In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Death penalty] Well, here is some good(ish) news: "Executions and new death sentences dropped to their lowest numbers in decades in 2014, an anti-death penalty group said in a new report." But it's not wholly good news, of course, because executions are still happening, and death sentences are still being handed out: "The Death Penalty Information Center, a nonprofit organization that opposes executions and tracks the issue, said 35 inmates were executed this year and 71 have so far been given death sentences. The last time fewer inmates were put to death was in 1994, when there were 31 executions nationwide. The number of new sentences is the lowest in the 40 years that the center calls the modern death penalty era." Lowest in 40 years is still not good enough. It won't be good enough until the number is 0. End the death penalty now.

[CN: Criminalizing addiction; misogyny] "A federal civil rights lawsuit is being filed on behalf of a Wisconsin woman who was jailed after allegedly using methamphetamines while 14 weeks pregnant. Tamara Loertscher, 30, was jailed after seeking prenatal care at a Mayo Clinic branch in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Loertscher was seeking treatment for a serious thyroid condition and depression, and disclosed to doctors that she'd been using drugs before she knew she was pregnant. Hospital workers then had Loertscher jailed." The law under which Loertscher was jailed is colloquially known as the "cocaine mom law." Because of course it is.

[CN: Transphobia] An Indiana man who is trans was finally granted an amended birth certificate after a year-and-a-half struggle. I hope this victory will streamline the process for other trans* Hoosiers, and I fear that instead our garbage state legislature will enact laws making it even more difficult.

[CN: Disablism; video may autoplay at link] What the everloving fuck? "The parents of an eight-year-old boy in Missouri are outraged after they say their blind son's cane was taken away and replaced with a pool noodle" as a punishment. I am truly without words.

[CN: Transphobia] Do you remember Karen Adell Scot, the high school teacher whose students told her she was their hero after she transitioned? Here she is talking about her first year after transitioning, the great bits and the hard bits.

Something something Jeb Bush and his ridiculous party and ideological rigidity.

Something something Hillary Clinton meaningless poll.

(Boy oh boy I can't wait to get back to the This Guy! That Gal! Poll! portion of the election that hasn't even started yet!)

[CN: Misogyny; antifeminism; violence] Here is some further detail on the colossal failure that is DC's new Wonder Woman series.

[CN: Disablist tropes] Everyone in the multiverse (and thanks to each and every one of you!) has sent me the video of a dog running on 3-D printed legs for the first time, so here it is and yayayayay! Go, doggie, go!