Anti-trans grifter Riley Gaines suffers major court loss against NCAA

Riley Gaines

From the online publication them:

A federal judge dismissed Riley Gaines’ lawsuit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), accusing the organization of violating her Title IX rights, on September 28. This dismissal comes after U.S. District Judge Tiffany Johnson concluded that the evidence provided by Gaines’ team did not establish that the NCAA was a recipient of federal financial assistance, something that must occur in order for the Title IX law to apply. 

 The lawsuit in question was put forth by Riley Gaines and a group made up of both current and former female collegiate athletes back in March 2024 and centers their claim that the NCAA violated their Title IX rights by implementing trans-inclusive policies.

 . . . Gaines and her legal team plan to appeal the decision in order to continue their pursuit of suing the NCAA, per Politico. They must file a notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit within 30 days to continue the lawsuit. 

 The evidence that Gaines’ legal team attempted to use in the lawsuit centers on money streams of the NCAA and the Department of Defense, both of which contributed money to the University of Indiana. Johnson maintained that the two organizations have separate funding streams, writing that “there is no evidence that the NCAA ever received, or could have received, federal funds. Thus, Plaintiffs’ Title IX claims cannot proceed." According to Johnson’s order, “[the] department’s money went to the university and other research participants rather than to the NCAA.”

Riley Gaines is like a musician with subpar talent constantly putting out remixes of the one hit song she was lucky to have. Her attacks on trans athletes and the trans community are very pathetic, seeing that her claim to fame was tying for fifth place in a swimming meet with trans athlete Lia Thomas. It's obvious that her "concern" for women's sports is a huge con game in which she is playing culture warrior for that "wingnut welfare" money which is plentiful for those faking conservative activism. 

When she's not portraying the virtuous white virgin tied to the railroad tracks of woke by dastardly trans villains, you will find her attempting to earn her coins by crying foul over so-called vital things such as Black Santas.  That is when she isn't having verbal fights with more successful athletes such as Simone Biles in embarrassingly blatant attempts to catch the proverbial "hem of their garment" so that she has at least a brief flicker of fame. That sort of thing is always good for a generous five minutes on Fox News for Gaines.

Seeing that as the case, this loss she just suffered in court should be good for maybe 10 minutes of pandering from a Fox News host Sean Hannity, Jesse Watters, or Laura Ingraham. It really doesn't matter because I can't tell those folks apart. They are bad combinations of the Borgs from Star Trek and The Stepford Wives.

'Recent articles show how Republicans are using transphobia to distract women, LGBs from harmful policies' & other Mon/Tue news briefs

Editor's note - two leading items in this evening's news brief post should be a clue to transphobic LGBs, and women that their anti-trans hysteria is being manipulated by Republicans to distract them from the actual harm being done by their policies.

Education Department formally rescinds Title IX protections for LGBTQ students - The "pick me" and the transphobic LGB folks were warned. There is no separating the LGBTQ community. When one of us gets attacked, we all get attacked.

A “monstrous injustice”: Trump admin announces pro-LGBTQ+ antidiscrimination rule ends tomorrow - More details about this vile happening. 

Ectopic Pregnancy Deaths Have Nearly Doubled. It’s Worse in States With Abortion Bans - This is an issue from earlier this month. I don't think it got as much attention as it should with all of the nonsense about trans athletes and idiots causing problems with the WNBA. Republicans like to appeal to anti-trans hysteria by asking folks "what is a woman." Now you can tell them "A woman is someone whose rate of death from ectopic pregnancies have doubled while y'all distract us with transphobic bullshit." 

Fox pundits enraged that Obama praised women leaders without being transphobic - More of the same from Fox News. 

A Different World returns with a refreshing take on a coming-of-age queer story - As a black gay man, I've always felt disconnected to the original iteration of A Different World because there were no LGBTQ storylines. In the show's defense, this was a period of time in which there were very few LGBTQ storylines on any shows because of the controversy it would cause. THANK YOU A Different World for addressing situations regarding LGBTQ students on HBCUs. And doing it rather well, I see.

