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survivingcapitalism · 2 years

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What an absolute nightmare country.... This is neoliberal eugenics. Social murder.

She desperately wants to move to an apartment that’s wheelchair accessible and has cleaner air. But her only income is from Ontario’s Disability Support Program (ODSP). She receives a total of $1,169 a month plus $50 for a special diet. "I've applied for MAiD essentially...because of abject poverty," she said.

One of her physicians, Dr. Riina Bray, medical director of the Environmental Health Clinic at Women's College Hospital in Toronto, has been looking for better housing saying Denise requires “immediate relocation for her safety.”

But Denise said she and supporters have called 10 different agencies in Toronto over the past six months to locate housing with reduced chemical and smoke exposure that she can afford on ODSP.

"None of them were able to do anything meaningful in terms of getting me relocated, getting the discretionary emergency, or temporary housing and emergency funds," said Denise.

Applying for medically assisted death has been surprisingly easier. Denise said she began working on applications for MAiD in the summer of 2021.

[...]

Denise says her life today is a far cry from her early days as a professional make-up artist.

"I was earning $25 an hour. It was a good job," she told CTV News.

But chemical exposures from her work triggered her Multiple Chemical Sensitivities (MCS). MCS is a recognized disability under the Canadian Human Rights Act. It’s believed to be caused by exposures to chemicals, or other environmental exposures that cause physical symptoms, although it is a controversial diagnosis in the medical community.

Her story is disturbingly similar to one reported by CTV earlier in April. Sophia also suffered from Multiple Chemical Sensitivities. She received a medically assisted death in February, after fruitless attempts to get an apartment away from smoke and chemicals in her building. Denise said she started the paperwork on her request for MAiD in the summer of 2021, long before Sophia's story went public.

[...]

Among those trying to help her, is David Fancy, a professor of drama arts at Brock University and disability rights advocate. He heard about her plight last fall and attests to how hard Denise has tried to get a healthier home. But he’s seen her lose hope.

“Door after closed-door after closed-door...the gauntlet tends to push people in the direction of the legislation that is there, which is medical assistance and dying, " said Fancy, who has started a GoFundMe to try to help Denise find better accommodations. "I've got a very significant concern that this is the tip of the iceberg," he added.

#Canada #Cdnpoli #ODSP #TW: Suicide #TW: Eugenics

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red-hemlock · 5 months

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Headcanon: Father

Dr. Evan Rowe was an average, drab-looking man. Eccentric and determined, but somewhat quiet and shy. He was ALWAYS overworked and sleepless, much preferring to bury himself in work, and co-workers would swear to the end of time that the frown of worry etched onto his face was permanent. But, as odd as he might have been, he had a calling... A natural TALENT for toxicology that no one could write-off.

And it was that talent which sealed his fate.

The women of the Locke family search for specific talents to breed into future generations; and after Evan's work lead to the creation of an antidote against the toxins of a particularly nasty plant, it wasn't long until this achievement caught the attention of the Locke matriarch: Rena. Seeking to see if a possible heir could be made with a passion for poisons that rivaled her own, she 'paired' her daughter Donna with Evan; and sent her out on a mission to seduce him, and see this 'experiment' through. With little experience in the whims of love, the toxicologist fell and fell hard, for the carefully-constructed mask that Donna made to do this.

They never married, but his eventual daughter was the very light of his life. Evan only held her a few times, before work required him to take an extensive international trip; and it all but ruined him when news of her sudden 'death' was given whilst on this trip. SIDs, he was told, but the truth he would eventually come to discover, was much more sinister. Two years later they would try again, only for Donna to disappear without word or reason once they found-out they were now having a boy.

That is until some years later, when pure chance allowed him to catch sight of his lost 'love' in the background of a news event taking place in a town in Oregon... With a young girl. Emotions run high, he left right away, determined to get some answers; to find Donna and their son, and the little girl who looked all-too suspiciously like him.

He was never seen again.

