TV experts aren't paid

Talking heads on TV are not paid except maybe in the UK if they ask the television producers nicely.

I think I’ve cracked the code on S@m H@selby’s weird obsession with historians who have appeared on MSNBC. He actually thinks we’re getting *paid* when we pop up there, and paid handsomely. And … hoo boy, no.

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— Kevin M. Kruse (@kevinmkruse.bsky.social) Aug 25, 2024 at 7:33 PM

For the record, the few times I’ve agreed to appear on MSNBC shows it’s been to promote a book (guilty!) or discuss current events where I was asked to provide historical context. I was never once paid, though I did get car fare a couple times.

— Kevin M. Kruse (@kevinmkruse.bsky.social) Aug 25, 2024 at 7:37 PM

Former BBC producer here - you definitely have to ask. Rate 15 years ago was roughly £40 for typical contributor but higher for well known people (and depending on urgency!) Tory cuts may have had an impact since then but worth asking.

— Hywel Da (@hjd.bsky.social) Aug 26, 2024 at 12:20 AM

Donna Lee Parsons and the Beastie Boys

"It was on the front page of her personal website that Donna Lee Parsons chose to begin her story with a short vignette about a boy."

— "True Trans Soul Rebel (subscriber-only): In 1982, she introduced the hardcore scene—and the world—to bands like Agnostic Front and Beastie Boys. Your introduction to Donna Lee Parsons is long overdue. Norman Brannon, Antimatter, Apr 2, 2024

"Donna Lee Parsons isn’t particularly well-known in hardcore/punk circles, but she should be. She played a pivotal role in rock history.

Before she transitioned, she founded Rat Cage Records, a record label that released the Beastie Boys’ first two EPs; she signed them at their very first show. Twenty years later, after Parsons came out as trans and the band’s meteoric rise to fame, the artists quietly paid for Parson’s gender affirmation surgery."

— Beastie Boys paid for trans woman’s gender-affirming surgery: She kickstarted their career. They helped her start a new life. Bil Browning, LGBTQ Nation, April 4, 2024

5 stories I wrote on Medium that got hardly any views

The following articles had 1–19 views each. Never mind whether the person who viewed them went on to read them. Each title had failed to persuade 20 people even to click on it.

I assumed the titles were bad, and I retitled them.

However, months later, they haven't gotten any new views. Apparently, retitling an old story doesn't nudge Medium's algorithm.

If 'we' were the only pronoun, how would 'you' act? (Feb 7, 2020)
New title: Thinking on the Level of the System

Feelings may become reasonable over time (Feb 20, 2019)
New title: In High Conflict, Is the Growth Worth the Drama?

The Top Ten Things You Can Write Instead of a "Top Ten" List (Mar 17, 2020)
New title: Top 10 Things to Write Instead of a 'Top 10' List

Economics Doesn't Crunch 'Environment' Well (Oct 15, 2022)
New: Earthpocalypse Isn't a 'Marginal' Cost (Despite What Economists Say)

Now Departing From Track 1 (June 30, 2021)
New: The Would-Be Scholar of Eunuchs

It's hard to know what to do with old articles that no one ever read. It's as if I tossed them down a well. What do you think?

Christian faith leaders cashing in on sex hormones

Check out this new essay: Taking T for Jesus: The transphobic evangelicals hawking hormones, Maud Newton, The Baffler, August 21, 2024.

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In this essay, Newton explains that Kenneth Copeland "has amassed an alleged estimated net worth of $760 million and why he is often described as the wealthiest pastor in the United States." These sorts of people used to promote faith healing, but now they promote supplements because there's money in it.

"A 2019 post on Copeland’s Victory Channel website, '3 Ways Hormones Keep You in Divine Health' ... [says] that there is a certain amount of testosterone established by God for elderly Christians to restore their most essential manliness or womanliness and that, via God, Colbert knows what that amount is."

On the other hand, pastors like him of course

"condemn people who undergo sex-hormone treatment. Trans people are possessed by demons; they are destroying families, threatening children, and ushering in the end of the world, according to [Kenneth] Copeland and his ilk. 'We were created male and female in the image of God,' the Copeland Network tweeted in October 2020. 'In causing people to question their gender, what Satan is really doing is causing people to doubt the image of God.'"

Newton writes:

"In many ways, my mom has always been an outlier insofar as notions of 'biblical womanhood' are concerned... * * * it wasn’t so surprising that my mother would find her way to testosterone. What surprised me was that she believed Jesus endorsed it, even as she’s fully in favor of legislation banning hormones for trans and nonbinary people."

