Portraits of Wildflowers

Perspectives on Nature Photography

Archive for July 2023

Sunflowers don’t mind the heat

with 26 comments

 

In my part of town on July 29th I stopped to photograph a large sunflower plant (Helianthus annuus). When I got close to one of its flower heads I noticed a crab spider on it, as you see above. Although the plant had many flower heads and some opening buds on it, one leaf had died and curled up, as shown below.

 

 

 

 

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Math and language lover that I am, I’ll tell you that some people, and perhaps many, misinterpret the statement that “inflation is coming down” to mean “prices are coming down.” While it’s true that over the past year the rate at which prices are increasing has been coming down, prices themselves have on average kept rising. For certain products the prices have risen a lot, as documented by Jesse Newman in a July 8th Wall Street Journal article titled “The Supermarket Aisle Where Prices Are Still Soaring.” The sub-head is “Cost increases for meat, eggs and produce have been tamed, but inflation is running hot in grocery stores’ inner aisles, home to packaged food and household goods.”

The article included these examples of price increases from a year ago (and remember that prices then had already risen noticeably from the year before that):

  • Hot cocoa: 15.6%
  • Frosting: 14.3%
  • Pretzels: 16.7%
  • Cereal 16%
  • Jellies and jams: 17.5%
  • Potato chips: 16.7%

You’re welcome to read the full article.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 31, 2023 at 4:32 AM

Flame acanthus flowers and buds

with 14 comments

 

From Great Hills Park on July 16th comes this floral portrait of flame acanthus, Anisacanthus quadrifidis var. wrightii. Can you say red? Of course you can.

 

 

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I call your attention to a July 22nd opinion piece in The Hill by law professor Jonathan Turley titled “Tyranny of the minority: Liberal law profs urge Biden to defy the courts and the public.” Here’s how it begins:

 

I shall resist any illegal federal court order.”

When “the Court’s interpretation of the Constitution is egregiously wrong,” the president should refuse to follow it.

Those two statements were made roughly 60 years apart. The first is from segregationist Alabama Gov. George Wallace (D). The second was made by two liberal professors this month.

In one of the most chilling developments in our history, the left has come to embrace the authoritarian language and logic of segregationists in calling for defiance and radical measures against the Supreme Court. 

In a recent open letter, Harvard law professor Mark Tushnet and San Francisco State University political scientist Aaron Belkin called upon President Joe Biden to defy rulings of the Supreme Court that he considers “mistaken” in the name of “popular constitutionalism.” Thus, in light of the court’s bar on the use of race in college admissions, they argue that Biden should just continue to follow his own constitutional interpretation.

The use of the affirmative action case is ironic, since polls have consistently shown that the majority of the public does not support the use of race in college admissions. Indeed, even in the most liberal states, such as California, voters have repeatedly rejected affirmative action in college admissions. Polls further show that a majority support the Supreme Court’s recent decisions.

So despite referenda and polls showing majority support for barring race in admissions, academics are pushing to impose their own values, regardless of the views of the public or of the courts.

However, even if these measures were popular, it would not make them right. It is precisely what segregationists such as Sen. James Eastland (D-Miss.) argued, that “all the people of the South are in favor of segregation. And Supreme Court or no Supreme Court, we are going to maintain segregated schools.”

Tushnet and Belkin cite with approval Biden’s declaration that this is “not a normal Supreme Court.” Biden’s view of normalcy appears to be a court that agrees with his fluid view of constitutional law, by which he can forgive roughly a half of trillion dollars in loans or impose a national eviction moratorium without a vote of Congress.

Tushnet and Belkin know their audience. Biden has previously evinced little respect for the Constitution or the courts. Take the eviction case. In an earlier decision, a majority of justices had declared that Biden’s actions were unconstitutional, confirming what many of us had said for months.

Even after the majority declared it unconstitutional, Biden wanted to reissue the national moratorium. White House counsel and most scholars told him the move would be blatantly unconstitutional and defy the express ruling of the court. Instead, he consulted the only law professor willing to tell him what he wanted to hear and did it anyway. It was quickly again declared unconstitutional.

Other commentators and academics have gone from implied to open contempt for our constitutional norms. 

 

You’re welcome to read the full piece.