River also inherited her huge appetite and penchant for snacking from him.

#Headcanon #TW: Eugenics #('Cuz Riv's grandma is pretty awful as always. The Read More is more for post length though.)#(But ohhhh Evan. He was a good guy and would've given River and her brother a good life. =( )#(But he made the mistake of getting with crazy twice and then following her when she didn't want to be found.)#(So now he's become another head on grandma's trophy wall. =T)#(The only time Riv 'met' him was the day he died and she didn't even know who he was. Maybe someday I'll write a drabble about it.)#Long Post

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firespirited · 5 months

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Every single part of menstruation aside from the first six months at 11 and a year at 17 was traumatic,

the ten day mega bleeds so bad I wore sweaters around my waist to hide leaks all year round. cysts at 14 and bad meds, new meds with nausea and dysphoria, the pills I finally got that kept it to 6-7 days of gushing like a stuck pig. Not being able to use tampons, the horrific price of pads that actually work, the anemia and the price of meat.

The gradually increasing pain in my back and legs that was aggravated by periods.

Then one day I'm watching a documentary about the social revolution that is the pill and a scientist mentions you can take your bog standard 2 compound pills without stopping, it's actually less natural to force your body into withdrawal every month for no reason but the church intervened. I nearly ripped my hair out in anger.

I started buying an extra otc pill pack every few months and went down to 2 days normal flow with 2 days spotting despite taking them at the correct time every day.

It was manageable and shame free until about 15 years ago when the muscle issues got worse: uterine cramps would spread across the bowels and not only press on important nerves but cut blood flow to my legs this makes the legs cramp and press on more nerves. I had to lobby doctors for several years to try various stronger hormones as seizure/tremor meds make normal doses inert. By lobby, you all know the drill: this could affect your fertility, this can increase risk of cancer blablabla find a way to say you'd be a more productive little ant if your legs worked, find the doctor who actually hears.

Yeah so I don't talk about my personal journey with the pill or the fact that pregnancy is too risky because

the point is to communicate that we have a solution to the horrors for 98% of girls

for the other 2% we have other medicines and options (which should include days off, medical period supplies for free and therapy/group therapy).

And for disabled, ill, intersex kids, mentally ill women, refugees and prisoners: sickening how fast puberty blockers, tube tying and surgeries are deployed when there are so many alternatives. Eugenics is alive and real.

The fight for women's right to control their periods and fertility, for trans folk to control their bodies and marginalised folk to control their fertility is **all part of the same eugenics** and addressing only part of the issue doesn't get rid of the rot at the root. They don't want trans men and birth controlled teens because they're breeding stock, and if you're 'undesirable' you may wake up with your body changed without your consent.

So please tell all your friends and parents of girls that there are solutions and what is and isn't normal period symptoms. We have the science!!!

#Tw: abuse #Tw: eugenics #tw: medical abuse #Saf #Period poll

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inkyvulture · 2 years

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I don't know why or how come people still need it spelled out for them, but if something contains racist/sexist/etc-ist elements, it is racist/sexist/etc-ist.

In other words if your favourite paleo artist is claiming "IQ" is linked to race, they're racists, they're into eugenics.

If that book you're reading makes fun of disabled people for issues created by a system that runs against them, that is ableism.

If the game you play has racist tropes, that is racism.

If your s/o says they're "pro-life", they're anti-women.

The damn list goes on. Supporting those people or their content has you be an accomplice to it via your silence. Silence never ever helped the attacked group.