In online forums like Reddit, where Christians ask whether it's morally acceptable to take hormones, answers vary:

"Some suggest, for example, that due to changes from pesticides, microplastics, and other environmental pollutants many men may need testosterone supplements to reach God-intended levels. Others maintain that hormone therapy is appropriate only in cases where a specific believer needs a particular sex hormone to manifest their (sorry, his or her) biological sex in the traditional way. Still others take the position that hormone issues should be addressed more naturally, through changes in diet and exercise. One thing that just about everyone in these forums does agree on is that a trans person taking hormones for gender confirmation is an abomination."

I try to pay attention to where right-wing anti-trans funding comes from. It's interesting to me that one of the wealthiest Christian leaders is profiting off selling cross-sex hormones to his followers and then using his influence to say that it's bad to change your gender.

Gender specialists know stuff about gender

Only anti-trans people believe they shouldn't

Jesse Singal thinks it's a conflict of interest for gender-medicine specialists to have opinions on gender medicine. jessesingal.substack.com/p/yales-inte...

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— Michael Hobbes (@michaelhobbes.bsky.social) Aug 21, 2024 at 12:45 PM

It's a classic Jesse Post where the headline promises to identify examples of harmful misinformation, while the text consists of tedious nitpicks and minor linguistic complaints.

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— Michael Hobbes (@michaelhobbes.bsky.social) Aug 21, 2024 at 12:50 PM

See my March 2023 article: Jesse Singal detransitions (a 5 min read on Medium)

Singal does not know a lot about many things he talks about:

I've long gathered from reporting by @michaelhobbes.bsky.social and others that Jesse Singal is incredibly loose with the facts. But I'm not an expert in the fields he usually digs into and so it has been hard for me to know just HOW off base he is. Now he's in my field, and MY GOD.

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— Tahir Duckett (@tahir.bsky.social) September 17, 2024 at 9:24 AM

Trump-Musk 'conversation' about climate (Hint: fake)

The section on climate change in the Musk/Trump "interview" is just *wild* It really is worth reading in full to get a sense of the two men. Just off-the-scale levels of ignorance, denial, misinformation and half-truths. I've put the transcript here... docs.google.com/document/d/1...

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— Leo Hickman (@leohickman.bsky.social) Aug 13, 2024 at 5:09 AM

The NYT decided to do a fact check of it. Gift link www.nytimes.com/2024/08/13/c...

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— David Sacerdote (@davidsacerdote.bsky.social) Aug 13, 2024 at 1:26 PM

1979 follow-up on trans people: 'job, educational, marital, and domiciliary stability'

Lydia Polgreen's New York Times op-ed on August 13, "The Strange Report Fueling the War on Trans Kids," referred to a 1979 paper.

I wrote about Polgreen's op-ed here: No One Needs ‘Evidence’ That Transition Improves Trans People’s Humanity.

The old paper doesn't seem to be on JSTOR, at least not on free access. For those who want more info and have institutional access to read it on JAMA:

Abstract:

"Although medical interest in individuals adopting the dress and life-style of the opposite sex goes back to antiquity, surgical intervention is a product of the last 50 years. In the last 15 years, evaluation procedures and surgical techniques have been worked out. Extended evaluation, with a one- to two-year trial period prior to formal consideration of surgery, is accepted practice at reputable centers. Cosmetically satisfactory, and often functional, genitalia can be constructed. Less clear-cut, however, are the characteristics of the applicants for sex reassignment, the natural history of the compulsion toward surgery, and surgery's long-term effects. The characteristics of 50 applicants for sex reassignment, both operated and unoperated, are reviewed. The results of long-term follow-up are reported in terms of such indices as job, educational, marital, and domiciliary stability. Outcome data are discussed in terms of the adjustments of operated and unoperated patients." [emphasis mine]
Meyer JK, Reter DJ. Sex Reassignment: Follow-up. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1979;36(9):1010–1015. doi:10.1001/archpsyc.1979.01780090096010

Please note the part I emphasized above. Polgreen's point, with which I agree, is that your work experience, formal education, marital status, and housing stability doesn't make you a better human who needs, deserves, or benefits from transition more than someone else, nor does it mean that society benefits more from your existence than it benefits from someone else.

More info: Transgender Map discusses one of the paper's co-authors, Jon K. Meyer as "a key historical figure in anti-transgender activism...The damage Meyer caused to generations of trans people is incalculable."

