Sandy Ernest Allen
@sandyernestallen.bsky.social
3.4K followers 670 following 18K posts
trans journalist/author guy. i cover mental health. subscribe: https://whats-helping-today.beehiiv.com/ 📝: The Believer, Esquire, The Cut, This American Life ... 📖: akomp.info (Scribner) https://www.sandyernestallen.com https://linktr.ee/hellosandyallen
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sandyernestallen.bsky.social
cis folks, i'm curious for you to share answers, if you want:

what made you start caring about trans rights? who'd you know/what happened? tell me the story.
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
sandyernestallen.bsky.social
I'm once again asking anyone else who's trans/gnc affiliated with Brown University who wants to speak on record to please reach out ...

More info here:

www.sandyernestallen.com/announcements

reposts/sharing this with anyone you know is greatly appreciated, thanks!

#brownuniversity
STORY SOURCE CALL: I’m looking for Brown University-affiliated trans/gnc people (especially trans/gnc alumni, students, staff) and any others who feel affected by the university’s transphobic actions and are interested in speaking with me for a potential upcoming reported piece. (If you’ve not read them already, check out my Boston Globe op-ed blasting the university’s administration, as well as my Assigned Media essay about my time as a closeted trans student back when.) For those who want to share their stories and are concerned for whatever reason, you can request anonymity if you like in your initial email. Please write me via my contact form.
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
katelynburns.com
At the same time, I've launched another way to support me and keep up with my work, launching BurnsNotice.com on Ghost. There you can buy an annual subscription for $40/year.

I do not want to ever have to paywall my work, and you can help me keep from doing that by becoming a paid subscriber.
Burns Notice
Trans rights, politics internet culture, gaming, and the occasional sports thing. A newsletter by independent journalist Katelyn Burns.
BurnsNotice.com
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
katelynburns.com
It's been awhile since I've done a serious paid subscriber drive on here. I came into this year with 509 paid Patreon subscribers and set the ambitious goal of hitting 1000 by the end of this year. I'm a little behind pace on that now at 802. patreon.com/katelynburns
Katelyn Burns | Patreon
creating LGBTQ journalism
patreon.com
sandyernestallen.bsky.social
MIT rejects this compact ... meanwhile Brown ... "seeks community input" so says President Paxson ...

www.browndailyherald.com/article/2025...
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
liberalcurrents.com
“The problem with billionaires isn’t that they’re hoarding money that would otherwise pay for a Scandinavian social utopia. It’s that their money has become a source of wildly distorted political power that allows a few men with extremist views to wreak havoc on the rest of us.”
Billionaires Are Hoarding Power, Not Money
Billionaire money has become a source of wildly distorted political power that allows a few men with extremist views to wreak havoc on the rest of us.
www.liberalcurrents.com
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
gregsargent.bsky.social
Stephen Miller just said that Chicago ICE raid was one of the most successful law enforcement operations ever. I asked Pritzker to respond.

"If this was Pinochet’s Chile, if this was Argentina under authoritarian rule, maybe you’d call it successful," he said. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/2016...
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
govpritzker.illinois.gov
Reporting live from Chicago, there’s no “hellscape” I’d rather be in.
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
propublica.org
Kristi Noem, while governor of South Dakota, supplemented her roughly $130,000 salary by secretly accepting $80,000 donated to a political nonprofit she was affiliated with, records show.

She never disclosed this income on federal ethics forms.

