Herded by Cats

🚨 It looks like the UK government is gearing up to upend copyright law in favour of AI companies, legalising the theft of their work.

This is despite creatives' huge protests, and despite previous proposals being roundly rejected by the public.

Please spread the word.

🧵 1/4

A scanned image of the first page of a legal document on letterhead from Ken Paxton, Attorney General of Texas, dated February 27, 2026. It is labeled "Opinion No. KP-0518" and addressed to Mr. Darrel D. Spinks, Executive Director of the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council. A portion of the first paragraph is highlighted in yellow, reading: "mental health care providers" licensed by the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council."

A scanned image of the second page of the Attorney General Opinion document. A section in the first full paragraph is highlighted in yellow, which reads: "[f]or the purpose of transitioning a child’s biological sex as determined by the sex organs, chromosomes, and endogenous profiles of the child or affirming the child’s perception of the child’s sex if that perception is inconsistent with the child’s biological sex."

A scanned image of the third page of the Attorney General Opinion document. The text discusses various statutory and dictionary definitions of the terms "health care provider" and "health care". There are no highlighted sections on this page.

A scanned image of the seventh and final page of the Attorney General Opinion document, showing the "SUMMARY" section and the signature block for Ken Paxton. The entire summary paragraph is highlighted in yellow, reading: "The definition of a “health care provider” in subsection 161.701(2) of the Health and Safety Code unambiguously encompasses the professions regulated by the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council. Any licensee that facilitates the provision of unlawful procedures or treatments that aim to transition a child’s sex are thus forbidden from receiving public money in support of those efforts and, separately, risk revocation of their licenses to practice."

Texas AG Ken Paxton has declared that it is illegal for mental health providers and therapists to treat trans youth. It means that trans youth will be denied access to any mental healthcare that isn't conversion therapy. Paxton also threatens parents of trans youth with child abuse investigations.

my favorite part about OpenAI is how it went from a nonprofit dedicated to stopping AI from being used for war and profit by big tech companies, to a big tech company dedicated to using AI for war and profit.

I’m begging people to learn about post-infections syndromes in history

POTS/dysautonomia research goes back to the US Civil War at least, and MECFS research around the same time

These are two leading conditions in many post-infectious syndromes leading to housebound and bedbound patients

“There can’t be that many people with Long Covid, I never see them” as though we don’t know post-infectious syndromes cause many patients to become housebound and bedbound, (the worst of whom can rarely or never post online) the same with previous post-infectious syndromes for millennia

Seriously, everyone needs to stop with the "the last acceptable prejudice," or "if this were any OTHER minority, it wouldn't be acceptable"

because as we keep seeing, EVERY DAMN DAY, it is ALWAYS multiple minorities being targeted

bigotry only comes in variety packs

The Maine subreddit is like 70% people saying "he's not a Nazi he's just a dumb guy & idk what's so bad about sending him to congress & after all we're we all using gay as a slur & saying racist pro rape shit here on reddit in our 30s" anyhow Maine is 91.34% white

NYC is 31.2% white, in contrast

This is monstrous.

"Why hack the DHS? I can think of a couple Pretti Good reasons!" Today, DDoSecrets published data about ICE contracts hacked from DHS's Office of Industry Partnership. The hacker group, Department of Peace, published a statement that included: Why hack the DHS? I ...

micahflee.com/why-hack-the...

A group calling themselves the "Department of Peace" hacked the DHS' Industry of Partnership and has published the data on ICE's contracts. Searchable page here: micahflee.github.io/ice-contracts/

I hear that Uraguay is pretty trans friendly.

A screenshot of a digital news article from The Sunday Times. ​Headline: "Trust me, taking testosterone as a woman is about more than sex". ​Subheader: "Most doctors only prescribe the hormone for low libido yet menopause campaigners say it has many other benefits too. So why is no one researching these claims?". ​Lead Image: A portrait of a woman, Rebecca Seal, wearing a blue sweater and smiling at the camera. ​Byline and Date: Written by Rebecca Seal; published Saturday, February 28, 2026.

