Beatles' "taxman" Would Be So Much Better If It Was "landlord" Instead.

Beatles' "taxman" would be so much better if it was "landlord" instead.

#theyre really gonna make me vote for

funniest Kamala Harris VP picks go

New comic! (link)

This week I am very happy to present a collaboration comic with my friend Chrissie, who has been generous in sharing with me her experiences of gender dynamics in a technical field, and then helping me craft them into a comic narrative.

Whenever I see Chrissie’s work I’m always impressed at the cool, creative things she does. When we were discussing this comic, she told me: “I find men persistently try to direct me lots now too, which is probably the biggest problem I consistently run into”, and my feelings around that fact are a terrible and familiar blend of frustration, sadness, and lack of surprise.

When we talk about the differences in how men and women are treated professionally, especially in technical fields, we are often dismissed with ‘everyone has to deal with that’, or ‘women need to demonstrate more confidence with their skills’, or ‘they’re just trying to be helpful’, or ‘it’s all in your head’.

It’s frustrating when we know something like this is happening, but we spend so much of our time actually trying to get people to believe that it’s a real phenomenon. I find narratives like Chrissie’s validating in that she has a comparative set of experiences and is like ‘oh yeah, people totally think I’m less competent at my job now. it’s totally a thing’.  So, can guys just believe us already and get on helping it not happen?

This is what it’s like to have dyslexia. Web developer Victor Widell is hoping to shine a light on the learning disorder with this creative coding simulation.

hey uh I’d encourage you to go look thru this post and the linked posts and articles abt using tme/tma. They’re separatist terms that were made with the intent to act as though afab folks have more privilege for being assigned female at birth. They were made to push transmen and transwomen apart. I’m not saying you have to stop using them, I’d just like it if you could do research abt the terms, and decide if you still wanna use them, okay. just if you decide after research that you still do want to, and believe that they cause no harm, I’d rather you stop interacting with me and my blog.

You just seem like a nice and cool person so I wanted to let you know so you could do your own research instead of just outright asking you to not interact with me cus you use those terms without further explanation.

I hope you have a nice day, or night /gen /nm

I went ahead and softblocked you; I didn't see your dni before, and I apologize for intruding where I'm not welcome.

Firstly, I don't believe that afab folks have "privilege" for being afab. In fact, I don't believe that there is any use in attempting to define a universal experience via ASAB (assigned sex at birth) because one's ASAB musn't necessarily impact who they are, how they define, how they move through the world etc. However, I do believe that afab folks are inherently oppressed under a cisheteropatriarchal context, although afab folks don't all experience that oppression under the same system / on the same axis.

Secondly, I do think that framing tme / tma as "separatist terms" is transmisogynistic. Speaking about who is affected by transmisogyny shouldn't be "divisive", unless one has no interest in checking how they may perpetuate harm against transfems – which is transmisogyny.

I'm not sure if this was your intention, but it seems as though you are conflating "tme" with "afab", which is erroneous at best and dishonest at worst. There are amab tme folks. Being tme is not about your asab, but rather your proximity to transfemininity. We can't have productive conversations if we aren't willing to engage honestly with these ideas.

Lastly, the post you linked is full of transmisogynistic dog whistles, but I'll address the claim that "everyone is affected by transmisogyny in variable amounts, including cis men and women", and therefore transfems creating terms to better discuss these matters is "backwards and wrong":

I see nothing wrong with tme folks discussing the ways in which they experience misdirected transmisogyny. In fact, it's very productive to point out these injustices wherever and whenever one can. I do see something wrong with these conversations decentering those who experience the brunt of the systemic violence, discrimination, and disenfranchisement: transfems.

If you are not a transfem or identify with transfeminity, aka tme folks, you should check how you perpetuate this idea that transfems speaking about their experience is divisive, unless you are fine perpetuating transmisogyny and silencing transfems.