 

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 30, 2023 at 4:24 AM

Not the pontifex maximus*

with 21 comments

 

Cenchrus spinifex may well be our most annoying native grass. Many people would replace “annoying” with “painful,” given how readily the spikes on its seed capsules penetrate human skin (something I can attest to from years of experience). On July 13th in Great Hills Park I noticed that a stalk of this grass was growing close to a Mexican hat (Ratibida columnifera). You can see that two of the spiky seed capsules had come off and attached themsleves to the Mexican hat. Later I had to remove lots of them from my shoelaces, the soles of my shoes, and the mat I’d knelt on. Ah, what nature photographers endure for the sake of pictures.

 

* “The pontifex maximus (Latin for ‘supreme pontiff‘) was the chief high priest of the College of Pontiffs (Collegium Pontificum) in ancient Rome. This was the most important position in the ancient Roman religion, open only to patricians until 254 BC, when a plebeian first occupied this post.” You can read more in Wikipedia.

 

 

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I think most people believe that similar things should be treated in similar ways. Evidence shows, however, that “should be treated” often differs from “are treated.” For example, we often see that when someone in political party X does something egregious, members in opposing party Y rightfully criticize the offender while members of party X support the offender; but then when someone in party Y commits a similar offense, members in opposing party X rightfully criticize the offender while members of party Y support the offender.

We do allow some amount of subjectivity. If person A and person B and person C with similar backgrounds are separately convicted of embezzling a million dollars in similar ways, and the judge in the first case hands down a sentence of 7 years in prison while the judge in the second case hands down a sentence of 8 years in prison and the judge in the third case hands down a sentence of 9 years in prison, we still feel justice has been done. But if a fourth person is convicted under similar circumstances and gets off with only probation, or a fifth person in similar circumstances gets 25 years in prison, we feel justice has not been served in those two cases.

I couldn’t help noticing an example of different treatment on July 19th, when the House of Representatives held a hearing with two whistleblowers from the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) who gave evidence of the ways in which people in charge at the IRS and the Department of Justice impeded the whistleblowers’ investigation into income tax violations by Hunter Biden, the son of the president of the United States. During the course of the hearings, one representative from Georgia stirred up a controversy. As reported in The Hill that day:

 

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) leaned in on some of the more salacious issues concerning Hunter Biden in her questioning of IRS whistleblowers who investigated Biden at a House Oversight Committee hearing Wednesday — and brought sexually explicit posters to make her point.

“Before we begin, I would like to let the committee and everyone watching at home know that parental discretion is advised,” Greene said.

Greene’s questioning included her holding up small posters featuring graphic sexual photos from the laptop hard drive that purportedly belonged to Hunter Biden, which were censored with black boxes.

The faces of others involved in the sexual acts were censored with black boxes, but Biden’s face is visible in the photos.

 

Many people in the opposing political party were outraged that the Georgia representative had shown such salacious photographs in a meeting of adults, even though the representative had announced beforehand that parental discretion is advised in case any children were watching the hearing then or in later playbacks of the proceedings. And yet some (perhaps many) of the outraged representatives have been advocating for books with illustrations of sexual acts—and without any black boxes covering up intimate body parts—to be allowed in public school libraries. They call the keeping of such graphically explicit books out of schools “censorship.”

I’ll grant you that we could have done without the provocations of the Representative from Georgia. Similarly, I think we could agree that books with explicit illustrations of sexual acts aren’t appropriate for school libraries. Parents who want their children to see such books can buy them themselves or take them out of the public library.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 29, 2023 at 4:25 AM

Two takes on a skeleton plant

with 10 comments

 

From July 10th along US 290 a few miles south of Johnson City come this backlit take on Lygodesmia texana, known as the Texas skeleton plant because its stalks are almost leafless. The flower head was whiter than usual and had one damaged ray floret. The view below shows you what a seed head in this species looks like.

 

 

The resemblance to chicory and the common dandelion confirms that the skeleton plant is a native relative of those two Eurasian species. All are in the Cichorieae “tribe” within the vast sunflower family (just as botanists belong to the cram-as-many-consecutive-vowels-into-a-scientific-term-as-you-can tribe).

