycott's and protests under the TROUMP era. UH. Disney and Disney World in Orlando is one of the state's biggest employers and an enormous economic force inside Florida. And when disney silence was met with pushback, Bob Chapeck, the CEO, try to kind of do damage control at first, like

internally within the company and then for outside press. UM last Monday, I think, which was the seventh UM in a in a In a memo to Disney staff, Chapec argued that the company can do more to promote tolerance quote through the inspiring content we produce and the welcoming

culture we create and the diverse community of organizations we support. UM, which is funny if you know anything about the history of Disney, also saying that the messages in their movies are more powerful than any law being effort, which is uh yeah, which is also you know, great coming from the company most famous for queer coding almost all of

their filings. Uh so sure, sure, bob Um. Two days later, UM, at a shareholder meeting, was a little more open and told told shareholders that the company had privately opposed to the bill. UM, and we'll trying to explain why the silence in the recent legislative efforts to attack lgbt P LGBTQ people. He said that we chose not to take a public position on the bill because we felt like we could be more effective working behind the scenes. Engaging

directly with lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. But it uh, it later came out that Speck had only reached out to Florida Governor Randa Centers just that morning after the bill had already had already passed. Yeah, we we need that cat from Saga that just yells lies. Yes, lying cats my favorite. UM definitely appreciate lying cat lying. Uh. Yeah. So of course none of this satisfied anybody, UM, and there's been increasing pushback from both within the Disney Company

and outside UM. Pixar sent a letter to JPEC criticizing his wishy washy stance on the on the on the don't say gay bill, and even goes on even goes on to goes on to criticize the corporation for capitalizing on pride through like a through rainbow mickey merchandizing and stuff, uh, saying, quote, it feels terrible to be part of a company that makes money from pride merch when it when it chooses to step back in times of our greatest need and when our rights are at risk, says the Pixar letter.

So yeah, after after aw if you did after the shareholder meeting, Jpeck said third times the charm and tried again to save face, announcing the company would immediately be and supporting efforts to combat similar legislation in other states, and would pause all political donations in the state pending

a review of the company's political giving. UM conceding that the company failed to be a stronger ally in the fight for equal rights, and all that is well and good if you ignore the fact that in the past two years alone, Disney has given three thousand dollars to politicians in Florida who voted for the Don't Say Gay Bill. UM Disney Entities donated at least four thousand dollars in the re election campaigns for the bill's chief sponsors, state

Representative Joe Harding and state Sponsor Dennis Baxley. UM and Disney Entities also donated fifty dollars to political action committee tied to the governor, Rhonda Santa's one so just last year.

So yeah, that's a that's a lot of money. Yeah, And I think I think it's worth like noting for people who like are somewhat younger, which is that like there's a whole thing where corporations pretend that they like queer people now and this is the thing that has existed for maybe a decade, and the other several hundred years of capitalism are them like ruthless lee crushing queer people of all kinds. So yeah, this is this is their normal state. Queer capitalism is like not a thing.

It's a It's a thing that exists solely to sell you sweatshirts. It's not a thing. Get that rainbow Mickey merchandise. Yeah, they want they are actively okay with funding people who want to kill you. So so as as I as I was writing this, UM last week tonight the show with Jonathan Oliver came out with a small piece that was covering similar ground, uh to to my writing. That also included some nice, nice, nice background on Disney sponsored politician and lead sponsor. If they don't say gay bill

that Dennis Baxley. Um, so yeah, apparently Baxley has said that quote abortion is causing Europeans to be replaced by immigrant Disney's going back from its Nazi roots. Nice little white replacement lie. Um. He worked on bills to repeal protections for queer workers and worked to relegalize gay conversion therapy. UM and at some kind of fundraising event he said

that quote. I know some districts where there's a big infestation of homosexuals that were pushing their agenda under the screen and then trying to get more people hired like them instead up gay adoptions and all this stuff. It's a continual fight for the values that we hold dear boy, brought to you, brought to you by Disney and yeah, take ticket infestation. Yeah, it's a yeah, take take take

none of the use of the infestation there. Um, that kind of ties into my whole, my whole like a viewing, you know, queerness as a contagion kind of idea well, which I mean viewing the enemy is a contagion is also older than just viewing queer people as a contagion, because it's exactly how Hitler talked about the Jews, and you know, it goes we can look at like some