Transvestigation

Quispe López writes:

"Transvestigators often utilize racist, anti-semitic, and white standards of beauty to out 'inverts,' or the celebrities they falsely believe are trans. ... While transvestigators are a fringe group of conspiracy theorists, similar to Pizzagate and QAnon, their talking points are not. What makes transvestigations dangerous is how they bleed into mainstream right wing politics and broader anti-trans sentiment."

The silly conspiracy theory part of it is called "Elite Gender Inversion," the elites referring to the cabal that supposedly controls the world. That dates back to about 2017. But it didn't come from nowhere; anti-trans legislative initiatives gave rise to it and continue to fuel it.

Also:

"Victims of transvestigation are typically scrutinized for having features that transvestigators deem outside the bounds of a person’s biological sex, like 'broad shoulders' and 'large noses' on women. Men are similarly analyzed for 'delicate features.' Their pseudoscientific tactics hinge on a transphobic or misogynist belief that if a successful person has even a shred of gender nonconformity, they must have gained that success through false pretenses or nefarious means."

"Transvestigation wields political power by falsely implying that being trans is inherently negative and that trans people are trying to 'trick' cis people in plain sight," López writes. The inevitable result is that they "they attempt to dehumanize and discredit those accused, to no real end." The targets are usually cisgender people.

How “Transvestigation” Crawled Out of the Worst Corners of the Internet Into the Mainstream: The most committed transvestigators believe a cabal of secretly trans celebrities controls the world. Quispe López, Them, August 14, 2024.

Anyone could be trans, right?

Le Juiice - Dieu Soit Loué

Today's mood:

How would a trans-exclusive lesbian dating app exclude trans people?

Did you miss this news about a new female-only dating app?

Jenny Watson's "L Community...claimed it could identify and exclude trans women to a rate of 99.89% accuracy using AI-powered 'sex recognition software.'"

I missed it! Did not know!

However: "As of Aug. 7, more than 60 days since launching, the website couldn’t even break 100 users."

Does the AI facial recognition work? "Watson initially claimed that her AI-powered software only messed up 0.10% of the time. She provided no proof to verify the claim."

"Fundamentally, Watson’s model wants to differentiate between ciswomen and transwomen. Since existing computer models successfully read transwomen as women most (87.3% per Scheuerman) of the time, Watson likely needed to train her model specifically for its task.

The specifics of Watson’s model remain under wraps. But ostensibly to get the level of accuracy, Watson’s model must have been trained on photos of both transgender women and cisgender women, in addition to transmen. This raises questions of consent."

Lots of trans people pass for cis in our post-transition genders. Not all do, nor is it required that we try to do so. But many simply do. We are simply perceived as members of our gender. The question of how anyone would reliably exclude all trans people is a question that could be raised anywhere in life — dating app or no, AI or no.

Read more: How I — a trans man — went undercover on a TERF dating site: Female-only app asserts lesbians must be ‘biologically female’, Henry Carnell, Washington Blade, August 13, 2024

'Veneno' on HBO Max: 2020 series based on the life of Cristina Ortiz

"Spanish actress Jedet has always been a fan of Cristina Ortiz. Also known as 'La Veneno,' or 'poison' in Spanish, Ortiz was a transgender woman who shot to fame in 1996 after a journalist interviewed her in Parque del Oeste in Madrid, where she was based as a sex worker. She later became an actress, singer and model, and the most visible trans person in Spanish pop culture at a time when life was incredibly difficult for the country's LGBTQ community.

'There were no women who looked like her at that time. I was so starstruck when I saw her,' says Jedet, who is one of three transgender actresses who play Ortiz at different stages of her life in Veneno, a television series based on her life, out on HBO Max on Nov. 19 [2020]."