Article on 'Black-Market' Hormones ​A screenshot of a digital news article from The Times. ​Headline: "Doctors fear young at risk from ‘black-market trans hormones’". ​Subheader: "Medics call for an urgent investigation into trans community groups offering support on accessing supplies for self-medication". ​Lead Image: A photo of a trans rights demonstration outside Holyrood in 2022, featuring individuals and large Transgender and Non-binary pride flags. ​Byline and Date: Written by Mary Wright; published Sunday, March 01, 2026.

Absolutely incredible.

It is possible to be glad that certain tyrants are no longer in power *and* to be deeply disturbed by how other would-be tyrants are wielding their power.

It is possible to be worried for Iranians *and* for Israelis in their bomb shelters and Palestinians without them.

Compassion has no ceiling.

The Platner pattern of getting caught doing something Nazi-adjacent, huffily disavowing it and then doing another wink-wink nudge-nudge signal to the extreme right is pretty much the Trump 2016 playbook

I'll say it again: If you're consistently finding ways to rationalize away Graham Platner's Nazi tattoo or embrace of Nazi content creators then you really are no different than those on the right who were trying to explain why Elon really wasn't giving a Heil Hitler

Invisible Rainbows The tale of the invisible Universe and the LGBTQIA+ astronomers discovering it

UK folks!! Marvelous new book coming out there in May from @drcarpineti.bsky.social! It's very 🔭 and very queer, so very 🌈🌈🌈🌈!! 🧪

Right? Baffled and dismayed that anyone is willing to vote for him after that.

Y’all are so stuck in the South Park style “antisemitism as meme” mindset that you preemptively forgave a guy for getting a Nazi tattoo just because he pretended to give a shit. Be more discerning, I beg you.

"Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism" is a true statement, that needs to be made when groups like the ADL try to claim all anti-Zionism is antisemitism. "Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism" also functions for some people to get out of thinking about when something is actually antisemitic. Both are true.

ICE is still here in MN, and our neighbors are still in hiding. Rent is due TODAY, and I’m scrambling to raise funds to keep immigrant families in need out of eviction court. Can you help?

V: @Ian-Coldwater
CA: $iancoldwater
PP: @coldwater

Please share and give if you can! Thank you! 🌷

The way people set up camp in my mentions when I said there was no way Platner was the only option...I agree with Munk, but also we are in fact in trouble because some of you would rather vote for a Nazi fanboy with a poorly done spin than look for literally anyone else.

it’s wild how everyone hates Fetterman (correctly) and there’s a guy running who’s basically holding a huge I’m The Next Fetterman sign and it hasn’t slowed him down at all

Yeah, not a great sign that they're just going to be experimenting on trans inmates like this and it's not a big story.

The two options at this point are (1) that Platner is a straight up Nazi, (2) he is the dumbest motherfucker in the state of Maine, the second is arguably better in some abstract sense but both are disqualifying

in case anyone ever needed confirmation that it's not about building a democratic Iran, it's about collapsing Iran and turning it into a land of rubble that can be bombed every six months

One of the core challenges for anyone doing liberatory work is figuring out how to meet people where they're at while simultaneously remaining principled and decent.

There is a difference between absolving the complicit and patiently finding a path to help folks recognize and end their complicity.

Iran's top national security official, Ali Larijani, announced that an interim committee would run the country until a successor to the ayatollah was chosen. He also said that the death of the ayatollah would not deter Iran, which he said would hit Israeli and American targets "with a force they have never experienced before." The supreme leader was killed in his home office in the U.S.-Israeli attack on Saturday, Tasnim, the Iranian news agency, reported.

Iran's top national security official, Ali Larijani, could be emerging to fill the power vacuum in Iran created by the assassination of Khamenei.

Larijani oversaw the brutal crackdown on the Iran protests which killed tens of thousands.

Live Iran updates gift link:
www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03...

Or maybe.

And just bear with me here.

We can address both?

Normalizing assassinations of heads of state/government is not a particularly wise thing to do for the stronger hegemon facing asymmetric conflicts.