 The US deported LGBTQ migrants to countries where homosexuality makes them a target - And I bet it's deliberate. More proof that the transphobic LGBs who voted for Trump (yes there are some) are writing death warrants for our community.

MAGA millionaire using Washington state anti-trans ballot measures to gain tax cut

According to LGBTQNation, a millionaire hedge fund manager and ally of Donald Trump is behind two Washington state anti-trans ballot measures in a scheme which could get him a tax cut and girl athletes subjected to genital tests.

 Brian Heywood, a hedge fund manager and close ally of President Donald Trump, is the “villain we’re up against,” Libby Watson, campaign manager for No Hate in WA State, tells LGBTQ Nation. That organization is the collection of non-profits, parents, medical professionals, students and teachers arrayed against Heywood’s self-funded right-wing political action committee, Let’s Go Washington. 

The group is behind two initiatives that Watson and No Hate are organizing against. 

 Initiative 638 would ban trans girls from school sports with a requirement for genital exams or other forms of testing to confirm the sex of every girl in the state who wants to play sports. Initiative 001 outs LGBTQ+ students to families, repeals records protections from the victims of child abuse, and opens confidential school meetings between students and counselors for inspection. 

 Together, they’re a one-two punch attacking what MAGA supporters of the anti-LGBTQ+ Let’s Go campaign characterize as “gender ideology” and the “transgender agenda.” 

According to the article, there is a third component to the anti-trans ballot measures.

After qualifying the two culture war initiatives for the ballot, Heywood ran a separate signature-gathering campaign to qualify Initiative 645, which would repeal the millionaires’ tax recently passed by the Washington legislature that established a 9.9% tax on income over $1 million per year. Let’s Go Washington is packaging all three together in their Yes campaign. 

 “Ultimately, what he really cares about is not being taxed, and so he’s using students, the trans kids, LGBTQ+ youth as a scapegoat to rile up his base with the hope that he can turn out enough conservatives and persuade enough voters to vote yes on all three initiatives,” Watson says. “It’s not about fairness in girls’ sports.”

You can read the entire article from this site.

Transphobes reintroduce faulty Finnish study while ignoring its credibility issues

JK Rowling and other transphobes are amplifying an anti-trans study as if it is new. In reality, it an old piece of nonsense which was called out in April for inaccurate conclusions and the author's problems with bias and objectivity.

The tweet above is from arch transphobe JK Rowling amplifying a study which claims that gender-affirming care does not improve the mental health of trans youth.

Rowling and others amplified this study last weekend while arguably implying that it is a new discovery. That implication would be a lie.

The study came out in earlier this year and when it did, many people called out its errors which can be summarized by the graphic below:

For those who want more intricate information other than a graphic, I wrote a blog post about it. My post included a wonderful critique of the study by Dr. Laura Targownik, who has been called "a prominent leader in advocating for gender equity and transgender health rights within the medical profession."

I also wrote a second post calling attention to the fact that the author of the study had a serious conflict of interest which put to question her objectivity. I said the following in the piece:

According to trans activist and substacker Erin Reed:

The study, published in the low-impact journal Acta Paediatrica, comes from Riittakerttu Kaltiala, a Finnish psychiatrist with extensive ties to at least one anti-LGBTQ+ hate group and a history of anti-trans political advocacy. The study uses Finnish registries and psychiatric visit data to support these conclusions. However, a closer examination reveals the study to be fatally flawed: it does not actually measure what it claims to measure, its headline finding is a massive artifact of surveillance bias, the clinics practices were abusive, and it operates within a system where its findings were essentially baked in from the start—regardless of what the actual mental health impacts of gender-affirming care might be.

The anti-trans hate group Kaltiala is connected to is SEGM - the same group which praised her study. 