(Published June)
Kristi Noem Secretly Took a Cut of Political Donations
A dark money group paid $80,000 to Noem’s personal company when she was governor of South Dakota. She did not include this income on her federal disclosure forms, a likely violation of ethics requirem...
www.propublica.org
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
sjjphd.bsky.social
As someone who has studied the circulation of terms “subversive” and “communist” in the lead to and through McCarthyism as empty signifiers to justify violent suppression I feel like I’m both amazed and unsurprised how transparently and unsophisticatedly “woke” and “antifa” are now doing the same.
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
erinbiba.bsky.social
LMAOOOOO

A bunch of comedians tried to make up for their participation in the Riyadh comedy festival by donating their pay to Human Rights Watch and Human rights Watch was like “nah bitch we don’t want your dirty blood money” 😂😂 I’m dying
Human Rights Watch Doesn’t Want Any Riyadh Comedy Festival Money
Taking money from those who took money from Saudi Arabia would impact perception of the org’s independence.
www.vulture.com
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
karlbode.com
papers like the New York Times actively help right wing propagandists by introducing false claims as something that's open to debate and interpretation, instead of clearly framing them up front as lies pushed by unreliable operators

Turning Point USA is a right wing propaganda op aimed at kids
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
karlbode.com
The New York Times also just kind of introduces Turning Point USA as this ambiguous entity without explaining what it is, or detailing any of its dodgy behaviors as a super shady right wing propaganda organization

this kind of generous framing isn't done by accident
NYT: "In the weeks after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, he has become a target of right-wing hate, accused of being a part of the movement he studied. Jack Posobiec, a right-wing influencer, called Dr. Bray a “domestic terrorist professor” on X. The Rutgers chapter of Turning Point USA then circulated a petition accusing Dr. Bray of being an “outspoken, well-known antifa member” and called for him to be fired.

The petition referred to him as “Dr. Antifa.”

“My role in this is as a professor,” Dr. Bray, an assistant teaching professor at Rutgers, said in an interview on Wednesday, hours before his planned departure. “I’ve never been part of an antifa group, and I’m not currently. There’s an effort underway to paint me as someone who is doing the things that I’ve researched, but that couldn’t be further from the truth."
sandyernestallen.bsky.social
I've said it once and I'll repeat: In my view the problem with the folks at the NYT is they've been reading the NYT
karlbode.com
you'd think a prominent news outlet like the New York Times might mention that "antifa" isn't an actual organization in a long story about antifa, but nope!

and the subhead helps props up a false claim this professor was up to something seedy as something up for debate
NYT headline: "Rutgers Expert on Antifa Tries to Flee to Spain After Death Threats"

subheadline: "Mark Bray was teaching courses on antifascism. Turning Point USA accused him of belonging to antifa, which he denies. His flight to Spain was canceled abruptly on Wednesday night."
sandyernestallen.bsky.social
fuckin barf
donmoyn.bsky.social
"30-year-old conservative lawyer and activist who is Trump’s nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, which deals with federal employee whistleblower complaints and discrimination" cancelled his colleague's hotel room so she would be forced to stay with him.
www.politico.com/news/2025/10...
In late July, Paul Ingrassia, the White House liaison for the Department of Homeland Security, arrived at a Ritz-Carlton in Orlando with a lower-ranking female colleague and others from their department. When the group reached the front desk, the woman learned she didn’t have a hotel room.

Ingrassia then informed her that she would be staying with him, according to five administration officials familiar with the episode. Eventually the woman discovered that Ingrassia had arranged ahead of time to have her hotel room canceled so she would have to stay with him, three of those officials said.
sandyernestallen.bsky.social
"bread hats" is a good name!!
aliciastoller.bsky.social
Technically a trapper hat...But when my son was 4 he wanted one of those hats and didn't know what to call it. So he said, "You know mom, those hats that look like they have a slice of bread on each side to cover your ears." I still think of them as "bread hats" for this reason.
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
oregonian.com
Things are happening at Portland's ICE facility tonight.

Read more of our protest coverage here: www.oregonlive.com/crime/2025/1...
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen
onestpress.onestnetwork.com
María Corina Machado—leader of Venezuelan opposition against Maduro, former member of National Assembly and presidential candidate — has been awarded Nobel Peace Prize

“When authoritarians seize power, it is crucial to recognize courageous defenders of freedom who rise and resist”, Nobel Committee
Reposted by Sandy Ernest Allen