About 60 drawings and hieroglyphic inscriptions, dating back around 5,000 years, have been discovered at a site called Wadi Ameyra in Egypt’s Sinai Desert. Carved in stone they were created by mining expeditions sent out by early Egyptian pharaohs archaeologists say.
They reveal new information on the early pharaohs. For instance, one inscription the researchers found tells of a queen named Neith-Hotep who ruled Egypt 5,000 years ago as regent to a young pharaoh named Djer.
Archaeologists estimate that the earliest carvings at Wadi Ameyra date back around 5,200 years, while the most recent date to the reign of a pharaoh named Nebre, who ruled about 4,800 years ago. Read more.
Yes, you should eat. You should always eat. No more of this sitting around for an hour with your cup of coffee trying to decide. You should always eat. There is never a time when skipping a meal is the right answer. Go eat, because you need to. Go eat, because you have a life to live.
So yeah, I’m transgender. And yeah, I’ve transitioned. I’m out to my friends and family. Most people at work know too. Everyone is cool with it. Yes, thanks to my fabulous sister they’ve done it before, but also because they’re fantastic people. Without the love and support of my wife and friends and family I would not be where I am today. Lilly Wachowski
While yes, we should celebrate Lilly, please don’t forget that she was basically intimidated into coming out by the media - notably the Daily Mail, the notorious british tabloid - and yes the statement above is uplifting, but I feel it’s kind of covering up the circumstances a lot and I know a lot of people won’t follow the link to the article.
Another extract from the statement in the Windy City Times:
“My sister Lana and I have largely avoided the press. I find talking about my art frustratingly tedious and talking about myself a wholly mortifying experience. I knew at some point I would have to come out publicly. You know, when you’re living as an out transgender person it’s … kind of difficult to hide. I just wanted—needed some time to get my head right, to feel comfortable.
But apparently I don’t get to decide this.
After he had given me his card, and I closed the door it began to dawn on me where I had heard of the Daily Mail. It was the “news” organization that had played a huge part in the national public outing of Lucy Meadows, an elementary school teacher and trans woman in the UK. An editorial in the “not-a-tabloid” demonized her as a damaging influence on the children’s delicate innocence and summarized “he’s not only trapped in the wrong body, he’s in the wrong job.” The reason I knew about her wasn’t because she was transgender it was because three months after the Daily Mail article came out, Lucy committed suicide.
And now here they were, at my front door, almost as if to say—
“There’s another one! Let’s drag ‘em out in the open so we can all have a look!”
Being transgender is not easy. We live in a majority-enforced gender binary world. This means when you’re transgender you have to face the hard reality of living the rest of your life in a world that is openly hostile to you.
I am one of the lucky ones. Having the support of my family and the means to afford doctors and therapists has given me the chance to actually survive this process. Transgender people without support, means and privilege do not have this luxury. And many do not survive. In 2015, the transgender murder rate hit an all-time high in this country. A horrifying disproportionate number of the victims were trans women of color. These are only the recorded homicides so, since trans people do not all fit in the tidy gender binary statistics of murder rates, it means the actual numbers are higher.
And though we have come a long way since Silence of the Lambs, we continue to be demonized and vilified in the media where attack ads portray us as potential predators to keep us from even using the goddamn bathroom. The so-called bathroom bills that are popping up all over this country do not keep children safe, they force trans people into using bathrooms where they can be beaten and or murdered. We are not predators, we are prey.
So yes, Lilly is a fantastic woman, and I am happy that she is comfortably out in her own support network and community. But please remember that she only outed herself publicly because if she didn’t do it herself, the press were going to kick up a fuss.
Please note: I am cis, and I don’t want to speak for or over trans people, I’m simply highlighting what I think is the more important message to take from this press statement.
alternative headline: Daily Mail bullies woman into coming out as transgender
…………………reblog this and say something nice about the person u reblogged it from because there’s too much hate on my dashboard right now and its making me upset so lets start a chain of love
Censorship of sexuality, especially while simultaneously violence, particularly sexual violence, is left uncensored, and the harmful implication this juxtaposition has on our collective sexual wellness, is something I’ve written a lot about, like here and here. Hell, I’ve even written a book about it.
So when I found out there is a new “kid safe” search engine called Kiddle designed to block adult search returns for children, I feared it had sex-is-bad-and-violence-is-normal disaster written all over it. When I learned the results are handpicked by humans and not a computer broadly banning based on keywords, I was extra curious to see if I was still right. I was.
I typed in a bunch of different searches that a child might reasonably want or *need* to anonymously ask the Internet. Well, I’ll let you see the results for yourself:
My girlfriend hits me” is also a bad word.
Inquiries about vaginal discharge are, you guessed it, also bad words.
Related bad words: menstrual care, menstrual pads, menstruation, and uterus.
When avoiding a gay dating website in the search results is considered a higher priority of “safety” for children than their homelessness, and you recommend confronting their abusive parents, we have a tish bit of a problem.
If I was 12, typed this into a search engine, and instead of results got a “bad word” finger wagging, I would take the answer to the “is it ok to be bisexual” question as a big fat NO it’s not OK :(
But the human censors apparently allows kids to search for this one under their “kid safe” censorship policies.
So questions about puberty, health, identity, and seeking help for sexual abuse is not “safe”, but kids buying guns is. I feel like a broken record, so I’m going to let you all unpack it this time. Discuss:
Sirius was not handed his life on a silver platter.
Sirius chose to step out of his comfort zone and befriend James instead of the people his parents wanted him to befriend.
Given that Sirius had spent a lifetime being brainwashed, I would not be surprised if he still held some prejudices when he started his first year. But he chose to keep his mouth shut and get to know people like Remus and Lily. He chose to remain friends with Remus even after finding out he was a werewolf.
He chose to be ostracized by his family and other purebloods in Slytherin. He chose to argue with his parents until the split was irreparable. He chose to run away and risk being disinherited. He chose to join the Order and risk his life, even though he knew that some of his family members and childhood playmates would be standing on the other side. Sirius chose to put his life at risk for his friends. He chose to continue fighting after his father, brother, and many of his fellow Order members died. He chose to risk his life for his friends. He chose to risk his life to protect Harry.
okay but imagine a sixth year lily evans doing research for her muggle studies class (”i want to know what hogwarts is teaching about my people” is what she tells the confused) and she comes across the name henry potter, who championed muggle rights during a muggle world war and she pauses at the name and knows that it can only mean one thing, but she asks him anyway
and james is just like “yeah he’s my grandfather. rad, isn’t it? i want to be just like him” and he smiles and asks what else she found about about henry and the whole time lily is like “shit shit shitSHIT hes perfect”