#seriously #i keep finding out so many people still support/read/play/etc stuff that helps problematic causes #anyway this post has been brought to you by #emily willoughby #she's shit #trigger warning #tw: eugenics

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trixree · 1 year

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so... this claim about XY sex chromosomes but phenotypically female development (you made it on a post) ....... I have 2 thoughts there. 1 is that this occurs because specific genes, like SRY, that are critical to male development in humans can be absent/nonfunctional on that tiny Y thus rendering the person actually X- (single X) in terms of gene expression, which leads to being female but often with health complications. That is an important distinction to me... just from a intersex/DSD health and research standpoint. Not only does it not produce hermaphrodism (there is no true hermaphrodism in humans) ... it isn't someone "magically" having XY and being female out of nowhere. The "being female" part happens for a reason, and that reason isn't gender/society-culture related. It's a unique genetic event with very specific causes. And it's reasonable that a lot of people don't know about it or skip over it in casual discussion, and it still means functionally, if you have a functional Y, you develop male. My 2nd thought is I just don't get what disorders of sex development have to do with gender to you. It's its own thing.

Hi! I don't know exactly what post you're referring to, so I can't make direct reference to it.

I'll answer your second question first, cause that speaks to my answer for the first question!

I bring up disorders of sex development often when discussing gender broadly because disorders of sex development help complicate the binary model most people are working off of. It's an important starting point when many folks are coming at issues of transition and gender from a foundational knowledge that says "there are two distinct ways of being, male (XY) and female (XX) and anything else is a rare aberration". Historically, it is actually intersex people who shaped our models of normative human sex/gender; and I take care to say "sex/gender" here because at the turn of the 20th century, it's important to note that these concepts were not distinct - "gender" as we think of it didn't really enter the scene scientifically until 1940 and was popularized in 1970). Challenging this fundamental misconception that this male-female sex binary is both natural and discrete - it was not natural nor discrete, but constructed out of experimentation on intersex bodies (usually of children) as a project of normalization - is important foundational work for understanding parts as seperate from people and identity.

Which leads me to this statement you made, that "there is no true hermaphrodism in humans" which is simply not correct in the way that hermaphroditism functions as a meaningful political and medical category. While "true" instances of hermaphroditism are rare (OVO-DSD or XX-intersex), hermaphroditism historically has meant broadly anyone with ambiguous sex organs, which today would cover all intersex conditions (of which OVO-DSD/XX-intersex is one) This broad category crucially helps us renders violence against ambigous bodies (often queer and trans bodies) more visible, both in our present moments and in our history.

In this book, I use the general term "hermaphrodite" for all so-identified subjects of anatomically double, doubtful, and/or mistaken sex (that is, supposedly mislabeled sex). But I do this not because I think the category 'hermaphrodite' is self-evident or because I think it forms a clearly bounded, ontological category that cannot be disputed [...] I use hermaphrodite to refer to my historical subjects first because it simplifies my narrative. A single so-called hermaphrodite could, in the scientific and medical literature of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, go from being officially labeled male, to female, to hermaphrodite, to a subject of mistaken sex, to a subject of doubtful sex [...] it is simplest to use the word hermaphrodite for anyone whose 'true' sex fell into question among medical and scientific men. Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex, Alice Domurat Dreger (1998) - From Chapter 1, Doubtful Sex

It's important to know that in many cases of intersex children, the cause of the intersex condition is never known, which begs the question is the particular diagnosis ("true hermaphoritism" vs other intersex conditions, which can be much more ambiguous) especially meaningful in terms of ones' daily life?

Your example regarding Sewyer syndrome (the non-functional SRY gene on the Y chromosome) is correct, but I'm not following your reasoning that this constitutes an "important distinction". Why is that an important distinction? You say, it's not "true hermaphroditism" and it isn't "magically having XY and being female", "being female happens for a reason, and that reason isn't gender/society-culture related." Again, I don't know the original post you're referencing, but I'd agree with you that this isn't "magically being female"! We do understand the mechanism of this genetic anomaly. However, the reason that a person who develops female secondary sex characteristics (i.e., looks female), regardless of their chromosomal sex or the presence of any sex anomalies, is most likely to be raised female. This is, quite literally, the way our gendered society is intended to work.

So, when we uphold the uncomplicated binary model of sex, when we don't talk about interesex people in conversations about gender identity and queer/transness, we obscure the complex nature of gender identity and ones' sex assigned at birth. (While simultaneously erasing a history of sex that was literally build on the bodies of intersex people as living laboratories.) This history is intentionally made obscure and the voices of those intersex people silenced in their own records and in our own queer history.

