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A newborn baby girl will have to go through life with the wrong sex on her birth certificate after a registrar’s error, which her parents have been told they cannot change. Grace Bingham and her partner, Ewan Murray, were excited to register their first child at the Sutton-in-Ashfield Registration Office in Nottinghamshire last week. But, after nights of broken sleep, they failed to notice the registrar had written the wrong sex on the birth certificate until after it had been submitted. “We were horrified but assumed that, as we saw the mistake just a few seconds after it had happened, correcting it would be an easy matter,” said Murray. “But although the registrar apologised for her mistake – and the area manager also apologised – it turns out that birth certificates can’t be changed.”

this article is interesting because it demonstrates that cis people can very easily apply structural thinking to sex assignment - this couple immediately identifies that their daughter, having mistakenly been assigned male at birth by the registrar, will have administrative problems in employment, education, travel, and so on. they pretty adeptly identify the foundational role that sex assignment plays in the administrative and civil functions of a state, and how incorrect sex markers effectively produce a ‘rational’ reason for discrimination within these administrative and civil arenas:

The General Register Office (GRO), which is responsible for administering all civil registration in England and Wales, and the Home Office have both confirmed that Lilah’s birth certificate cannot be reissued, although an amendment can be made in the margin of the original document. But Bingham said this is not enough. “People reading a birth certificate might easily miss a tiny note in the margin – which means that Lilah could be regarded as male when she applies for school, her passport, for jobs – for everything that she needs a full birth certificate for.”

And given that this was published in The Guardian, this article makes zero mention as to why it’s impossible for this couple to receive an updated birth certificate with correct information (something the author notes was possible to do a year ago), but the reason is obviously transphobia. 

Now one might ask why there’s no exception for cis people whose birth certificates were recorded incorrectly at birth, but this reveals the instability of cissexualism. How would you determine who is a cis person with a mistaken birth certificate, versus a trans person who wants to change their mistaken sex assignment record? Sure, you could say well, this is an infant, of course she’s “really” “biologically” female (something the parents argue in the article as grounds for having their child’s birth certificate re-issued), but 1) that certainly can’t be argued for in all cases, 2) 'biological sex' is understood by medical doctors as alterable through hormones and surgery, which trans people are often required to undergo in order to change their records, and 3) binary sex assignment is already imprecise and discretionary, particularly if infants have sex characteristics that don’t conform to binary F/M assignment standards (which is part of how the category of intersex emerges, framing this failure to conform to state census categories as a biological defect - and in fact, many intersex people do not discover they are intersex until the onset of puberty or later, at which point they are even less in luck if they want to change their sex assignment - and if they don’t, if they are cis but have sex characteristics that do not conform to cis standards, they will be discriminated against anyway). 

Even setting aside the issue of transgender and intersex people for a moment, states fuck up all the time in administration! you've probably either experienced this directly or know someone who's had some kind of record fucked up by the government at some point in their life. If you get married they could fuck up changing your last name, fuck up your disability status, record your social insurance number wrong, print the wrong address on your driver’s license, fail to acknowledge you as a dependent when filing taxes, incorrectly mark you as having graduated when you’re still a student, fuck up your immigration paperwork, record your name wrong during immigration, etc etc into infinity, and this is not even getting into errors that occur when different levels of government pass information between one another. This level of administrative rigidity is purely to punish people who fail to perform cissexualism correctly, and in the case of this couple's child, the administrative error of the state is imputed to them as a personal failure that she and her parents will now have to deal with for the rest of their lives. 

I think the ultimate analysis is not that transphobia will become less precise and hit more "wrong" targets as it expands its reach, but that this is the exact same operational logic as all other liberal state measures - if you encounter a systemic issue, it’s your fault for not avoiding it, fuck you, go away. You’re poor because you’re lazy, you’re unhoused because you’re lazy, you’re disabled because you’re lazy, and your daughter is now administratively transsexual because you’re lazy. In this case, we don’t even need to assume the intentions of the state - they outright say it:

The family complained to the GRO but was told the mistake was their responsibility and could not be fully rectified. “The duty to ensure that information recorded in any particular entry is true is the responsibility of the person providing the information and not of the registrar general or the registrar recording the birth,” the GRO said.