 

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In contrast to the accusatory, non-equal-treatment indoctrination taking place in some American schools, as described yesterday, consider the fairness of the education guidelines the Florida legislature has enacted into state law. Regarding the teaching of African American history, for example:

 

  • The Legislature acknowledges the fundamental truth that all persons are equal before the law and have inalienable rights. Accordingly, instruction and supporting materials on the topics enumerated in this section must be consistent with the following principles of individual freedom:
    • No person is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously, solely by virtue of his or her race or sex.
    • No race is inherently superior to another race.
    • No person should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment solely or partly on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, disability, or sex.
    • Meritocracy or traits such as a hard work ethic are not racist but fundamental to the right to pursue happiness and be rewarded for industry.
    • A person, by virtue of his or her race or sex, does not bear responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the same race or sex.
    • A person should not be instructed that he or she must feel guilt, anguish, or other forms of psychological distress for actions, in which he or she played no part, committed in the past by other members of the same race or sex.

 

For years now there’s been a trope among some ideologues that certain deplorable Americans don’t want schools to teach about slavery. If there are any people who don’t want our schools to teach about slavery—and I’ve yet to have anyone point out a single example to me—the Florida legislature isn’t among them:  

 

  • The following is in the required [emphasis mine] instruction statute, s. 1003.42(2)(f), F.S.
    • The history of the United States, including the period of discovery, early colonies, the War for Independence, the Civil War, the expansion of the United States to its present boundaries, the world wars, and the civil rights movement to the present. American history shall be viewed as factual, not as constructed, shall be viewed as knowable, teachable, and testable, and shall be defined as the creation of a new nation based largely on the universal principles stated in the Declaration of Independence.
  • The following is in the required [emphasis mine] instruction statute, s. 1003.42(2)(h), F.S.
    • The history of African Americans, including:
      • the history of African peoples before the political conflicts that led to the development of slavery;
      • the passage to America;
      • the enslavement experience;
      • abolition; and
      • the history and contributions of Americans of the African diaspora to society.

 

“Ah,” some might say, “that sounds pretty general and might not mean much in practice.” Well, Florida has posted a document with grade-by-grade specifics. Pages 3–21 are about the African American experience, with pages 5–15 delving into slavery in great detail.

Nevertheless, and in spite of all this evidence, racialists are claiming that Florida’s African American history curriculum is a whitewash. For example, a few days ago I saw a partisan on MSNBC glibly say that the people in charge of education in Florida don’t want to teach about Rosa Parks. It so happens Rosa Parks is mentioned on page 4 of the above document. Either the partisan hadn’t done his research—in which case he shouldn’t have made the claim—or he was deliberately saying something untrue for political purposes.

The latest brouhaha arose over a single sentence among the many in the Florida standards: “Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.” Ideologues, including our country’s vice president, have taken that statement of historical fact and distorted it into the blanket claim that slavery was beneficial to slaves. On July 24th the Washington Free Beacon ran an article about this, the first two paragraphs of which are:

 

Vice President Kamala Harris’s claim that Florida’s new education standards whitewash slavery is “categorically false,” Florida Board of Education adviser William B. Allen said in an unaired ABC News interview.

Allen, a Michigan State University emeritus professor who is black, told ABC that the standards “never said that slavery was beneficial to Africans,” as Harris claimed. “What was said, and anyone who reads this will see this with clarity, [is that] Africans … were able to develop skills and aptitudes which served to their benefit, both while enslaved and after enslavement.”

 

You’re also welcome to watch a July 25th interview with Dr. Allen in which he explains in much more detail why the charges of a whitewash are a sham (and shameful, I would add). You can use the timeline at the bottom of the video to jump ahead to 3:20, where the segment begins; it ends at 21:35, and is therefore about 18 minutes long. One thing that endears Dr. Allen to language-loving me is his observation that even the grammar of the statement in question precludes the spin ideologues are trying to put on it.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 28, 2023 at 4:33 AM

More about talayote

with 25 comments

 

In Great Hills Park on July 16th I photographed not only the flowers and buds of a talayote vine (Cynanchum racemosum var. unifarium), but also a looping tendril and a yellowed leaf.

 

 

 Oh well, this being a milkweed vine, I guess I should also show you one of its seed pods.

