I WANT

This couch.

WOO HOO GAY PEOPLE IS MARRY

W00T CALIFORNI-GAY! I IS CONGRATULATING FOR THE GAY PEOPLES! !

W00T marriage is for old people! I want it!

Update on the DSM-V Issue

This crucial bit of information has come to us from Dr. Marshall Forstein. Please read it.

Before people get overly hysterical about the Gender Identity Work group for the DSM, some things need to be made clear.

The letter you are asking us to sign onto is inaccurate in many ways and does not help our cause. Let me clarify what I know as someone who has worked with the American Psychiatric Association for many years.

1- there are TWO professional associations: Both unfortunately go by A P A

a) one is the American Psychiatric Association [this is a MEDICAL society of physicians who specialize in psychiatry]

b) the other is the American Psychological Association [this is a non- medical society of psychologists who are not medical doctors but have a PhD or PsyD or EdD in psychology, either clinical or research or academic or all.]

The American PSYCHIATRIC Association is the organization that publishes the DSM. This is a guide to diagnosis and NOT to Treatment.

Dr. Zucker, although not my preferred choice to head the work group on Gender and Sexuality, does not decide himself what the American Psychiatric Association publishes in the next DSM. In fact, there is a lengthy, and complicated process of peer review based on PUBLISHED scientific literature- in fact, the way we got homosexuality OUT of the DSM [1973] was to force the scientific program committee to produce evidence that homosexuality was an illness, and then in 1989 we removed ego-dystonic homosexuality because there was no evidence to support it and we suggested that there was also ego-dystonic heterosexuality that was a phase of people coming to understand their inner nature.

Sexual orientation is NOT even an issue for the DSM committee to consider. Transgender Identity is a bit more complicated, especially in childhood. The DSM work group will struggle with these issues in coming up with criteria for what to diagnose as a true gender identity disorder. I WANT TO EMPHASIZE THAT TREATMENT RECOMMENDATIONS ARE NOT A PART OF THIS ENDEAVOR.

Any treatment recommendations that the American Psychiatric Association makes are the result of significant process of creating EVIDENCED based research.

I am currently the Chair of the Work group on Practices Guidelines on HIV Psychiatry for the American Psychiatric Association, and so am intimately aware of the process. Guidelines go through rigorous research review for controlled studies in order to make recommendations. Hundreds of people review these guidelines before publication, and the same will be true of the criteria set forth by the work group on the DSM gender identity subcommittee.

EVEN if there is literature out there that disturbs those of us who are comfortable with the concepts of transgender identity, unless it meets peer review by legitimate journals ( i.e. non religious based periodicals) it will not be considered in the development of criteria for diagnosis or treatment.

I hope that what I have written makes us pause a bit before we do something to alienate even our supporters and friends in the American Psychiatric and the American Psychological Association who have been very pro-gay and pro-trans in their deliberations so far. There will always be a vocal minority that claim otherwise, but the process is vetted by many people committed to scientific integrity and evidence.

I have alerted the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists to the announcement of Dr Zucker's appointment and we will be addressing the implications of this within the psychiatric and psychological professional groups. I will also be talking with the Medical Director of the American Psychiatric Association and the Director of the Research group that oversees the DSM to convey the concerns that people have about the "transphobia" that may emerge.

In good conscience, however, I cannot sign a petition that is inaccurate and misleading - it may do far more harm than good. Clarity of the scientific evidence, asking the right questions of the committee, and addressing the criteria that will be put forth for review before it is ever considered ready for publication is the only way we will be taken seriously.

Please let me know how I can help to keep the issues clear.

Marshall Forstein, M.D.
Associate Professor of Psychiatry
Harvard Medical School Director, Adult Psychiatry Residency Training
The Cambridge Hospital
The Cambridge Health Alliance
1493 Cambridge Street
Cambridge, MA 02139

617-665-1189
office 617-665-3449
mforstein [at] cha.harvard.edu

APA STATEMENT ON GID AND THE DSM

May 9, 2008

The American Psychiatric Association has received inquiries about the DSM-V process, particularly concerns raised about the Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders Work Group.

