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Biology Is A Shit Show

Apr26

This has been posted elsewhere many times over the years and was composed by Rebecca Helm, a biologist and assistant professor at the University of North Carolina (at least at the time this was written).

Rebecca Helm, a biologist and an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina, Asheville US writes:

Friendly neighborhood biologist here. I see a lot of people are talking about biological sexes and gender right now. Lots of folks make biological sex sex seem really simple. Well, since it’s so simple, let’s find the biological roots, shall we? Let’s talk about sex…[a thread]

If you know a bit about biology you will probably say that biological sex is caused by chromosomes, XX and you’re female, XY and you’re male. This is “chromosomal sex” but is it “biological sex”?

Well…

Turns out there is only ONE GENE on the Y chromosome that really matters to sex. It’s called the SRY gene. During human embryonic development the SRY protein turns on male-associated genes. Having an SRY gene makes you “genetically male”. But is this “biological sex”?

Sometimes that SRY gene pops off the Y chromosome and over to an X chromosome. Surprise! So now you’ve got an X with an SRY and a Y without an SRY. What does this mean?

A Y with no SRY means physically you’re female, chromosomally you’re male (XY) and genetically you’re female (no SRY). An X with an SRY means you’re physically male, chromsomally female (XX) and genetically male (SRY). But biological sex is simple! There must be another answer…

Sex-related genes ultimately turn on hormones in specifics areas on the body, and reception of those hormones by cells throughout the body. Is this the root of “biological sex”??

“Hormonal male” means you produce ‘normal’ levels of male-associated hormones. Except some percentage of females will have higher levels of ‘male’ hormones than some percentage of males. Ditto ditto ‘female’ hormones. And…

…if you’re developing, your body may not produce enough hormones for your genetic sex. Leading you to be genetically male or female, chromosomally male or female, hormonally non-binary, and physically non-binary. Well, except cells have something to say about this…

Maybe cells are the answer to “biological sex”?? Right?? Cells have receptors that “hear” the signal from sex hormones. But sometimes those receptors don’t work. Like a mobile phone that’s on “do not disturb’. Call and call, they will not answer.

What does this all mean?

It means you may be genetically male or female, chromosomally male or female, hormonally male/female/non-binary, with cells that may or may not hear the male/female/non-binary call, and all this leading to a body that can be male/non-binary/female.

Try out some combinations for yourself. Notice how confusing it gets? Can you point to what the absolute cause of biological sex is? Is it fair to judge people by it?

Of course you could try appealing to the numbers. “Most people are either male or female” you say.

Except that as a biologist professor I will tell you…

The reason I don’t have my students look at their own chromosome in class is because people could learn that their chromosomal sex doesn’t match their physical sex, and learning that in the middle of a 10-point assignment is JUST NOT THE TIME.

Biological sex is complicated. Before you discriminate against someone on the basis of “biological sex” & identity, ask yourself: have you seen YOUR chromosomes? Do you know the genes of the people you love? The hormones of the people you work with? The state of their cells?


Since the answer will obviously be no, please be kind, respect people’s right to tell you who they are, and remember that you don’t have all the answers. Again: biology is complicated. Kindness and respect don’t have to be.


Note: Biological classifications exist. XX, XY, XXY XXYY and all manner of variation which is why sex isn’t classified as binary. You can’t have a binary classification system with more than two configurations even if two of those configurations are more common than others.

Biology is a shitshow. Be kind to people.

You Did This

Feb4

This is to every single person who told me I was “hysterical” for predicting the rise of theocratic based fascism in the United States as long as 11 years ago (before Trump even announced his candidacy)

This is for every single person who told me “that can’t happen here”.

This is for every single person who said our institutions would save us.

The entire time, conservatives have said in advance, publicly, precisely how they would undermine everything, destroy every safeguard, seize control of every institution.

Even if a given court rules Trump in contempt of violating a court order, who’s going to arrest him now? Who’s going to enforce anything?

And now we have the first concentration camp since WWII. We have citizens being threatened with deportation. Kids being denied medical care. An entire group of human beings being actively erased from existence and history (that’s called “genocide” for you who are too f*cking stupid to get it).

