LassCalibur

CW: Mentions of transphobia, transphobic violence, mass shootings, school violence, slurs.

Being trans is not a controversial idea. It is a lived reality.

Philosophical conversations about trans people do not happen in a vacuum. They happen in a political context where trans people are relentlessly attacked and a material context where trans lives are particularly vulnerable. These contexts make it impossible to "just ask questions" about trans people. And trans people and our loved ones are not okay -- in, with, and because of our discipline.

So what is it like to be a table in a discipline that has been busy writing table-burning instructions? Being Trans in Philosophy collects first-personal accounts from 22 trans philosophers and philosopher-parents of trans kids. These stories detail the material and on-the-ground consequences of our discipline's role in providing intellectual cover for a global transmisogynistic and transphobic moral panic -- one that has been increasingly institutionalized into laws and policies. But they also speak to solidarity, freedom, hope, moral progress, and our shared love for philosophy.

Any who are unaware of the conversations at issue might read Hope Pisioni's piece in Unclosed Media, A Philosophy Professor Is the Only Known Author of Trump's Big Trans Health Care Report. Why? on the most recent instance of philosophical scholarship being used to promote state-sponsored transphobia.

A Federal Court judge has halted the deportation of a non-binary American in a ruling that criticized Ottawa’s Immigration Department for not properly considering the situation of LGBTQ Americans since U.S. President Donald Trump took office.

Angel Jenkel, a 24-year-old multimedia artist from Minnesota who is engaged to a Canadian, can now remain in Canada while their case is judicially reviewed, in a judgment that their lawyers hailed as precedent-setting.

https://archive.ph/BxIik

The Latin Times reports, Mx. "Jenkel's legal team says the ruling could open the door for other LGBTQ Americans facing similar threats under current US policies to seek refuge in Canada."

Since January 2025, police raids on massage parlors have intensified, targeting immigrant women suspected of sex work. Amid nationwide protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), these workers — among ICE’s most systematically targeted — are largely excluded from community defense.

One of the most telling things about queer history is that so much of it has to be gleaned by reading between the lines.

There are the obvious tentpoles: the activism, the politics, the names and accomplishments of key cultural heroes. Without the stories of lived experience behind them, however, these things are mere information; to connect with these facts on a personal level requires relatable everyday detail — and for most of our past, such things could only be discussed in secret.

In recent decades, thanks to increased societal acceptance, there’s been a new sense of academic “legitimacy” bestowed upon the scholarship of queer history, and much has been illuminated that was once kept in the dark. The once-repressed expressions of our queer ancestors now allow us to see our reflections staring back at us through the centuries, and connect us to them in a way that feels personal.

One of the most effective formats for building that connection, naturally enough, is documentary filmmaking — an assertion illustrated by two new docs, each focused on figures whose lives are intertwined with the evolution of modern trans culture.

Viewer discretion is advised, both companies are subject to calls for a queercott, and HBO/Max is engaging in wizardry.