Based

To my uk trans people and allies out there.

Food for thought

I'll believe that governments want to "empower disabled people to achieve employment" when they actually:

Legislate broader work-from-home abilities for jobs that don't actually require in-office presence

Strengthen employment discrimination laws so employers stop thinking that the easiest way to get around having to accommodate a disabled employee is just to fire them

Actually create systems where they, the government, monitor and enforce accessible environments and building codes. The onus shouldn't be on us to get the money to hire a lawyer and sue our own workplaces to get our basic access needs met.

Include disabled people in minimum wage legislation, instead of leaving legal carve-outs where "substandard workers" can be paid subminimum wage.

Allow disabled people to keep savings accounts of our own, which we don't need anybody else's approval to create or spend

Let us form supportive households, relationships, and marriages without taking away our benefits (especially because this means we have no money of our own if we want to leave those relationships)

Until then, nuh-uh. Fuck off. You're not "empowering" us. You're just pushing us further out onto a perilous ledge because you think you can use inspirational supercrip narratives to force us to perform or die.

just wanted to share the National Down Syndrome Society’s message for this year’s World Down Syndrome Day (21st March) 💛💙

CNN

James Harrison, blood donor whose rare plasma saved millions of babies, dead at 88 | CNN

James Harrison, a prolific Australian blood donor famed for having saved the lives of more than two million babies, has died at age 88.

It's worth noting that there are some extraordinary people in the world who have been quietly doing the work for decades, and they should be celebrated with all the fervor that we denounce the villains. I first read about Harrison twenty-odd years ago, when he'd already been doing this for about fifty years, and this is one of those guys whose life can, indeed, be summed up by his headline.

James Harrison saved millions of lives. Millions. Not with anything flashy or dramatic, not with profound speeches or brilliant strategy or any of the things we insist are the ways to impact the world. He simply kept himself as healthy as possible so that every few weeks he could go and sit quietly in a room and give away a fundamental part of himself — quite literally his lifeblood — to people he'd never meet, for no pay and no expectation of acknowledgement. (He was, it should be said, acknowledged quite a lot per this article, but that's beside the point.)

When we talk about the kind of people we want to elevate and celebrate in our societies, I often think of people like James Harrison. I hope we get more of him; not just for his blood, but for his heart.

“Bondi has now made public statements assessing the facts and the law of the Signal case while resisting calls for an investigation. These are simply astounding actions by a sitting attorney general. “The Justice Department’s approach thus far stands in contrast with its customary role of examining serious national-security breaches,” the WSJ reported in the most understated possible way. The abiding concern all along has been that Trump would place loyalists at the Justice Department in part to protect himself and his administration from legal consequences for their wrongdoing – a permanent coverup mechanism to ignore, bury, and disregard executive branch lawlessness. Pam Bondi is eagerly filling the role of a loyalist attorney general. This is what it looks like.”

— Pam Bondi Takes Point On Covering Up Trump’s Signal Fiasco

Putting bioessentialist up on the high shelf until tumblr users understand that it's not just a word for when someone says genders are different

The oppressive Ivy League strata are fucking losing it in their desperation to keep us subservient to employers

verified ways to send aid to gaza directly

Help a Palestinian family directly:

gazafunds.com - Donate directly to a Palestinian family in urgent need of evacuation, medical attention, food, rebuilding homes/businesses etc. (Spotlights 1 verified gfm at a time so if you don't know who/where to donate to just go here and donate to the one they show you!)

Help provide tents (urgent):

The Sameer Project: Currently providing tents for displaced families in Gaza (emergency bc tents in Rafah are being burned as we speak) (paypal) (gfm)

Food, cash & essentials:

Care for Gaza: Working on the ground in Gaza to distribute food, cash, medicine & other essentials to displaced families. (paypal) (gfm)

Direct Aid for Gaza: also working on the ground in Gaza to distribute food, cash & other daily essential suppliess to displaced families. (paypal) (gfm)

Water:

Gaza Municipality's water project: The official Municipality of Gaza needs help rebuilding the water infrastructure in Gaza City to restore access to clean water and waste management services for the people of Gaza. (This campaign only has a couple of weeks left but it's still only at 15%!)

eSIMs (urgent):

guide to buy & send esims for gaza

crips for esims for gaza: If you don't know how to buy esims or don't have the capacity to manage them (e.g. topping up regularly), this team of volunteers are collecting funds to buy & manage gaza esims regularly

Medical Aid

Palestine Red Crescent Society: Provides emergency medical and ambulance services and humanitarian relief on the ground in Gaza e.g. rescuing and treating the wounded.