Now, anon, if you're still with me (and I hope you are!) I'd like to tell you one of these stories of a real intersex person - a child diagnosed as a hermaphrodite in 1915 who was treated by leading professionals in the field of sex development and endocrinology at the Harriet Lane Home at John Hopkins (emphasis added):

In his memoir, Young describes a 'case that did not end happily' to introduce [Robert] Stonestreet. As Young remembers it: 'A boy was brought to us years ago for operation on account of a genital defect. Dr William Quinby... discovered that the patient was a girl, and advised the father allow him to carry out operations to make his child normal." Like Young, Quinby was most interested in the possibility that overactivity of the adrenal glands from fetal life on had resulted in the masculinization of Stonestreet's body, leading to his assignment as male at birth despite his having "female" gonads. Stonestreet had been raised without question as a boy for ten years and unambiguously understood himself to be a boy. Indeed, when the Stonestreets brought their child to the Institute, the reason was "hypospadias and undescended testicles", not hesitation over his sex.

Young and Quinby undertook an external and internal physical exam, followed by radiographs, a urine test to establish kidney function, a syphilis test, a blood pressure check, and a blood count [...] Finding nothing out of the ordinary, aside from the appearance of the genitals, they moved on to an exploratory laparotomy. Finding 'an infantile uterus with tubes and ovaries of normal appearance,' Young and Quinby were faced with a contradiction. According to a gonadocentric paradigm, the presence of ovaries would trigger a diagnosis of 'female pseudohermaphorditism' and sex reassignment as a girl. 'The sex of an individual must always be determined by the nature of the gonads, regardless of the presence of other abnormalities either of other parts of the genital system or the secondary sexual manifestations of the body as a whole [...] Consequently, this patient is of the female sex; and this in spite of so many secondary sexual characteristics of the opposite, male sex.'

According to Young, when Quinby advised Stonestreet's father 'that the patient was a girl', the response was 'that he had six girls and that this boy, although only ten, was a valuable worker on the farm. He refused to have another girl added to the family and departed.' The Stonestreets might have also recognized their child's self identity as a boy as real, choosing to reject the medical model.

Twenty one years later, Stonestreet returned to the Brady Institute. Now in his thirties, he had lived his whole life as a man and was engaged to marry a woman. Their priest, however, had refused to perform the ceremony because Stonestreet's father had told him about the childhood hermaphroditism diagnosis. Stonestreet now demanded that Young provide medical proof that he was a man, not a woman. 'After a careful study I had to tell him,' Young claims, 'that no mistake had been made. The two left in tears.' Three days later, Young was summoned to the Institute. He found Robert Stonestreet there, on his deathbed. An autopsy found that he had committed suicide by taking a lethal dose of mercury. Young took advantage of Stonestreet's death to verify his theory of adrenal hyperplasia during the autopsy. A few years later he published photographs of Stonestreet's autopsied adrenal glands in his memoir.

Histories of the Transgender Child, Julian Gill-Peterson (2018) - From Chapter 2 - Before Transsexuality

Let me ask you this: what matters more, the way that Robert understood himself to be (unquestionably male) and the way that he lived his life (as a man) or the diagnosis of hermaphroditism that rendered him "female"? That rendered instutitions, like medical and marital ones, incapable of seeing him as he actually was? I'll ask you directly: do you know your chromosomal configuration? Do you know your full genome, every condition or aberation in your body? No! Even the most highly medicalized among us (those living with multiple diagnoses, chronic illnesses, disabilities, or otherwise in close proximity to medicine and medicalized life) would contest the idea that our most fundamental biology matters most, that we can (or even should) know everything about our genes, or even that this information has great bearing on who we become. But I'm certain still, without having the full sequence of your sex chromosomes in front of you or without submitting to a medical examination of your genitalia, you already have some understanding of who you are. Our genetics are not reflective of who we are and who we understand ourselves to be; they never have been a reliable picture of who we will become.