In a piece Reed wrote in June 2024:

Importantly, members and associates of the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM) have recently played a significant role in the Cass Review, a supposedly “independent” review now being cited to crack down on transgender care in England and the United States. Recent investigations revealed that multiple SEGM members and associates were part of advisory groups to the review with secret memberships. One such person was Dr. Riittakerttu Kaltiala, a Finnish psychologist who prominently presented at the latest SEGM conference and has been closely associated with SEGM, which denies her membership due to the organization having “no official members.” Dr. Kaltiala facilitated a meeting between Dr. Cass and Dr. Patrick Hunter, a DeSantis medical board pick and member of Genspect. Dr. Cass later shared information with the team according a letter obtained exclusively by this publication. Dr. Kaltiala went on to “meet regularly” with the DeSantis appointees and even testified in favor of Florida’s ban on transgender care.

What's interesting about that particular post was the visceral reaction I received by some who read it and others who obviously did not. I don't think I have ever received such an ugly reaction from anything I had published before:

These comments didn't upset me because it was obvious that I struck a nerve amongst the wolves. That's why I am amazed at how some of the same individuals are attempting to polish up the study while ignoring its past controversies in a sad attempt to make it seem new and fresh.

Then again, I am amazed, but I really shouldn't be. Nor should I be completely shocked.

Admitted liar JD Vance smears gay community service group as devil worshippers

Vice President JD Vance

From The Advocate:

Vice President JD Vance reached for satanic panic Monday while campaigning in Kansas, falsely describing the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence as devil worshipers and mangling the group’s name in the process. 

 Vance appeared at a MAGA Inc.-organized rally at Webco Manufacturing in Olathe to support Republican U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, who faces the Rev. Adam Hamilton, a prominent United Methodist pastor and Democrat, in November. State Senate President Ty Masterson, the Republican nominee for governor, also attended, according to the Kansas Reflector. 

 Hamilton “proudly supported a drag group called Our Ladies of Perpetual Indulgence,” Vance claimed. No organization by that name exists. He apparently meant the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, the 47-year-old volunteer network of queer and transgender nuns. Vance called the Sisters “the devil worshiping group that was saying special blessings before LA Dodgers games” and an “anti-Christian hate group.” 

 The Advocate refuted that lie: 

 The Sisters do not worship the devil. Their stated mission is community service, human rights advocacy, spiritual outreach, and combating shame and bigotry through humor. The organization has raised money for community nonprofits and became an early provider of sex-positive safer-sex information during the AIDS crisis. 

 The Dodgers did not invite the Sisters to bless baseball games. The team honored the Los Angeles chapter with a Community Hero Award before its June 16, 2023, Pride Night game, recognizing its charitable work. Catholic leaders and conservative politicians opposed the honor because the Sisters satirize Catholic imagery — criticism Vance inflated into a tale of devil worship. 

Vance offered no evidence that Hamilton or his church contributed money directly to the Sisters or endorsed every PrideFest participant. He also claimed Hamilton considers being white and eating meat sinful. The Kansas Reflector reported that those accusations were assembled from old sermon excerpts stripped of context.

 Bear in mind that this is the same JD Vance who, during the 2024 election, helped Donald Trump spread the ugly lie that Haitian immigrants were kidnapping and eating people's pet dogs and cats. '

When confronted about this, Vance pretty much admitted that the story was a lie by saying:

“If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do."

During the same time frame of him lying on the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence and Hamilton, Vance also filmed a plea begging voters to give Trump and the Republicans "another chance" as the midterm elections approach. He did this due to the strong possibility that voters, fed up with Trump's incompetence, will give control of Congress to the Democrats.

With his lie, Vance is giving voters good reason not to be taken in by his ridiculous begging.

As for this voter, I have only one thing to say to Vance - Pretend that I am a couch and kiss my ass.

Those who know, know.

Former SC Moms for Liberty chapter chairs say they were told to stay silent when ally was jailed for child pornography

In South Carolina, nine former chapter chairs of Moms for Liberty cosigned a letter claiming the group has lost its way. One of their complaints has to do with how they were allegedly advised to stay silent when ally and former state legislator Robert (RJ) May was convicted of distributing child pornography.

In my state of South Carolina, infamous far right (and SPLC designated hate group) Moms for Liberty is having a massive membership problem.  One of the reasons seems to be that SC chapters were allegedly told to stay silent when an ally was sentenced to prison for distributing child pornography.