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a whole bunch of gazan mutual aid projects and nonprofits. if the decision of which individual fundraiser to give to feels too daunting, or if you just want to help as many people as possible in one go, these are great initiatives to support.

care for gaza - focuses on providing food and essential supplies. donate here or here.

connecting humanity - securing internet access via donations of virtual sim cards (esims). if you can't afford a whole plan yourself, crips for esims is a communal pool that will use your donation to purchase and maintain esims

gaza soup kitchen - provides food, medical care, and classes for children. also has a gofundme

glia gaza medical support initiative - provides medical care through field clinics and tents at hospitals. donations can also be sent through their website.

ele elna elak - provides clean water, food, clothing, and shelter. they also have a gofundme

life for gaza - raising money for the gaza municipality to repair water and waste management infrastructure

taawon - partners with local civil organizations to provide food, water, medical care, shelter, and basic supplies

the sameer project - running various initiatives providing tents, medical care, and necessities. they have their own encampment project focused on sheltering families with children, sick and disabled members, or members in need of perinatal care

islamic relief worldwide's gaza emergency appeal - provides food, water, hygiene kits, medical supplies, and psychological support

baitulmaal - provides a variety of necessities, including food, water, shelter, and medical supplies

gaza mutual aid fund - distributes food, hygiene products, water, and other essential supplies, including financial support. run by @/el-shab-hussein's amazing friend Mona. updates can be found on her instagram.

hygiene kits for gaza - provides hygiene supplies including menstrual products, wipes, and toothbrushes/toothpaste

anera - provides a variety of necessities, including food, water, hygiene supplies, medicine, blankets and mattresses, and psychological care

palestine children's relief fund - provides supplies and support with a focus on children. also has an initiative for lebanon

dahnoun mutual aid - provides water, food, tents, baby supplies, financial support, and other necessities. updates can be found through their instagram

certainly this is not an exhaustive list, so please feel free to add on other projects or organizations that i didn't include. and as always, please take the time to donate if you can and share. it truly makes all the difference.

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Strawberry Switchblade!!

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“what’s posted on the internet stays there forever” is true for everything except that one piece of fanart you saw when you were 10 that changed the trajectory of your life forever. you will never find that again it is gone forever

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mom has boxed wine in the house,,, you already know wtf is up

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put me in the prozac urn I’m done for

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I am pleading once again for white liberals to read The New Jim Crow and see how racist policing and law enforcement is 1) bipartisan and 2) the key to how people of color (Black people specifically) are systemically, violently, and purposely kept in check in this country. Begging y'all to see that someone doesn't have to say a slur to be antiblack in the entirety of their belief system, that the status quo you live under is maintained by the suffering (both current and potential) of millions

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art by @christiansinglebabes

Urgent! Please help a father save his three young daughters from war

This family is very low on funds, with only €4,237 out of the €40,000 goal

I was reached out to by Ahed to make a post for his family. This fundraiser is vetted by Gazavetters, #229 on their spreadsheet

Ahed is a 33 year old father of three young girls with his wife Maisoon. Getting Ahed the funds to evacuate his family is very urgent because they have three children under the age of ten with them, who currently don’t have access to food, clean water, or medical treatment they need. They’re at risk of bombs, infectious illnesses, and starvation every day they remain in Gaza. every hour matters

Ahed’s daughters are the light of his life and his motivation to keep going, and he’s campaigning on here every day to keep them safe. In Ahed’s words, his daughter Fatima (9) is “the closest to my heart, and my little one.”, Iman (6) “The friendly, kind, and loving child who is loved by everyone”, and little Nour, only one year old: “Who did not live her life like other children, as she was born two months before the war”.

Imagine that you’ve just had a baby girl, and you look at her with so much love and imagine with excitement what a bright future she’ll have and how she’ll play with her siblings. And only two months later, your whole life is turned upside down, and you have to wonder every day how you’ll feed her and keep her safe.