The APA has a long-standing mission to provide guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders, based on the most current clinical and scientific knowledge. Through advocacy and education of the public and policymakers, the APA also affirms it commitment to reducing stigma and discrimination. The DSM addresses criteria for the diagnosis of mental disorders. The DSM does not provide treatment recommendations or guidelines. The APA is aware of the need for greater scientific and clinical consensus on the best treatments for individuals with Gender Identity Disorder (GID). Toward that end, the APA Board of Trustees voted to create a special APA Task Force to review the scientific and clinical literature on the treatment of GID. It is expected that members of the Task Force will be appointed shortly.

There are 13 DSM-V work groups. Collectively, the work group members will review all existing diagnostic categories in the current DSM. Each work group will be able to make proposals to revise existing diagnostic criteria, to consider new diagnostic categories, and to suggest deleting existing diagnostic categories. All DSM-V work group proposals will be based on a careful, balanced review and analysis of the best clinical and scientific data. Evidence accumulated from work group members and hundreds of additional advisors to the DSM-V effort will be considered before final recommendations are made.

The Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders Work Group, chaired by Kenneth J. Zucker, Ph.D., will have 13 members who will form three subcommittees:

--Gender Identity Disorders, chaired by Peggy T. Cohen-Kettenis, Ph.D.

--Paraphilias, chaired by Ray Blanchard, Ph.D.

--Sexual Dysfunctions, chaired by R. Taylor Segraves, M.D., Ph.D.

Each subcommittee will pursue its own charge, provide ongoing peer review, and consult with outside experts. The DSM-V is expected to be published in 2012.

Updated info on anti-trans moron

This came over the TransMuslims list - a member asked a friend of his about this issue, and she responded as follows. I have no further information.

Unfortunately, the petition is not very well written, and Zucker may chair the whole committee on Sex, Gender and Paraphillia, he doesn't have direct control over anything trans related. That is in the Gender Identity subcommittee, headed by Dr Cohen-Kettenis who actually has a good head on her shoulders.

If you want to complain (and I STRONGLY recommend you do) here are the contacts you should be sending it to.

Rhondalee Dean-Royce, 703-907-7820
rroyce@psych.org

Sharon Reis, 202-745-5103
sreis@gymr.com

Zucker is pure insanity. His policy for dealing with pre-puberty transkids is to first deny them all "cross gender stimulus" (toys, TV, even drawing that corresponds to the opposite sex), then when that doesnt work to prevent them from even playing with, or contacting friends of the opposite sex. He has said "transition is an unfortunate and totally avoidable outcome in gay youth". He advises parents and school administrators NOT to provide information to fellow students so that a transyouth may be "peer pressured" (read: bullied, physically and verbally assaulted) into a gender normative role.

Blanchard is also in there, though he is heading up the paraphilia sub-comity. Blanchard his half of the half-brained idea of autogynaphillia (the other half is Bailey). Their theory is that there are only three types of transpeople

1) men who are too ashamed of being gay so they want to be women so they can be straight men
2) men who want to masturbate with a vagina.
3) liars

The sender notes, "Anyone notice a distinct lack of transmen?"

Anti-Trans Moron Appointed as Head of DMV-V Committee on Trans Issues!

I am forwarding this from where I encountered it on TransMuslims: here's a quote from a site that has more information and a petition.

The American Psychological Association (APA) recently appointed Dr. Kenneth Zucker to chair the task force responsible for updating of mental health language and treatment of diagnoses such as Gender Identity Disorder (GID) for the upcoming DSM-V (Diagnostics and Statistics Manual, Fifth Edition).

Don’t let his recent appearance on NPR sounding like a nice guy fool you. At a time when the American Medical Association (AMA) is supporting stopping discriminating against and stigmatizing transgender people, Dr. Zucker is a widely recognized proponent of reparation (”ex-gay”) and aversion therapy for children and youth. These techniques have been proven to be ineffective at best and–more often–severely damaging to the mental health of people who are LGB or T.

I am looking into this more but I am mostly just making this post a flag for us... please look into it if you can.

See also:

http://transactive.blogspot.com/2008/05/dsm-v-kenneth-zucker.html
http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/kenneth-zucker.html"
http://www.exgaywatch.com/wp/2007/05/zucker-and-bradley
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Dreger/ASB%20paper/Zucker/Zucker%20subverts%20ASB.html

A Publick Apologee

I come before you to confess my sins.