 

 

 

 

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Over the past several years it’s become common for partisans to deny, sometimes strenuously, that the tenets of critical theory or gender ideology or wokeism or whatever you wish to call that conglomerate of beliefs are being implemented in America’s schools. The evidence says otherwise. Look at the beginning of Christopher F. Rufo’s 2022 article “Radical Gender Lessons for Young Children”:

 

Evanston–Skokie School District 65 has adopted a radical gender curriculum that teaches pre-kindergarten through third-grade students to celebrate the transgender flag, break the “gender binary” established by white “colonizers,” and experiment with neo-pronouns such as “ze,” “zir,” and “tree.”

I have obtained the full curriculum documents, which are part of the Chicago-area district’s “LGBTQ+ Equity Week,” which administrators adopted last year. The curriculum begins in pre-kindergarten, with a series of lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity. The lesson plan opens with an introduction to the rainbow flag and teaches students that “Each color in the flag has a meaning.” The teacher also presents the transgender flag and the basic concepts of gender identity, explaining that “we call people with more than one gender or no gender, non-binary or queer.” Finally, the lesson plan has the teacher leading a class project to create a rainbow flag, with instructions to “gather students on the rug,” “ask them to show you their flags,” and “proudly hang the class flag where they can all see it.”

In kindergarten, the lessons on gender and trans identity go deeper. “When we show whether we feel like a boy or a girl or some of each, we are expressing our GENDER IDENTITY,” the lesson begins. “There are also children who feel like a girl AND a boy; or like neither a boy OR a girl. We can call these children TRANSGENDER.” Students are expected to be able to “explain the importance of the rainbow flag and trans flag” and are asked to consider their own gender identity. The kindergartners read two books that affirm transgender conversions, study photographs of boys in dresses, learn details about the transgender flag, and perform a rainbow dance. At the end of the lesson, the students are encouraged to adopt and share their own gender identities with the class. “Now you have a chance to make a picture to show how YOU identify,” the lesson reads. “Maybe you want to have blue hair! Maybe you want to be wearing a necklace. Your identity is for YOU to decide!”

 

And all that is just through kindergarten! You can read the full article. In 2021 Rufo had written a similarly revelatory article that began this way:

 

An elementary school in Cupertino, California—a Silicon Valley community with a median home price of $2.3 million—recently forced a class of third-graders to deconstruct their racial identities, then rank themselves according to their “power and privilege.”

Based on whistleblower documents and parents familiar with the session, a third-grade teacher at R.I. Meyerholz Elementary School began the lesson on “social identities” during a math [!] class. The teacher asked all students to create an “identity map,” listing their race, class, gender, religion, family structure, and other characteristics. The teacher explained that the students live in a “dominant culture” of “white, middle class, cisgender, educated, able-bodied, Christian, English speaker[s],” who, according to the lesson, “created and maintained” this culture in order “to hold power and stay in power.”

 

You can read that full article, too. So if you hear people deny that American schoolchildren are getting indoctrinated, tell them they’re wrong and point them to these articles.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 27, 2023 at 4:27 AM

Talayote flower and buds

with 26 comments

 

In Great Hills Park on July 16th I found a talayote vine (Cynanchum racemosum var. unifarium) that was happily budding and flowering despite the heat and drought. The flowers are only about a quarter of an inch (6mm) across, and their fiveness is a hallmark of their milkweedness.

 

 

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In March I ordered Alan Levinovitz’s 2020 book Natural: How Faith in Nature’s Goodness Leads to Harmful Fads, Unjust Laws, and Flawed Science. Only last week did I start reading the book, and one surprising—some would say shocking—thing I learned early-on is that of all “developed” countries, the United States has the highest maternal mortality rate. In other words, more women die from childbirth here than in other developed countries. I went online to check the statistics, which a page at statista.com confirmed. The maternal mortality rate for the United States in 2020 was 23.8 per 100,000 live births. By comparison, developed but not-as-affluent countries did better. For example, the maternal mortality rate was 7.2 in Greece, 2.9 in Italy and Spain, and 1.8 in the Slovak Republic. You can see a chart and read more about this at Maternal mortality rates worldwide in 2020, by country.

A paragraph at the bottom of the chart noted, not surprisingly, that “rates of maternal mortality are much higher among women aged 40 years and older.” The following paragraph also pointed out discrepancies by race/ethnicity: “In 2021, the rate of maternal mortality among non-Hispanic white women was about 27 per 100,000 live births, while non-Hispanic black women died from maternal causes at a rate of 70 per 100,000 live births. Rates of maternal mortality have risen for white and Hispanic women in recent years, but black women have by far seen the largest increase in maternal mortality.”

