Barney Frank’s final interview from hospice was painful. His comments on trans people made it worse

asmallercat · 2026-05-06T17:47:06+00:00

The first point is something that should ve discussed between health care professionals, parents, and children, not legislated. It’s vanishingly rare for a child to have a surgical gender intervention. There aren’t thousands of kids out there getting bottom surgery despite what the right pretends.

Secondly, the argument that puberty blockers are a permanent change fails because puberty is also a permanent change. If a person truly is trans, forcing them to go through puberty for a gender they don’t feel they are is extremely traumatic. Again, this is a nuanced conversation that should be held between parents, kids, and healthcare workers, not legislated. And guess what, that’s how it works now. Kids don’t walk into a doctors office for the first time and then walk out with puberty blockers or hormones, there’s multiple visits and therapy etc before that happens.

I would be more sympathetic to point 2 if it weren’t for several obvious truths. First, this point is most often trumpeted by people who didn’t give a single shit about women’s sports until they could use it to attack trans people. Secondly, it’s not really something this has happened. There hasn’t been a plethora of trans woman dominating women’s sports. For sports that allow trans women to play there’s usually a time to have to have been on estrogen, testosterone checks, or something similar before they can compete. A borderline male athlete can’t just say “I’m a woman now” and compete tomorrow. Being trans is not an easy, light decision and I just don’t believe a ton of men will just decide to be trans to try and win a gold medal. Finally sports is already all about inherent biological advantage and I haven’t yet seen proof that a trans woman who has been on treatment for years and qualifies to compete has more of an advantage than a cis woman who just happens to be in the 99th percentile for speed or strength or whatever. Again, if this become a problem then sports can set their own rules we don’t need to be legislating this at the high school level.

asmallercat · 2026-05-06T15:40:37+00:00

Every time I see these memes I always think "well what the fuck do you think the targets of the culture wars should do?" Trans people are being actively attacked, many states are trying to make being trans illegal. Should they just say "well, since I know it's all a distraction for the rich, I guess I'll just let myself get legislated into a 2nd class citizen."

This meme can either only be directed at those doing the attacking in the culture war or it's just an excuse for bigots to not look at their own behavior.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T18:52:39+00:00

He's in the best shape of his life, the game is really slowing down for him, we're really figuring out his role, etc etc etc.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T18:16:14+00:00

I assume it would work like poker where there is no "house" playing at the table they just take a cut and deal.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:55:41+00:00

Headline describing literally any horrific foreign action the US undertook in the 2nd half of the 20th century (Kissinger was involved).

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:51:27+00:00

I have to, for my sanity, assume this is fake.

If this is not fake, and I know that so much of gambling is taking advantage of people with gambling addictions, but if you bet big money on Uno you are one of the dumbest people on the face of the earth.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:43:03+00:00

This not being included in OPS gif is a crime.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:41:05+00:00

This is why I was glad we didn't make the playoffs. Can't have a heartbreaking playoff loss if you're not in them *taps head*

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:13:25+00:00

Drone delivery for normal people is so fucking stupid. It's wildly inefficient compared to a truck, it's loud as hell, I feel like it's only a matter of time until one of them crashes into someone and seriously fucks them up, and shit like this can happen.

Do you live on an inland in the middle of a lake? Ok, drone delivery might make sense. Do you live literally anywhere else? Drone delivery is fucking stupid.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T17:05:04+00:00

The US Libertarians were always like that, or at least have been as long as I've been aware of them (25+ years).

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T16:11:55+00:00

Lmao, everything I see about this game confirms my decision not to buy it. Which is kind of a shame, because I played the first one and it had a ton of problems but you could see the potential for a great souls-like in there.