Some of you are just NOW finally asking how do we mobilize against this to “save” our country? You should have mobilized a decade ago. In waiting til now to realize this, you’ve already lost. The United States of America is already dead. And you can’t face that, can you? You killed it by your inaction, your refusal to listen to what they openly said.

For those that can get out, do it as soon as you can. For those that can’t, your lives and the lives of your descendants for generations will become a living hell.

You were warned and ignored every warning. You deserve what’s coming. Those of us who told you don’t deserve this but we’re the direct targets. Our blood will be on your hands too. Trump didn’t do this alone. You let him.

Carry that guilt to your grave. And to every spineless Democrat in Congress seeking “common ground” with these fascists? May you burn in hell.

The End Of The United States As We Know It

Jan14

Some folks are talking about resistance, about saving the country. I don’t think the country can be saved. Worse, I don’t expect the United States to survive. If you’re talking about resistance, consider at least thinking what a shattered United States might look like, what the politics of each region might be, and where you’d prefer to live. (Sample map above is just a sample of how the US might shatter. All sorts of other arrangements are completely possible too.)

Why consider this? Because Putin is doing to the USA what the USA did to the USSR – funding internal dissidents, getting people into power who oppose central governments generally, and who then make that central government incompetent, or worse, make that central government into an actual detriment. (Trump vs California for disaster assistance is going to show this clearly.) As the central government becomes increasingly irrelevant, blue states are going to have to ask themselves why they are staying. When Trump and Republicans deny disaster aid to California, California is going to have a big WTF moment when they ask why they are subsidizing red states because that’s a fact – blue states subsidize the red states, except for Texas which also subsidizes other red states.

Trump’s policies are also going to turn into issues that make people question why they are part of the United States of America at all. Increasingly, there are deep divides that I do not think can be surmounted by simple politics. People are going to get hurt, some may get killed because of this. Blue states are going to find that Trump will be prepared to browbeat them into submission for his way or the highway. And the highway is going to look better and better as time goes on.

And that is going to turn into large incentive to leave the union and keep all that tax money at home. California is the 5th largest economy in the world. With Oregon and Washington state, it would be the 3rd largest economy. California’s GDP is $4.08 trillion. Washington state’s is $850 billion. Oregon’s is $329 billion. Germany is the 3rd largest economy in the world right now, at $4.9 trillion. Those three states would pass it and be worth $5.29 billion. If they kept their taxes at home, they could fund their own military, have universal healthcare, and a wide range of social programs for the working class just like in Europe.

New York plus Pennsylvania plus the New England states could be the 5th or 6th largest economy in the world. They could afford those things too and would likely ally with NATO and participate in the EU in some fashion. As Trump, Bannon, etc., achieve their goals of “dismantling the administrative state”, the incentives for blue states to stay will continue to drop. As Trump implements policies that go against what blue states want, the incentives to leave will continue to rise.

Further, Trump is openly talking about arresting blue state elected officials who do not bow to his demands. How long will that be accepted? Will every National Guard member, particularly officers, allow the arbitrary arrests of elected officials just because they oppose Donald Trump’s policies? Remember, The Heritage Foundation is saying this as well. They want to turn the US into Hungary, a thin veneer of “democracy” lain over top of a vast oligarchy that focuses on enriching the already rich at the expense of everyone else.

I do not expect the survival of the United States of America beyond the 2040-2045 time frame and it may collapse even faster than that, especially if Trump gets the 22nd amendment overturned. And remember, they’ve publicly said they’re going after the 19th too. But the next 10-20 years are going to be rough in this country, very rough. If you’re an older minority and can afford to relocate to another country, consider doing so.

Remember, Putin has a goal here that many are missing. The collapse of the USSR taught Putin that when a nuclear power collapses, the rest of the world brings tremendous pressure on the newly independent states to denuclearize. With the USSR, all did except Russia. Nobody wants a nuclear armed Montana or Arkansas, so if the US does collapse, Putin gets to remove the United States as a global power in one fell swoop without ever firing a shot. It’s a brilliant strategy and it appears to be succeeding slowly but steadily.