O friends, I did in fact rent and enjoy this horrid and tawdry film, 27 Dresses, & during the viewing of which did ogle Katherine Heigl lesboppropriately, but only whilst committing the sin of enjoying a hypertawdriclicous romance film of the genre known as "extreme heteronormative chick flick", for which my excuse of lesboögling is no excuse at all.

O my friends, I compound my error by buying into the heteronormativity of said "flick" and imagining it were, in fact, me as Katherine Heigl's character, but while James Marster is in fact pretty cool I did substitute also Katherine Heigl or another hot woman whenever he did appear with Witty Male Banter.

My sins are made worse by my shame at not truly being contrite for having enjoying this film, and duly confess that I also rented another film with Katherine Heigl in't, namely Knocked Up, of which I am of the understanding is even yuckier heteronormativity (but O sweet friends, she is so hot, ever since I saw her as a youngun on that show where she were an alien, ahhhh), wherein a drunken frat boy is "redeemed" as the ideal match for her.

In an attempt to hide my sins, I do duly confess that under the pressure of feeling ill, I did rent also extreme violence movies to try to "water down" my sins, namely Hitman & Live Free or Die Hard.

HOWEVER! I did also rent Michael Clayton, which though it has George Clooney, does in fact feature the unbearably desirable Tilda Swinton, with whom I fell madly in love as a child while watching Orlando and who, over the years, has only gotten hotter. (Her portrayal of the Archangel Michael in the otherwise horrid Constantine made me swoon with desire...)

O my friends, forgive me these lapses, as I am only human.

the real orange county.

i love my hometown. 40 point spread, baby. end it tonight. end it!

Solution To Record High Vacancies Due To Foreclosure

...and to the honey bee colony collapse problem. let's turn all those empty homes into beehives! the bees just want to upsize, that's all.

Gin And The Cognitive Surplus

emily0 showed me this from warren ellis. fucking amazing.

Watch this one.

Comparisons to Amy Winehouse will be (or already have been) made. Duffy is a bit more "Motown" though.

awkward!

my alma mater is such a pre-med diploma mill. that was all fine and good, except now everyone in my class has finished residency and are doctors. and guess where they all end up? new york city.

note to all gynos out there: if you do know me from college, pretend you don't know me until AFTER THE EXAM. that way i won't suddenly remember who you are when i am in a delicate position. and if you happen to also be gay, keep that to yourself until i have my pants on, because i am extremely immature about these things. that's why i became a lawyer, not a doctor.

Food Rationing Comes To America

food rationing has come to america while food riots erupt around the globe. i haven't been blogging because it's too depressing. the economic empire that is the US economy is teetering ever so slowly toward oblivion and it doesn't seem like anyone actually wants to acknowledge this. i can't bring myself to blog because all i can think of writing about is the fact that there's an impending global famine (see this article about the wheat fungus that's killing off a major staple crop) and that there's an economic meltdown ahead of us.

who does ben benarke think he is? some sort of fucking wizard, i'd imagine. does he actually think he can correct the ridiculous imbalances in our economy by fiddling around with interest rates and opening up a credit line to the very same troubled banks that got us into this mess? let me make a confession. about 5 or 6 years ago, i was convinced the american economy was going to collapse and suffer a meltdown not unlike the Great Depression. i considered taking my meager savings and buying precious metals or investing them in stocks related to precious metals. when the collapse didn't happen, i basically figured that i was an idiot for paying so much attention to goldbug nutters.

i should have listened to my gut and bought the gold. it has tripled in price since then. my gut has been talking to me a lot lately and it's saying that we're totally fucked. basically, i'd sound like a survivalist nut jar if i said what i really think. so, i'm avoiding the internet.

meanwhile, i've been dreaming of building a house out of dirt.

darwin award candidate / fox news.

link.

1) how did this chica get into yale?

2) fox news is completely depraved.

Who are we?