— Suyin Haynes, "How the New TV Series Veneno Is Reviving the Legacy of a Spanish Trans Icon," Time, November 19, 2020

veneno

There are no trans women Olympians this year, so anti-trans people picked a 'victim' to falsely 'accuse'

"‘This is not a transgender issue’: IOC addresses Olympic boxing controversy," CNN video, August 1, 2024

Transphobia Hurts Everybody, Joshua P. Hill, New Means (Substack), August 2, 2024

She’s Not Trans: Gender Politics Display Our Ignorance About Women’s Bodies, Melissa Corrigan, Bouncin’ and Behaving Blogs TOO, August 2, 2024

Olympic boxer Imane Khelif calls for end to bullying after backlash over gender misconceptions, KADDOUR HABBARI AND GREG BEACHAM, AP, August 5, 2024

Why Is JK Rowling calling a cisgender female Olympian a man? Kaylin Hamilton, Prism & Pen, Medium, August 3, 2024

"Trump called into an episode of the right-wing show 'Clay and Buck' on Thursday to field questions about 'men in women’s sports,' discussing the transphobic right-wing reaction to an Algerian woman defeating an Italian woman in an Olympic boxing match, despite both athletes being cisgender." — Sara Boboltz, Trump: ‘They’re The Weird Ones’, HuffPost, August 1, 2024

Olympic Boxer Who Had Gender Test Issue Wins Fight, Causing Conservative Meltdown Tech billionaire Elon Musk and former President Donald Trump were among those criticizing the participation of Algerian boxer Imane Khelif in the Olympics. Sebastian Murdock, HuffPost, Aug 1, 2024

Italian Olympic boxer apologizes as "transvestigation" against opponent spreads: Angela Carini apologized for her treatment of opponent Imane Khelif, and for a transphobic storm that brewed after. Griffin Eckstein, Salon, August 2, 2024

"Weirdo right-wingers whip themselves into a hateful frenzy over Olympics boxing match" Matt Gertz, Media Matters, August 2, 2024

There are no trans women athletes at the Paris Olympics. So bigots manufactured them. The true story is much more complex than can be explained clearly in a handful of rage tweets. Katelyn Burns. MSNBC. August 2, 2024

Olympics 2024: Debate over trans inclusion hits female boxers hard - Editorial, NZ Herald

Algerians complain of 'violation' against Imane Khelif by Olympic boxing rival, Outsports

Only 8% of cable news coverage of anti-trans legislation featured a trans or gender-nonconforming guest in the first half of 2024, Media Matters

Irish boxer who beat Imane Khelif in 2022 defends former rival amid abuse over Olympic appearance, The Pink News

The transphobia Imane Khelif is experiencing isn't new—it's part of a disturbing, hateful pattern, The Advocate

The Boston Globe incorrectly printed the headline "Transgender Boxer Advances." The author was sports journalist Greg Beachem who wrote it for the AP. He clarified: "That's not my headline. That word isn't in my story. My stories are syndicated worldwide, and customers [of the articles in the AP wire service] are allowed to write their own headlines." Erin Reed adds: "The word 'transgender' does not appear once in the story, which was printed on August 2, 2024."

"International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach has confirmed that Khelif is a cisgender boxer, calling disinformation about her gender “totally unacceptable.” Khelif’s family shared pictures of her as a child, as well as identity documents showing her assigned sex at birth. Notably, gender transition is criminalized in Algeria, making it extremely unlikely that transgender people would be allowed to transition in the country.
The original claim about Khelif’s sex eligibility arose when the scandal-plagued International Boxing Association (IBA) ruled her out of competition, alleging she failed an unspecified gender test after defeating an undefeated Russian boxer. Notably, the IBA is presided over by Umar Kremlev of Russia, an associate of President Putin. In 2023, the International Olympic Committee voted to derecognize the IBA due to concerns about corruption, governance, and judging controversies."
— Erin Reed, Boston Globe Falsely Prints Headline Calling Olympic Boxer Imane Khelif Transgender: The paper, which claimed that Algerian cisgender boxer Imane Khelif, adds fuel to an already raging fire over womanhood and boxing. August 3, 2024

Read the boston Globe's apology: "Editor's note," Boston Globe, August 3, 2024

The Right-Wing Campaign to Purge Women From Women’s Sports, Natasha Lennard, The Intercept, August 2, 2024

Algerian boxer Imane Khelif clinches Olympic medal after facing online abuse

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— Phil Lewis (@phillewis.bsky.social) Aug 3, 2024 at 11:27 AM

One thing I didn't mention in this, because it would be a digression, but: JD Vance's attack on a female boxer exposes how much a lie it is that conservatives want to "protect" women in sports. It proves that they don't believe female athletes are legitimate. www.salon.com/2024/08/05/g...