of the things the Turks would say about Armenians. It's this idea of you know, you there's no there's no middle ground with a virus, and if you turn people into a virus, then you don't have to consider a middle ground. Um. So before we go and break I'm gonna I'm gonna do one more. I'm gonna do A quote from an article in The Atlantic UM titled want to understand the Red State onslaught Look at Florida. Um, it's a it's a it's a deccent article kind of

going through the financial stuff that Disney has kind of backed. Um. But yeah, quote. Why have so many companies backed away from these fights? The fights against the legislation? Some corporate lobbyists I spoke with said that one reason is that they believe the public opposition is counterproductive because more Republican elected officials in the Donald Trump era find it politically

valuable to be seen as fighting big companies. Businesses also frequently complained that the widening gulf between the parties leaves them in a lose lose position of alienating an important block of potential customers wherever they come down on policy debates. UM activists will point out that business is often try to have both ways by rhetorically identifying with causes such as inclusion and diversity without taking any tangible steps to

defend them. Another factor probably looms larger than any of these considerations, however much they want to publicly align with the values of younger customers and consumers and workers. Big companies want to only want to go only so far and fighting these proposals because they still mostly prefer Republicans and control of state governments to deliver the low tax

like regulation policies that they favor. State Republicans have, in turn, have grown more overt about threatening those beliefs when business leaders raise objections to the cultural war components of their agenda. When American Airlines criticize the restrictive voting bill in Texas past last year, Lieutenant Governor Patrick openly threatened to kill

other legislation the company had cared about. So yeah, like, obviously, companies want Republicans to be in charge because it will make it easier to run their big giant corporate businesses that basically are as powerful a lot of a lot of other like government entities. Uh so, yeah, they're gonna spend supporting Rhonda Santis. They're gonna spend dollars in the past the past two years supporting all these Republican candidates that voted for for they don't say, gay bill, because

that makes them more profit in the long run. And that's you know, if you're if you're running a business. That's what they want. So yep, that is uh, I'm gonna we're We're gonna take another ad break and then we will we will come back to talk about Texas and and and bathroom bills and healthcare and all of the other kind of stuff that's happened in recent weeks. Yeah, hello,

we are back. Sorry, I was, I was taking some time to listen to my favorite Ringo Star RM album in the break in between reading books by It's a really good combo of the media. How how dare you not the not properly appreciating Michael Stipe, the voice of several generations, Michael Stiper Michael Stipe, Yeah, so he was. I mean, yeah, I I really like the Black Keys. So anyway, um, I'm gonna make more bad music jokes

or I could continue my script. Yeah, please continue. We don't have to talk about all of the wonderful contributions your generation is made to music like uh like you two with hit Like You two, Fame Zoomer Bands, you two with hit Man. George Harrison, m Yep, you gonna make a lot of people happy, Garrison, a lot of people real happy. At least everyone states have introduced bills that would ban trans athletes from competing in sports that

correspond to their gender identities UM. Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee have already signed such bills into law. At the start of this year, new restructions were put into place for for in in Texas to also restrict UM what K through twelve school sports people can be on now, making them specifically match they're sex listed on their birth certificate at a your time of birth UM and even when the

states who don't just have blanket bands. There's other horrifying things happening, like in the beginning of last February, it came out that the Utah Republicans are making UH have proposed a commission to analyze the bodies of trans kids that would determine student athletes eligibility on a case by case basis, with having the authority to establish a explain range for fiscal characteristics affected by puberty, banning schools school

school athletes who do not fall within these established limits from participating in generate sports UM. Also a non fun fun side side but about the bill is that in their efforts to analyze the bodies of trans kids, the bill would also remember the commission immune from any lawsuit with respect to all acts done and actions taken in

good faith and carrying out their purposes. Um. Yeah, And this is this is something that I think is really common specifically with transphobia, which is that like all of the rhetoric about transphobia is about sort of like like

a huge amount of it's about molestation. Here's about amount amount of it's about pedophilia, and then a specifically with the most station part, it's like yeah, okay, so we're gonna have this council, right, we're gonna have we're gonna have this commission that these people are gonna they're they're going to just like they're going to molest these kids, right. But like this this is just something that happened to the transpeople constant, like the t s A like constantly.

It's just an enormal engine for just like like socially abusing every single trans person who goes who goes into an airport, Like I've definitely had not fun experiences at the airport the past few times. Like this is this is the thing is It's like it's it's they they impose as a sanction on trans people, the things that they claim trans people are doing yes, and it's it is.

