Mitch Effendi (ميتش أفندي)

They’re all over AliExpress and TEMU. People use them mostly to cheat bridge tolls, lol.

Always how it is. Philly is an amazingly, deeply progressive place that started what we would consider today’s interpretation of “progressive” way way back in 1812. Racists and bigots absolutely exist in the city but for the most part, every instance of political violence in the past 10 years has either been actual Nazis (Patriot Front) shipping in via U-Haul, or goobers from the outer counties driving in specifically to shoot guns at windows and signs and drive out of the city with their plates covered, using one of those friggin remote controlled piezoelectric tint plate blockers

I spoke to a few people about this since commenting, and this is essentially the response I got back — this kind of thing does already exist, but it has typically been organized by ciswomen for transwomen on a community basis — I. E., strong moderation and vetting and familiarity prevents abuse.

So, I’m guessing the better direction for random cis men who want to organize would be to create a chapterized organization that protects or provides physical barriers around places trans people need to enter and may be prevented from doing so by rioters or violent dissidents. My immediate thought is to protect the doctors and patients who give care to trans youth, and just make an email, text, or Fediverse alert system that dispatches people near an area if a credible report appears of that kind of need.

I think, that way, it helps separate communications between trans folks and cis folks for safety reasons, but the needful is still done and everyone comes away feeling better and more united. I feel like that first part is really necessary to prevent opportunistic abuse.

I do not disagree, but, not every trans person wants to carry a weapon — their existence should just be respected like any other person around here. I mention my thought because those people still need protection, for both their physical and emotional safety.

Idk. Being trans is hard enough, and being a cis white het man is pretty much easy mode comparatively. My thought was moreso that trans people really deserve it that we lean in more using the things we know we have at our disposal. I don’t claim whiteness, but I am unquestionably white if asked by other white people, and I know for a fact that white dudes are much more likely to treat me with respect off the bat. I don’t like that, but I can exploit it to keep people who are just trying to live their fucking life in peace safe. I can’t imagine a more stereotypically ‘American’ cause than that.

Nothing can prepare you for what it’s like when gross dudes suddenly think they’re in good company and let slip some shit that is so heinous that you can’t even react for a few minutes.

Conscious cismen and transmen know what I mean.

I am genuinely not sure how that kind of outreach would work, or how to protect anything that is out there from bigots weaponizing it, but I recognize that there’s a need and that cis men like myself (especially those of us with some height on us) have a surprising amount of power to prevent other cis dudes from fucking around.

I am not much for toxic masculinity, but I’ve spent enough time embroiled in it to know that groups of guys will back off anyone who they think might have a weapon. Hell, I’ve personally seen gangbangers actively ward other gangbangers off from cat-calling a woman wearing a wedding ring. I learned later that this is common wisdom because the potential damage that a scorned husband can cause is ridiculous. I think there is something to just utilizing that effect for, y’know, good instead of evil.

I wish there were a group of cis men who would be willing to open-carry where it’s legal, on demand, and accompany any trans person to and from anywhere they gotta go. I’d do it if I weren’t a pacifist, but maybe it’s still useful even to just have a walking buddy.

It’s a shame that this is where we are as a society, but then again, I’m just using the same argument I’ve been fed my whole life about guns being critical towards creating a more polite society.

Y’all, the denial of power happens on every possible level. We gain power with every single Charlie Kirk Memorial Highway sign that gets “accidentally” knocked down with a car bumper. Or every Charlie Kirk Memorial Highway offramp sign that gets suddenly redesigned overnight with a can of black spray paint. Deny them quarter on every single front.

The Wheezle! Propaganda, buuuuuuuuuudddddddy.

Nazis did not have an ideology. They were a grievance movement that utilized a common folk scapegoat (Jewish and Roma migrants) to unify the fractured German political landscape in the Weimar Republic era.

It was a populist demogogue movement that cynically and callously used terminology that was common and popular among poor working class people in order to trick them into believing that their movement was about anything other than hatred, extermination, and pilfering public coffers. The ‘Socialist’ part of their name was a cynical play to attract those who were active in Communist organizing in the early 1900s.

There was no collective ownership in Nazi Germany. The government owned much of everything, and the only parties that benefited from that ownership were the individual cronies that Hitler personally feted. Nazi Germany was socialist in the way that Vladimir Putin’s Russian Federation is a Communist state — IN NAME ONLY.