#tw: eugenics #tw: suicide #trans tag #intersex #queer history #trans history #sex and gender #asked and answered #trixree speaks

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merriadoc-brandyfuck · 1 year

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Wish I was joking

#tw: eugenics #eugenics #Canada #and I thought the US was the only country devolving into a fascist state #i’m not even kidding #doctors and nurses are legally allowed to kill their disabled patients #without the patient’s consent #I hate it here #canadian politics #canadian problems #disabled #disabled rights #physically disabled #intellectually disabled #important

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sophiegoose · 5 months

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Not sure who on here also uses Instagram, but for those that do have y'all noticed that the comments section has just been...

Worse, lately?

Like idk if it's just people coming over from Twitter as it collapses or what but I've seen a big uptick in just awful shit in the comments section, especially on the short-form vids.

Like just an absolute bevy of people spewing LGBTphobia, ableism, trying to use "autistic" as an insult, people spouting a whole bunch of fash conspiracy theories (low-T beta nonsense, "tHe WeSt HaS fAlLeN," straight-up eugenics directed at POC, the works) just casually out in the open.

Like, where did all these 15 year olds who watch way too much Andrew Tate come from, and where are their parents? Come pick them up, plz

#goosechatter #instagram #social media #tw: ableism #ableism #tw: eugenics #eugenics #tw: racism #racism #like i go on insta to ramble about toys #watch funny pet videos #and have the algorithm feed me Miguel O'Hara fanart #plz go back to twitter and 4chan you weirdos #and also do your homework and get some sleep

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sweetpumpkinmouse · 6 months

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So, remember my add on on the eugenics post where I try to explain why disabled people have issues with the way people are talking about abortion? Specifically when it comes to disabled people.

Well, there was a person who had reblogged my post saying, “Not to be a Helen Keller, but—“ and then went on a self-deprecating tirade about how “if my mom aborted me, I wouldn’t of known so it’s not eugenics, it pro-choice—“

Have you looked up what eugenics is??? Do you know what people did to the ”undesirables” of society because of eugenics?

So yeah, you are a Helen Keller. You are a self-hating disabled person who is rooting for eugenics because of the simple fact that you hate yourself for being disabled and want other disabled people to hate themselves.

If you understood my point, you would understand that a person getting aborting a disabled fetus IS A CHOICE, but what is the choice based on? Is because they don’t want it? Or is because it’s disabled? You can do what you what, but you sure as hell have some deconstructing to do.

Also, I checked this person’s account, and guess what? They are pro-Isreal! No, not criticizing anti-semitism. I fucking wish. I would at least believe they were talking in good faith. They’re pro-Isreal.

Which proved my suspicion that when given the evidence that something is wrong, they’ll ignore it and twist it into their own narrative.

So, I blocked them.

#vauge posting #ranting #venting #I don’t want pro-lifers twisting what I’m saying I don’t want your false concern #I do talk about abortion and I know not everyone can handle it #tw: abortion #tw: eugenics

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identitty-dickruption · 7 months

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there is a difference between a disabled person saying “in my perfect world, I wouldn’t be disabled”, and someone saying “in my perfect world, disability doesn’t exist”

the first is understandable. being disabled can be really fucking hard. pain is not fun. fatigue is not fun. meltdowns aren’t fun. relying on constant medical intervention is not always great, either. there’s nothing that says a disabled person HAS to love themselves, and it’s not inherently ableist for a disabled person to wish that they were different

the second is eugenics. that’s the long and short of it. you wish disabled people didn’t exist? well we do exist. oh but you wish they didn’t? how do you plan to achieve that, bud? it’s just straight-up eugenics

#tw eugenics #tw ableism #disability

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thecoffeelorian · 8 months

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So, apparently...if you leave Tiktokkers alone for a certain amount of time...

