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Hey John, This is Artemis, Editor in Chief @ The Needle - News! We're a trans owned and operated news and culture paper. Thank you for subscribing to our newsletters!
Here is your Weekly NRT! Up first, we have an article discussing a new academic, peer-reviewed journal article authored by the President of the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM), a US-based hate group that has influenced anti-trans discourse and policy. - D'Angelo, the SEGM President, argues that cis doctors participating in providing transition medicine are "colluding" with a supposed "ego death" and that choosing to transition itself is worse than the force and abuse involved in gay conversion therapy, which he acknowledges is unethical.
- He also argues against transition care and trans people's autonomy by fearmongering about "medicalization" while also somehow successfully avoiding saying the word "people" next to the words "trans" or "transgender" most of the time.
Artemis writes that, "It’s not about protecting gay people, or trans people– especially when the author can’t say “trans people” most of the time. It’s about controlling and maintaining cissexual bodies."
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For our Investigations column, Jane and Artemis co-wrote a piece based on an investigation Jane performed into the viral rumors regarding the FBI sending letters to trans content creators in order to intimidate and threaten trans people. - Tara Knight, the Instagram creator who first publicized these rumors provided a clearly-AI-generated document as "evidence" to Jane, on the record, when asked about what happened.
- After The Needle ran a story showing how the letter was clearly illegitimate, Knight eventually admitted that the letter never came from the FBI, and then that it wasn't real at all. (She later backtracked and said a different version of it exists and was sent to her by some stalker or other threatening figure, follow our upcoming coverage for more on this wrinkle– as that different version has also been validated by others as illegitimate.)
- In short, the letters rumor in this case turned out to be an unfortunate hoax.
As Jane and Artemis write, "It is not impossible for the FBI to do what has been claimed. As mentioned above, the FBI has a history of shady and threatening behavior towards equal rights activists. However, that does not mean that the people claiming to have been threatened are telling the truth." Further, as part of our ongoing work to highlight good news when it happens, as part of our Good News! column, we published a story detailing how all anti-trans poison pills within the upcoming federal appropriations bill have been removed. - This story was first reported by The Independent's Washington Bureau Chief Eric Michael Garcia.
Another pair of stories, centered on the state of Indiana, covered how the Indiana legislature was going to have a committee hearing on SB 182, which has been called a "total legal framework" for anti-trans discrimination in the state, as well as the results of the committee hearing. - The short version is: the bill made it through the committee hearing and will now be voted on in the Indiana Senate. It is exceedingly likely to pass.
- Shout out to Lilliana Young, a candidate for state legislature– specifically House District 61– in Indiana for the tip that led to these two stories.
- Interesting context is that, during the hearing, the fact that in the recent Supreme Court hearings on trans kids and adults in sports no pro-trans definition of sex was provided was weaponized within the Indiana Senate to defend this legislative assault. (The SCOTUS hearings were also covered by The Needle, more on that below.)
Next up, we have coverage of the two SCOTUS hearings on trans people and trans kids in sports. Finally, I wanted to highlight an interesting piece published by GCN. While I don't benefit from pushing GCN's work directly, I do believe in trans community building and radical solidarity. With that motivation in mind, Sarah Creighton Keogh wrote a story on how zines became embedded in trans and queer culture. Thank you for being a supporter of The Needle. We'll be back next Friday with another dose of News Replacement Therapy.
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💡 Disclaimer: This newsletter is named "News Replacement Therapy" as a cheeky reference to HRT, and is not meant to be an actual, literal medicine or therapy. We aren't trained in that, but to be fair, neither is your doctor. |