And it's also interesting you'll find how many of these kind of bill sponsors politicians, um, eventually have it come out that like they watch a lot of like trans pornography and stuff. It's like it's it's all it's all fake, like all like everything, like everything they say they don't actually mean. It's all about the culture war. It's all about all the fucking like save the children's stuff. It's

all in opposite that they can get elected into politics. Right. Well, we'll talk about this with like that with like the with the Texas thing, how all of the big New Texas stuff happened like days before the primary election because they were being challenged by by by other politicians that were farther to the right of them. So it's all

like a political ploy. But the problem is is that at certain points, because of how long the culture war kind of idea has been going, there's people who you know, sincerely bought into the idea of the of the cultural war now themselves running for office. Um. So like it is like they do actually genuinely believe the things now it is it is like it is like a full circle thing of things that were just you know, just to get votes initially, like things that weren't really believe sincerely,

just just to hold votes. But now people who were brought up in that whole political idea are starting to run for office who do actually believe those in those things that sincerely So now it's it's leading, its leading to a whole new kind of onslade of rights because these people have just escalated and accelerated the whole culture

war idea. Yeah. Well, and and the other thing is like they've linked up with people who, like people whose politics at the church or people whose politics have specifically been about eliminating trans people for like half a century.

Right Like there there's there's the linkages that are being formed between people who have sort of like you know, between these militantly anti trans organizations in between sort of these people who buy into this, like either who are very who who are cynically deploying the sort of the sort of Christian supremacist rhetoric, or the people who are

just actual like Christian fascists. Right like, these people like these people are goying together to the point where it doesn't it doesn't really matter why they're doing it, Okay, at certain points, like the reason why specifically they're doing it becomes immaterial and you're just sort of left with

the things that they are doing. Yeah, it's I mean, and there's just been so much of it the past the past year, specifically like over like overall, more than one hundred bills designed to restrict the rights of transgender of transgender people have been introduced in at least thirty three states. It justin just one, which is like, it's become a record breaking here for any kind of anti trans legislation. It's just it is accelerated to such a

extreme degree. UM and now continuing in two legislative cycle UM. Last spring in in in in Arkansas, the state legislator banned gender of her main care for minors UM, including you know, puberty blockers HRT, all the stuff you know UM and the House Bill one five seven oh prevents transpeople from receiving hormotherapy, puberty blockers, similar treatments UM. It was called the Save Adolescence from Experimentation Act UM, you know,

referring to medical treatment as experimentation UM. And shortly after the bill was signed into law, UM, the doctors who run the largest or who ran the largest provider of of hormone therapy, and the state reported an increase in suicide attempts in their patients during like just that same month. UM. It was it was the first of its kind of bill sign into law, and it was it was initially vetoed by the governor, but then that veto was overturned

by the state legislator. So and that kind of similar laws have been have been happening in states ever since then. We're not going to talk about Texas, UM, because that's one of the one of the biggest, one of the biggest kind of things in this whole fight is the

stuff around Texas. So, Texas officials have begun investigating parents of transgender adolescence for a possible child abuse, according to a lawsuit filed on a few a few weeks ago, after Governor Greg Abbott directed uh the the Child Protective Services Agency in Texas, to handle certain medical treatments, including

puberty blockers and h RT as possible crimes. The directive from Governor Abbott was following a non binding opinion by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton UM saying that parents who provide their transgender to natures with doctor prescribed a care could be investigated for a child abuse. So the moves by both Abbott and Paxixton try to Republican UH incumbents came just days before the primary election UM in which

each of them faced significant challenges from farther right opponents. UM. So they've both they've faced criticism from not being staunch staunchly anti trans enough in the past, like in the months prior to this, and they did this to hopefully, you know, gain support from the more radical, UH, more radical voters in Texas. That's like, that is that is undoubtedly a big, a big, big part of why this

happened at the time that it did. They did the same thing both Paxiston, well, let's Paxton, but Abbott did basically the same thing with like masks in the last year two where it's like, yeah, you know, I mean it's it's great because the people are just they will literally kill thousands of people or just hold onto their

power and it's among to be. The first people investigated for child abuse was actually an employee by the States Protective Services Agency who had a sixteen year old transgender child. On March one, the a c l U of Texas and Lambda Lambda Legal great great name went to state court in Austin to try to stop this inquiry into this family. Who again, who who worked for? Who? Worked for the Child Protective Services Agency UM. The employee, who was not named in the court filing, works on reviews

