GYGO: Israel Is an Apartheid State

Hello! It’s been a while since I came to pinch hit for GYGO but… well, the prophesied time is upon us, and I am awakened from my dark slumber.

Lesbians, Discourse, and ebay

Have you ever played Thirsty Sword Lesbians? Ever get the inclination to write something that’s compatible with it? Well, now you can! (You always could, but now you can publish it.) The creator of TSL, April Kit Walsh, also happens to be a copyright attorney and has kindly released a licensing document so that you can create your own works compatible with the TSL ruleset.

It was Discord’s birthday! They’re being very twee about it in the notices for the actual app, but this blog here about the design choices that went into their rebrand is an interesting read.

ebay is updating their policy to ban the sale of sexually oriented material to include anime, manga, and video games, effective June 15th. I assume on June 15th we’ll also hear the first instance of ebay banning the sale of something under the LGBTQ+ umbrella, since that’s always the thing that immediately happens next. That’s on top of the eternally ambiguous wording of “sexually-oriented” presenting its own set of problems. For instance, you’ll still be able to sell your old Penthouses, so long as there are no explicit images or wording in the listing! Similar exceptions are made for Playboy, Playgirl, and Mayfair, and even sex toys and accessories, but none are made for… resource books on sexual education, or any magazine similar to the four titles listed but catering to a different audience (say, the LGBTQ community). Hey, look at that, took me about two minutes to find the way this is going to be used for discrimination. Fellow queers, you’ve got a month.

Israel Is an Apartheid State

The big-ticket item is, of course, the whole IGN thing. On Friday, the site ran a post offering resources to help Palestinian citizens suffering in the middle of ongoing Israeli airstrikes against their country. Over the weekend, that post was deleted, and everything since has been a shitshow, to use the technical term. IGN’s official Twitter put out a statement in the middle of the night, with replies turned off, attempting to try the “both sides” tactic. Except… no one at IGN signed off on that statement. Hm.

IGN employees have released a collective statement to leadership at IGN condemning the removal of the article without consulting the contributors and the issuing of an ambiguous statement that suggested an inclusive “we,” potentially including those employees, decided it needed to be removed. The employees called the decision “corporate overreach” and are calling for a meeting with corporate leadership for transparency as well as opening a republishing process for the piece.

Of course, what’s even more annoying is that now the attention’s on IGN instead of the real issue at hand. Free Palestine.