...They start doing this.

youtube

Truly, I have no words for this...just...everyone, please stay safe.

And DON'T join in "trends" like this.

EVER.

#public service announcement #psa #when tiktok goes wrong #tiktok #tw: phrenology #tw: eugenics #tw: racism #tw: antisemitism #you name it this person did it #stay safe everyone #Youtube

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ryanjudgesthings · 1 year

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There's a mistake I see a lot of people in the mental health community make and in all honesty, it's one I've made myself. But I think we should really work on it. And that's saying "if this were a physical illness, wouldn't you care?"

I've learned that no actually, people wouldn't care. Katelyn Weinstein (theADHDprincess on Twitter) is a neurodiversity acceptance activist who really put this in perspective for me. She said that it's actually more an issue of longevity than physical vs mental health.

If you're having a bad day people will generally be understanding. But when you're experiencing chronic depression and you have many bad days people lose sympathy.

In the same respect people may be understanding when you've broken a bone that will heal properly or when you have a cold that will go away soon in ways they simply won't understand when you have chronic pain or need to use a wheelchair. They may send chicken soup for a temporary situation, but when you need consistent accomodations it's an entirely different story.

I understand that from our perspective it looks like people care more about physical health than mental health, but it's good to remember that our own perspective is also limiting. Facing ableism doesn't mean you can't be ableist. And I know so many people are not ill-intentioned when they say this. I know I wasn't. But we can't discount the lived experiences of physically disabled people. If we want true equality we need to be united and we need to listen to those with physical disabilities and illnesses. And those with physical disabilities and illnesses (some of which are also invisible) have said that they are not given proper accomodations either.

So let's be united and fight for equality and accomodations for everyone, no matter what their illness or disability may be.

#fuck eugenics #ableism #ableism tw #mental health #neurodiversity #neurodivergent #actually adhd #adhd #actually ocd #ocd #mental illness #disabilty #disability rights #disabled rights #equality #allyship

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survivingcapitalism · 1 year

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Jacquie Holyoak is considering accessing medical assistance in dying (MAID) due to the debilitating pain of living with fibromyalgia. But she says it's a choice she might not even contemplate if her disability benefits didn't leave her struggling to make ends meet.

"I'm just really exhausted ... I need someone to help me, and I've been asking everywhere. And unless you have money, you're just not going to get the help," said Holyoak, who lives in Fergus, Ont.

The former medical assistant is on the Ontario Disability Support Program [ODSP], but says it's not enough to live off.

"If I wasn't on ODSP, would I be seeking MAID? I don't know that answer, but I'm leaning towards no, because my quality of life would be so much better," she told The Current's Matt Galloway.

[...]

"I have children. I have a new grandchild. Do I want to actually die? Of course not," she said.

"I love music and soccer and [have] things I want to do. But my quality of life doesn't allow me to do those things."

[...]

“I'm just sitting here wanting to live, but not knowing how. And seeking help to die, but not knowing if I'm even going to be eligible”

#Canada #Cdnpoli #Disability #TW: Eugenics #Eugenics #MAiD

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buttersteps · 10 months

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ambrosius and nimona: arm chopping is NOT a love language

ballister: actually, it's complicated

#i just KNOW nimona and ambrosius would vibe so well... give that wet cat (ballister) two affectionate puppies (ambrosius and nimona)#nimona #nimona movie #nimonaedit #riz ahmed #ballister blackheart #eugene lee yang #ambrosius goldenlion #lgbt #lgbtq #flashing tw #nimona spoilers

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firespirited · 2 years

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Here’s my review of Border 2018: the short story is available in the book: Let The Old Dreams Die and the movie is available on hulu and disney free and others at $4 - spoilers under the cut.

