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Tag: Fascism

Austin Chronicle: Trans Kids Under Attack In Texas

Posted in Austin Chronicle, Journalism, and LGBTQIA

Despite a temporary halt to politically motivated child abuse investigations of families with trans kids, parents and advocates say they continue to live in fear as anti-trans moral panic sweeps through the Lone Star State’s GOP base voters and their leaders.

The ACLU of Texas and Lambda Legal have won four successive rulings in their challenge to Gov. Greg Abbott’s directive to investigate normal gender affirming health care as child abuse. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has asked the Texas Supreme Court to overrule a lower court’s injunction and allow Child Protective Services investigations to continue immediately. Shelly Skeen, a senior attorney from Lambda Legal representing the plaintiffs, told the Chronicle that she expects a favorable ruling, because both the law and medical experts are on Lambda Legal’s side.

… Texas continues to look for other ways to put pressure on trans kids, their parents, and their health care providers. In late March, Paxton’s office filed new investigative demands in a civil case against two pharmaceutical companies, Endo Phar­ma­ceuticals and AbbVie Inc., which provide puberty-blocker drugs. Although approved by the Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of children who enter puberty early, they’re also prescribed (with the backing of experts like the American Medical Association) as a way to delay puberty in transgender kids who are too young to receive other forms of medical treatment such as hormones.

Fact-checking Fascism: Axios Platforms Violent Biker Gang Over Veterans Day

Posted in Creative Commons, Journalism, and Occupy Wall Street

Over 5 years since the election of Donald Trump and the rise of the powerful white supremacist movement he empowered, the mainstream media still struggles to fact-check fascists.

It always interests me which organizations get the benefit of the doubt from the mainstream media.

I (and many others) have written about how the mainstream media tends to take the words of police at face value. Reporters often use whatever language makes police seem blameless after violent interactions.

Just like cops, right-wing fascists frequently get platformed by reporters who fail to ask vital questions.

Which brings us to an article by Asher Price, an Austin reporter for Axios.

We Didn’t Fix Austin (Or America)’s Nazi Problem

Posted in Austin, Creative Commons, and Journalism

A friend that lives in Portland posted on his Facebook about the latest spasm of white supremacist violence that took place there.

Someone that I’ve a bunch of mutuals in common with responded. A sort-of-smug comment to the effect of “thank goodness we ran those people out of Austin, Texas!” And I’ll be honest, that comment shocked me: we did what?

The comment reminded me that this attitude is probably widespread in my city and across the country.

I asked myself, are there people in this country that go days without thinking about the rise of fascism and the collapse of the climate? What must that be like?

‘It Came From Something Awful’ Suffers From Factual Errors

Posted in Creative Commons, Journalism, and Occupy Wall Street

I don’t write about books often, and usually I stick to good ones, but I feel this needs to be said: “It Came From Something Awful” is a book that, at minimum, needed more fact-checking before publication.

Though the book came out in 2019, author Dale Beran is back in the spotlight because of the January 6, 2021 storming of the U.S. Capitol. Beran is seen as one of the experts on 4chan, and 4chan is seen as a key origin point of What Just Happened ™.

When I dug into the book, I found out this argument represents the first third of it at most, and my problems with the latter chapters make me call the whole thing into question.

Anyone Can Adopt Any Activist Tactics: A Spencer Sunshine Interview

Posted in Creative Commons, and Journalism

Activists sometimes forget that anyone can use tactics like banner drops, including the fascist far right.

Late in 2020 and in the first days of 2021, I spoke twice to Spencer Sunshine, a researcher of the far right and ways to oppose them. I included “40 Ways To Fight Fascists,” the zine he co-wrote with PopMob, in my Virtual Gonzo Zine Library.

Since Trump’s election, I’ve noticed more American fascists using tactics traditionally associated with leftist activism, like banner drops or wheatpasting. Patriot Front is one of several groups that frequently drops banners, with messages in support of white supremacy, from buildings and overpasses.