Random News: June 21, 2023

DISCLAIMER: Zak's Random News is very random and doesn't cover many things, and not everything may be accurate, because I'm just some guy. Go find a real news source.

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Good morning. It’s June 21, 2023, and it’s a Wednesday. It’s also the first day of summer 2023, beginning just a minute or two after I post this, at 7:57am PDT. We’ll talk more about that in a bit, but let’s learn and grow and be better people first…

• Today’s Pride note is a salute to non-binary people, frequently abbreviated as NB (and pronounced enby).
• Hello enbys!
• Enbys are a portion of the “T” section of LGBTQIA+ world, though not in the way you might assume.
• Let’s get historical, as we often do. Going back to ancient times, some people were described as being androgynous, meaning they possessed both masculine and feminine characteristics.
• But let’s be super clear here: being non-binary is not the same as being androgynous, and also not the same as being intersex. Those are totally different concepts, though there can be overlap between them.
• You can look and seem noticeably masculine or feminine and still be non-binary. You can be attracted to just one gender or another gender, or to both genders, or just to other non-binary people, and still be non-binary.
• So what does it mean? Non-binary (aka genderqueer) is an umbrella term for gender identities that are not solely male or female. Non-binary people typically identify with a gender that is different from their assigned sex, though many non-binary people do not consider themselves transgender.
• Non-binary people may identify as an intermediate or separate third gender. They may identify with more than one gender, They may have a fluctuating gender identity.
• And once again, be aware that gender identity is separate from sexual or romantic orientation; non-binary people have various sexual orientations.
• The reason that many people my age and older don’t seem to relate well to this term is that even though non-binary folks have always been around, the term didn’t come into common widespread use until about 20 years ago.
• But there are societies, including many indigenous and native peoples around the world, who have recognized the concept of “third gender” people for centuries.
• Let’s talk about pronouns. You know you want to.
• Language is pretty straightforward as a cisgendered person. I am he. You are him or her.
• But that language does not accommodate people who do not identify as male or female. That’s why some non-binary/genderqueer people use gender-neutral pronouns such as they/them.
• When that first became a thing, I was annoyed… as a writer who was tied to they/them being references for a plurality of people, and having my verb-subject agreement in sentences being clusterfucked.
• But once I got used to it, it seemed normal and natural, like most changes that happen in an evolving world.
• Have enbys tried creating new pronouns to avoid the grammatical issues of “they/them”? They sure have. Neopronouns such as xe, ze, sie, co, and ey have been suggested, as well as titles like Mx.
• But until those are in widespread use and understood, I’m fine with they/them.
• Note: some enbys use the conventional gender-specific pronouns "he" or "she", some alternate between "he" and "she", and some use only their name and no pronouns at all.
• At the end of the day, I call people whatever they prefer to be called. If your name was Squilimanious but you preferred to be called Squilly, that’s what I’d call you. If my coworker or my friend’s kid or my neighbor wants to be they/them, then that’s what I call them.
• According to a 2021 study by the Williams Institute, an estimated 1.2 million American adults aged between 18 and 60 identify as non-binary. 
• Purposefully misgendering a non-binary person, or bullying them over their choice of pronouns, is an asshole maneuver, and I’ll call it as such whenever I see it.
• I’ll end with one note… a musical one. I have a disproportionately large list of people whose music I admire that fall into the enby realm.
• Okay. Let’s do some news…
• It’s the first day of Summer. As I mentioned, the solstice happens at 7:57am PDT. Happy Solstice, you scientists and astronomers and Pagans and Wiccans and other people of nature!
• What is a solstice? It’s the moment when one of Earth's poles has its maximum tilt toward the Sun and starts heading the other direction. In the Northern Hemisphere where over 90% of humans on Earth live, the summer solstice is in reference to the north pole.
• Every day of summer, the days get shorter. Today is the longest day of the year. A more accurate statement: today has the most sunlight of any day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.
• If you live on the equator, none of this has any meaning to you.