This is what happened to Ahed and his wife when they should’ve been at their happiest with a newborn daughter, everything turned into a nightmare. Their apartment was destroyed in a bombing, they were displaced multiple times, and suddenly they were raising their beautiful daughters in a war zone.

Every hour in Gaza is dangerous. Please help get Ahed, Maisoon and their children to safety as soon as possible 🙏🏼 Every donation will bring them closer to a future where Fatima, Iman, and Nour can play together and go to school and rest and recover from what they’ve been through.

Please give Ahed and Maisoon peace where they don’t have to watch their children suffer from illness and malnutrition, the worst thing for a parent to experience.

Please let Nour experience what peace feels like.

Thank you for reading their story, if you’re not able to donate, please share so it can reach people who are able to.

Donate here to save their family

@autisticmudkip @90-ghost @heritageposts @furiousfinnstan @biconicfinn @butchniqabi @neechees @strangeauthor @appsa @akajustmerry @dirhwangdaseul @toesuckingoctober @vampiricvenus @sawasawako @brutaliakhoa

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Most of us will never know the agony of being a parent that does everything to provide for their child, only to keep coming up empty. Of the immense suffering and self-loathing that comes with being responsible for this little life, and feeling like you're failing: to keep them safe, warm, sheltered, fed. Of holding your child, your toddler, your newborn, watching them slowly waste away from that relentless, gnawing hunger you can't stop (one that you feel yourself). Watching as they howl in pain, and the hollowness that comes when your child becomes too weak even to do that. All the while being totally helpless to stop it because it's not up to you.

Most of us will only see the aftermath of such a thing: a parent carrying the far-too-light shroud of their child, pictured under a headline that details how starvation has taken hold of some given population. Distant and removed from us.

Except that it isn't. There are so many desperate parents who've run out of options, for whom this isn't some abstraction, who are asking—begging—us for our help. Just so they'll be able to buy some of the shit canned food left from the last aid delivery, and a couple loaves of bread to feed their children with. Extortionately pricey because of scarcity, but it's enough to keep their children in a state of "acute malnutrition" rather than "catastrophic hunger", so they'll pay anything for it.

Attacks on NGOs & prevention of aid into Gaza puts every single person there at risk of a slow death due to starvation. Especially children, like Samah's newborn baby boy, her little 2 year-old girl, and their big sister (who's only 9). But we can help. What's pocket money for us, is an invaluable lifeline to parents like Samah. At a time when so many seem to have decided to live in an alternate universe in which deliberate starvation and mass slaughter of civilians is acceptable, we have to do what we can to oppose it. Not to push it away, to ignore it, to decide it's been going on so long we don't care or that it's hopeless so give up, but to grit our teeth, dig our heels in, and say "no, seriously, what the fuck are we doing here?"

tldr: donate to Samah so she can buy food for her kids so they don't starve to death. please. and thank you. :)

(vetted by association by @/bilal-salah0 (relatives), & Bilal was vetted here, #132)

sorry about this, tagging for reach, but let me know if you'd like off

@cozy2000 @orphetoon @catgirl-kaiju @dykentery @ossifer

@crusty @libelelle @coastalhorrors @tenderscience @tiercel

@borrelia @nvtxl @nonbinary-watanuki @bigandgreedy

@verdiesque @6oys @metamorphesque

@eremes @whatcoloristhatcat @waterloggedsoliloquy @antisocialxconstruct @mirrorhouse

@gothhabiba @capybara @femmesbians @specialmouse @s9sh9

@jesse-pinko @leechloach @dadpilled @gojobait @thedyke

@c-rberus @ilovenanu @mlm-blues @void-flesh @stellarfalls

@queerpyracy @lakesbian @bitegore @u3pxx @crtvirus

@d-druxy @pornogrind @rubyfunkey @muscosus

@hexhomos @soymikki @spoiled-ojousama @rosamundpkes

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just found out that there is a sudanfunds website! like gazafunds, it is a compilation of funds for people facing genocide

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How it feels to have friends and hang out with them