It’s a lovely story about Tina, a brilliant customs officer who can sense people’s emotions. She discovers that she’s not ugly and broken she’s just different. I recommend the story, it took me just over an hour to read, the movie is stunning too but has a secondary plot that undermines the core message. Tina’s story will resonate and ache with you if you’re deemed different or damaged, don’t fit western gender ideals... basically anyone who’s felt uncomfortable with eugenics talk because hey that could be you and people you love. Both the book and the film have graphic but tender sex scenes between unusual bodies and a bunch of the reviews seem to be more distressed by “uggos getting laid” than some really disturbing history that’s a lot like our own.

Tina is a troll, there are very few left: a genocide program in the 70s saw them placed in institutions or labs where they died, it’s been covered up and followed by cultural genocide as the few remaining trolls have been raised in adoptive or foster families, their tails cut off and told they are humans with a chromosomal disorder. Tina was raised by a father who would be considered loving if he hadn’t kept his daughter’s heritage from her and stood up for her. She would have known to avoid storms (a lightening strike left her badly hurt) and spend more time in nature which is where she’s healthiest and happiest.

She has a naf boyfriend that she keeps around for the company, they don’t have sex because they tried once and it hurt, she accidentally gave him licence to cheat when she secretly hoped he’d say “no: there will only be you”. He’s a bit of a freeloader but it’s not abusive and it gives her a sense of normalcy so she’s ok with this arrangement.

She gradually uncovers her identity and her family history as she meets a male troll called Vore who falls for her, he’s hiding something she can’t figure out and experiences her own new desires and some hidden anatomy. Both the book and the film end with her happy, living the life she wants to live and having something she’s long wanted.

Here’s the thing, Vore, as a male troll makes unfertilized embryos every few months and they die within a few days. These “eggs” can be moulded into looking like exact replicas of any given human baby. Vore who lives constantly on the run as he doesn’t fit in human society makes a living using his eggs to steal babies and sell them. This isn’t great obviously, but in the book there’s no malicious reason: he has no family, no community but it’s something he can do so he does it. At the end of the book, he’s never going to do it again.

So “humans have every reason to hate trolls because they’re baby snatchers” doesn’t work, Vore became a monster because he’s without any guidance or community, he gives it up because Tina shows him that humans aren’t all genocidal trash.

But big spoiler alert and sickening addition, in the movie, there’s child sexual abuse material being smuggled that Tina is investigating due to her work in customs. Vore knowingly sold a baby to a paedophile and stole babies because he’s getting revenge on the humans for his parents’ death and his abuse in care. This not only feeds the myth of the victim turned perpetrator (which is only backed by paedophiles’ dodgy testimony not any actual data btw), it also feeds the “minorities doing a reverse racism” revenge fantasies common among racists especially the benevolent/ignorant types that we have here in europe.

There is a HUGE difference between baby theft because you don’t know better and baby theft because you know how much it’ll hurt. Adding this not just anti-social but actively cruel dimension to Vore takes away from the horror of what was done to the trolls.

“1 minority bad guy doesn’t represent all” applies to real life where there are 100 others who would never, not a fantasy story where Vore is our sole other representative of the troll race, where Tina got a childhood without too much violence and is very kind and Vore's implied to be a product of cruelty. The subtlety given to the rest of the story falls apart for some shock value. It’s absurd. I am so mad: this story is undermined by this stupid addition.

There is a place for stories about how foster care and bigotry messes you up, how generational trauma echoes down the family line even as each generation does their best to do better by their kids. Border 2018 was NOT that place and the book knew how to keep Tina and her racial trauma front and centre.

The film does a very tactful job of showing terrible things: a graveyard with simple unmarked stones as a marker of the disrespect in death and horrible secrecy. The CSAM is people reacting to the light of a small screen and the sound of a baby crying. But it has no grace for Vore to be more than the angry retelling of horrific violence inflicted on his people and his “humans are worse and deserve worse” reasons. Tina is betrayed by her choice of lover in so many ways. This ends up being a trash retelling of an important story and makes Tina look like a chump.