From The State:

Moms for Liberty, which started in 2021 in Florida amid the COVID pandemic, grew nationally and grew to 21 chapters around the Palmetto State. Chapters held events to talk about child safety when it came to technology and to hear from candidates for the state House. But frustration within the state, “internal disagreements,” a disillusionment with the national leadership, and alleged bullying by some chapters has taken place, those who left the organization say. Now only seven chapters in the state are listed on the group’s website and only three chapters with listed local leadership. 

 The State pointed out that in August, a group of nine former Moms for Liberty chapter leaders cosigned a letter claiming that the group "has lost its way." Part of the letter reads as follows: 

 “We are disappointed in the direction the national organization has taken in South Carolina,” the leadership team stated in a joint communication. The group identified several critical issues that led to this decision, including: 

Conflicts of Interest: Concerns regarding the intersection of organizational goals and private interest. 

Lack of Accountability: A perceived failure to enforce the organization’s own Code of Conduct, which these leaders helped establish to ensure ethical behavior and integrity. 

 The leadership team noted that they observed no consequences for behaviors that directly contravened the established standards of conduct intended to guide the organization’s decision-making and public presence. This departure follows a history of rigorous standards maintained by the South Carolina Legislative Committee, which required members to pledge themselves to the highest standards of ethical conduct, objectivity, and professional courtesy.

The State goes into great detail about internal pettiness and slights plague the organization. But what I feel is the most important part of the conflict has to do with former SC legislator and presently convicted sex offender Robert (RJ) May III. Before May got into trouble, he was an ally of Moms for Liberty and received the 2023 Legislator of the Year award from the group. 

From The Pink News: 

 During his time in office May was outspoken against gender-affirming care, trans inclusion in sports and drag performances, and was listed as a speaker at Mom’s for Liberty’s Reclaiming Education in America event in 2022. Many of his concerns about LGBTQ+ topics were cited in regards to child safety.

In January, May was convicted of distributing child pornography and sentenced to 17.5 years in prison. 

According to LGBTQNation in September of last year: 

(May) — an anti-LGBTQ+ politician who has accused drag queens and transgender people of harming kids — pleaded guilty . . .  to distributing child sex abuse material (CSAM) after first denying it, Newsweek reported — including images of adults sexually abusing seven-year-olds.  . . . May used the screen name “joebidennnn69” to exchange 265 different files of toddlers and young children involved in sex acts on the Kik social media network during spring 2024. Representing himself in court — despite not having a law degree — May had originally asked the judge to throw out the warrant used to search his home, laptop, and mobile devices, as well as evidence that he had flown to Colombia to film himself having sex with three underage girls.

According to the letter from the former Moms for Liberty chairs, how the group in general dealt with the controversy about May was a "breaking point."

For many of us, the breaking point was the RJ May scandal. Following the arrest and federal guilty plea of former Representative RJ May on charges of distributing child sexual abuse material, we expected absolute moral clarity. Instead, South Carolina leaders were instructed to remain silent. Protecting the organization’s image took precedence over speaking out against child exploitation.

The State goes also goes into more detail about this:

“We wanted to speak out and say like we’re not aligned with him. We’re just as shocked as you,” said Dawn Pierce, who previously led the now defunct Lexington County Moms for Liberty chapter. “They put out a very short, very short statement, and that’s it,” Pierce added about the national organization. 

 The national organization said it advised the local chapters not to engage on social media with people who were attacking the organization. 

“Moms For Liberty issued an unequivocal condemnation of RJ May and his atrocious actions,” a Moms for Liberty spokesperson said. “On social media, we observed that anti-Moms For Liberty trolls were trying to attack our South Carolina members and goad them into social media commentary. To protect our members, we asked that they not play into the hands of those bad actors and allow the organization’s statement to stand for itself.”

 The local chapters wanted to revoke the award given to May after his arrest and send a statement denouncing him. But they were encouraged not to say anything.

