I saw this cited as a useful source for explanation of “gender identity” and all that: Transgender Identity Formation. In it I read this claim:

Biological

We are just beginning to understand the various aspects of the biological components of who and what we are, and how they interact.

In an invited paper published in the December 2001 issue of Neuroendocrinology Letters, Dr. Gunter Dorner and his colleagues outlined two probable causes of transsexualism that fall into two general categories: 1) genetic enzyme mutations and 2) epigenetic effects which can include stressful prenatal situations and fetal exposure to endocrine disruptors i.e. the breakdown products of DDT (DDE which is estrogenic in nature).

Gender and sexual brain organization is dependent

Caroline Criado-Perez does it again: Parliament Square will add to its eleven (11) statues of men one (1) statue of a woman.

Prime Minister Theresa May announced on Sunday that Millicent Garrett Fawcett, who campaigned for the right of women to vote, will be honored with a statue to stand in the company of giants like Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln and Nelson Mandela.

Mrs. Fawcett formed the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies in 1897 and died at age 82 in 1929, a year after all women in the United Kingdom were granted the right to vote.

It’s only the right to vote for half of all human beings. No biggy.

Fawcett, a political and union leader, is not

Administrators at a Louisiana university are busy sweeping away pesky useless shit like scientific specimens to make room for athletic facilities.

The curators of the Museum of Natural History at the University of Louisiana-Monroe got grim news last week from the school’s director: The museum’s research collection had to be moved out of its current home. The reason? The space was needed for expanded track facilities.

The curators were given 48 hours to find a new place on campus to store the collection — something they weren’t able to do. Now they must get another institution to take their several million specimens. Their hard deadline is July, when the track renovations are slated to begin. And if the collection

The violence on Westminster Bridge last week was a horror, but so was this:

His name was Timothy Caughman. He was from Manhattan and was 66 when he died. The police say he was stabbed on Monday night by a 28-year-old man who had come to New York City from Baltimore looking to kill black men. It was Mr. Caughman’s misfortune to be male and black when the stranger with a 26-inch sword approached on Ninth Avenue near 36th Street, around the corner from where he lived.

We don’t know much else about Mr. Caughman, but the persona he shared with the world on Twitter was that of a man of buoyant outlook and varied interests, who was amused

Lordy. Lor-deee.

Why is Omarosa Manigault there?

Manigault, 43, is fiercely loyal to Donald Trump, whose decision to cast her as an alpha-female villain in the first season of “The Apprentice” more than a decade ago made her a reality television celebrity.

Apparently that’s the reason right there. But I was asking about what qualifications she has to be there. Being a reality television celebrity isn’t a qualification.

But because she is one of the few African Americans in Trump’s immediate orbit, others caution against dismissing her.

“It’s important that we take Omarosa seriously, irrespective of how we feel about her,” said Leah Wright Rigueur, a professor of public policy at Harvard. “The idea of having access to the White

The sleaze continues to deepen, now that both Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner are what the Times calls senior federal government officials.

But the financial disclosure report released late Friday for Mr. Kushner, which shows that he and his wife still benefit financially from a real estate and investment empire worth as much as $740 million, makes clear that this most powerful Washington couple is walking on perilous legal and ethical ground, according to several prominent experts on the subject.

Unlike Mr. Trump, who is exempt from conflict of interest laws, both Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump — who took a formal White House position this past week — are forbidden under federal criminal and civic law to take

The Trump dynasty will go right on profiting from their business interests despite their entanglement in his presidency, even though there are rules against that, because I guess it’s just too embarrassing to tell them no.

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, President Trump’s daughter and son-in-law, will remain the beneficiaries of a sprawling real estate and investment business still worth as much as $741 million, despite their new government responsibilities, according to ethics filings released by the White House Friday night.

Ms. Trump will also maintain a stake in the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. The hotel, just down the street from the White House, has drawn protests from ethics experts who worry that foreign governments or special interests

Courtesy of latsot:

… Read the rest

Mike Flynn has a story to tell. He wants to tell it.

Former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn has told the Senate Intelligence Committee he is willing to be interviewed about the Trump campaign’s possible ties to Russia in return for immunity from prosecution, a Congressional official told NBC News.

The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Flynn had told the FBI and Congress he was willing to be interviewed in exchange for a grant of immunity.

In a statement tweeted Thursday, Flynn’s lawyer, Robert Kelner, confirmed that discussions had taken place with the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, and said “General Flynn certainly has a story to tell, and he very much wants to tell it.”

Never … Read the rest

Speaking of Mike Pence, and scum, and hatred of women – he has a personal Rule against being alone with women.

The Indianapolis Star reported in 2016:

During his 12 years in Congress, Pence had rules to avoid any infidelity temptations, or even rumors of impropriety. Those included requiring that any aide who had to work late to assist him be male, never dining alone with a woman other than his wife, and not attending an event where alcohol is served unless Karen was there.

So he excludes women from some aspects of working for him; he excludes them as women, because they are women. I believe there are laws against that kind of discrimination. It doesn’t suddenly … Read the rest