3 Quarks Daily hosted this amazing video.

Also, I'm kind of that person who holds up the "I am an idiot" sign... d'ohh.

the education gap re: white dem voters

more on this from tnr.

fbi wiretaps on mlk

in its witch hunt, the fbi failed to prove that mlk was a communist. instead, the wiretaps proved that mlk was very much a heterosexual.

a blog i stumbled upon.

the pakistani heretical girl, written by a queer pakistani girl living in england. this is her site's quick description: "Apostate Pakistani girl in England speaks out and tells her own story of surviving Islam." yes, it is angry, but please don't be put off by the anger. the anger is justified. it is very eye-opening. read her back story, the parts about the hijab, forced marriages, and the u.s.'s afghan policy. it will make you think about the limits of multiculturalism and how western feminists and the left in general may not be seeing the full picture regarding women's place in islam. reading her blog made me realize how ignorant (and lucky) i really am. more people like her need to speak up and get their voices heard.

New(ish) lesbian blog.

Some crazy lesbians started Grace the Spot and its companion feature Stuff Lesbians Like, which is like Stuff White People Like except about lesbians. Go visit.

Midterm Period Sucks

grrr. light blogging this week. too busy. i've chosen five recipients on whom to bestow the Excellent Blog Award. i will post them when i am finished with midterm hell. if i have time, i will read blogs on my blogroll and choose five more.

Garfield, Minus Garfield

Garfield, Minus Garfield is unbelievably trippy. A smart person wondered, "what would Garfield look like if I removed Garfield from it?" The result is pure genius!

Go, look. What are you still here for?

obama and his pastor. and ron paul.

if people can be found guilty by the actions of their associates, then all of us are guilty. the actions of ron paul's associates helped sink his campaign. when the ron paul newsletters were unearthed from a dusty early 90s trash heap, the left (and much of the right) couldn't stop harping on the vile racist rants found therein. ron paul repudiated those messages. the left (and much of the right) were unconvinced.

since what goes around comes around, the left now has to deal with the vile anti-american and racist rants of obama's close personal associate (his pastor) that were made much more recently. should obama's campaign be tossed aside as well?

sorry, but something about all of this just makes me cynical.

i don't give a crap about what geraldine ferraro says. i don't give a crap about what jeremiah wright says. and come to think of it, i don't care what the ron paul newsletters said during a time when i wasn't even old enough to have a driver's license, even though this retraction comes a little too late. there, i said it. i was thinking this all along, but it wasn't "proper" for me to admit it.

the "glass houses" idiom comes to mind right about now.

stick with the issues. don't get distracted by the rants of lunatics.

*Sigh*

Every time I think that I may be a little too harsh on the thing called the "liberal arts education", I run across something like this, which makes me want to call for the systematic shuttering of all liberal arts colleges. (Granted, the stuff beyond the first two paragraphs isn't so outlandish and may even be somewhat intriguing, but the title of the page caused my jaw to drop.)

Four months ago, a prophet spoke...

Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Getting That Old Dotcom Feeling
Posted by emily1 at 9:34 PM

anyone else out there thinking that the financial industry has been smoking crack for the last ten years? anyone want to take bets on when the first big bank goes under? will i be wiping my ass with dollar bills next year because they're worth less than toilet paper?

the mortgage rate interest resets won't peak until next year. soft landing, my rosy red ass.

The first big bank just went under, and Lehman Brothers is next!

I await the day I can wipe my bum with dollar bills.

Bear Market Indeed

the Federal Reserve, in an attempt to restore confidence in the credit market, now accepts debt as collateral. this has been characterized as the Federal Reserve's 'boldest action since the Great Depression'. predictably, many investors and analysts are disappointed that the Federal Reserve just didn't purchase the mortgage securities outright. i am sick of idiot speculators who want their stupid asses bailed out after their foolish investment strategies bring the eminently predictable consequences down on their heads.

in other news, Drake Management is contemplating whether to shut down one of its largest hedge funds or continue to restrict redemptions or to allow their clients to shift money into other funds. they aren't the only firm to have a wee bit of trouble with hedge funds:

At least a dozen hedge funds have closed, sold assets or sought fresh capital in the past month as banks and securities firms tightened lending standards. The industry is reeling from its worst crisis because bankers -- staggered by almost $190 billion of asset writedowns and credit losses caused by the collapse of the subprime-mortgage market -- are raising borrowing rates and demanding extra collateral for loans.