This is why Putin has funded white nationalists in the US. This is why Putin funneled $30 million dollars through the NRA to right wing political entities. This is why every secession movement so far has been headquartered in Russia. And unfortunately, this approach is working. This is why Putin supports incompetent politicians – to render the central federal government of the United States inept, incompetent, and corrupt, thus further driving the wedge between the federal government and the individual states.

Thus, I do not expect the United States to survive. My advice is relocate to a blue state and wait for the collapse or get out of the country entirely. Either can work but in the long run, I don’t expect there to be a United States of America.

My final comment is this – if the United States does survive as a single entity, I expect it to end up as a Christofascist Neo-Nazi theocracy based on rigid right wing evangelical values. LGBTQ people will be fully persecuted. People of color will be ghettoized fully again by Jim Crow laws, or worse. Non-Christians may find themselves persecuted and subject to a functionally apartheid state set against them and for evangelical right wing Christians.

The best outcome I can see is the Balkanization of the United States but if the United States survives as a single political entity, it’s going to be a nuclear armed third world theocratic hell hole.

What If It Happens?

Dec30

Americans need to start to seriously discuss the possibility of the balkanization of North America, of the dissolution of the United States, and what that can and will mean for the world.

The image above is for illustration purposes only. I doubt any of us could accurately predict what a shattered United States would ultimately look like. But imagine the USA with no predefined political borders. What happens when Republicans so completely neutralize the federal government that it becomes a hindrance to the states instead of a help?

California is one of the largest economies in the world. Add in Washington and Oregon and you have a high tech state that would be the 4th largest economy in the world. These three states have existing military bases of all type. Naval bases, Marine Corps bases, one of the major submarine bases for the US Navy, and several Air Force bases, and multiple US Army training facilities would give “Greater California” a head start on forming its own military.

Texas is the eighth largest economy in the world. Add in Louisiana, possibly Oklahoma, and maybe a bit of New Mexico and southeast Colorado and it would be a powerful nation in its own right.

The American south is its own cultural hub, if you presume white supremacy is some form of culture. And those states are still stubborn enough to try to go it alone, poor as many other third world nations, and that’s what the American south. call it the Second Confederacy, would be if the US shattered – a third world nation with third world education and third world healthcare.

The northeast, say from Maryland and Pennsylvania up to Maine, would have a lot of incentive to hang together. With New York state and New York City as the center of everything, it would be a global financial power.

The Great Lakes states are hard to think about, but if they chose to hang together, they’d bring a lot of economic clout to the table. If not, states like Minnesota, Michigan, maybe Wisconsin, and even Illinois (especially Chicago) might find themselves petitioning to become part of Canada.

The northern Great Plains States – Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska have a total population of 5.5 million people approximately. It’s an empty region of the world and if the US collapsed, it would be reduced to becoming the vassal of whatever nearby power chose to absorb it.

Idaho has become white supremacist central though. There are even movements to get the eastern half of Washington state added to Idaho to create a “white nation” for the racist contingent that love that part of the country. No, I’m not saying everyone from Idaho is a racist but there are a lot of them there.

Remaining states? They just sort of fall out where they might. West Virginia might try to join Kentucky and Tennessee as part of that Second Confederacy. Virginia might opt to go with the northeast instead of the Second Confederacy. Arkansas and Missouri likely would be part of that Second Confederacy or, if they’re smarter than that, maybe try to become part of Greater Texas.

But all this is just speculation. How it falls apart remains to be seen but make no mistake, the United States is, right now, today in 2024, a failed state. It’s a failed state where justice doesn’t get applied equally. It’s a failed state where Merrick Garland failed in his most basic duty to uphold the law. It’s a failed state where, in direct contravention to our history and constitution, the Roberts court declared Trump a king-like figure. It’s a failed state where The Heritage Foundation announced quite bluntly that the election of 2024 was a revolution, “bloodless of the left allows it to be”, to turn the US into something it was never intended to be.

And part of The Heritage Foundation goals is to destroy the administrative state centered in Washington, DC. They want to ultimately end it. But if they do, what reason do blue states like California or New York have to stay in the union? What does the union do for these states? More to the point, what do all the taxes that blue states pay and red states take do for those blue states? Especially when they have their own pressing issues?

