Actually playing games during dire emotional states throws fuel unto my dissociation/depersonalization/derealization problems; but just mindfully sitting in my favorite place in the Temple of the Moon on a private vanilla WoW server works great for me. The sounds, music, colors, lighting effects, and water create a very zen space that helps me observe my thoughts and feelings without getting so tangled up in them. That kind of presence helps me better understand what is really going on and how it all happened.

If things are merely bad then maybe I'll play some original Sims 1 or Rimworld on the coziest of settings. So long as there's no nest of trash around then it's probably okay. Eufloria in relaxed mode is a lovely RTS game that hasn't ever caused me any problems.

Hopefully you find your way through this soon!

Wikipedia states that NGO Monitor's focus is to "End promotion of 'politically and ideologically motivated anti-Israel agendas' by certain NGOs," that they report "on international NGO activity from a pro-Israel perspective," and that a former online communication editor employed with the group was indefinitely banned for biased editing. Personally I'm more inclined to trust a Wikipedia article with 75 sources unless there is substantial evidence to the contrary.

I suppose my followup to that would be what gives someone a specific sense of gender?

As a binary trans woman my very being in and for myself imparts upon me a capacity for directly revealed self-knowledge regarding my gender, which is to say how I wish to be as a presence and present myself to others within the world.

To say ‘I am a woman’ is taking societies interpretation of woman as being right.

Perish the thought! In general however I might reveal my gender it is as an invitation to others for them to interact with me and understand me as a woman. Try to think of this as less a matter of being right or wrong and more one of how you and another might best both enjoy your interactions together.

What differentiates that from ‘I am a man who likes womanly things’?

Gender does! It is literally that simple.

What separates the ‘tomboy’ woman from a trans-masc?

They would through their understanding of their own genders which grants truth or grants falsehood to statements regarding their gender.

Binary trans woman.

Yes indeed! You might wish to look into the idea of double consciousness, the dual self-perception experienced by subordinated or colonized groups in an oppressive society. Its a sense of attempting to perceive yourself as both who you know yourself to be and as an oppressive other will perceive you. If you want to smash that noise then you need to learn to stop being ashamed of yourself!

Also, you definitely should be taking the self-defense class appropriate to your gender as violence is very often gendered. There's a podcast episode of The Gender Rebels about one trans women's experience taking Krav Maga you might want to give a listen.

Good luck and take care :)

Yeah the boot process is a mess! Debian's noisy GRUB and unsightly boot text is an obvious and unnecessary paint point for a desktop user but very desirable for server installations. You do have some options though!

Carlo Contavalli apparently has a relatively simple work-around discussed at https://rabexc.org/posts/grub-shush. What I've done in the past is rebuilding Ubuntu's source deb package for GRUB against my Debian system. You can grab it at https://packages.ubuntu.com/source/lunar/grub2. Build instructions can be found here https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/117503/how-to-compile-a-debian-package-from-source.

The great thing about Debian, Linux, and FLOSS is that you can even automate downloading Debian's source package when it gets updated, applying the silent patch, applying Ubuntu's compilation options, compiling the deb, and installing the deb! But yeah why can some package maintainer not provide such as an option in the repository! It's really an annoyance for many and almost makes me feel like I'm not the type of user the Debian community desires. Like, "Wait... what? You like pretty stuff? GTFO!" Maybe its even true? Hopefully you will enjoy using Debian! Its most preferable to Ubuntu in many ways these days!

There are occasional forum posts with lab results by transwomen who suspect they may have an unstudied SHBG variation causing a preferential bond to the strong agonist E1 which some claim might generally result in a greater prevalence of the weaker agonist E2 being available to cell estrogen receptors. Some further speculate this claimed SHBG variation to be a possible causal mechanism for the three atypical sexual dimorphisms observed in the brains of transwomen.

Generally such folks say they see better results following a switch from pills to injections and orchiectomy. Please take all of this with a grain of salt. However, it could be good idea to ask your doctor about getting your E1 and E2 levels checked.

Why quit HRT? Those transwomen who came before us made due with far fewer options than we have today. A glass is not perfectly filled to just the right, perfect height or else unenjoyable!

Thank you! According to Wikipedia only 5 countries prohibit mutilation of intersex children. The other 190 countries do not. This affects as many people as have red hair. Being intersex is a normal and natural variation, not a disorder or mutation.

There are a number of nice skeuomorphic tagged themes on pling and other icons and such also are available there. The best option might be to just abandon the trendy GTK scene and embrace good old TDE! TDE has KDE3's Plastik theme which looks great to me! (And there is a new port available for current KDE if anyone is interested.) But the early pre-gummy version of ClearLooks would be my favorite if it existed. Raleigh is pretty nice with those classic zebra stripes! Please do let us all know what you find because there are many of us not so happy with the corporate minimalist aesthetic.

While I didn't read the politico article, the California Attorney General's press release regarding this lawsuit is informative.

https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bonta-announces-lawsuit-challenging-chino-valley-unified-school

"The lawsuit also asserts this the Board’s plain motivations in adopting the policy were to create and harbor animosity, discrimination, and prejudice towards transgender and gender-nonconforming students, without any compelling reason to do so, as evidenced by statements made during the Board’s hearing. In discussing the policy before its passage, board members made a number of statements describing students who are transgender or gender-nonconforming as suffering from a “mental illness” or “perversion”, or as being a threat to the integrity of the nation and the family. The Board President went so far as to state that transgender and gender nonbinary individuals needed “non-affirming” parental actions so that they could “get better.”"

Its wonderful to hear some good news these days! Thanks!

Psyche!

Since Washington seems like a nice place for me to live I decided to look into Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez's explanation for her vote in favor of this deplorable National Defense Authorization Act. She writes, "The bill also included my amendment to improve the military’s ability to fix its own equipment." Voting against human rights in order to get a right to repair seems like an absurd deal for anyone who actually supports human rights to make.