• Moving on with some amazingly good news…
• Yesterday, a federal judge struck down Arkansas’ first-in-the-nation ban on gender-affirming care for children as unconstitutional. It’s the first ruling to overturn such a prohibition as a growing number of Republican-led states adopt similar restrictions.
• U.S. District Judge Jay Moody issued a permanent injunction against the Arkansas law, which would have prohibited doctors from providing gender-affirming hormone treatment, puberty blockers or surgery to anyone under 18.
• That law also would have prohibited doctors from referring patients elsewhere for such care. Moody ruled that the prohibition violated the due process and equal protection rights of transgender youth and families. He said the law also violated the First Amendment rights of medical providers by prohibiting them from referring patients elsewhere.
• Thank God.
• And now some equally putrid news…
• Vanderbilt University Medical Center has turned over transgender patient medical records to the Tennessee Attorney General's office, who say that they are conducting an investigation into potential medical billing fraud.
• The state requested medical records from January 1, 2018 to the present. Tennessee claims to have legal standing to seek the private medical records. Under HIPAA law, for uses and disclosures of medical records for which authorization is not required, the records can be released for an “administrative request, including an administrative subpoena or summons, a civil or an authorized investigative demand, or similar process authorized under law.”
• They claim that the state's investigation is focused on the facility and certain providers, not patients.
• I don’t believe them.
• Moving on…
• In the ongoing saga of a guy in contention for the “Worst Person In the World” title, yesterday s federal judge denied Rep. George Santos’s (R-NY) latest attempt to keep sealed the identities of the people who financially backed his criminal bond.
• U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert ordered the names be unsealed at noon ET on Thursday, giving the bond sureties a window to withdraw beforehand.
• Santos was released on May 10 on a $500,000 bond, after he was indicted on 13 federal criminal counts, including fraud. He claimed at the time he’d go to jail rather than reveal the identities of whoever post that half-million for him.
• The House Ethics Committee is also seeking to learn the identities of the people who helped Santos make bond, as the panel investigates any possible violation of the House Gift Rule.
• Heh.
• Virginia had their primary elections yesterday. Democratic voters ousted State Sen. Joe Morrissey, a political centrist who supports limits on abortion access. He lost to former state legislator Lashrecse Aird, who calls herself a 100% supporter of abortion rights.
• On the Republican side, Sen. Amanda Chase, a right-wing idiot who embraced falsehoods about the 2020 presidential election, was edged out by Glen Sturtevant, a lawyer and former senator.
• In your were wondering (I was), Virginia is one of just a few states that holds its legislative races in odd-numbered years. The unusual calendar and quasi-swing state status make Virginia worth watching for hints of voter sentiment ahead of the next midterms or presidential cycle.
• In other politics news, this morning Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-DE) announced a bid to succeed retiring Sen. Tom Carper, laying the path to potentially become the third Black woman to ever serve in the Senate.
• Blunt Rochester joined the House in 2017 and was the first woman and person of color to represent Delaware in Congress. Wishing her luck on her Senate run!
• Moving on…
• SCOTUS justice Samuel Alito is an asshole. I know this isn’t news. But this is…
• In July 2008, Alito went vacation at a luxury fishing lodge that charged more than $1,000 a day. He was on the trip with Paul Singer, a hedge fund billionaire who has repeatedly asked the Supreme Court to rule in his favor in high-stakes business disputes. Singer had flown Alito to Alaska on a private jet, a charter with a value of over $100,000 one way.
• In subsequent years, Singer’s hedge fund came before the court at least 10 times. In 2014, the court agreed to resolve a key issue in a decade-long battle between Singer’s hedge fund and the nation of Argentina. Alito did not recuse himself from the case and voted with the 7-1 majority in Singer’s favor. The hedge fund was ultimately paid $2.4 billion.
• Alito did not report the 2008 fishing trip on his annual financial disclosures. By failing to disclose the private jet flight Singer provided, Alito appears to have violated a federal law that requires justices to disclose most gifts.
• Alito now says that Singer was merely a casual acquaintance, and said he was not aware of Singer’s connection to any subsequent court matter. He also said that he accepted the offer of a seat on Singer’s private plane because it would otherwise have been unoccupied had he declined.
