Happy Mother's Day!

1. In a draconian new policy, Texas Tech is banning writing about LGBTQ+ topics. The ban is the first don't say gay or trans policy to apply to students themselves. It applies to any thesis/dissertation moving forward. They are using AI to scan everything. Subscribe to support our journalism.

Some people don’t have family, friends or a spouse to care for them. Some people don’t have an emergency fund or a back up plan. When you lose your health, you can quickly become broke & homeless. This can happen to anyone. Everyone deserves safe, loving care and a roof over their heads.

for, uh, world-historical reasons I am putting this back out there

What did people think he meant when he said Republicans just had to elect him this one time and then they would fix it so no one had to vote anymore? Like what other explanation was there?

🚨BREAKING: In a 4-3 ruling, the Virginia Supreme Court has OVERTURNED the redistricting referendum approved by voters last month. The court ruled the General Assembly violated the Virginia Constitution in advancing the amendment, nullifying the referendum entirely.

The rapid response/immigrant advocacy group Hijos de Migrantes has released a summary of yesterday's surge of federal immigration agents through the Chicago area, incl. ICE presence at 4 Cook County courthouses and an arrest outside one of them. The group reports 5 confirmed ICE detentions total.

Happening now: Cook County officials, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant & Refugee Rights and other immigrant advocacy groups are holding a presser outside the county's Domestic Violence Court in Chicago, re: federal immigration agents being spotted at 4 separate Cook County courthouses today.

Just got a message from the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights: they plan to hold a presser today at 2 pm outside the domestic violence court over ICE presence at Cook County courthouses. ICIRR claims ICE sighted today at four separate county courthouses.

People have been saying this for weeks but it's no less true: federal immigration agents have continued to abduct people in the Chicago area since the end of Midway Blitz, just with less fanfare. And with spring here we're seeing a marked increase in ICE activity compared to the winter.

As of 11:30 a.m. today, rapid responders are reporting federal immigration agents present in multiple Chicago neighborhoods and suburbs, including outside the domestic violence court in downtown Chicago. RR groups report 1 detention in Belmont Cragin.

Wisconsin school board considers pulling piece from spring band concert due to LGBTQ+ history ties www.wpr.org/news/wiscons...

I also have my Help Hope Life, for which donations are tax deductible and I only receive funds if I submit proof of a medical expense. I know the wording is strange, but all donations in my honor go to my fund! It's direct #MutualAid but also a nonprofit! helphopelive.org/campaign/159...

*IF* Alan lands either job, this might be the last time I have to ask for help with insurance premiums! I have to cough up about $392. Please share and help an LGBTQ disabled person unable to escape red-state hell. venmo: KARRIE-HIGGINS-2 www.paypal.com/paypalme/kar...

Ben Bergquam appears to be in Chicagoland to sell his upcoming book. Bergquam's appearance follows Tom Homan's remarks yesterday in which Homan threatened to flood New York with DHS agents if lawmakers pass laws protecting migrants. Illinois has similar laws in place.

Proud Boys associate, Ben Bergquam, is embedded with DHS agents today and was spotted during an abduction in Wheaton, Illinois.

So, seems like I’m neurodivergently confusing because my CPTSD (which looked like autism) masked my ADHD. If you’re really impulsive, and impulsivity creates mistakes, and mistakes are extremely costly, you develop hypervigilance that looks exactly like rigidity to avoid those mistakes.

Silverio died in the street with hardly any cameras around. There was no press scrum in the aftermath. A brave neighbor filmed what she could of a scene outside her door she never expected to see. She immediately gave us videos and information that proved the DHS narrative of events was a lie.

Smith College is now under investigation by the Department of Education for admitting trans students. archive.ph/Zn90w

Just hours before the 2026 #MetGala, hundreds gathered in the Meatpacking District to watch people walk down a different red carpet in custom couture. The "Ball Without Billionaires" - a runway show co-hosted by fashion stylist Gabriella Karefa-Johnson and 'Abbott Elementary' actress Lisa Ann Walter

If the Democrats let Republicans have this INSANELY easy W, I am going to be apoplectic. This shit polls like chlamydia. Get on the other side of it now and be loud about it.