Bear Stearns sought a bailout just days after reassuring their increasingly panicky clients that things were A-OK. apparently, their clients weren't reassured because there was a run on the bank which prompted the bailout by the Federal Reserve and JP Morgan. the bailout itself isn't a total fix because Bear Stearns needs to solve its financial crisis or find a buyer very soon. the real story behind the bailout is that JP Morgan borrowed the money from the Federal Reserve for Bear Stearns, but JP Morgan isn't bearing any of the risk of default on the loan. that risk is entirely on the Federal Reserve itself.

Prosperity Is Just Around The Corner

Record fuel prices blow budgets

Separate from the role energy prices play in the risk-and-reward scenario for speculating investors, the result for Americans' lives is that energy, and the mobility that it brings, is becoming crushingly expensive.

High oil "makes us poorer than we would otherwise be," says St. Louis Federal Reserve President William Poole. "There's a hit to real income. It's a drain on your purchasing power."

How this shows up in everyday life:

•Portland, Ore., trucker Lee Klass delayed a dental operation that will cost $500 after insurance payments because of $4 diesel fuel. He can't boost his fuel surcharges fast enough to keep up with zooming diesel prices, he says. "It's impossible for a normal business to keep up with it. You just can't do it."

Many more going bankrupt

Bankruptcy filings have surged 22 percent in Massachusetts this year, as more people are unable to afford their rising mortgage payments or refinance their homes to pay bills, according to court filings and bankruptcy attorneys.
more stories like this

[...]

Lawyers, trustees, and other bankruptcy specialists said the housing crisis is the single biggest reason that personal bankruptcy filings are rising rapidly. They said homeowners with subprime and adjustable-rate mortgages who cannot make their higher payments are resorting to bankruptcy. A decline in housing values has also limited the financial flexibility of homeowners who once were able to tap their home equity to pay off car loans or mounting credit card bills.

Employers cut back on hiring

Employers in many of the world's largest economies are "taking a step back in hiring", reflecting concerns that the crisis in financial markets could spill over into other sectors, according to a survey of more than 55,000 employers.

The study, conducted in 32 countries by Manpower, one of the world's largest recruitment companies, reported that the jobs outlook in the US, one of the main engines of the global economy, was the weakest for four years.

401(k)s tapped to save homes

Struggling to save their homes from foreclosure, more Americans are raiding their 401(k) retirement accounts to pay their bills — and getting slammed with taxes and penalties in the process, according to retirement plan administrators.

Rather than borrow money from their 401(k) accounts, which would have to be paid back, a growing number of beleaguered families have been cashing out, plan administrators say.

Some Homeowners Use Arson to Avoid Foreclosure

Looking to cash in on their insurance rather than face foreclosure, some people have committed arson to avoid losing their homes.

Michigan authorities believe 38-year-old Sheryl Christman was one of those people, when she set her home ablaze Sept. 1. Christman was just three days short of foreclosure.

Good times are over, central bankers told

Life for central bankers is going to get tougher as globalisation begins to produce malign effects - pushing up prices and spreading a financial crisis across the world, monetary policy chiefs said on Friday.

[...]

Jean-Claude Trichet, the ECB president, said the recent surge in commodity and food prices "reminds us that globalisation can also lead to upside risks in world inflation".

WellPoint is dark cloud for insurers

Shares of Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc. plunged $17.11, or 26%, to $48.72 in afternoon trading, following its announcement late Monday that it would slash profit expectations. The company cited several factors, including medical costs, lower fully insured enrollment and a weak economy (emphasis mine).

Sharing the Pain

We have always gotten a distorted picture of how well Americans were doing from politicians and the media. The U.S. has a population of 300 million. Thirty-seven million, many of them children, live in poverty. Close to 60 million are just one notch above the official poverty line. These near-poor Americans live in households with annual incomes that range from $20,000 to $40,000 for a family of four.

It is disgraceful that in a nation as wealthy as the United States, nearly a third of the people are poor or near-poor.

