Kraken Syllabub

Doing a massive overhaul of my friendslist. I'll try and keep everyone on who I still see about, but if I miss you, I'll put an unlocked post up after and you can let me know! If you see this and want to be supersure you stay on, leave a comment here.

While most of this is retreading old ground, one of the things I found most interesting was the line about, "No one has claimed that Margaret Thatcher repressed her lesbian side," and the discussion of the 'homophobes are really repressed gaaayyyz' shit people pull - made me think how it only ever seems to be aimed at men! It's an 'argument' that's always bothered me because of how it ultimately situates queer ppl as responsible for homophobia+, but this seems to really highlight the basis of the argument itself in a fear/derision/etc of male homosexuality....

Guardian article: Why this obsession with what gay people do in bed?

Gone through and taken a whole bunch of accounts of people I've lost touch with/who never post/who have left lj etc off my flist. Drop me a line if you think you've been removed in error!

I am hugely saddened, disappointed, angered and sickened by the cissexism of my former teacher T Thorn Coyle in her article here on what happened at PCon. I am challenging her on her facebook page and trying to get her to understand.

Thorn has done some amazing work, but this is NOT amazing. I invite anyone - especially Thorn's tradmates and current/former students - who cares about opposing cissexism both in Paganism and in the world at large to challenge her on this one.

I want to be sick.

I don't know how to talk about this, so bear with me.

I discovered something tonight that horrified me so much I actually wanted to vomit. There's a place called Pennhurst, and as torrain says they put people like me in there [TRIGGER WARNINGS].

And they did terrible things to them.

Torrain, who found out about it at the same time as me says it in her post, some of it. The details in that link talk about it, the physical and sexual abuse. I know about those places. That's not the part that makes me so sick, no more sick than knowing about it every damn day does.

It's the fact that they've turned it into "a Halloween event, with make-believe. Family fun to scare people".

I looked at their site, the people who're doing it. I won't link to it here. You can find it if you want to. And they're not just using the building - they're using the actual fucking medical equipment - and they're gloating about picturing the "thousands of visitors coming through (their) attraction knowing that everything in (there) is real" and it wasn't closed until the 1980s and they're making fucking money out of what happened there, out of what happened to people like me.

They're selling tickets. It should be a fucking museum and memorial and they're making it family fun and to excuse what they're doing they've pasted on the plot of the remake of House on Haunted Hill (thanks to jasmine_koran for the tip-off) and people were beaten and tortured and raped because they were like me or they had a developmental disability or they were "bad girls" who liked boys too much and -

It was a major part of the start of the deinstutionalisation process and the disability rights movement, it was part of the start of a fucking civil rights movement and -

It will include a mock "morgue" and "crematorium," along with lobotomy and shock therapy rooms. In the crematorium, fake skulls are piled in a kiln, while a laundry bin filed with fake body parts sits nearby

and this is not okay. It's not. It's not.


ETA: apparently Pennhurst is a member of the International Sites of Conscience, a worldwide network of "Sites of Conscience" – historic sites specifically dedicated to remembering past struggles for justice and addressing their contemporary legacies. And they're doing this.

ETA ETA: The lives of the residents are honoured here and throughout that site, as are the staff members who *did* try to work to their benefit. What is remembered, lives.

If you want to donate to an organisation which does get it, you can go here.

UPDATE: it looks like someone in the area who works with the rabbit rescue may be able to foster her. We will keep you posted!! If you do know of anyone who would give her a forever home, PLEASE still contact us!

----

So, we have acquired a temporary rabbit.

Someone had taken her into the reptile store, and told the owner to feed her to a snake. >_< Said owner has snakes easily big enough to nom the bunny, but was loathe to feed what has at some point obviously been a well-loved pet to them.

She's friendly and cuddly and fluffy enough that even I, who grew up thinking of rabbits as food, think she's pretty damn cute. And she's *incredibly* good-natured. The store owner gave her to us for free, complete with one of his feeder rat cages. We took her home, cleaned out his rather filthy cage and gave him food and water - she's currently on our balcony.

But we can't keep her. We have NO space, with us and two cats and the dragon and soon a corn snake. She can't stay out on the balcony long-term, certainly not in Canadian weather (too hot and then too cold). We're in touch with animal rescues, but because it's just after the day when everyone in Montreal moves (July 1), they're inundated with abandoned animals. The exotic animal vet (here rabbits are exotics apparently, wtf) are also on the case.

So please, PLEASE, if you know ANYONE who might take her, let us know. Please spread the word - feel free to link to my post, or to jasmine_koran's post. Because this is such a sweet, good-natured animal, and she's had a horrible time, and she deserves a proper home.



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Having a bit of a flist-cut to get rid of people who've left lj, haven't friended me back etc. If you get cut by mistake (or have just been lurking for a long time!) and want back on, leave a message here or on my friends-only post. :)

So I'm going to go ahead and do the cis privilege bingo posts, cos I find it interesting.

If you're not sure what cis privilege is, it's the privilege that comes from being cissexual and/or cisgendered. To use Lisa Harney's short definition, "Being cissexual is having a body your brain expects. Being cissexual is having a body society expects. Being cisgender is having a gender that society considers valid. That is to say, if you’re female and say you’re a woman, no one will argue with you, try to assert that you’re a man, or try to assert you’re neither."

Some points:

Open to all - for trans people to give their perspective and their thoughts, for cis allies to do the same, and for cis people to ask (genuine) questions about the point being discussed. In these posts, I am happy to do a bit of ejumacatin' (note that I can't promise other commenters will be patient, though). Trolling and outright transphobia will get people banned.

Cissexual and cisgender participants, please read this: How To Check Your Cis Privilege. Srsly. Also, if a trans person tells you to check your cis privilege, or that what you're saying comes across as transphobic, listen.

I kind of assume this goes without saying in my journal, but other forms of discrimination - misogyny (both common-or-garden and transmisogyny), racism, ableism, homophobia, classism, religious discrimination etc - are likewise Not On.

If other stuff comes up, I'll add it here.

farnbluete relates how the animal shelter that her pets come from is closing. 250 animals (60 cats and the rest dogs) need rehoming by the end of December or will be put to sleep. Can you help? Can you or anyone you know take a pet?





Please link the shit out of this anywhere that you think might be helpful!