Rose Tico is one of the best Star Wars characters and her line about winning by "not fighting what we hate, but saving what we love" is one more people should take to heart.

Waldorf schools (like the one I attended in high school) are 1. Way ahead of the game on this and 2. Have been like that for a long time and 3. Tons of well-paid tech workers, like my own parents, send their kids to them very intentionally.

So how many people here remember the Ugly Laws? I think it's gotta be like 10 whole people on BlueSky. Our society hates visible disability so much, we made it illegal to go out in public. No, the laws are no longer enforced, but YES we are still that same culture. Erin is right: this is huge.

oh my GOD the ERTÉ OF IT ALL

Ok fuck yeah disability REPRESENT People with disabilities can be fashionable and stunningly beautiful too.

now that's costume as art

Hours later, still my favorite!

I listened to Kelly's conversation with Rebecca Solnit and I recommend it. I was particularly struck with what Solnit says here: truthout.org/audio/hope-i...

RESULT out of Texas. The Lake Travis school district in the Austin area become a focal point for book bans (see this story from 2024: www.kut.org/education/20...) Two conservatives school board members who were integral to that push just lost their reelection bids tonight, and are ousted.

RESULTS from Texas: The school district of Grapevine Colleyville, near Fort Worth, drew national attention after conservatives running on an explicitly Christian message took over the board (archive: www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...). Voters just ousted 3 conservative incumbents tonight.

This is disgusting

Name your top 15 TV shows ever, gut instincts only — X-Files Bob’s Burgers Simpsons Schitt’s Creek The Good Place Ted Lasso Frasier Saturday Night Live New Girl Six Feet Under Phineas and Ferb Gravity Falls Daria Kids in the Hall King of the Hill

That’s quite a chart www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Nonstop rapid response alerts to ICE sightings in Chicagoland so far this morning.

an essay I'm gonna write: 2000 - There's a digital divide in which rich kids have tech and poor kids don't. 2030 - There's a digital divide in which rich kids have humans and poor kids don't.

I say it again and again: Because we don’t learn the real history of this country, we do not understand what this country is capable of. After 1870, 22 Black men served in Congress. By 1901, because of racist SCOTUS rulings, electoral coups and election cheating and violence, there were none.

*incredible* ten minutes for this rule

In the meantime, if anyone can help, we need it: bsky.app/profile/karr...

Well, they've finally struck home. #ICE has detained my former #umich student, Yousif Azizi, a PhD student in public policy at Virginia Tech w/a valid visa. He was arrested while taking his children to school in Maryland. After multiple transfers, he is in a detention center in Arizona.

Also, even if that were true, that’s fucking monstrous? Are we not supposed to care when people who have other health problems die?

We’ve been supporters of the SPLC for a decade now, they do such important work

ICE in Chicago this morning at Elston and Kennicott—a masked agent tells a witness (on the sidewalk) not to get in front of his car. Feds are continuing kidnappings across the city & burbs after increased activity this month. No flashy CBP caravans, just a steady stream of covert ICE arrests.

the penne opticon

The Strokes at Coachella has me wanting to share this episode of Glennon Doyle’s podcast (which is often about heartfelt and often funny social emotional “how do we human” conversations) by Amanda Doyle as information about the US history of coups. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/w...

baked

Coachella is trying to wipe all of the footage of The Strokes protest set so I’m gonna post it here. The last images on the screen made me cry.

The average person doesn’t give a fuck if AI has some niche use where it actually excels if used properly. In fact, that is what a tool is *supposed* to do and none of us will have a problem if it is used like that. What we see is AI fucking up real life in a massive way.

"...The signature line on the check just says 'wife?'" "Yes. I am wife. Take wife's money for radio."