The High Cost Of Eating

Surging costs of groceries hit home

[... C]orn prices have more than doubled in commodity markets over two years, and soybeans nearly tripled, according to DTN, a commodities analysis firm in Omaha. Meanwhile, with poor harvests in major wheat-producing regions, wheat prices have more than tripled.

These crops have a profound impact on food prices because they form foundations for many products, including oils, sweeteners, and flour. Corn, for example, is a key ingredient in livestock feed. When the price of corn rises, so does the price of feed, and ultimately, so do the prices of meat, poultry, and eggs.

citizens from the wealthy developed world sacrifice luxuries like expensive organic food to cope with rising prices, but for the world's developing nations, food inflation promises economic consequences that are far more dire that having to eat conventionally grown food.


China's Inflation Surges to 8.7% as Food Prices Soar

Food costs soared 23 percent after blizzards destroyed crops and snarled transport links, causing shortages. China, the biggest contributor to global growth, raised rates six times last year in a failed attempt to curb prices and more increases risk triggering an economic slump as export demand weakens.

[...]

Pork prices soared 63 percent from a year earlier, vegetables climbed 46 percent, and edible oil rose 41 percent, adding to the burden on the 300 million people estimated by the World Bank to be living in poverty. The state-run People's Daily Online reported last week that most respondents in a survey of 100,000 people described inflation as ``unbearable.''

``Food prices make up one third of the consumer-price index but for poor households it makes up more than 50 percent of their household budgets,'' said Sherman Chan, a Sydney-based economist with Moody's Economy.com.

Food and Energy Shortages Stoke Inflation, Anxiety in Pakistan

The line for cooking oil was nearly a block long, just a few miles from the Parliament building. Saida Bibi, fistful of rupees in hand, elbowed her way to the front of the angry crowd shoving its way into the government food shop.

She had waited in the line seven times for seven hours over the course of a week and left empty-handed every time. But with the price of cooking oil at most markets nearly double what it was at government-subsidized food shops, she couldn't afford to do anything but wait.

Global calculus of food aid for N. Korea changes

Severe crop failure in the North, surging global prices for food and tougher behavior by donors, particularly South Korea and China, are putting unaccustomed pressure on Kim Jong Il's dysfunctional communist state.

[...]

China also appears to have tightened its food squeeze on North Korea for domestic reasons. In order to meet local demand and control inflation, Beijing slapped a 22 percent tariff on grain exports to the North.

China is by far the country's major source of food imports, and the tariffs have resulted in higher prices and less grain in markets across North Korea, according to several aid groups.

lions and tigers and...

...bear markets!

speaking of bears... bear stearns' stock fell 47% today! ouch!

More Props For Us!

i'm delighted that two other bloggers have decided to honor wFd with the Excellent Blog Award. ThePoliticalCat gave wFd this award a little over two weeks ago, and now Dizzy Dezzi of Dizzy Dayz has also chosen to recognize wFd as an excellent blog. i passed this award on to other blogs after ThePoliticalCat awarded it to wFd a couple of weeks ago. since this blog has been twice honored, i will compile another list of nominees this weekend.

One Of The Most Incompetent Suicide Attempts Ever

last week, my fiance show me a case tried in the alaska court of appeals in 2007 concerning an individual who must be inducted immediately into the suicide incompetence hall of fame. in october 2002, Robert R. Dorr kidnapped his estranged wife after discovering that she was seeing another man. Dorr shot and killed his wife as she tried to escape from him and then turned the gun on himself. unfortunately, he was not as successful in killing himself as he was in killing his wife. Dorr shot himself twice in the head and survived.

there's a short blurb about his sentencing here.

Think Your Food Bill Is Too High?

imagine trying to make it on a third world income, where it is not unusual for a family of 8 or 10 people to depend on one wage earner. staples like cooking oil and wheat are at record prices. it's things like this that make me realize how unbelievably lucky i am to have the luxury of treating wheat and cooking oil like negligible expenses.

the new york times puts a positive spin on this development, noting that the higher prices are reviving the american farmer and that some of the rise can be attributed to increasing demand from a growing global middle class. they also note that higher fuel prices are responsible for more expensive food, however. additionally, globalization is introducing new tastes to consumers around the world. in nigeria, demand for wheat has soared because bread has ceased to be a delicacy and is now a staple food.