of reports of abuse and neglect. She was paced on administrative leave a few weeks ago. According to the filing, the friday after Governor Abbott made the initial kind of letter UM, she was visited by an investigator from the agency UM, who was also seeking medical records related to her child. UH. The family of the child, identified in court documents only as Mary Doe has as as refused to voluntarily at turnable records and as taking the case

to court. According to the lawsuit, the state investigator told parents that the only allegation against them was that their transgender daughter may have been provided with gender affirming healthcare and was currently transitioning. And that was that was the claims, that was the that was the basis for the claims of of of of of child abuse. It's a so like. Initially, it wasn't clear if Abbot's order would survive kind of judicial scrutinty because the order does not any The order

doesn't change any Texas law. Um, it's just it's just an opinion piece. And several county attorneys and district attorneys of Dallas and Houston have publicly condemned Abbots and Pakiston's directives UM, clarifying that they would not prosecute families for child abuse under the new definition, and they would not

irrationally um and unjusfiably interfere with medical decisions. The mayor of Austin announced that Austin should be considered a safe place, a sanctuary for transgender children and their families, and they would not be enforcing the governor's mandate. So it's quite a time to be alive to have sanctuary cities for

being trans YEA. And of course all of these things, whether it be from like the d A S or the mayor, that doesn't stop trying to protective services from not investigating you like that, doesn't like that doesn't like They can still investigate and harass you. They can still send agents to your door. They can still try to see his medical records, right, They can still investigate claims even if even if the DA won't prosecute. There's still that massive like looming threat of and like that like

terror like holding over you know, people's heads. Um, you know, it's it's it's a it is like a mass it's a massive scare tactic, right, it is. It is too terrorize people like they will be too scared to transition because they don't want their family to get in trouble. It's it's pretty grim. It's pretty. It's pretty. It's pretty evil. Um so on the for the for the a c

l U and the Lambda Legal Court failing. Uh, they they're they're seeking to block the request for medical records from the employees case and more broadly kind of challenged the legitimacy of the entire investigation and the power that the government has to change this definition of child abuse.

It's a because it's it's it's it's it's also important important to mention that the mandatory as the mandatory reporting aspect of the bill, which was well not not bill of the of the legal opinion that was really emphasized

in Governor Abbot's directive. Um Abbott described his letter that the order would mean that all licensed professionals who have direct contact with children, including doctors, nurses, therapists, and even school teachers would be required to report to state authorities um if if if they believe that there is a minor who's trans or could be receiving any kind of gender affirming treatment. Um and if they don't report this,

they could themselves faced criminal penalties. So the whole, the whole mandatory warning aspects in other like insanely insanely bad thing that we could talk about it for a long time. This episode is getting long enough, so we're just gonna continue through and we can we can ponder at how

at how bad that is. Um. One parent of a transgender a teenager in Houston to the family's health clinic, Legacy Community Health has suspended all refills and new prescriptions for a transgender youth in light of Abbot's new order. So it's it's happening, Like, yeah, it's there, it's the stuff has happened, the stuff has started. It's it's already scaring people into not doing stuff like it's it's that

is what it was designed to do. Yeah, and and I and I know we keep making this episode longer, but like it is worth mentioning that, like it actually like having someone even temporarily like being off of the hormones that they've been taking for for HRT, like that fucking sucks. Yeah, it's like it has really bad negative effects. I mean yeah, like people will be surprised how fast hormones start working and how fast going off of them they stop working. Like it is it is, It is

pretty it is pretty surprising. And like I didn't want to get tons into like the science of being trans in this because that's because that's not the focus of this week. We're talking with the legislation and the onslaught of queer rights of people trying to hurt them. But like you know, it's it's obvious that like there is not many cases at all where there's being you know, like genital surgery done on minors. Like if that does

that does not happen. It can happen for like medical like that can happen for medically necessary reasons, like if there's like accidents and stuff, But that doesn't happen for gender affirming care. What happens is you get on you you you go on puberty blockers, which are already prescribed to assist gender kids all the time. Um, if they have early on puberty, they have no lasting side effects,

they're completely safe. Um And in some cases, depending on the kids therapists and their doctors, they may be prescribed HRT or they will be prescribed that a bit later. But that is that even still, that is that is the only things that happened. Um, And what they're trying

to suppress is both but both of those things. But also like the ability for like therapists to even talk about gender with kids, Like kids are having problems with with like with gender dysphoria, they don't feel comfortable to even have to not even be able to talk to that to talk talking about those feelings with therapists is like part is part of the goal because that can