Speaking of discrepancies, I didn’t understand how the overall American maternal mortality rate could be 23.8 when every component is a higher number than that. Then I noticed that the rates of the American components were from 2021, the year after the rates for countries. Turns out the rates rose a lot over that one year, presumably because of the pandemic. I also learned, however, that the rates had been going up significantly each year since 2018, even before the pandemic.

In any case, the fact that American maternal mortality rates differ among ethnic groups got me wondering if differing rates of obesity might be a factor, so I looked up those figures. At the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) I confirmed that obesity does vary among groups: “Non-Hispanic Black adults (49.9%) had the highest age-adjusted prevalence of obesity, followed by Hispanic adults (45.6%), non-Hispanic White adults (41.4%) and non-Hispanic Asian adults (16.1%).” Notice that obesity among Asians occurs only a little over one-third of the rate for all the other groups taken together. Now that’s a striking—and healthy—difference.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 26, 2023 at 4:31 AM

Leafcutter bee on pavonia mallow flower

with 17 comments

 

In Great Hills Park on July 16th I found this stately bee on a pavonia mallow flower (Pavonia lasiopetala). The folks at bugguide.net tell me the visitor was a female in the genus Megachile, whose members are known as leafcutter bees. You may recall a picture of their incisive “handiwork” from a post several weeks ago. And coming back to the pavonia mallow, notice the bud beginning to open at the left.

 

 

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Imagine the uproar if an American school district announced that from now on no students will be allowed to play basketball before high school because it makes many white and Asian kids feel inferior when they see how well some of the black kids in middle school play basketball.

Of course no school district is actually proposing such a thing. What several American school districts aren’t just proposing but actually doing, however, is banning algebra before high school. The motivation is the same as in the hypothetical basketball scenario, only the groups being protected from feeling bad are blacks and Hispanics, and the group excelling is Asians. It’s yet another horrid example of “equity.” Unless everybody performs well, nobody will be allowed to perform well. It’s as much a manifestation of cancel culture as the censoring and banning of people whose ideas ideologues don’t like.

For more details about the recent banning of algebra in American middle schools you’d do well to read Noah Smith’s July 18th article “Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity.” Here are several paragraphs from it:

 

It is difficult to find words to describe how bad this idea is without descending into abject rudeness. The idea that offering children fewer educational resources through the public school system will help the poor kids catch up with rich ones, or help the Black kids catch up with the White and Asian ones, is unsupported by any available evidence of which I am aware. More fundamentally, though, it runs counter to the whole reason that public schools exist in the first place.

The idea behind universal public education is that all children — or almost all, making allowance for those with severe learning disabilities — are fundamentally educable. It is the idea that there is some set of subjects — reading, writing, basic mathematics, etc. — that essentially all children can learn, if sufficient resources are invested in teaching them…

Now imagine what will happen if we ban kids from learning algebra in public junior high schools. The kids who have the most family resources — the rich kids, the kids with educated parents, etc. — will be able to use those resources to compensate for the retreat of the state. Either their parents will teach them algebra at home, or hire tutors, or even withdraw them to private schools. Meanwhile, the kids without family resources will be out of luck; since the state was the only actor who could have taught them algebra in junior high, there’s now simply no one to teach them. The rich kids will learn algebra and the poor kids will not.

 

You can read the full article, which includes a great rejoinder to the widely circulated cartoon of kids at an opaque fence standing on differing numbers of wooden crates, which is supposed to illustrate how “equity” works.

Noah Smith’s article also gives a link to another good one, Armand Domalewski’s “California needs real math education, not gimmicks.”

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 25, 2023 at 4:26 AM

Dry balsam gourd parts

with 14 comments

 

The bright red fruits of the balsam gourd vine (Ibervillea lindheimeri) are its most conspicuous feature. A close look at one of these vines in Great Hills Park on July 13th revealed other interesting shapes and textures. One was a dry tendril, about three inches (7.6cm) of which you see above (click to enlarge). Another was the scrunched dry leaf shown below.

 

 

 

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Imagine you’re a foreigner who’s visiting the United States for the first time. In your hotel’s lobby a television is tuned to a cable news channel and you see some people identified as Democrats, but you don’t know what that word means. You turn to a nearby American and ask for an explanation of who Democrats are. The answer you get is: “A loose, shifting constellation of political and cultural people who vary according to context, place and time.”