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— Amanda Marcotte (@amandamarcotte.bsky.social) Aug 5, 2024 at 9:28 AM

"Imane Khelif Is the Latest Victim of Weaponized White Womanhood: The most lethal weapon a white woman possess is her tears." My Lovely Suque, Aug 5, 2024

Florence Ashley, August 7, 2024:

"...in many ways, transphobia isn’t about trans people. Rather, it’s about what trans people mean to ideologies of race and gender. ... My colleague Blu Buchanan and I tracked that racial logic a bit more in depth in a truthout essay a few years ago. White supremacist ideologies are heavily invested in rigid gender norms and roles because they see them as necessary to white reproduction. The panic about ‘gender ideology’ is about trans people, yes, but it’s also explicitly about cis men and women not conforming to gender ideals that see men and women as fundamentally different forms of life with different roles in a society organized around the nuclear family.

Here, Helen Joyce is asserting which chromosome pairing Khelif has and saying that she's male.

J.K. Rowling and Elon Musk Named in Cyberbullying Lawsuit Filed by Algerian Boxer Imane Khelif After Olympic Win (EXCLUSIVE) By Elsa Keslassy, Alex Ritman, Variety, August 13, 2024

This is bullshit. All the info comes from the IBA, which lost its IOC credentials due to corruption. IBA said they tested Khelif's chromosomes, then said no actually it was testosterone, then said no it was something else, then claimed it was WADA certified which WADA denied.

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— Max Kennerly (@maxkennerly.bsky.social) Aug 14, 2024 at 10:14 AM

Imane Khelif: TERFism Was ALWAYS about Race, Riki Wilchins, Aug 14, 2024

Imane Khelif Slams Trump and Musk Over Transgender Allegations: Olympic gold medalist Imane Khelif has filed a cyberbullying lawsuit in France following false claims about her gender identity made by public figures, including former U.S. President Donald Trump. Khelif, a cisgender woman, has condemned the harmful rhetoric that has marred her victory and highlighted the damaging effects of transvestigation on both cisgender and transgender women. The lawsuit also names Elon Musk and J.K. Rowling as contributors to the online harassment. Transvitae Staff, August 15, 2024

Imane Khelif is the people’s champion.

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— Nathan Kalman-Lamb (@nkalamb.bsky.social) Aug 20, 2024 at 7:26 PM

today in “gender critical feminism”: if you’re a butch who occasionally femmes it up you’re gonna need a dna test for that

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— Julia Carrie Wong (@joolia.bsky.social) Aug 23, 2024 at 10:46 AM

Rowling went on to harass other athletes: "J.K. Rowling Calls Trans Paralympian 'Inspirational' But It's Sarcastic Scorn": The "Harry Potter" author won't make her contempt on gender issues disappear. Ron Dicker, HuffPost, Sep 4, 2024.

Elon Musk is deceptively taking info for U.S. swing state voters and giving it to a Trump PAC

Elon Musk is using X, aka Twitter, to serve up a "Register to Vote" message to users in the United States. If their state's electoral outcome is considered guaranteed, they're taken to voter registration. But if they're in a swing state, they're asked to cough up demographic info which Musk then hands over to a Trump-supportive PAC that Musk created, America PAC — and the person isn't registered to vote.

Read more:
How an Elon Musk PAC is using voter data to help Trump beat Harris in 2024 election, Brian Schwartz, CNBC, August 2, 2024

Also:

"Elon Musk shared a deepfake video spoofing Vice President Kamala Harris on X. Despite owning the platform, the post appears to violate the platform’s own policies against synthetic and manipulated media.

The video Musk shared on Friday [August 2, 2024] alters a recent campaign video Harris released, one that makes it sound like the presidential candidate said things she didn’t. The manipulated clip has Harris saying things like she is “the ultimate diversity hire” and that she “had four years under the tutelage of the ultimate deep state puppet, a wonderful mentor, Joe Biden.” The original account that had posted the video labeled it, “Kamala Harris Campaign Ad PARODY,” a disclaimer that might prevent it from violating X’s policies. But this context did not appear in Musk’s repost. Instead, Musk’s post simply showed the video, adding his own commentary: “This is amazing,” with a laughing emoji."

— Lauren Feiner, "Elon Musk posts deepfake of Kamala Harris that violates X policy," The Verge, July 29, 2024

And:

"Former President Donald Trump plans to offer a job to his billionaire buddy Elon Musk if elected, Reuters reported on Monday [August 19, 2024.

His announcement followed a campaign event in York, Pennsylvania, where Reuters asked Trump about the $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles. Trump said he would consider terminating it, and also be open to assigning a cabinet or advisory role to Musk, the Tesla Motors co-founder and CEO." (HuffPost)