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January 3rd, 2026
 | 04:10 pm - Supporting trans rights in the UK
Because I happen to have a bit of RL knowledge and pulled this list together in a comment elsewhere.
In no order, and this is in no way intended to be comprehensive (if you've got other suggestions, please add them in the comments), but these are groups who I know are doing good work:
TransActual -- they've been taking the lead on campaigning after the Supreme Court ruling and are extremely on the ball: https://transactual.org.uk/
Gendered Intelligence -- support primarily focused on children and young people (up to 25), doing lifesaving work as so many trans kids and teens in the UK are really suffering right now, with the puberty blockers ban and also the overwhelming sense that the entire country hates them: https://genderedintelligence.co.uk/
The Trans Legal Clinic -- new organization providing free legal help for trans people in the UK; I know someone doing third-sector work who's met them and was incredibly impressed by them: https://www.translegalclinic.com
The Trans Safety Network -- a tiny group of people doing formidable investigative work: https://transsafety.network/
The Trans+ Solidarity Alliance -- impressively-organized political lobbying and briefing of MPs, again I think being done by a tiny group of people: https://www.transsolidarityalliance.com/
Not trans-led or trans-specific (unlike all the others I've linked), but the Good Law Project are fighting a bunch of the key legal cases at the moment, and they are working closely with trans-led groups: https://goodlawproject.org
They're much bigger and better-funded, though, so you might wish to send donations to the smaller groups for whom it'll make a lot more difference.
Also, if you're thinking of donating, some of these are legally charities (e.g. Gendered Intelligence) and some aren't because they're too "political" and are thus registered as CICs or suchlike (this is just relevant in terms of being able to use Gift Aid etc.).
Trans+ Solidarity Alliance and TransActual also have good info and advice on emailing your MP (including template letters), if you have the time/spoons free at some point.
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October 25th, 2025
 | 11:33 am - UK people: Scrap The Bathroom Ban
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/scrap-the-bathroom-ban
From TransActual and Trans+ Solidarity Alliance. Produces a template letter to your MP which you can customize as much as you can or want to.
Article by Jane Fae of TransActual (who have been absolutely kicking ass):
https://www.scenemag.co.uk/jane-fae-a-director-of-transactual-writes-on-the-eve-of-launching-a-new-campaign-to-get-mps-to-reject-the-ehrcs-bathroom-ban/
There are now a bunch of Labour MPs who are worried and making noises at the government, even if it's only about the impact on businesses of rules which are possibly illegal and impossible to follow without getting sued:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/oct/23/dozens-of-labour-mps-warn-of-chaos-for-firms-over-gender-recognition-advice
It's alleged that Bridget Phillipson was sitting on the guidance because she was worried it'd scupper her bid for the deputy leadership, whereas Powell is actively trans-friendly and has called for MPs to have a chance to debate and vote on the guidance.
The below may be an overly optimistic view but it seems clear there's tension and conflict between the EHRC and government:
https://iandunt.substack.com/p/frightened-and-desperate-ehrc-anti (warning for Substack, in case you are boycotting it)
So this is a moment when leverage is possible, and letters to your MP may actually do something.
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June 26th, 2025
June 16th, 2025
May 16th, 2025
| 09:00 am - Gender Free World shirts
If you don't want to pre-order, you can just go to:
https://www.gfwclothing.com/collections/shirts
and sort by your body shape/size to see if they have anything fitting you left over in stock from previous batches.
As I have said many times before: cannot rec too highly, turns out that shirts that actually fit look incredibly good.
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May 7th, 2025
| 07:22 pm - For Trans+ History Week
Please enjoy this issue of TransSisters: The Journal of Transsexual Feminism from Nov/Dec 1993, in which multiple people tell the saga of Nancy Burkholder's expulsion from Michigan Womyn's Music Festival after they found out she was trans, and the early stages of the subsequent battle over the "womyn-born-womyn only" policy:
https://transreads.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/2020-05-23_5ec935e84503c_TransSisters2.pdf
Because trans womens's inclusion in women's spaces -- and lesbian spaces specifically -- is not new, and the TERFs and associated transphobes are trying to re-fight a battle which they lost in the '90s, at which point they were re-fighting it after they lost in the '70s.
(I found this issue because someone was suggesting that the "I might be transsexual" badges needed to be brought back again in the UK.)
And the issue is amazing; I knew a lot of this story from having read accounts by Riki Ann Wilchins and other members of Camp Trans, but it's full of details and episodes I knew nothing about, and is both an extraordinary period piece and unfortunately relevant now.
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| 08:56 am - UK cis people
https://bsky.app/profile/bernietranders.bsky.social/post/3lnobillyrc2c
Now would be a really good time for cis allies to start wearing trans pride badges and make it even more impossible for the toilet police to determine who is and isn’t trans
See also The Chaff Project: https://www.tumblr.com/jackalpants/782322101296168960/transgender-pride-flag-badge
https://bsky.app/profile/jackalpants.bsky.social/post/3lnpsyfpah22p
Wear a trans rights thing, show some solidarity, give a little cheer to any trans people in your vicinity, and confuse the transphobes even more (it's not hard).
N.B. By doing this, you are increasing the chances (which may be negligible or already substantial, depending on your everything) that someone will object to your presence in a single-sex space (indeed, that's partly the point), so you have to be prepared to deal with that and decide that this enhanced risk is acceptable for you.