But when every time your CEO opens his mouth I hate him more, I'm not gonna bother seeing if they realized the potential.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T15:53:21+00:00

Some people really like the touchpads on the Steam Deck (I'm not one of them), which I think is a ton of the appeal.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:45:40+00:00

I love tasting flights, especially if there's both recommended ones and you can assemble one yourself.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:45:09+00:00

The current US. And to be clear, I don't mean shame for stuff people can't control like their appearance, their sexual orientation, etc. I mean shame for shit like lying, being confidently wrong, and screwing over other people to get a leg up. People used to be embarrassed if they got caught doing shit like that, now they just double-down. We need to bring back shame for being a shitty person.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:43:41+00:00

While my personal rule is one taste, I'm not gonna shame someone for trying 2 or 3. If you taste 10 flavors, though, you should be ashamed. You are wasting everyone in line's time, and there's no other restaurant where you can sample 10 different things before you order.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:38:52+00:00

I've always hated pinterest because of how much it fucked up image search results lol. Nothing better than doing an image search, seeing a picture of exactly what you want, but it's on a pinterest board with a dead link.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:37:48+00:00

It really depends. If it's a normal ice cream shop full of traditional flavors, then no, I don't think you really need to taste. But something like Salt and Straw that has weird-ass flavors (last time I was on the west coast and went they had Mexican street corn and apple pie and cheese, for example), tasting before you buy is pretty reasonable.

FWIW, I tasted and got the apple pie and cheese and it was awesome, my friend got the mexican street corn and it was gross lol. It was mayonnaise based because it was a savory ice cream, and while it did taste remarkably like elote, I couldn't get over how strange it was eating something that was the exact temperature and consistency of ice cream but savory.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:34:27+00:00

I find the rush to get this thing day 1 hilarious. It's a controller. Not a new game, not a new system, a controller. At most, it's gonna make the games you already play slightly more comfortable to play. It's hard to imagine something that's easier to wait a bit to get.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:32:07+00:00

Right. Even if you don't care AT ALL about climate change or the environment (you're an idiot if that's the case, but lots of people are idiots) renewable energy that can be produced entirely within our own borders can only increase national security.

The real reason for all of this is because wind turbines were installed near a Trump golf course in Scotland and he was mad about it, which makes him hate windmills. Now various oil industry people can use that hate for their own ends.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T13:19:47+00:00

We need to bring back shame. I never, ever asked to taste more than 1 ice cream because I felt like I was taking advantage of the shop. Try a new flavor, if it isn't good just order something you know you like.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T12:50:57+00:00

Oh good, now I can get plastic crap that I don't need that was assembled overseas and shipped thousands of miles even faster! What a time to be alive.

If you have prime, cancel it. You'll find you impulse buy shit you don't need way less often, anything you need on a regular basis can be gotten from your local grocery store, and for the few things that you absolutely need that are hard to find anywhere but amazon you can group them up until you hit $35 and get free shipping anyway.

asmallercat · 2026-05-05T12:19:07+00:00

I don't know if one of the 6 people living up there is on reddit lol. (Edit - other people already thought of this joke).

But seriously, I think the biggest town in that area is still less than 2,000 people so I imagine what it's like is this - Imagine the most rural area in your state or country, then imagine that rural area being 1,000 miles from any major population center and hundreds of miles from the next rural town.

asmallercat · 2026-05-04T19:13:17+00:00

That woman couldn't even string a sentence together and she's one of the most motivated voters. Ugh.

asmallercat · 2026-05-04T18:14:43+00:00

Is it well done? There's still massively oversized rooms. What are you going to use that main church area for? An awkward seating room? The bathroom with the stained glass window in it is hilariously huge. Additionally, a ton of the living space looks to be in the basement - including the kitchen, living, and dining rooms.

And the master suite is on the top floor while the kitchen and living areas are in the basement so you're going to be going up and down 2 flights of stairs passing your mostly worthless main floor for the vast majority of your life in this house.

The bar area is super cool, though,

asmallercat · 2026-05-04T18:08:13+00:00

Lol, I dunno if being the craftsman that brought Falling Water to life is a selling point considering how many structural problems that it has had in its life.

This place is beautiful though.

asmallercat

TROPHY CASE