• What?
• Bibles will return to the shelves in a northern Utah school district. Officials from the Davis School District have determined the sacred text was age-appropriate for all district libraries.
• Is it, though?
• And now, The Weather: “Freak” by feeble little horse
• A brutal heatwave is gripping the South, and more than 300,000 customers in the southern U.S. remained without power Monday following damaging weekend storms.
• Three words: global climate change.
• A restaurant in Northern California has been ordered to pay $140,000 in back wages and damages to employees after it hired a fake priest to extract workers’ confessions.
• Che Garibaldi, who operates two locations of Taqueria Garibaldi, hired a guy who pretended to be a priest to hear confessions during work hours and “get the sins out,” including asking them if they had been late for work, stolen money from the restaurant or had “bad intentions” toward their employer.
• Sweet Jesus.
• The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force has reported that all young and middle-age adults should be screened regularly for anxiety and depression, even if they don't have symptoms.
• It is the first time the group has advocated for routine screening of anxiety in adults. Pregnant women and those who gave birth within the past year were highlighted as people who should be screened.
• As you will likely find unsurprising, emotional stress has skyrocketed in recent years, increasing demands on the limited number of counselors and therapists nationwide.
• From the Sports Desk… here are the ten best teams in Major League Baseball via their current record.
• 1 - Tampa Bay Rays (51-25), 2 - Atlanta Braves (47-26), 3 - Baltimore Orioles (45-27), 4 - Texas Rangers (45-28), 5 - Arizona Diamondbacks (44-30), 6 - Miami Marlins (42-32), 7 - San Francisco Giants (41-32), 8 - New York Yankees (40-33), 9 - Los Angeles Dodgers (40-33), 10 - Los Angeles Angels (41-34).
• Today in history… Halifax, Nova Scotia is founded (1749). The United States captures Guam from Spain (1898). China formally declares war on the United States, Britain, Germany, France and Japan as an edict issued from the Empress Dowager Cixi in the Boxer Rebellion (1900). The U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision in Guinn v. United States, striking down Oklahoma grandfather clause legislation which had the effect of denying the right to vote to blacks (1915). Italy begins an unsuccessful invasion of France (1940). A Japanese submarine surfaces near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by Japan against the United States mainland (1942). Ellen Fairclough is sworn in as Canada's first female Cabinet Minister (1957). Three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, are murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, United States, by members of the Ku Klux Klan, later documented in the film ‘Mississippi Burning’ (1964). In its decision in Miller v. California, the Supreme Court of the United States establishes the Miller test for determining whether something is obscene and not protected speech under the U.S. constitution (1973). John Hinckley is found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan (1982). The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Texas v. Johnson that American flag-burning is a form of political protest protected by the First Amendment (1989). SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight (2004). Pluto's newly discovered moons are officially named Nix and Hydra (2006).
• June 21 is the birthday of composer Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach (1732), Daniel Carter Beard (1850), astronomer Max Wolf (1863), chemist/activist Clara Immerwahr (1870), caricaturist Al Hirschfeld (1903), philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905), actress Jane Russell (1921), actress Maureen Stapleton (1925), composer Lalo Schifrin (1932), singer-songwriter/guitarist Ray Davies (1944), businessman Maurice Saatchi (1946), actress Meredith Baxter (1947), actor Michael Gross (1947), singer-songwriter/guitarist Joey Molland (1947), drummer Joey Kramer (1950), singer-songwriter/guitarist Nils Lofgren (1951), illustrator Berkeley Breathed (1957), singer-songwriter Kip Winger (1961), comedian Jim Breuer (1967), actress Juliette Lewis (1973), guitarist/composer Mike Einziger (1976), actor Chris Pratt (1979), actor Jussie Smollett (1982), activist/criminal Edward Snowden (1983), singer-songwriter Lana Del Rey (1985), and singer-songwriter Rebecca Black (1997).

Okay, hurry and go dance around naked for Solstice. Feel the tilt of the planet shirt under your very feet! Or something. I don’t know. Enjoy your day.