The Heritage Foundation is playing directly into Vladimir Putin’s hands. Putin has been waging war on the west for over 20 years, seeking to do to the USA what the USA did to the USSR – to use internal dissidents and points of contention to break apart the larger union. When people ask me why would Putin do this? It’s simple. The lesson of the dissolution of the USSR is that a shattered Soviet Union wasn’t allowed to retain nuclear weapons except in Russia. Every other former Soviet state was pressured to disarm from nukes.

Likewise, a shattered USA would face extreme pressure to get rid of its nukes. And in losing its nuclear weapons, Putin removes the United States as a global superpower without firing a shot. The Northeastern US would likely align closely with the European Union. The Greater California nation would be focused on the Pacific rim. And America’s global focus would be gone.

The Heritage Foundation won’t accomplish all this overnight but I can’t see the United States surviving past the year 2040. And with Trump trying to legislate by decree, especially in controversial and bigoted ways, with Trump threatening to drag us into war with Mexico, Canada, Panama, and Denmark, more and more blue states are going to start asking “What do I get for remaining part of this insanity?”

And the answer is, increasingly, nothing. The blue states get nothing for staying in the union, so why stay?

Someday soon, probably within the next 10-12 years, some governor of California is going to throw the first stone. He or she will quietly negotiate a treaty with Japan or maybe even with China, then tell Washington that the state of California is no longer remitting federal taxes to Washington anymore.

And when that day comes. Or when Minnesota petitions to become part of Canada, or when New York says “no more” to GOP lunacy, that’s when the US will finally shatter.

So if you’re considering places to move, consider places that are more likely to be good countries on their own than bad ones. Because some places, like Texas, might just become a realized version of the horrors of Gilead, from The Handmaid’s Tale.

Choose wisely. It’s coming because the United States is already dead and all that’s left now is a twitching warm corpse.

The Killer of The United Healthcare CEO Is A Folk Hero

Dec7

What most of you who are whining about the rule of law are missing is that the United States of America is a failed state. It fails to function as a society for the majority anymore at all. This is why both left and right wing working class people are cheering on the assassin of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

To be clear, I am not advocating that people do what this man did. But the fact that he did it tells me an immense amount about the condition of the United States of America today and the most key finding is that the US is a failed state.

Trump never going to jail is proof of that. Trump’s reelection is proof of that. His open plan to turn the government against everyone except his billionaire friends is proof of that.

America, as some idea of a “shining city on the hill” doesn’t exist and never has. And now it never will.

America is exactly what historians have called a “failed state” for every other corrupt country that imploded in history. And failed states always die.

I predict there will be no America as you know it by 2040 at the latest, likely sooner.

And more than the CEO of United Healthcare will die in this implosion. A lot of people, regular working class people are going to die from unnatural causes over the next decade plus. Trump’s “deportation camps” (aka concentration camps) are going to kill tens of thousands via sheer neglect and willful cruelty. And when the ACA is repealed, health insurance companies will kill even more Americans in their pursuit of profit. None of this will end by politely asking them to stop. Your oppressor won’t take his boot off your neck just because you beg.

Finally, let me remind you that over Mr. Thompson’s nearly 30 year career with United Healthcare, that United Healthcare is directly responsible for over half a million deaths due to insurance being too expensive or care being denied.

Nearly 60,000 Americans die PER YEAR from lack of health insurance or denial of coverage from insurance companies. (The actual number may be even higher.)

That’s 1.8 million deaths over 30 years. United Healthcare’s share of that 1.8 million deaths is at least 450,000. At least, if not more. Mr. Thompson ran a company that has killed more Americans than were murdered in the Rwandan genocide.

Think about that. PROFIT does not excuse murder. Mr. Thompson and the entirety of the for-profit health insurance system are mass murderers. Every single person working for health insurance companies is complicit in mass murder. Every single one.

I don’t care if people don’t like that statement either. Just because we’ve made it “legal” doesn’t make it moral or ethical. Mass murder in pursuit of profit is immoral and a time will come for that bill to be paid. And history teaches us that the oppressors often pay in blood, both yours and theirs.

Consequently, I repeat, the United States is a failed state and failed states always die. Within 15 years, the USA will have gone the way of the USSR and other corrupt failed states.

Watch and see.