It’s that magical time of year when the SC legislative session is nearing its end but before the Supreme Court drops more hideous anti-democratic decisions that only benefit fascist rich white men. It’s also a beautiful lull personally, as spring grades are in and summer work gently amps up. The weather is pleasant, and our kids are still in school. It’s lovely having more time for writing and research, both for my academic book project and for this newsletter.
Another typical benefit of being a faculty member is usually your administration doesn’t sic militarized police on you for exercising your free speech rights. I didn’t see or hear about any protests at our small college, but at the University of South Carolina down the road, a small group of protesters held up some signs in the student union and did some chanting for thirty minutes, and the USC administration seemed to think they had to call the cops on them. After peacefully exiting the building, the cops arrested two of the protesters on what seems like some real bullshit charges.
had a good newsletter yesterday linking the administrative and state responses to larger federal forces, driven by the American far right pretending to care about antisemitism if it can divide the left and use it as justification for militarized violence both here and abroad.I also liked
’s take, and can tell you no one is paying faculty and staff enough to deal with these kind of responses.In more bad news, yesterday the SC Senate passed the anti-trans legislation that bans much gender-affirming healthcare for minors. It is an unnecessarily cruel bill that also requires teachers and school administrators to out trans youth to their families and prevents low-income people from using the state Medicaid system to pay for gender-affirming care for minors OR adults. It’s a sweeping bill that will harm children, trans adults and doctors practicing in the state. It goes back to the House for another vote after the Senate made changes to the bill, but it looks likely to become law.
The Biden administration recently announced changes to the Department of Education Title IX rules, expanding protections for gender identity and sexual orientation, in a move to protect LGBTQ students in schools nationwide that have failed to provide equal access or even protection from violence (take a look at homophobic sex education programs in Oklahoma and Florida for some prime examples). Red states have quickly moved to sue the administration over the changes, because they quite obviously only want students that conform to their Christofascist heteronormative agenda to receive safe education. Ellen Weaver, our very own entirely unqualified, Heritage Foundation puppet state superintendent, also directed South Carolina schools to ignore the new guidance.
From Ellen’s Instagram. The trolling in the comments is good.
But, let’s end with two pieces of good news. In perhaps a token move to look like they care about women, the legislature did just pass a bill that will remove the taxes on period products, joining a slew of other states and countries finally recognizing that when you underpay women, maybe don’t charge them extra for necessities. (Not that we’ll be spending too much on period products with all these forced pregnancies, but let me not digress.) And if you’re in Columbia, or on your way to the beach, you have to swing by South Carolina’s only independent queer bookstore, the newly opened Queer Haven Books. If you’re not local, you can buy online.
The end of the session is always a bummer, because I’m thinking, what if our South Carolina government actually worked to help the people of the state by passing Medicaid expansion, or funding education, or mandating scientifically based sex education instead of passing bills that actively harmed people? But at least it’s an election year, so let’s get out there and help these campaigns. And if you live outside of South Carolina, please send money and support by donating to Democratic candidates or helping our abortion funds, like the Palmetto State Abortion Fund or the Carolina Abortion Fund. Now that Florida’s ban is in effect, women in the Southeast have to travel even further to access care. You can see it all mapped out in this article from the NYT.
Enjoy the weekend, and only read as much news as you can take. More next week, and thanks as always for reading.