Not understanding that explanation, a few minutes later you ask another American what a Democrat is, and you get this answer: “Someone who experiences the norms that are associated with Democrats in their social context as relevant to them.”

You thought you understood English pretty well, but now you’re beginning to wonder if you’ve overestimated your ability. A little later you turn to a third American and ask what a Democrat is. This time the answer you get is: “A Democrat, for me, is someone who feels that they are a Democrat.”

That still didn’t help, so you ask a fourth American, who says: “Every Democrat is a Democrat. Democrats are multifaceted, intergenerational, international. They are limitless, formless. Democrats are the world.”

A fifth American gives you an answer similar to what the third American said: “A Democrat is anyone who identifies as a Democrat.”

Now, just change the word Democrat to woman, and all the “definitions” are real ones that people have given in response to the question “What is a woman?” Those 5 are among the 26 non-definition definitions that mathematician and journalist Helen Joyce has compiled on her “What is a Woman” page. You’re welcome to read the other 21.

I made a similar point about non-definition definitions of a woman in a commentary on May 2nd.

  

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 24, 2023 at 4:31 AM

Posted in nature photography

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Woody tangles

with 11 comments

 

In the Upper Bull Creek Greenbelt on July 13th I saw a tangle of mustang grape vines (Vitis mustangensis).
A week later in Great Hills Park I photographed the erosion-exposed base of an oak tree on a cliff. As has occasionally been true for the pictures you’ve seen here, I took both of today’s with my iPhone.

 

 

 

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After I prepared yesterday’s commentary I became aware of mathematician and journalist Helen Joyce’s dialogue with Megyn Kelly on July 19. Here’s the blurb describing the 100-minute interview:

Megyn Kelly is joined by Helen Joyce, author of “Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality,” to talk about how trans activists are changing the language to redefine women, the silencing of women’s safety concerns, the dangers of allowing the opposite sex into single-sex spaces, why all-gender spaces are actually less dangerous, how social media censorship is key to trans activism, the capture of children medical agencies in America, why America’s polarization makes the problem worse, Biden administration official Rachel Levine once saying how glad he was to have had kids and transition later in life, now saying kids should be able to transition during puberty, what autogynephilia is and how it relates to some transgender people, Asa Hutchinson’s misinformed statement about “gender-affirming care,” celebrities bragging about their “trans” and “queer” kids, the “emotional blackmail” on the issue of “gender affirming care” related to suicide, what the reality of suicide within the trans community really is, and more.

If you have the time, it’s worth watching.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 23, 2023 at 4:33 AM

Posted in nature photography

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Balsam gourd

with 17 comments

 

Last week Marie Laing, the doyenne of Great Hills Park, tipped me off to a balsam gourd vine (Ibervillea lindheimeri) there, so on July 16th I went and took pictures of it. You’re looking at one of its ripe balloon-like fruits, each of which grows to between 1 and 2 inches in diameter.

 

 

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This spring I brought you a first, a second, and a third excerpt from mathematician and journalist Helen Joyce’s book Trans. Here’s a capsule description of the issue:

 

This is a faith-based movement, and the faith is that we have inner selves, and those inner selves are sexed, and the sex can be different from the body…. But then I keep coming back to the fact that it’s a very linguistic movement, and it requires the policing of other people’s language. That’s why they don’t want debate, and that’s why they’re angry with somebody like me.

 

Those words are from Helen Joyce’s Parallax Views dialogue in late 2022 with Marc Glendenning of the Institute of Economic Affairs in London. Some people have used the term “sexed souls” for what she referred to there as sexed inner selves. In May last year I compared such “sexed souls” to the nine kinds of angelic beings medieval Christian theologians believed really exist. I went on to list over three dozen of the more than a hundred genders that current ideologues have invented, and which are no more real than the seraphim, cherubim, thrones, and principalities of medieval Christian theology. As Helen Joyce noted, the trans movement is faith-based, not scientific. In other words, it’s a religion.

You’re welcome to watch Marc Glendenning’s 50-minute interview with Helen Joyce.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman

 

 

 

Written by Steve Schwartzman

July 22, 2023 at 4:23 AM

Posted in nature photography

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