be considered gender affirming care. Um. I think that there's one other thing we really should mention, which is that so there there is one kind like one that is the few, but that there's there there's a very important kind of like quote unquote like gender surgery that is done on children, which is the stuff that's one to intersect kids, Yes, I mean sex kids. Yeah. Also like circumcisions are already like yeah, but I mean with with

specific with intersext kids. This stuff matters because all of these bills that you're talking about, where's like, oh, you can't have gender affirming surgery. You can't have like surgery and kids. Like every single one of these bills like that, they all have They all specifically have card carve outs to allow doctors to funk up the generals of inter sex kids. Yeah. That's it's it's all carved out there. So yeah, well let's see. We we are. We are near the last we are. We're near near, near the

last little stretch here. Um. On March eleventh, a Texas State court halted the new Department of Family Protective Services policy of investigating the parents of transgender children. UM District District Judge Amy Mention concluded on concluded the hearing on the requested statewide injunction by saying, quote, the Governor's directive was given the effect of new law or new agency rule despite there being no new legislation, regulation, or even

agency policy. Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Department of Family Protective Services Commissioner Baby Masters of their actions violate the separation of powers by impermissibly approaching into the legislative domain. UM Judge Mentiontion also granted a temporary restraining order blocking the state from investigating the family that that that prompted this lawsuit happening from the from the person who already worked at the Department of a Family Protective Services UM.

Texas Attorney General Kent Pactonum appealed this decision. Well, first of all, he appealed the restraining order and lost that appeal. UM. And and the the s o U is trying to make this temporaries training order against the state permanent and extend to all parents of all transgender kids in Texas. And there's there's gonna be a whole trial scheduled for

this topic on July eleven, two. So this is gonna this is gonna get this is gonna happen, like where where we will figure out what is gonna happen with this later on this year. UM. And after the judges ruling halting the investigations due to lack of legal binding, Attorney General Ken Paxton filed an appeal for for for the ruling. So and that's so, so that's that's gonna get appealed. UM. And he he tweeted out that the quote Democrat judges order permitting child abuse is frozen. Much

needed investigations will proceed as they should. The fight will continue up to the Supreme Court. I'm ready for it, um. But it's unclear how much legal backing this actually has, So we don't know if if the if the if the Protective Services actually has permission to keep investigating or not. It is kind of unclear. Paxton says that they can this, this state judge says they can't, and that's kind of legally up in the air right now, so we don't totally know. But there's gonna be a whole trial on

the topic in July. UM. Kind of one of the last things I want to mention is, uh, this this Idaho bill that was passed by the House of Representatives that would that would criminalize gender affirming medical procedures, including property blocker, sorry, including puberty blockers an HRT for any kind of trans transgend gender youth. And it was also reported that the bill would make it a felony punishable by life imprisonment to anyone who helps a kid travel

across state lines to get gender affirming healthcare. But this actually maybe isn't actually true, Like this actually probably wasn't a part of that bill. Um. The bill just amend's current laws regarding female genital mutilation, of course of carving out a specific section to allow the mutilation of intersext kits um. But uh, but yeah, it added a section also criminalizing gender firm and care. Um. But the section of the bill making it a felony to travel out

of state only refers to the general mutilation section. Um. It doesn't refer to the gender firm in care section. And it's unclear if that was an oversight um or if the limitation was intentional, who knows. Um, But it still did attempt to criminalize gender firm and care within the state. The bill was I believe, I think earlier this morning as of time time of recording, the bill

was not passed by the Senate. UM. So that's good. Uh. They said the Senate that it was too vague in scope and it was unclear how it was to be enforced. So that bill was halted and it did not did

not continue. Um. Yeah, but you know that's yeah. There is a lot of the reason why all stuff has kind of started is that, like there has been so much progress happening in queer rights in the past like ten years, right, Um, so, now because the progress is more visible, what was once like obvious but like low key bigotry is trying to be put into law. Right.