The situation in South Carolina wouldn't be the first time Moms for Liberty found itself embroiled in a sex scandal. In 2023, one of its founders, Bridget Ziegler and her husband (now former) GOP Florida state chair Christian Ziegler was involved in the middle of a huge scandal when Christian was accused of raping a woman with who he and his wife allegedly had a three -way consensual sexual relationship with in the past.

And then more details came out regarding the sexual habits of the Zieglers.

 From a report obtained by The Florida Trident:

The report, obtained by the Florida Trident and authored by Sarasota police Det. Angela Cox, recounts how Christian Ziegler went “on the prowl” in bars for women to bring home to Bridget, a Sarasota County School Board member who has backed a number of anti-LGBTQ measures at both the state and local level, for threesome encounters. While at the bars, Christian would surreptitiously photograph prospective women and text the photos to Bridget for approval, according to the report. 

 Investigators found “numerous sexual videos” on Christian Ziegler’s phone involving the couple and other women, according to Cox’s report. The detective noted that it wasn’t clear if the women in the videos knew they were being recorded or not. “There were numerous text messages between Bridget and Christian where they are on the prowl for a female and Bridget is directing him to numerous different bars in search of a female that they are both interested in,” Cox wrote of the Ziegler phone contents. 

“During these conversations Christian is secretly taking photographs of women in the bars and sending them to Bridget asking her if she wants this one or that one. Bridget is telling him to pretend to take pictures of his beer, so they don’t see him taking pictures of them. She tells him ‘Don’t come home until your dick is wet.’”

Elon Musk, Republicans relying on desperate AI anti-trans gambit instead of the economy to win midterm elections

Elon Musk (seen here saluting) and the Republican party are spending major dollars on AI anti-trans ads in hopes of distracting voters during the midterm election.

Two things are obviously clear on this day

The midterm elections are in full swing, and Republicans are freaked out at the thought of losing both the House and the Senate. This means they are going to lean in hard on the "transgender boogeyman" narrative in an attempt to get distract voters from their dismal governing.

From The 19th:

America PAC, Elon Musk’s super PAC supporting conservative candidates and causes, is churning out dozens of digital ads vilifying transgender people and criticizing Democratic candidates over their past support for trans rights in the hopes of driving Republicans out to the polls in November. 

 In less than a week, the group, initially created to support President Donald Trump’s 2024 reelection campaign, has released at least 38 social media ads claiming Democrats in competitive midterm Senate races would “put our daughters in danger” and prioritize a “radical trans agenda” if elected. Most of the group’s ads focus exclusively on trans people, according to a review of America PAC’s ads in the Meta and Google libraries. 

. . . The ads, which portray trans women as drag queens rather than as they are in day-to-day life, follow a recent pattern of AI-generated attack ads targeting Democratic candidates over their support for trans rights. It’s unclear whether these specific ads are AI-generated, but they fall in the uncanny valley of authenticity. At minimum, they present harmful stereotypes of trans women — that they are physically imposing and always wear overdone makeup — to an audience who may not have ever met a trans person.

 In an ad against Democrat Sherrod Brown in Ohio, an image of a crossing guard with a blowout and dark eyeshadow, implied to be a trans woman, looms in the background as a voiceover declares that Brown “gave the green light to the radical trans agenda” while in office. Brown was ousted from the Senate in 2024, losing reelection to Republican Bernie Moreno, and is attempting a comeback against Sen. Jon Husted.

Will it work? I hope I'm not jinxing anything when I say I don't think so. 

People are upset with Trump's inability (more like refusal) to better our economy or at the very least keep it from getting worse, his confusing war (don't you dare call it a war) with Iran, his preoccupation with ridiculous building projects, the killing of Americans by ICE, betrayals of Latino and other ethnic communities who supported him and are now seeing the TPS status of their relatives being revoked, and a multitude of various other scandals, failures and broken promises.  All of these situations are adding up to a figurative form of the lingchi torture (slow death by a thousand cuts) of Trump voters who believed his promises during the 2024 election.  

So, while the anti-trans ads described above are dangerous, they may also be seen as desperate attempts to distract voters from how Trump broke his promises and how the Republican party were more concerned about kissing his ass than providing decent governance.