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May 3rd, 2025
| 02:30 pm - UK people: early day motion recognizing Trans+ History Week
If you've already repeatedly e-mailed your MP to express your concern over the Supreme Court ruling and the EHRC's appalling "interim update," you can vary it up by asking them to sign this!
https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/63563
Find your MP's contact details if they've not already signed (and if they have signed, write to thank them):
https://members.parliament.uk/members/Commons
Or use https://www.writetothem.com
The EDM doesn't do anything, but it's a simple measure of which MPs are prepared to commit publicly to the radical idea that trans people are people.
Which, in the current situation, matters.
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April 26th, 2025
 | 11:55 am - UK people: this is a five alarm fire for trans rights
The government and the EHRC have committed to the full "bathroom bans" interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling, with the special bonus cruelty that they're advising that trans people can legally be excluded from BOTH the toilets of the gender they identify with AND the ones of their "biological sex":
https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/media-centre/interim-update-practical-implications-uk-supreme-court-judgment
This is of course a totally unbiased interpretation that has nothing to do with the culture of transphobia among the EHRC leadership:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/ehrc-staff-quitting-transphobia/
Or the culture of bullying and harassment which Kemi Badenoch ensured wasn't investigated:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/may/23/chair-of-uks-equality-watchdog-being-investigated-after-staff-complaints
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-67214229
Anyway, they are also insisting that single-sex women's groups MUST exclude trans women, whether they want to or not -- i.e. you can't stay a women-only group if you include trans women (and the same with men's groups being required to exclude trans men).
For peak absolute fuckery, the Supreme Court has also defined lesbians, whether the lesbians like it or not:
https://bsky.app/profile/wearequeeraf.com/post/3ln5vjkufak2h
I am sure all the lesbians will be very appreciative and grateful.
Please contact your MP (if you haven't already): https://www.parliament.uk/get-involved/contact-an-mp-or-lord/contact-your-mp/
The Trans Legal Project has some talking points if you need ideas: https://www.translegalproject.org/post/urgent-action-write-to-your-mp-to-protest-the-supreme-court-ruling-and-the-ehrc-s-proposals-to-impo
ETA: another script for letters: https://saxifraga-x-urbium.tumblr.com/post/780990467044179968/i-know-you-wont-do-this-without-a-script-so
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April 24th, 2025
| 03:24 pm - Hey, UK people, you can email Keir Starmer
It's free, it's easy and they can't stop you!
https://contact.no10.gov.uk/
N.B. as with almost all of these things, nobody with decision-making power will actually see your e-mail or appreciate its painstakingly-crafted eloquence -- HOWEVER, there absolutely will be a tally of "X number of people wrote in pro/con this issue," and maaaybe a note of points that multiple people raise.
It's obviously going to be a very bad idea to threaten anyone, and probably a bad idea to say anything personally abusive or anything that lets them write you off as obviously unhinged.
But otherwise, IMHO: don't sweat it, pick a few important points and make them clearly, call it done. You only get 1000 characters so if you've got more points to make, save them.
Then do it again every week, maybe.
(They possibly don't have a system for filtering out "this person wrote in 10 times already", and the TERFs have apparently been making like an army: https://bsky.app/profile/transactualuk.bsky.social/post/3lnghryr2wl2c )
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April 23rd, 2025
April 22nd, 2025
April 18th, 2025
April 17th, 2025
April 11th, 2025
| 04:53 pm - "'One of us is wrong here, and I don't think it's me'"
Courtesy of ![[tumblr.com profile]](https://www.tumblr.com/favicon.ico) remnantglow, "Congenital Agenesis of Gender Ideation by K.N. Sirsi and Sandra Botkin" by the author now named Cameron Reed is available for your reading pleasure:
https://remnantglow.tumblr.com/post/773043138539503616/hey-just-getting-into-reading-sci-fi-n-i-was
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wVO8lbyi2_6M2n9-KVi0raWxLcWnuVR9/view
Published in 1998, btw.
Also Reed's comment about her two in-progress novels could not be more calibrated to appeal to me personally:
https://remnantglow.tumblr.com/post/767073967312912384/mar-have-you-seen-that-cameron-reed-has-announced
What We Are Seeking shows the influence of Joanna Russ's We Who Are About To ..., Janet Kagan's Hellspark, and The Left Hand of Darkness. Courting Hellfire contains DNA from Babel-17 and the Nero Wolfe novels.
ETA: the excellent bonus episode of Wizards Vs Lesbians where (in their new tradition of inviting authors they've featured to come on the podcast to talk about someone else's book) Cameron Reed joins them to talk about Samuel Delany's Stars In My Pocket Like Grains Of Sand:
https://www.tumblr.com/wizardsvslesbians/777560065843544064/wizards-vs-lesbians-bonus-stars-in-my-pocket
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April 1st, 2025
| 02:01 pm - Day 11 of the Trans Rights Readathon, belatedly
I did not quite scrape under the wire to finish Ponyboy last night, but did this morning. Read eight books (counting the one re-read), some of which were extremely good and all of which were worthwhile, donated to two organizations, rebooted my fiction reading habits, read some books I'd been meaning to read for ages and discovered some authors I'd never heard of before, totally failed at reducing my tbr since I added more than I got through, A++ time would do it again.
(Actually might just keep going for a bit, in the sense of using the Readathon's lists and challenges to diversify my reading in the rest of the year.)
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March 31st, 2025
| 09:55 am - Day 10 of the Trans Rights Readathon, belatedly
Read Avi Silver's Pluralities (delightful but also ouch), started Eliot Duncan's Ponyboy. Just pushing myself to read a lot rather than waiting for the perfect moment to start something is definitely helping reboot my fiction reading, which is much appreciated.
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March 29th, 2025
| 08:44 pm - Day 9 of the Trans Rights Readathon
Somewhat less exhausted and consequently doing things in addition to reading, but still very much enjoying Imago.
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