Again, child molestation is not cyclical and it’s not because the perps have trauma. If you’re reading this and were hurt as a kid: the people who may have hurt you in childhood don’t have excuses and you don’t have to live in fear of being a bad adult yourself. Any media that plays into this myth is harmful to survivors and gives stupid ideas to the people around them. Some narratives stick in our culture like serial killers being smart instead of cops being biased and generally terrible at solving crime. You will hear stories about abuse within minority groups like it isn’t in all spheres of society: it’s a lie to make the majority think they’re good and they’re safe.

Full list of trigger warnings if you’d like to watch the movie (it helps to read the story and keep that as “the canon”) and know the extent of it. I’ve tagged a bunch of stuff i personally didn’t find disturbing because we’re all different.

You see, I sat in dread as this film is classified on wikipedia under “films about CSA” and instead got blindsided by the eugenics-genocide done to the trolls who look and sound like people I know and myself when i’m not verbal and unkempt. I kept flashing back to the canadian first nations residential schools, the covid ‘quality of life’ triage orders, the people I love who wouldn’t have been born if genetic testing had been around (my stance is complicated), the indigenous tribes of scandinavia who are more hairy with larger brows or monolids. It’s all very close and all very still sore.

9.20 a man has a SD card removed from his mouth, there’s some spittle and he makes gagging sounds. Dread about what’s on the card begins here.

28.50-30.30: Tina’s boyfriend gets into bed with her, attempts some grabbing, wants to have sex, she’s half asleep and unbothered, she straight up one arm throws him out of bed onto the floor where he whinges. Make sure to tune back in at minute 31 for the disney princess magic.

46.00-46.30: male troll has his version of a period, an embryo birthing, there’s screaming. {I wish I could go out in the woods for my periods and scream it out in 30 seconds}.

49.36-50.30 CSAM investigation, a small camera screen is seen reflected on a man’s face as a baby is heard crying in the video. This happens again in the interrogation room.

57-1.00 make out and consensual sex with unusual bodies and loud growling. they cry during sex and there’s a lot of tongue kissing. She has an ovipositor looking appendage she’s never seen before but they aren’t human so i’m uncomfortable labelling anything. They’re both happy in their gender which is why I’ve used male and female pronouns.

There is happy naked running in the woods and bathing, not going to bother with time stamps for that if you’re offended by non skinny happy bodies that’s a you problem, please never visit the swimming pool or art museums. They also eat insects as part of their diet, this happens several times and it’s not meant to be gross.

1.05.20-1.07 Vore does his “humans should fear us” vengeance and recounts his parents’ and his pain, Tina talks about catching paedophiles who seemed very ordinary people. His childhood pain feels cheapened by this flattening: humans were bad to trolls but just in case that wasn’t upsetting enough, humans suck because they’ll hurt their own human children /s.

1.09-1.10.20 Tina’s dad is playing up his dementia to avoid questions and Tina feels the weight of her grief.

1.17-1.17.35 close up on the squishy unfertilized embryo

1.19.25 man is grabbed out of police car and 3 punched (literally) to death barely off-screen culminating in 1.19.33-39 close up on a dead man’s fresh head wound and 1.19.56 dead body and blood pool seen at a slight distance

1.21 More Vore explaining why humans are pervs

1.22 feeding the not!embryo

1.23-1.24.30 “they took us, I take their children” Tina’s sense of betrayal is agonizing to watch.

1.26.10 the neighbours’ baby is sick and dying, we know it’s not a baby. He didn’t love her enough to stop his crusade.

1.34-36 Tina finds out her true name and her parents’ graveyard, there is joy and grief and power and pain all intermingled. I’m putting this here so you can take a moment to breathe but it would be a disservice to skip it as intense as it may be.

There is a happy ending. Also a 3 wolf hoodie over a silky mint night gown is both terrible and fabulous fashion.

What I take from the film is the euphoria of self discovery and setting boundaries, the beautiful images of nature that’ll stick with me but I choose to believe in the original story.

#saf #long long post #tw: everything #tw: csa #tw: genocide #tw: eugenics #border 2018

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