There's there's there used to be so many medical hoops to jump through to get any type of gender affirming treatment, but now almost every like legit medical organization recognizes the importance of gender firm and care. So that plus the visibility and the cultural acceptance of queerness is making some you know, mostly good old white Christian conservative populations a

little bit uncomfortable. Right, There's there's this increasing fear that what if your kid thinks they're trans, well, what if what if they become an unholy degenerate? What if? And what if there are people trying to make that happen on purpose. Right, all of the brutal reality, all of like, all of the brutality in these bills, the kind of the not like the total nonchalance at the possibility of you know, kids killing themselves because of this bill and

because of all these legislations. So all of like the transphobia negatively contributing to mental health, all of that brutality is just justified in the minds of these anti trans like people, because it's to save that, it's to save their kids from experiencing that in the first place. Right, it's the idea that queerness is an infection, that it can spread from person to person. It's like it's a it's it's like a contagion. If you hear about it,

you could yourself become gay. So they don't hear about it, then that's not going to be a possibility. So all all of the brutality, it's like, it's it's it's it's both the point, but it's also justified because this thing is seen as such like an it's seen as such an ontological threat to their whole idea of like the world. So yeah, that's uh, and it's I mean, it's it's not gonna stop right every you know, one, we saw

a massive increase in le legislation on this topic. Twenty twenty two, we're seeing an even bigger increased in legislation on this topic, and you know, attempts to physically oppose it. You know, it's our can can kind of be done. I mean, like you can you can see all there was some some successful kind of protests to the whole school board thing. You can also like you can sneak queer books into libraries, so you can just put you can just put them in there. Um, you can request

queer books in your library systems. Um, you can you know, attend school board meetings. And again it's sure that the institution of the institution of schooling is problematic um in a lot of ways, but it's we shouldn't make it worse for queer kids. So maybe it's still is worth actually focusing on. And there's there's a lot, like you know, you can, like like in the case of the still U suit, there is legal challenges being taken up against

all of these things. We'll see how that goes. The there's always been a there's always been a shaky record of the legal you know of like the court's ability to protect these rights. But every once in a while it does happen, like with like with gay marriage. Um. The last thing I'll mention with like specifically with like HRT being made illegal in a lot of these places at least like prescribed vida doctor. Um, I will kind

of talk. I will mention um d I y HRT as the thing that that that is the thing, it exists You can go to d I y h RT dot get hub dot io to get information on this. It's been It requires a lot of research, but you can find like you can get h you can get like estrogen and stuff from like like made by the companies that that supply pharmacies. You can buy that legally. UM. Testosterones a little bit more iffy because that is I think that it is like a schedule tour scheduled three

drug UM. But estrogen is much more available UM to buy legally online. To just make sure you get it from a good place and make sure that you you know, know how it affects you and all that stuff, like do lots of reading. But that is a possibility. So I will probably plan an episode on d A y h r T in the near future just it's like

a whole episode the topic. But I just wanted to kind of mention that as one of the last things that being like, yeah, if they're restricting all these stuff, we should probably you know, learn to provided ourselves because there's no guarantee that the government's or any kind of even like pharmacies will be able to do that forever. Right, Like it's it's good to have alternative methods of figuring out how to get the drugs that make you feel nice.

So yeah, that was that is my episode on the on the legislation that has been happening in the past, in the past really like six months. Um yeah, that's fun. Yeah, but by the time there there there might there might be new stuff that has happened. Oh, most certainly. Yeah. Good, that's why when you know, when all this stuff gets very depressing, I just like listening to my favorite Wayne Cohen's song by Pink Floyd and it really just really

does held me down and make you feel much better. Wow. Well, I'm gonna go listen to the new uh double them that A hundred Gecks did with Billy Joel I Do I Do love Me someone hundred gus mhm yeah, the Gus Joel concert. It's even I hear that that Elton John is going to get into and they're gonna they're gonna do. That would be quite the show. Honestly, that would would be a fascinating experience. That would be a very mix of like horny women in their sixties and

horny seventeen year olds. What would happen? Well, yeah, that is Ah, there are plenty of organizations that are you know, fighting inst and stuff in Texas. UM. I could list them, but honestly, if you if you if you're not there, it's it's it's if you mean you should, you should. You should look into what's happening in your area, Learn what legislation is being passed in your area, learn what your you know, representatives are doing, and look into helping

people get the way Turkey. That's really that's really. I mean, like, if there's a way that bodybuilders can get testosterone, there's a way that you can get testosterone for transguise, if estrogen is much easier to get, um, so look into that. Don't don't. Don't be stupid. Um. But yeah, that is a that's that is. That is that is my piece. Find joy, find violence, and find the correct application of the two that allows people to stay alive. Yeah. Yeah, and uh yeah and uh listen to listen to music

that makes you happy. That is that is that is all you can do. All you can all all you can do, yeah is find your favorite YouTube album, uh featuring Roger Waters. All right, good bye,